The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1922-04-12
THE PROOF OF THE PUDDING,


printing a series of articles on Rus
s.a written by Emma Goldman. her
self a communist not unknown in the
United States
Miss Goldman has spent two years
in Russia and after having made a
study of the Russian conditions. she
now comes forth with what, perhaps.
is the most categorical and powerful
indictment OF the Bolshevist regime
that has. ever appeared in the Ameri-
can or the European press.
Miss Goldman says that it was tNe
Bolshevist ''senseless and cruel mem
DDS that have killed the revolution
and placed the yoke of despotisIn
upon the peoples neck" To call
Russia soviet Russia or the Boishe-
visit regime a soviet government is
preposterous. she says. The soviets
now voice only the decision OF the
communist party. No other political
opinion has any chance to get a hear
fng. The election methods practiced
by the communists would fill Tamma ny
hall with envy. Every known
device is employed by the Bolsheviki
to swell the communist vote. If ordi-
nary pleading fails. threats of losing
the food ration and Of arrest do the
work.
In describing what an arrest means
in Bolshevist Russia. Miss Goldman
thus characterizes the notorious
"Cheka;" The Cheka, the all-Rus-
sian extraordinary commission. un-
questionably is the blacklist measure
of the Bolshevik regime. 1t
would require the master pen OF
Dante to bring home to the world the
inferno created by this organization,
the brutalizing. disintegrating effect it
has upon the extraordinary commits
sions themselves, the dread, distrust,
hatred. suffering and death it has
wrought upon Russia" To this Miss
Goldman adds that Every Commun-
list, by the discipline of his party,
must at any time be ready TO serve in
the Cheka. But the majority of the
Checklists are from the cars 'Okhrana'
from the black hundreds. and from
the former high officials of the army.
They are adopts in the application of
barbarous methods"
of the Bolshevist regime
and the corruption OF their bureau
crazy contributed much to the dissat-
isfaction of the rural population. The
promised to the peas
ants in exchange for their produce
seldom reached them. or. when &C
tually received. proved to be damaged
goods. short of measure. and so
forth" Consequently. the Bolsheviki
were compelled TO resort to forcible
food collection in the villages. because
of the refusal Of the peasants to feed
the city
Punitive expeditions" says Miss
Goldman, following upon a villages
resistance to the governments food
collectors and always in charge of
would attack the place by
force OF arms and often literally de-
stroy it. Unbelievable as it
may seem, it is a fact well known in
Russia that the Ravyorstka system
was partly responsible for the present
famine. For the peasants were not
only stripped of their last pood of
flour. often they were robbed of the
seeds they had put by for their next
planting. The drouth is. of course.
the main cause OF the narrowing con-
in the Volga districts But it
is nevertheless true that il the peas
ants had been able to plant at the
propert time. and freely. at least GER
tain areas would have been in a posi-
ton to help lessen the famine on the
Volga"
Such are the accomplishments of
the dictatorship of the proletariat''
the peasants. Analysing the
Bolshevist policy towards the work
ers in the cities Miss Goldman saws
that the dictatorship OF the phole-
tariat'' is in reality a dictatorship over
the proletariat- In describing the
OF labor which was her
aided to the world a. the greatest as
set of communism" Miss Goldman |
says that what it did accomplish as
to establish. while it existed. chattel !
and to replace T., bourgeois |
parasite by the machinery of Boil |
shevik parasitism. IS function was
to drive the workers to toll. oversee /
them on the job and have them ar
rested and occasionally even shot for
deserving the job. Under such I
enslaving and degrading conditions |
one need not be surprised that the !
people shirked the work because they |
hated 1t and were driven to It. They |
began to look upon the communist |
state as the new leech that was sap
ping their lifeblood. The workers OF |
the most revoIutionary-l
what wonder If even they came to |
loathe the false revoIutionists and I
everything connected with them"
The proof OF the Bolshevist pud- !
ding is in the eating.