V. I.   Lenin

Ministerial Tone


Published: Pravda No. 53, May 23 (10), 1917. Published according to the text in Pravda.
Source: Lenin Collected Works, Progress Publishers, 1964, Moscow, Volume 24, page 382.
Translated: Isaacs Bernard
Transcription\Markup: B. Baggins and D. Walters
Public Domain: Lenin Internet Archive 1999 (2005). You may freely copy, distribute, display and perform this work; as well as make derivative and commercial works. Please credit “Marxists Internet Archive” as your source.


 

The editors of Ivestia of the Petrograd Soviet have adopted a ministerial tone. They do not like Pravda; they condemn it for its “sharp attacks against the Provisional Government”.

To criticise what he doesn’t like is the sacred right of every publicist. But why make oneself ridiculous by dispensing ministerial censure for our “attacks” without criticising the issues we raise? Would it not be better to analyse our arguments, or at least one of our resolutions, or at least one of our statements on the class struggle?

The country today is heading for ruin,” says Izvestia’s editorial. Correct. For that very reason it would be unwise today to rely on the conciliatory policy of the petty bourgeoisie, the Narodniks and the Mensheviks, with regard to the capitalists. The country cannot be saved from ruin in that way.


Notes


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