The disruption of the Second Peasants’ Congress by the joint action of Bolsheviks and Left SRs spelled the demise of independent peasant organizations in Russia. In the middle of January 1918, the Bolshevik–Left SR Executive Committee of the self-styled Peasants’ Congress convened a Third Congress of Peasants’ Deputies, fully under their control. It was scheduled to meet concurrently with the Third Congress of Soviets of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies: on this occasion, the two institutions, heretofore separate, “merged” and the Congress of Soviets of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies added “Peasants’ Deputies” to its designation. This event, according to one Bolshevik historian, “completed the process of creating a single supreme organ of Soviet authority” and “put an end to the Right SR policy of running the Peasants’ Congress apart from the Congress of Workers’ and Soldiers’ Deputies.”73 It would be more accurate, however, to say that this shotgun marriage put an end to the peasantry’s self-government and completed the process of its disenfranchisement.
To free themselves completely from democratic control, they had one more hurdle to overcome: the Constituent Assembly, which, according to one contemporary, “stuck like a bone” in their throat.74
By early December, the Bolsheviks had succeeded in (1) shunting aside the legitimate All-Russian Congress of Soviets and unseating its Executive Committee, (2) depriving the executive organ of the soviets of control over legislation and senior appointments, and (3) splitting the legitimate Peasants’ Congress and replacing it with a handpicked body of soldiers and sailors. They could get away with such subversive acts because they involved manipulation of institutions in faraway Petrograd which the country at large could not easily either follow or understand. But the Constituent Assembly was another matter. This body, chosen by the entire nation, was to be the first truly representative gathering in Russian history. To prevent it from meeting or dispersing it would constitute the most audacious coup d’état of all, a direct challenge to the nation’s will, the disenfranchisement of tens of millions. And yet, until and unless this was done, the Bolsheviks could not feel secure because their legitimacy, grounded in the resolutions of the Second Congress of Soviets, was conditional on the approval of the Assembly—approval which it was certain to deny them.
To make matters still worse, the Bolsheviks had on many occasions committed themselves to the convocation of the Assembly. Historically, the Constituent Assembly was identified with the Socialist-Revolutionary Party, which made it the centerpiece of its political program, confident that given its hold on the peasants it would enjoy in it an overwhelming majority: this the SRs intended to use to transform Russian into a republic of “toilers.” Had they been politically more astute, the SRs would have pressed the Provisional Government to hold elections as soon as possible. But they procrastinated like everyone else, which handed the Bolsheviks the opportunity to pose as the Assembly’s champions. From the late summer of 1917, the Bolsheviks accused the Provisional Government of deliberately delaying the elections in the hope that time would cool the people’s revolutionary ardor. In launching the slogan “All Power to the Soviets,” they argued that only the soviets could guarantee the Constituent Assembly. In September and October 1917 Bolshevik propaganda shouted loud and clear that the transfer of power to the soviets alone would save the Constituent Assembly.75 As they prepared to seize power, they sometimes sounded as if their main objective was to defend the Assembly from the designs of the “bourgeoisie” and other “counterrevolutionaries.” As late as October 27,
the new revolutionary authority will permit no hesitations: under conditions of social hegemony of the interests of the broad popular masses, it alone is capable of leading the country to a Constituent Assembly.76
There could be no question, therefore, that Lenin and his party were committed to holding elections, convening it and submitting to the Assembly’s will. But since this Assembly was almost certain to sweep them from power, they had a problem on their hands. In the end, they gambled and won: and only after this triumph, on the ruins of the Constituent Assembly, could they feel confident of never again being challenged by democratic forces.
