Later that day (October 29), Kamenev and Sokolnikov attended a meeting, convened by the Union of Railroad Employees, of eight parties and several intraparty organizations. Following the resolution of the Bolshevik Central Committee, they agreed to have the SRs and Mensheviks enter the Sovnarkom on condition that they accept the resolutions of the Second Congress of Soviets. The meeting designated a committee to work out the terms for the restructuring of the Sovnarkom. Its ultimatum met, late that evening the union ordered its branches to call off the strike but to remain on the alert.25
Any sense of relief the Bolsheviks may have received from this agreement vanished the next day when they learned that the union, supported by the socialist parties, had raised its stakes and now demanded that the Bolsheviks remove themselves from the government altogether. The Bolshevik Central Committee, still minus Lenin and Trotsky, spent most of the day discussing this demand. It did so in a highly charged atmosphere, for the pro-Kerensky forces under Ataman Krasnov were expected to break into the city at any moment. Seeking to salvage something, Kamenev proposed a compromise: Lenin would resign the chairmanship of the Sovnarkom in favor of the SR leader Victor Chernov, and the Bolsheviks would accept secondary portfolios in a coalition government dominated by SRs and Mensheviks.26
It is difficult to tell what would have become of these concessions were it not that late that evening news arrived that Krasnov’s forces had been beaten back.
The military threat lifted, Lenin and Trotsky now turned their attention to the catastrophic political situation created by the “capitulationist” policy of the Central Committee. When the committee reconvened on the evening of November 1, Lenin exploded with uncontrolled fury.27 “Kamenev’s policy,” he demanded, “must be stopped at once.” The committee should have carried out negotiations with the union as “diplomatic camouflage for military action”—that is, presumably not in good faith, but only to secure its assistance against Kerensky’s troops. The majority of the Central Committee was unmoved: Rykov ventured the opinion that the Bolsheviks would not be able to keep power. A vote was taken: ten members favored continuing the talks with the other socialist parties about a coalition government, and only three sided with Lenin (Trotsky, Sokolnikov, and probably Dzerzhinskii). Even Sverdlov opposed Lenin.
Lenin faced a humiliating defeat: his comrades were prepared to throw away the fruits of the October victory, and instead of establishing a “proletarian dictatorship,” would share power as minor partners with “petty bourgeois” parties. He was saved by Trotsky, who intervened with a clever compromise. Trotsky began with a tirade against concessions:
We are told we are incapable of constructive work. But if this is the case, then we should simply turn power over to those who had been right in fighting us. In fact, we have already accomplished a great deal. It is impossible, we are told, to sit on bayonets. But without bayonets one cannot manage either.… This whole petty bourgeois scum which now is unable to side with either this or that side, once it learns that our authority is strong, will come over to us, [the union] included.… The petty bourgeois mass is looking for a force to which to submit.28
As Alexandra liked to remind Nicholas: “Russia loves to feel the whip.”
Trotsky proposed a formula to gain time: negotiations over a coalition cabinet should continue with the Left SRs, the only party that accepted the October coup, but they should cease with the other socialist parties if no agreement was reached after one more attempt. This did not seem to be an unreasonable way out of the impasse and the proposal carried.
Lenin, determined to put an end to defeatism in his ranks, returned to the fray the next day with the demand that the Central Committee condemn the “opposition.” It was a strange demand, given that it was he who opposed the will of the majority. In the debates that ensued, he managed to split his rivals. A resolution condemning them won with a vote of 10–5. As a result, the five who stood up against Lenin to the end—Kamenev, Zinoviev, Rykov, Miliutin, and Nogin—resigned. On November 4, Izvestiia carried a letter in which they explained their action:
On November 1, the Central Committee … adopted a resolution which, in effect, rejected agreement with [other] parties in the Soviet for the purpose of forming a socialist Soviet Government.… We regard the formation of such a government essential to the prevention of further bloodshed.… The dominant group in the Central Committee has undertaken a number of acts which demonstrate clearly its firm determination not to allow the formation of a government made up of soviet parties and insists on a purely Bolshevik Government, no matter what the consequences and how many victims the workers and soldiers will have to sacrifice. We cannot assume responsibility for this fatal policy of the Central Committee, pursued in opposition to the will of the vast part of the proletariat and the troops.… On these grounds, we resign from the Central Committee so as to have the right to defend our point of view openly before the mass of workers and soldiers and to appeal to them to support our slogan: “Long live the government of soviet parties!”29
Two days later, Kamenev resigned as chairman of the CEC; four People’s Commissars (out of eleven) did likewise: Nogin (Trade and Industry), Rykov (Interior), Miliutin (Agriculture), and Teodorovich (Supply). Shliapnikov, the Commissar for Labor, signed the letter but stayed on the job. Several Bolshevik lower-level commissars resigned as well. “We take the position,” the commissars’ letter read:
that it is necessary to form a socialist government of all the soviet parties. We believe that only the formation of such a government would make it possible to consolidate the results of the heroic struggle of the working class and the revolutionary army in the days of October–November. We believe that there is only one alternative to this: the maintenance of an exclusively Bolshevik Government by means of political terror. This is the path taken by the Council of People’s Commissars. We cannot and do not want to go this way. We see that this leads to the removal of mass proletarian organizations from the management of political life, to the establishment of an irresponsible regime, and to the destruction of the Revolution and the country. We cannot bear responsibility for this policy and therefore tender to the CEC our resignations as People’s Commissars.30
Lenin lost no sleep over these protests and resignations, confident that the straying sheep would soon return to the fold, as indeed they did. Where else could they go? The socialist parties ostracized them; the liberals, should they take power, would put them in jail; while the politicians of the right would hang them. Their very physical survival depended on Lenin’s success.
The decisions adopted by the Bolshevik Central Committee signified that the Bolsheviks would share power only with parties that were prepared to accept a role of junior partner and rubber-stamp Bolshevik resolutions. Except for four months (December 1917–March 1918) when the Bolsheviks allowed a few Left SRs into their cabinet, the so-called Soviet Government never reflected the composition of the soviets: it was and remained a Bolshevik Government in soviet disguise.
Lenin had now managed to beat off the claims for a share of power by rival socialist parties, but he still had to cope with the insistence of the CEC that it was the soviet parliament to which his commissars owed responsibility.
The CEC which the Bolsheviks had handpicked in October thought of itself as a socialist Duma empowered to monitor the government’s actions, appoint the cabinet, and legislate.* The day after the coup, it proceeded to work out its statutes, providing for an elaborate structure of plenums, presidia, and commissions of all sorts. Lenin thought such parliamentary pretensions ridiculous. From the first day he ignored the CEC whether in appointing officials or in issuing decrees. This can be illustrated by the casual manner in which he elected the CEC’s new chairman. He decided that Sverdlov would be the best man to replace Kamenev. He had no reason to doubt that the CEC would approve his choice, but since he could not be absolutely certain, he bypassed it. He summoned Sverdlov: “Iakov Mikhailovich,” he said, “I would like you to become the chairman of the CEC: what do you say?” Apparently, Sverdlov said yes, for Lenin promised that after the Central Committee had approved the choice, he would be “carefully” voted in by the CEC’s Bolshevik majority. Lenin instructed him to count heads and make certain that the entire Bolshevik faction turned up for the vote.31 All went as planned, and on November 8, Sverdlov was “elected” by a vote of 19–14.* In this post, which he held until his death in March 1919, Sverdlov ensured that the CEC ratified all party decisions after perfunctory discussion.