Background The left-wing faction of the
Socialist Revolutionary Party began to form after the
February Revolution, grouping the most radical elements of the party. The internal faction was highlighted in the
First All-Russian Congress of Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies in mid-May 1917 for its position close to that of the
Bolsheviks, while the bulk of the party aligned with the
Mensheviks. The left-wing socialist revolutionaries were especially strong in the
Petrograd Soviet, where they opposed the continuation of the
First World War – which had been defended by the centrist fraction of the party since mid-April. They were also strong in the
Northern Region,
Kazan,
Kronstadt,
Helsinki and
Kharkiv. Later they became the main current in important rural provinces of the Russian interior, places where the socialist revolutionaries enjoyed the favor of the population. At the third party congress in May, they were a large and important fraction, although it was not until the crisis of autumn and the October Revolution when its support extended to the entire country. at the head of the faction was a series of young leaders, from exile (
Boris Kamkov), from
Siberia (
Maria Spiridonova) or agitation activities among the population (
Prosh Proshian). The SR leadership, on the contrary, had veteran and conservative representatives, who led the party into an alliance with the liberals. This led the party to share government power but, at the same time, jeopardized its support among the population. The number of socialist-revolutionary organizations and committees that followed the leftist faction grew, a trend that was accentuated in the early autumn. The executive committee of the largest railway union, the
Vikzhel, elected on 23 August, had a majority of Left SRs. and the immediate socialization of land, first with their surrender to the land committees and then to the peasants themselves. They were also opposed to the continuation of the war, Their growth within the SRs led them to hope that it would come under their control, delaying a split. formed with the aim of accelerating the revolution and at the same time moderating actions of the Bolsheviks; One of its members,
Pavel Lazimir, who had played a leading role in the measures against Kornilov and presided over the military section of the Petrograd Soviet, presided over it officially. Numerous left-wing social revolutionaries, in addition to Bolsheviks and other activists without clear affiliation, participated in the committee's activities, from which the former withdrew on several occasions in protest of the actions of the Bolsheviks.
Split with the Socialist Revolutionary Party , revolutionary icon and symbol of the new Left SR party.|thumb|right The final Left SR split was due to the party's attitude towards the Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies. At the beginning, the SRs opposed the convocation of the new congress, fearing that it would be dominated by the extremists. Together, the SR delegations held a slight majority in the congress. Despite its presence in the Military Revolutionary Committee, the Left SRs opposed an armed insurrection. Part of the party's left wing remained in Congress and refused to leave the Military Committee. They were expelled by the SR Central Committee the next day, along with all those considered complicit in the Bolshevik uprising. The remaining delegates voted in favor of the decrees on peace and land – the latter very similar to the SR program -, but they refused to accept an exclusively Bolshevik government and demanded the formation of a coalition During the rebellion, the Left SRs had maintained a similar position to that of the Bolsheviks, participating in agitation in favor of the dissolution of the Russian Provisional Government, the transfer of power to the
soviets and chairing the Petrograd Military Revolutionary Committee. Opposed to the Bolshevik seizure of power up until the last moment, they reluctantly supported it, The Left Socialist Revolutionaries entered the
Council of People's Commissars, leading the people's commissariats of agriculture (
Kolegaev), property (
Karelin), justice (
Steinberg), post offices and telegraphs (Proshian), local government (
Trutovsky), and
Algasov received the post of People's Commissar without a briefcase. The left SRs also collaborated with the Bolsheviks during
Kerensky's attempts to regain control of the capital, Many representatives of the Left Socialist Revolutionary Party participated in the creation of the
Red Army, in the work of the
All-Russian Extraordinary Commission. Subsequently, the SR Central Committee began to dissolve local groups that they considered to be rebels, it is considered to have been remarkable and deprived the Socialist Revolutionaries of most of its radical elements and most of its support among the soldiers, while the intelligentsia remained mainly in the old party and the peasantry was divided between the two formations. In geographical terms, the new party formed by those expelled from the Socialist Revolutionary Party gained control of nearly half a dozen provinces, mainly in
Ukraine and the
Urals, parts of the capital and other isolated rural areas in the country. The conference was attended by one hundred and sixteen delegates from ninety-nine local organizations that had abandoned Socialist Revolutionary Party. The leadership was dominated by the more moderate current of the party. At first the Left SRs defended the creation of a new exclusively socialist government that included all currents and parties, including the Right SRs. However, the refusal of the Right SRs to participate and the pressure of its most extreme supporters made the party abandon this cause The idea of a broad socialist coalition government had received widespread support, including among the Bolsheviks, during the Soviet Congress, in which a motion to this effect by
Julius Martov had initially been unanimously approved. The Bolshevik radicals – led by Lenin and Trotsky – and the conservative faction of the Socialist Revolutionaries had been opposed to an agreement between the new government and the socialist opposition. The Left Socialist Revolutionaries, together with the moderate Bolsheviks and the Menshevik left, had played a crucial role in the negotiations thanks to their prominent presence in the Vikzhel that had imposed them. , surrounded by delegates of the Second Congress of Peasant Soviets, at the end of 1917.| thumb | right For its part, continuing the talks to join the new government, the Left SRs demanded the union of the executive committee of the Soviets of Workers and Soldiers with that of the Soviets of Peasants, of which it hoped to gain control in the imminent second congress, in addition to limit the
Sovnarkom to executive functions and leave the legislative to a new unified Executive Committee. The result, however, was not as satisfactory as the Left SRs announced, since the government was controlled by the All-Russian Central Executive Committee. with the intention of stopping it, and they obtained this portfolio for Isaac Steinberg. The objective of the Left SRs in partnering with the Bolsheviks was to moderate their actions,
Government coalition Formation of the coalition Eight members of the Left SRs eventually entered the Sovnarkom. The government agreement was reached on 28, the day on which the executive councils of the two council organizations were unified. Three days later, the Agriculture Ministry For his part, Karelin obtained the Deputy Commissariat of State Property, Prosh Proshian that of Post and Telegraph, Trutovski that of Local Government and
Aleksandra Izmailovich that of Housing. The Bolsheviks, however, maintained the most powerful ministries, those that controlled the armed forces, finances, and politics Despite having seven commissioners and vice-commissioners compared to the eleven Bolsheviks, the distribution of power in the government was very unfavorable to the Left SRs. The alliance lasted until mid-March 1918, when the left socialist revolutionaries withdrew from the government in protest at the signing of the
Brest-Litovsk Treaty. the number of its delegates to it was low. Partly their low presence on the Socialist Revolutionary lists was due to the youth and lack of experience of many of its future members, which made them seem unsuitable candidates to represent the party. The Left SRs wanted to approve extensive political and social changes in the assembly, but had no intention of submitting to parliamentary procedures to achieve its revolutionary objectives, as was the case with the Bolsheviks.
Agrarian policy and the strengthening of the Soviet regime In the field, the Left SRs played a crucial role in extending the authority of the new Soviet Government through the "
volost" soviets that the Bolsheviks, weak in the countryside, could not play. Also, the party supervised the agrarian reform approved by the Government at the end of 1917 and maintained control of both the Commissary of Agriculture and the peasant section of the
VTsIK – chaired by Spiridonova -, also in charge of agrarian issues. The legal reforms that supported the changes in the countryside increased support for the Soviet regime in Russian agriculture and during their months in government the Left SRs managed to unite their
populist program with the peasant desires for land. The populists also supported the resurgence of
communes, despite the Bolshevik opposition. The new "Fundamental Law of Land Socialization" —which abolished private land ownership, handed it over to those who worked it and favored cooperatives—, enacted on 9, it was also populist-inspired (see
Decree on Land). Lenin accepted it as inevitable. Between the approval in the Congress of Soviets and the ratification by the VTsIK, which emerged from the Congress, the Bolsheviks managed to include important clauses such as the priority of collective farms or the state concession of property that upset the Left SRs. Although the result did not dramatically increase the amount of land per farmer, In early 1918, The main strength of the Bolshevik-controlled regime was due to the peasant support achieved by its socialist-revolutionary allies, while in the cities the opposition of the middle classes continued and workers' disillusionment arose due to the food crisis. Steinberg, as
People's Commissar of Justice, was in favor of applying harsh measures against the opposition, but always legally; Lenin, on the contrary, was willing to use state terror to consolidate the revolution. At a meeting of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee on February 23, the Left Socialist Revolutionaries criticized the Bolsheviks for their repressions on trade union freedoms and voted against the signing of the treaty. None of the ninety-three party representatives in the VTsIK voted in favor of the treaty, albeit in some cases, such as that of Spiridonova, only for party discipline. This disagreement led to the resignation of the Socialist Revolutionary Commissioners on March 19, 1918, The socialist revolutionary leadership was actually very divided: almost half of the central committee was inclined to sign the peace treaty. The Left SR's opposition to the conditions imposed by the empires made them support
Trotsky's proposal to abandon the war without signing the peace. Determined internationalists, during the talks they had been convinced that the revolution would spread throughout Europe and that workers' representatives of the Empires would take the reins of the peace negotiations. After the ratification of the treaty, the representatives of the left-communists – who had abstained in the final vote – and the Socialist Revolutionaries – who had voted against ratification – as support for the Bolsheviks fell. Those who considered that the withdrawal of the Government had been a mistake and advocated resuming government work, a majority in the central committee, failed to convince the congress delegates, who ratified the actions taken after the approval of the peace treaty. In May the relationship between Bolsheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries was markedly worsened by the actions of the Bolsheviks in domestic politics, which joined the disagreements on foreign policy. from the countryside to supply the cities, the restoration of the death penalty (May 21) They also condemned the end of workers' control of the factories and the reappearance of the bourgeois managers, who they considered endangered the socialist transformation. Where the party concentrated on opposing requisitions and "
Committees of Poor Peasants", generally maintained peasant support,
The Fifth Congress of the Soviets and the uprising , a respected old revolutionary leader, one of the founders of the
Circle of Tchaikovsky,
Land and Liberty and the
Socialist Revolutionary Party. In 1917 he became the noble inspirer of the Left Socialist-Revolutionaries, but in 1918 he joined the new
Party of Revolutionary Communism| thumb | right Although some sectors of the party reacted to the repression in the countryside by demanding the separation of the Soviets of the peasant deputies from those of the soldiers and workers, the central committee preferred to press the Bolsheviks demanding the convocation of a new congress of the unified soviets, hoping to subject the government's policy to harsh criticism therein. The leaders of the Left SRs also hoped to gain the support of the
left-communists, at odds with Lenin for his capitulation to the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. the Bolsheviks sent enough delegates with suspicious credentials to secure a large majority in congress, In this environment, the Third Party Congress took place, between June 28 and July 1, and in which greater hostility to the Central Powers and to maintaining peace with them was revealed. Spiridonova raised the provocation of the imperialist invasion to cause uprisings like those taking place in Ukraine, a position that was rejected by other delegates, who were not convinced of the disposition of the population to rise up against the occupiers. Opposition to maintaining the treaty, however, was in a majority among the delegates and the central committee weighed in on carrying out terrorist actions against the German representatives. In this tense atmosphere began the
Fifth Congress of Soviets on July 4.), still openly opposed their former Bolshevik allies, for which they were expelled from the congress. On July 6, the German Ambassador
Wilhelm von Mirbach was assassinated by
Yakov Blumkin and
Nikolai Andreev, Initially the Bolsheviks reacted in disbelief, doubting the authorship of the crime. Dzerzhinski himself, sent to the Moscow headquarters of the Cheka in search of the assassins, was arrested by the Left SR central committee, gathered there, when he believed that the socialist revolutionaries were not involved. According to a letter from Spiridonova, the murder of Mirbach was a personal initiative of several leaders of the Socialist Revolutionaries, and there was no rebellion, and all further actions of the Left Socialist Revolutionaries were "self-defense". However, it was beneficial for the Bolsheviks to use the assassination of the ambassador as a pretext for defeating the last opposition party. Immediately, military measures began to destroy the centers held by the Socialist Revolutionaries, whose delegates to the Fifth Congress were arrested at the
Bolshoi Theater that same afternoon. The bombardment caused the Socialist Revolutionary troops and the Central Committee to leave the building, where Dzerzhinski was abandoned. The two party newspapers,
Znamia trudá (
Banner of Work) and
Golos trudovogo krestianstva (
The Voice of the Working Peasantry) were shut down the day after Mirbach's death. On July 9, the Fifth Congress of Soviets resumed its sessions, without the Social Revolutionary delegates; Lenin took the opportunity to get rid of the Left SRs as a political rival. At the nearby Kronstadt naval base, where the influence of the Left SRs was great, the Bolsheviks took political control by force, creating a "revolutionary committee" that separated the Soviet and in practice excluded the Socialist Revolutionaries from the next elections. The expulsion The attempts of the weakened party in maintaining their opposition to the government was futile and many of its members ended up joining Lenin's party. The party's determination to focus on opposing the peace treaty, a matter of secondary interest to the majority of the population at a time of great urban and rural discontent with the Bolshevik government, deprived the Left SRs of the great support with which it had counted in the spring and early summer. The general meaning of the interventions in the last congress was dejected, unlike those of the previous one. Although the practical consequences of this decree were very few, the tolerance of the committees by the Left SR congress, generally rejected in the countryside, ended up ruining the strength of the party in rural Russia. Some members of the central committee were tried and sentenced to imprisonment on November 27; some of them, like Spiridonova, received a pardon a few days later. The most radical current of the party, around Kamkov and
Irina Kakhovskaya, formed a clandestine terrorist group that carried out the murder of the German Commander in Ukraine,
Hermann von Eichhorn and other minor actions, disrupted by the authorities. In early 1919, some of the leaders were arrested again; in 1920 part of the party was able to re-establish itself until May 1921. Periods of relative tolerance alternated with more habitual periods of persecution by the Cheka and clandestine activity. The remains of the party were removed by the arrests carried out during the
Kronstadt rebellion, ==Ideas==