The Election of 1895
The 1895 election campaign was dominated by the scissors crisis between the peasantry and the urban proletariat. For decades it the workers had benefitted disproportionately from socialist rule whilst peasant issues had been largely ignored. But in 1895 Sorel’s peasant based Revolutionary faction swept the electoral campaign and forced the other factions into a reaction against it.
In 1895 there was also a new electoral system. Now the Chairman and the Assembly would be voted for separately. Party members would cast first and second preferences for the faction that would appoint the new Chairman. If no faction got an absolute majority from first preferences then second preferences would be counted and the faction with the most votes then would appoint a Chairman.
The Assembly was to be entirely elected by the people. For every 10 seats in the Assembly a faction gained one position within the Central Committee. The faction with the largest share of the vote would appoint the Speaker of the Central Committee.
Results
First Preferences
Marxist-Leninists: 33.8%
Anarchists: 23.5%
Revolutionaries: 22.1%
Luxemburgists: 19.1%
Democrats: 0.01%
With Second Preferences
Luxemburgists: 27.2%
Marxist-Leninists: 23.2%
Revolutionaries: 23.2%
Anarchists: 20.8%
Democrats: 5.6%
On first preferences for Chairman no single faction was able to achieve the 50% majority required. However the Marxist-Leninists took a decent lead whilst the Anarchists, Revolutionaries and Luxemburgists trailed with similar shares of the vote. The Democrats, meanwhile, struggled to pick up any support whatsoever. However things changed dramatically on the second preferences. Here the Marxist-Leninists performed incredibly poorly whilst the Luxemburgists (4th on first preferences) gobbled up support. In the end Rosa Luxemburg retained her position as Chairman with exactly 4% more votes than both the Marxist-Leninists and Revolutionaries.
Sorel’s bid to seize control of the head of the Republic and steer it in the direction of the peasantry had failed whilst Lenin’s attempt to win a 3rd term as Chairman had been beaten by the 2nd preference voting system. Finally the Anarchist Emma Goldman ensured a strong showing on the first election since her faction’s re-legalisation in 1890.
In the Constituent Assembly things went rather differently. Sorel’s Revolutionary faction secured the largest share of the vote (almost exclusively from rural areas where he secured almost 70% of votes), the Marxist-Leninists came second with 23% of the vote whilst the Luxemburgists, who had now appointed the Chairman, came 3rd with 20%. Of the minor factions the smallest, the Moderates, secured just 4% of the vote – pointing towards the ultimate demise of the factions whilst elsewhere both the Anarchists and Democrats would have been disappointed with their poor showings.
In the aftermath of this tightly contested election the Constituent Assembly was left very much hung. The Luxemburgists could not form a coalition with their traditional allies on the Right as combined with both the Democrats and Anarchists they could muster just 39% of the vote, likewise the Leninists and their allies could only muster 1/3 of seats. Even the Revolutionaries found it impossible to form a desirable alliance as combined with the Anarchists they managed just 37 seats.
The only way for a government to be formed would be for the Luxemburgists to align themselves with either Lenin or Sorel. The obvious pull from the faction was towards their more Left wing Marxist Comrades however Rosa Luxemburg touted the importance of aligning with the peasantry into order to finally address their issues and solve the scissors crisis once and for all.
Two days after the results had come through Luxemburg convened a meeting of several high ranking Luxemburgists in order to decide upon a coalition partner. Rosa Luxemburg was held in such awe by most of her faction that attacks on her proposal for a ‘Hammer and Sickle Alliance’ with the Revolutionaries and Anarchists were not viscous enough to scare off the idea. It took a famous speech from Luxemburg’s number 1, Karl Liebknecht (son of the ill fated Wilhelm), to finally defeat the idea of an alliance with the peasantry. ‘’If you align with the Revolutionary, reactionists then I shall no longer consider you any sort of Marxist. If you align with them you are abandoning the fundamental principles laid down by the late Chairmen Marx and Engels. The primary divide in society is not between the rural and urban proletarians but between the class conscious proletariat and the capitalist restorationists. Yet you would abandon on side of the proletariat to support the most reactionary side of another. You would weaken our Republic and allow the capitalist restorationists a chance to rebuild. You have two choices ahead of you Chairman: You can be pushed towards an alliance with the Marxists or you shall witness the better part of this faction jump as those of us who do care for the people, Party and faction leave to form a new – truly Marxist – faction’’. Faced with her first major rebellion and a serious chance of a splinter with the pro-Liebknecht branch of the Luxemburgists Rosa went to Lenin and agreed upon a Marxist Bloc coalition.
The Luxemburgists, Marxist-Leninists, Moderates and Militarists had now formed a new government - The Marxist Bloc.
Rosa Luxemburg held the position of Chairman yet she was clearly the weaker partner in the alliance. With a smaller share of the Assembly and lesser influence over the minor Marxist factions (although the Moderates were often divided between the two larger factions on a much more regular basis than the pro-Lenin Militarists) the Luxemburgists seemed to be the junior coalition member. Yet Rosa Luxemburg was the clear leader as Chairman.
Of the 6 Central Committee members the Marxist Bloc had 2 were Luxemburgists, 2 Marxist-Leninists, 1 Moderate and 1 Militarist. This gave Lenin an advantage at each stage of government over Luxemburg – she would have to rely upon the good will of the man who had spent more time in her role than any other and who craved a return to the Chairmanship.
The terms of the coalition were left vague. Lenin agreed to give the Luxemburgists dominance over the economy and to promise to protect Council Communism whilst Luxemburg agreed to give Lenin the aggressive foreign policy that he wanted. However aside from these two points little was agreed in 1895.
Elsewhere, in order to make room for the 3 new Revolutionary members, 3 old Central Committee members had to resign their positions as the Marxist-Leninists, Luxemburgists and Democrats all surrendered a member. From the Democrats came Julius Martov, from the Marxist-Leninists Clara Zetkin and from the Luxemburgists Necazian.
There was also a reshuffle as Goldman became Minorities Secretary, Bernstein received a large demotion form General Secretary to Minister for Foreign Affairs, Kautsky (now a coalition partner) took on Bernstein’s former role and Liebknecht had to move from his old position as Speaker to become Commissar for Finance.
Aside from faction leader and Speaker of the Assembly Georges Sorel the Revolutionaries took two very different figures with them to the Central Committee. In the symbolically invaluable role of Commissar for Agriculture came the latest in a long line of exiled Russian revolutionaries – Viktor Chernov. He was a young and enthusiastic socialist with an idea of communism centred on the peasantry. A perfect fit for the new faction and a powerful force on the Left of the faction.
Max Weber had had an interesting life. Born in the Prussian city of Erfurt in 1864 as a babe his country collapsed around him as, following the Deutschkrieg that ended 3 years before in utter defeat, the Prussian economy and political system fell in. At the age of two his country was integrated into the VSVR and Weber became a citizen of the then only Socialist Republic. Weber’s father had been a prominent politician in Prussian and his family had been very wealthy. The Webers were branded at bourgeoisie, their wealth was seized and they were forced to work alongside every other Erfurtian citizen. Rather than face this shame Weber’s father fled for Paris – leaving Weber’s mother to care for him by working in an ammunitions factory. At the age of 18 in 1881, whilst the unstable Kropotkin government reigned in Cologne, Weber managed to leave the VSVR and head for London where he had tracked down his father. Weber Senior paid his son through University at University College London – unlike so many VSVR politicians here, when his politics was developing, he was in a very anti-socialist environment. Degree in hand Weber decided to return to the Republic when the Civil War broke out and fought on the Anarchist side largely due to his hatred of Lenin. Indeed he was in Berlin during the massacre committed by Enewald’s Finns. After the Civil War Weber became immersed in academia and in 1888, despite being despised by the government, he was given a professorship at Brussels University. For the next two years he battled with the state censors and government alike. It was during the 1890s that his ideals really became prominent as he argued in favour of religion and against the statist socialism of the Marxists, the Council Communism of the Luxemburgists and Anarchists and against capitalism. Throughout his life he was always a proponent of freedom and when the 1892 Rebellion broke out he threw his support behind the peasantry. As Sorel’s Revolutionary faction grew from nothing Sorel quickly went around trying to pick up support wherever he could and Weber was an early ally. Since then the two’s physolophies have moved further apart but Weber’s supporters within the faction are numerous enough that removing him would do more harm than good for Sorel.