Vladimir Ilyich Lenin

The Third Congress of the R.S.D.L.P.{1}

APRIL 12-27 (APRIL 25-MAY 10), 1905

Published:
Source: Lenin Collected Works, Progress Publishers, 1977, Moscow, Volume 41, pages 142-166.1.
Translated: Yuri Sdobnikov
Transcription\Markup: R. Cymbala
Copyleft: V. I. Lenin Internet Archive (www.marxists.org) © 2004 Permission is granted to copy and/or distribute this document under the terms of the GNU Free Documentation License.

Contents

1. DRAFT RESOLUTIONS OF THE ORGANISING COMMITTEE FOR CONVENING THE THIRD CONGRESS ON THE REPRESENTATION OF CERTAIN ORGANISATIONS 142
2. O.C. DRAFT RESOLUTION ON THE CONSTITUTION OF THE CONGRESS 144
3. SPEECH ON THE CREDENTIALS COMMITTEE REPORT CONCERNING THE KAZAN COMMITTEE’S REPRESENTATION AT THE = CONGRESS 145
4. AMENDMENT TO A CREDENTIALS COMMITTEE PROPOSAL ON THE KAZAN COMMITTEE’S REPRESENTATION AT THE CONGRESS 146
5. SPEECH ON THE QUESTION OF A DEBATE ON THE O.C. REPORT 146
6. DRAFT RESOLUTION ON THE DEBATE ON THE O.C. REPORT 147
7. DRAFT AGENDA OF THE THIRD PARTY CONGRESS 147
8. SPEECH IN THE DEBATE ON THE CONGRESS AGENDA 148
9. SPEECH IN THE DEBATE ON THE CONGRESS STANDING ORDERS 148
10. SPEECH MOTIONING A DRAFT RESOLUTION ON ELECTION OF COMMITTEES TO EXAMINE DELEGATES’ REPORTS AND TO DRAFT RESOLUTIONS 149
11. STATEMENTS TO THE CREDENTIALS COMMITTEE OF THE CONGRESS 150
12. SPEECH IN THE DEBATE ON THE CREDENTIALS COMMITTEE’S REPORT 151
13. DRAFT RESOLUTION ON CONFIRMATION OF THE KAZAN AND KUBAN COMMITTEES 151
14. DRAFT RESOLUTION ON PROCEDURE GOVERNING VOTING AT THE CONGRESS 151
15. REMARKS ON RUMYANTSEV’S DRAFT RESOLUTION ON THE QUESTION OF OPEN POLITICAL ACTION BY THE R.S.D.L.P. 152
16. THESES FOR A RESOLUTION ON THE SOCIAL-DEMOCRATS’ PARTICIPATION IN A PROVISIONAL REVOLUTIONARY GOVERNMENT 153
17. SPEECH IN THE DEBATE ON THE RESOLUTION ON THE QUESTION OF OPEN POLITICAL ACTION BY THE R.S.D.L.P. 155
18. SPEECHES IN THE DEBATE ON THE DRAFT RESOLUTION ON THE ATTITUDE TOWARDS THE GOVERNMENT’S TACTICS ON THE EVE OF A REVOLUTION 155
19. RESOLUTION ON THE ATTITUDE TO THE PEASANT MOVEMENT 156
20. TO THE PRESIDIUM OF THE CONGRESS 157
21. OUTLINE OF A SPEECH ON THE QUESTION OF THE RELATIONS BETWEEN WORKERS AND INTELLECTUALS IN SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC ORGANISATIONS 157
22. SPEECHES IN THE DEBATE ON THE PARTY RULES 158
23. SPEECH IN THE DEBATE ON THE DRAFT RESOLUTION ON GENERAL MEETINGS OF THE C. C. 159
24. SPEECH ON THE CREDENTIALS COMMITTEE REPORT ON THE KAZAN COMMITTEE’S REPRESENTATION 160
25. SPEECH IN THE DEBATE ON THE DRAFT RESOLUTIONS ON THE RELATIONS BETWEEN WORKERS AND INTELLECTUALS IN SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC ORGANISATIONS 160
26. SPEECHES IN THE DEBATE ON THE ADDITIONAL RESOLUTION TO THE PARTY RULES ON PERIODIC CONFERENCES OF REPRESENTATIVES OF VARIOUS PARTY ORGANISATIONS 161
27. DRAFT RESOLUTION ON THE SPLINTER SECTION OF THE PARTY 161
28. SPEECH ON RUMYANTSEV’S RESOLUTION ON THE SPLINTER SECTION OF THE PARTY 162
29. SPEECH IN THE DEBATE ON THE RESOLUTION ON THE ATTITUDE TOWARDS NON-RUSSIAN SOCIAL-DEMOCRATIC ORGANISATIONS 162
30. SPEECH ON THE QUESTION OF THE ATTITUDE TO THE LIBERALS 163
31. SPEECH ON THE REPORT ON THE WORK OF THE C.C. 163
32. PROPOSAL ON PROCEDURE GOVERNING ELECTION TO THE C.C. 164
33. DRAFT RESOLUTION ON THE TIME OF THE C.C.’S ENTRY INTO OFFICE 164
34. SPEECH ON THE PUBLICATION OF THE PROCEEDINGS OF THE THIRD CONGRESS OF THE R.S.D.L.P. 164
35. AMENDMENTS TO THE DRAFT RESOLUTION ON PROPAGANDA AND AGITATION 165
36. SPEECHES IN THE DEBATE ON THE RESOLUTION ON THE EVENTS IN THE CAUCASUS 165

Notes

{1} The Third Congress of the R.S.D.L.P. was held in London from April 12 to 27 (April 25 to May 10), 1905. It had been prepared by the Bolsheviks and was directed by Lenin. The Mensheviks refused to attend it and met for a conference at Geneva.

The Congress was attended by 38 delegates: 24 with vote, and 14 with voice only. Delegates from twenty-one R.S.D.L.P. committees had Votes. Lenin was a delegate from the Odessa Committee. Among the delegates were V. V. Vorovsky, B. S. Zemlyachka, N. K. Krupskaya, A. A. Bogdanov, A. V. Lunacharsky, M. M. Litvinov and M. G. Tskhakaya. Lenin was elected chairman of the Congress.

The Congress examined the basic questions of the unfolding revolution in Russia and determined the tasks of the proletariat and its party. Lenin wrote the draft resolutions on all the main questions debated by the Congress. He gave reports on Social-Democratic participation in a provisional revolutionary government and on the resolution concerning support for the peasant movement; ho spoke on the armed uprising, the attitude to the government’s tactics on the eve of the revolution, the relations between the workers and intellectuals in Social-Democratic organisations, the Party Rules, the report on the Central Committee’s activity and other questions (see present edition, Vol. 8, pp. 359-424). The Congress laid out the Party’s strategic plan for the bourgeois-democratic revolution and defined the Party’s tactical line. The Congress set out the organisation of an armed uprising as the Party’s most important and pressing task. The Congress said that the victory of the armed popular uprising should lead to the establishment of a provisional revolutionary government, whose task would be to suppress the resistance of the counter revolution, carry out the R.S.D.L.P. minimum programme, and prepare the conditions for the transition to a socialist revolution.

The Congress reviewed the Party Rules: it adopted Lenin’s formulation of Paragraph One, which deals with Party member ship; eliminated the duocentric system (the C.C. and the C.O.) in the Party, and set up a single, governing Party centre—the Central Committee; it gave a precise definition to the C.C.’s powers and its relations with the local committees.

The Congress condemned the acts of the Mensheviks and their opportunism in organisational and tactical questions. In view of the fact that Iskra had fallen into Menshevik hands and was conducting an opportunist line, the Congress authorised the Central Committee to set up a new Central Organ, Proletary. A Plenary Meeting of the Central Committee on April 27 (May 10), 1905, appointed Lenin editor of the newspaper.

The Third Congress was of tremendous historical importance. It was the first Bolshevik congress, which gave the Party and the working class a militant programme of struggle for the victory of the democratic revolution. For the work and importance of the Congress see Lenin’s article “The Third Congress” (present edition, Vol. 8, pp. 442-49). The Congress decisions were substantiated in Lenin’s book Two Tactics of Social-Democracy in the Democratic Revolution (see present edition, Vol. 9, pp. 15-140). p. 142

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