The Soviets Must Be Revitalised

But how is such an active to be created? How is this problem to be solved? To think that it can be solved by means of verbal propaganda, by quoting from books, would be a great mistake. A wide, non-Party peasant active can be created around the Party only in the course of mass work in connection with the practical needs of the countryside, in the course of extensive Soviet constructive work in the countryside, by drawing the peasants into the work of volost, district, uyezd and gubernia administration. To revitalise the Soviets, to put them on their feet, to draw all the best elements of the peasantry into the Soviets—that is the way in which a wide, non-Party peasant active can be built up. Lenin said that the Soviets are the organ of the bond between the workers and the peasants, the organ through which the workers lead the peasants. And so, if we want to ensure that the political activity of the toiling peasants does not become detached from the leadership of the workers, we must take all measures to ensure that the peasants are drawn into the Soviets, that the Soviets are revitalised and put on their feet, that the peasantry find an outlet for their political activity by participating unfailingly in the administration of the country. Only in the course of such work can the peasantry provide extensive cadres of a non-Party active. Only from such an active can the Party select tens of thousands of members in the countryside.