Evening star., 1921-12-17
RUSSIAN PEASANT
NOT COMMUN|zED
Leaders at Coming Session
of Soviets Face Power of
Real Dictator.
RY LOUIS LEVINE,

| By Cable to Tie Star and Chicago Daily News.
| Copyright. 1921.
MOSCOW, Russia, December IT,
The invisible dictator of Russia, ''the
peasant in gray" is becoming more
visible as the congress Of soviets.
| opening on December 20, draws near
er. 1t is known that the peasant will
| be the main topic at this assemblage.
That was foreshadowed at the meet
ings of the agricultural agents and
experts in this city last week. These
were regarded as a general rehearsal
before opening of the grand show.
Lenin delivered speech before one
OF the meetings, emphasizing the i'm
portance of the peasant questions, and
the resolutions adopted proved that
quering the communist party. True.
the principle of land naturalization
| was reaffirmed. but the specialization
embodied in the land laws Of the So
Wet republic was renounced as an at
tempt at equalization which was un-
desirable and economically impossible.
The conferences went on record in
favor of organizing individual home
steads. renting land, hiring labor and
generally strengthening the middle
class" peasant by giving him fair
sized allotment of land and a fair
dulouut u equipment.
Considered Tactical Move.
This may be looked upon as clever
| tactical move. The bolsheviki now real
ize that the revolution has not trans
formed the peasant into a communist.
According to law, the land belongs to
the state, but every peasant regards
the land he is using as his own and
he expects to pass it on to his chill
dren. Furthermore, the peasants are
c fo L.
away from the village community. In
Smolensk and other western provinces
the peasants are dividing the land
into farms and moving their houses
| on their own homesteads. In Vladi-
| mir and other central districts the
peasants are joining their scattered
parcels of land into unified farms. In
other parts of Russia. villages with
several thousand Inhabitants are
breaking up into smaller settlements
so that the peasants can be nearer
their land and manage it more easily.
In all these movements the leader
is the middle peasant, whose strong
sense of -proprietorship and desire for
economic improvement give him the
strongest influence in the village. The
politically clever bolsheviki ally them
selves with this element.
Heroic Measures Needed.
Economically the, movement is urg-
ent. for Russian agriculture is in a
sad condition. More than one-fourth
Of the pre-war cultivated area is lying
idle. and the loss of farm equipment
has been large. More than Is per
cent of the plows and 20 per cent of
the threshers are gone. The loss of
farm animals has been even greater.
with consequent lack of fertilizer.
The economic organizations of the
peasants. such, for example, as the CO.
operative societies, have been de-
stroyed and heroic measures are nee
essary if Russian agriculture is to be
revived.
The bolsheviki realize that their
chief hope lies in the initiative and
self-interest of the peasants. Being a
| realistic lot. the bolshevik leaders
| are now ready to desert their old al
lies. the poorer peasants: abandon the
idea OF class struggle in the village
middle-class peasantry in order to in
crease agricultural production.
Omcial Gives Views.
Discussing the situation with me re-
Gently, NJ Osinki. the commissar of
agriculture. admitted as much. -
we are approach the land prob
lem." he said. not from the Marxist
standpoint. but from a general demo-
cratic angle. We are trying to make
| the Russian agriculture like that in
! Denmark. Under the system of ma
i tionalization there is no buying or
selling of land. We shall encourage
| cooperative agriculture. but we shall
| not force anything upon the peasants.
! They are to be left free to choose their
| own forms of farm working How
ever, Russian agriculture will not
make much progress unless we get
seed grain from foreign countries"