CORRESPONDENCE.
PARTIES AND TACTICS IN THE NEW DOM&
(To TIDE EDITOR or TER " Snscravoa".1 Sra,—It seems fairly plain that the Government will find this Duma in many respects much more difficult to deal with than the last. For one thing, the Socialists of various persuasions have taken an active part in the election campaign, and will have a considerable number of representatives. These Socialist Deputies will bring with them ideas of their own as to what is meant by Parliamentary work. The Socialist Revolutionaries, whose energies have recently been con- centrated on terroristic work, and who will for this reason not be so strongly represented as the other Socialist parties, naturally see in the Duma nothing but a platform for revolutionary propaganda. The Social Democrats hold very much the same view, though they express 'it rather more vaguely. A Social Democratic writer of the majority fraction, the fraction that is most outspokenly and recklessly revolutionary, declares that the representatives of his party must violently oppose in the Duma the efforts of the' Liberals to restore to the country peace and quietness. " They must counteract such efforts by energetically co-operating in the arousing of the revolutionary self-activity of the masses." The same writer also advocates the formation by the Dome's Left Wing of a Revolutionary Committee that shall keep in touch with local Revolutionary Committees, and thus organise the Great Revolution. The minority, or more politically disposed fraction, of the Social Democrats are more cautious, but the guiding principles of their policy are very similar. One of the candidates of the fraction thus puts his case :—" If it be true that the Dame could not be an instrument to secure the bourgeoisie in its dominant position in the arena in which it should collaborate with the old order; if it be true that it could be only a means of developing the revolution, it is perfectly clear that our guiding principle of action in the Duma should be the systematic organisation of the forces of the people in view of the impending consummation of the struggle of October, November, and December, 1905,—in other words, to prepare for the solution of the question of political power."
All this sounds sufficiently alarming, and certainly demon- strates the possibilities latent in a Social Democratic Parliamentary fraction. But during the electoral campaign Social Democratic speakers have frequently disclaimed the intention attributed to them by their own writers of riding roughshod over all Parliamentary rules, and it is possible, though by no means certain, that they will find it convenient to observe elme self-restraint in the Duma. What is quite certain is that M. Stolypin will have little pleasure in the, Socialists. They will remind him in no unmeasured language of the Gurko scandal, of the illegal clipping of the electoral law, of the murder of innocent men and women by the dram- head Courts-Martial, and of a hundred other violations of law, right, and elementary human decency. After all these months of enforced silence the brutalities committed in the secrecy of prisons and Government offices will be made known in the hall of the Tanrida Palace, and the voices loudest in condemnation will be those of the Socialists. The fraction is likely to be strong. The Caucasus is sending a large contingent, many are coming from the Baltic Provinces and Siberia, and some from the South and Centre of European Russia. Not a few of the non-party progressives, and a certain proportion of the peifsant Deputies, will probably follow in the wake of the Socialist fraction.
If the Premier looks away from the Left to the Extreme Right, he is, likely again to be disappointed. The combined Monarchist parties, the extreme reactionaries, some of whom have been involved in the organisation of pogromi, and are suspected of having arranged for the murder of M. Herzenstein, are this year sending representatives to the Duma. The attitude of the Monarchists to the Dams is even more unfavourable than that of the Social Democrats. They are absolutely opposed to Constitutional government, want Russia for the Russians, with Poles, Jews, and Armenians gagged, bound, and derided, and urge that the present Duma should be replaced by an advisory body elected by Russians only, in fixed proportions from various classes. The Monarchists will represent in the Dania the reactionary
party at Court, who are as bitterly opposed to M. Stolypin as are the revolutionaries.
If the Cabinet is to find support anywhere, it will be in the ranks of the Octobriat or Conservative Deputies, who will in certain cases be reinforced by the Polish Nationalists. The Octobrists are chiefly large landowners and Government functionaries, are not particularly well organised or well prepared for Parliamentary work, and will as a rule support Government measures. It seems probable that there will be considerably more of them in the second Duma than in the first. But the crux of the question does not lie in the strength or the attitude of the Octobrists.
The fate of the new Duma depends very largely on the position, the influence, and the tactics of the Constitutional Democrats. Discordant elements will be present in sufficient -force to make of the Duma a veritable bear-garden, and to give the Government an excellent pretext for Dissolution. But if one party, well organised and with a clearly conceived policy, can succeed, in face of a hostile and perpetually irritating Cabinet, in bolding the Duma to a fixed course of legislative work and avoidance of unnecessary friction, it is possible, though at this moment it is hard to believe in such an eventuality, that the Government will prepare to capitulate to the Dame.
But are the Constitutional Democrats strong enough ? Will they have weight enough in the new Dumu? Will they have power to keep revolutionary feeling within Parliamentary bounds ? And, above all, have they formulated a policy calculated to solve the difficulties of the situation ? One might ask whether, if the Constitutional Democrats should fail, another party might not succeed, had not the experience of the last year demonstrated that not one other well-organised Constitutionalist party exists in the country.
As to the numerical strength 'of the Constitutional Demo- crats in the new Duma nothing definite can yet be said, but it may be rather less than in the last Duma. In view, how- ever, of probable combinations with kindred parties, this should not be a great drawback. More serious is the almost complete change of personnel. Nearly all the representatives of the party in the last Duma, having been prosecuted for signing the Viborg manifesto, are ineligible, and their places will be occupied by comparatively unknown men. It is a slight compensation that a number of the former Deputies whose legal knowledge is indispensable will form a kind of Law Committee to assist their comrades within the Bums. But no one can at present assert positively whether the new Deputies will have sufficient personal weight to secure for their party an authoritative position.
Where the Constitutional Democrats are strong is in their clearly conceived and carefully considered line of policy ; in fact, it seems probable that they will be the only party in the Duma with a definite policy. Apparently they intend to display the greatest caution consistent with loyalty to principle. A favourite phrase of their leader, Professor Milyukoff, is that "it is impossible to take the bureaucracy by storm." Accordingly the party is preparing to subject the bureaucracy to a long siege. Certain categorical demands will have to be made upon the Government; this is inevitable. The Dams must demand the immediate abolition of the field Courts-Martial ; and if the Government choose to make of this demand a ground for conflict, the days of the Duma will be numbered; but there will be no help for it. The question of an amnesty to political offenders must again be raised; and though it has been complicated since the last Duma by the Maximalist policy of robbery with violence, the Dams will be compelled to demand from the Government some solution, and there will be no possibility of avoiding the demand for a thorough inquiry into the illegal actions of local authorities. Each of these questions may be made the occasion of a crisis if the dovernment choose. On the other hand, there are cases in which the Constitutional Democratic Party hope to make it easy for the Government to meet the Duma half-way. It is proposed, for instance, that the Reply to the Address from the Throne, while practically identical in substance with the Reply of the last barna, shall be made at least different in form for courtesy's sake. And as to the provisional measures enacted by M. Stolypin which will be laid before the Duma for confirmation, the. Constitutional Democratic Party, while not approving of them, does not propose to reject them in tote. One of the agrarian measures,
that relating to the sale of domain lands to the Peasants Bank, it will probably be in favour of passing. One or two other measures it suggests should be quietly ignored until the necessary two months' grace elapses, and the measures, being unconfirmed, become of themselves invalid. The most crying infringement on the legislative right of the Duma—namely, the measure aiming at the complete dissolution of the village commune—it is proposed in its most objectionable paragraphs to reject, and only in one or two details to confirm. The lapse of time since the enactment of several of the Premier's measures, and the fact that sales of land have been effected under their provisions, make it impossible to reject them absolutely and without reserve.
In one respect M. Stolypin is preparing to facilitate the work of the Duma. He has had elaborated a number of Bills on subjects that the Duma is willing and eager to discuss; and the Constitutional Democrats propose that simultaneously with the discussion of the Government Bills the House should discuss the Bills on the same questions brought in by their party, so that, in the event of the rejection of M. Stolypin's measures, the discussion might at least lead to some positive result. It so happens that one of M. Stolypin's Bills deals with the question of the reform of local government, a matter which the Constitutional Democrats have very much at heart, and place in the forefront of their Dumu programme. They hope by a thorough reorganisation of local government on democratic principles to create in Town, County, and Parish Councils centres of political organisation which shall serve as rallying-points for the support of the Duma in its struggle with the Government. The last Dams was in- effective because it had behind it no organised mass of the people. With Zemstvos and Town Councils democratised and endowed with extended functions, on the one hand the enormous power of the Central Government will be diminished, and on the other the habit of political thinking and effective political action will be developed amongst all classes of the people. In defence of the Duma, then, the Constitutional Democrats are preparing to carry their measure of local government reform, and in order to ensure its acceptance by the Upper House, thg Council of the Empire, they advocate the exertion of financial pressure in the sense of the employment to the full of the Dame's right of checking the Budget. The perilous question of agrarian reform it is proposed to return to somewhat later, when the Duma feels a little more sure of its footing.
The Constitutional Democrats will probably be opposed by the Social Democrats as well as by the Government supporters, the Octobrists. But the fact that they have an idea of what they want to do, and know fairly well what they are about, will secure for them the support of a large number of waverers and nonparty men, particularly amongst the peasantry. And in the end they may gain complete control of the Duma, as they were in a fair way of doing last year. Then M. Stolypin would find himself in the position of having to make terms with a party that for eight months he has chosen to treat as revolutionary.
I have suggested a few of the probabilities and some of the possibilities of the coming Duma. And after all, the main question—the question as to whether Dams and Government will work together—remains unanswered, because at this distance of time it cannot be answered categorically. There is one question of dominant importance the emergence of which during the first few days of the Session in the Address in Reply may lead to immediate dissolution,—that is the question of responsible government. The Duma does not want to work with the Stolypin Cabinet ; it wants to work, and will, if it lives long enough, demand to be allowed to work, with a Cabinet of its own choice. But by all tokens the Government will not give way on this point. Then there is nothing for it but dissolution, an extreme limitation of the franchise, and a third Duma which may or may not be more submissive, but will certainly be preceded by fresh develop. ments of the revolutionary movement. Yet who knows ? Perhaps by wisdom, tact, and firmness the Duma may succeed in holding its own in the face of a Government that is not, after all, very sure of iteelf.—I am, Sir, &c., St. Petersburg, February 15th. H. W. Wrissams.
[We publish Mr. Williams's interesting letter, but we take no responsibility for the facts or conclusions stated by him .--• ED. Spectator.)
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