Two excerpts from Revolution and Counter-Revolution: Class Struggle in a Moscow Metal Factory.
The following are two excerpts from Revolution and Counter-Revolution: Class Struggle in a Moscow Metal Factory (pages 50-52 and 58-62), the most thorough investigation to date on working-class life during the revolutionary era, reviving the memory of the incredible gains for liberty and equality that the 1917 revolution brought about.
The Workers’ Movement versus Guzhon
In sharp contrast to Guzhon management’s warnings of mob action, employees’ demands exude a clear sense of purpose. Economic issues were sent to arbitration, but on 19 June the factory committee submitted demands on other issues:
- Create a permanent space for the workers’ committee and for general factory meetings, lectures, and other cultural-educational activities.
- Recognize the night shift for seven-hour working day, but pay them for the normal eight-hour day.
- Regularize salary payments in the following form: no later than the twentieth of the month, give advances for the current month, and no later than the eighth of the next month with complete accounting for added cost-of-living bonuses.
- Bring in air ventilation for all enclosed places where there is production work.
- Baths and steam rooms for both sexes.
- Sufficient temperature in all shops and washstands during the winter.
- In all shops there should be a cafeteria or an enclosed warm place.
- Make toilets as close as possible to the shops.
- In all shops make a closet for workers’ clothes.
- In the sheet metal shop and construction area, bring in hot water because now it is too far away and inaccessible because of the continuous nature of work.
- Sick pay, whether job-related or not, must be paid in full from the first day of sickness and based on the average worker’s wage.
- For women giving birth, they are to be released for two weeks before and four weeks after birth but are to be paid in full based on the average salary.
- Medicine prescribed by private doctors should be distributed from our local clinic, and if the clinic does not have it, the factory should buy it from another pharmacist.
- At times of stoppages because of insufficient material, pay must be issued at half the minimum wage.
- After the birth of a child, issue twenty-five rubles; after the death of a child, give twenty-five rubles; for death of adults give seventy-five rubles.
- Every worker who has been in the factory at least one year must be given a two-week vacation; every worker over two years or more gets a month vacation with minimum pay.
The variety, clarity, and force of demands demonstrate workers’ increased confidence and organization. The need for a regular meeting place shows that the employees’ top priority was the strengthening of their own organization, and the special demands raised in the interest of women illustrate workers’ willingness to be more inclusive. While revolutionary egalitarianism was an important factor in this process, a practical consideration also drove such demands: the prerevolutionary demographic trend toward a more diverse workforce continued, and by May 1917, the concerns of 439 women simply could not be ignored.
Guzhon insisted on maintaining pay stratification, arguing that raising the wages of unskilled workers undermined the very foundations of productivity. The workers’ committee demanded a minimum daily pay of 5.50 rubles for unskilled female workers and 7.20 rubles for men. Guzhon argued that, “the level of pay must directly and inseparably correspond to the productivity of the worker.” Higher minimum pay was bad because “per diem rates lower productivity … shop wages should be set at a level that would be conducive for workers to switch to piece-rates to realize higher productivity on that basis.” Guzhon posited that “it is generally acknowledged that the guaranteed minimum of daily pay should be at least one and one-half times less than what a worker of a particular category and specialists would earn at a perpiece job.” Guzhon went on to assert that the fixing of minimum workers’ pay had been an “anti-state and anti-democratic act because it creates a privileged class of people that is guaranteed its means of existence at the expense of other classes of the population.”
Workers, however, were more concerned with economic equality than with the logistics of running a profitable enterprise. Guzhon complained that “having learned that the Factory Commission satisfied almost all their demands,” workers raised productivity for “three or four days,” but production later declined to 50 or 60 percent of the normal rate. The factory committee told management that the decrease in productivity was “completely understandable” and that the best way to increase productivity would be to raise rates so that workers could earn at least one and one half times the minimum. Guzhon included a detailed expense report that claimed such demands would lead to the factory operating at a loss of six or seven hundred thousand rubles a month.
The additional demands pushed Guzhon over the brink. On 20 June he informed the Factory Commission that he intended to close the factory, and castigated the Commission on the wage dispute and the workers’ dismissal of managers under the threat of violence. That the issue remained unresolved “undermines the very basis for healthy discipline, without which operating an enterprise is completely inconceivable.” He accused the Commission of conducting “systematic propaganda against private industry.” The Commission, he concluded, had brought “complete disorganization” to the work of the factory, and under such circumstances, he charged, it was “necessary to close the factory.”
Guzhon workers did not accept the impending closure without a fight, however. On 28 June, the factory committee reported to the Moscow Soviet that three of their members had confronted management about its attempt to shut down the factory. The director had ordered electricity cut off, but the factory committee found sufficient raw materials and fuel and ordered work to continue. Workers’ representatives from the factory then asked the Soviet to intervene to make sure the electrical supply would not be cut off.
In the end, Guzhon’s attempt to close the Moscow Metalworks backfired. The secretary of the factory committee described the special session of defense of the Provisional Government in Petrograd that decided the fate of the factory. “We explained that Guzhon had made a large war profit, that there was a continuous expansion of the factory workforce, and at the same time an extreme drop in workers’ pay.”
Why did the class conflict in the Metalworks race ahead of conflicts at factories in Moscow and even Petrograd? The speed of events suggests that workers’ anger exceeded the level of workers’ militancy in other factories. Significantly, Guzhon persisted in upholding a more intransigent strategy than other owners, who had opted for a conciliatory approach in an attempt to diffuse labor discontent. Yet by midsummer the crisis in Russian industry led other industrialists to reverse tack and adopt a hard-line stance similar to Guzhon’s. While the confrontation in the Moscow Metalworks may have temporarily outpaced events in other factories by several weeks, the escalating class confrontation throughout Russia had become irreconcilable and more political
The Ascendency of Bolshevism
…
Kornilov’s attempted coup d’état in late August gave concrete form to the threats from the right, but also strengthened the resolve of the left. Kornilov ordered a march on Petrograd to destroy the Soviet and install himself as dictator.
The attempted bourgeois coup “profoundly stirred the surface and depths of Russia,” wrote Sukhanov. In the days afterwards “Bolshevism began blossoming luxuriantly and put forth deep roots throughout the country.”
By early September, democratically elected soviets throughout Russia swung to the Bolsheviks. On 31 August the Bolsheviks won a majority in the Petrograd Soviet. By 1 September, 126 soviets had requested the Soviet Central Executive Committee to take power. Over the next week soviets in Moscow (5 September), Kiev, Kazan, Baku, and Saratov passed Bolshevik resolutions.
Economic discontent and a revival of labor militancy contributed to a rising tide of strikes that involved over a million-and-a-half workers in the late summer and early fall.
The Bolshevik-dominated metalworkers’ union was a focus of party members’ activities in the late summer. By the middle of September the factory had three thousand dues-paying metalworkers’ union members.
Despite their mutual animosity on larger political questions, the early nationalization of the factory encouraged Bolsheviks and SRs to cooperate in the day-to-day operations. On 14 October, workers left the factory at ten in the morning for a procession in honor of Illarion Astakhov. They marched to the bridge where he had been killed, and then to the cemetery, where they listened to speakers from the Bolshevik, SR, and Unity parties.
Workers in the Moscow Metalworks supported the October Revolution, as did workers throughout Moscow. Factory committee minutes show several September and October collections for Red Guard units to defend the revolution.
The factory SRs apparently divided between the left, right, and a group in the center that wavered. The Left SR factory leader Arapov enjoyed enormous authority and probably swayed many rank-and file SRs.
The Bolshevik-dominated Petrograd Soviet’s Military Revolutionary Committee launched an attack upon the Provisional Government in the days before the Second Congress of Soviets. Provocative actions by the government and the right helped legitimatize the preemptive assault. Throughout October, the Kadet newspaper Rech’ repeatedly warned against letting the Bolsheviks “choose the moment for a declaration of civil war.”
Fierce fighting lasted for almost a week in Moscow.
One of the more remarkable changes in workers’ attitudes during 1917 was the fraternization between Russian and German-speaking workers. Two years after many Moscow Metalworks employees had participated in vicious attacks against the German-speaking citizens of Moscow, Austrian prisoners of war at the factory regularly attended general meetings and played a part in the workers’ revolution. An international agreement on 1 October freed all prisoners of war, but management delayed releasing the factory’s 260 prison laborers.
Two characteristics differentiated the 1917 Russian Revolution from other workers’ rebellions of the twentieth century. First, in no society was the level of class hatred more pronounced than in Russia. The late summer crisis was not merely a consequence of a string of incompetent decisions on the part of the Provisional Government. Rather, the escalation of class conflict was the culmination of years of confrontation, war profiteering, brutal repression, and workers’ rebellion that could only have ended in the forceful rule by one class over the other.
In the Moscow Metalworks the ascendancy of the extreme left did not conform to the depiction of an infallible party leading the masses later popularized by Stalinism. Workers learned for themselves through the course of class conflict, in the process gaining a visceral sense of their own collective power. Yet revolutionary politics contributed in tangible ways to this process. Decimated by Okhrana arrests in the prerevolutionary period, the small factory-based Bolshevik group was inept and outnumbered by the SRs. Moreover, the SRs promoted a strategy of direct action, egalitarianism, and worker unity in the early months of the revolution that was hardly distinguishable from the Leninists. Bolshevik policy only became decisive when the more fundamental political issue of state power came to the fore during the late summer. The organizational weakness of the Leninists in the factory was overcome by what Alexander Rabinowitch describes as “the relative flexibility of the party.”
With thanks to Haymarket.
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GARF, f. 7952, op. 3, d. 210, ll. 254-255 and RGAMO, f. 186, op. 1, d. 104, ll. 74-75. The 19 June demand list continued with specific department issues. ↩
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RGAMO, f. 186, op. 3, d. 3, l. 17. ↩
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RGAMO, f. 2122, op. 1, d. 248, ll. 23-24. Guzhon letter to Chairman Moscow Factory Conference, 20 June 1917. ↩
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- RGAMO, f. 2122, op. 1, d. 248, ll. 23-27. Guzhon letter to Chairman Moscow Factory Conference, 20 June 1917.
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RGAMO, f. 2122, op. 1, d. 248, ll. 23-27. Guzhon letter to Chairman Moscow Factory Conference, 20 June 1917. ↩
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RGAMO 2122, op. 1, d. 248, l. 176. Factory announcement, 22 June 1917. Revolution and Collective Action 75 ↩
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RGAMO, f. 186, op. 1, d. 104, l. 64-65. Workers’ committee letter to executive committee Moscow Soviet, 28 June 1917. ↩
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GARF, f. 7952, op. 3, d. 271, l. 46. V.N. Arapov memoir. ↩
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. Russkoe slovo, 30 June 1917. ↩
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Kornakovskii, Zavod ‘Serp i Molot’ 1883-1932, 84. ↩
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Rabinowitch, The Bolsheviks Come to Power, 94-150. ↩
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Figes, A People’s Tragedy, 452-455. ↩
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Koenker, Moscow Workers, 135. ↩
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Sukhanov, The Russian Revolution, 522-523. ↩
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Koenker, Moscow Workers, 250-251. ↩
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Sotsial-Demokrat, 7 September 1917. ↩
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GARF, f. 7952, op. 3, d. 275, ll. 58-9. S.S. Leshkovets memoir. ↩
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Tony Cliff, Lenin: All Power to the Soviets, 313-314. ↩
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Lenin, Collected Works, 11: 359. ↩
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Tim McDaniel, Autocracy, Capitalism and Revolution in Russia (Berkeley, 1988), 390. ↩
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Lenin, Collected Works, 25: 234-241. ↩
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Koenker and Rosenberg, Strikes and Revolution in Russia, 268-275. ↩
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RGIAgM, f. 498, op. 1, d. 633, ll. 6-7. Management letter 30 May, Arbitrator ruling, 6 June 1917. ↩
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RGIAgM, f. 1076, op. 1, d. 19, l. 97-99. Arbitrator report, 11 July 1917. ↩
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RGAMO, f. 186, op. 1, d. 137, l. 16; d. 100, l. 46. Metalworkers’ reports, 1917. ↩
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RGAMO, f. 186, op. 1, d. 100 ll. 45-52. Demands dated 6 October 1917. ↩
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RGIAgM, f. 176, op. 2, d. 7, l. 1. Metalworkers’ conflict commission letter, 12 October 1917. ↩
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TsMAM, f. 2562, op. 1, d. 5, ll. 6. Rogozhsko-Simonovskii Soviet, 15 September 1917. ↩
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GARF, f. 7952, op. 3, d. 273, l. 37. P.N. Klimanov memoir. ↩
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RGIAgM, f. 498, op. 1, d. 305, ll. 1, 2. Factory committee meeting, 22 July 1917. ↩
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RGAMO, f. 186, op. 1, d. 96, l. 67; d. 133, ll. 7-13. Metalworkers’ report, n.d.; Metalworkers’ report on contributions, January 1918. ↩
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RGIAgM, f. 498, op. 1, d. 305, ll. 1, 2. Factory committee meeting, n.d. August 1917. ↩
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Sotsial-Demokrat, 15 October 1917. ↩
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GARF, f. 7952, op. 3, d. 276, l. 67. E.D. Tumanov memoir. GARF, f. 7952, op. 3, d. 271, l. 33; V.N. Arapov memoir. ↩
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RGIAgM, f. 498, op. 1, d. 305, ll. 2-3. Factory committee meetings, September through November. ↩
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GARF, f. 7952, op. 3, d. 209, l. 216. Red Guard data in documents on the revolution, n.d. ↩
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M. Akun and V. Petrov, 1917 g. v. Mosvke (Moscow, 1934), 146; GARF, f. 7952, op. 2, d. 276, l. 71; E. D. Tumanov memoir ↩
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GARF, f. 7952, op. 3, d. 276, l. 17. I.F. Toptov memoir. ↩
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GARF, f. 7952, op. 3, d. 271, ll. 46-52. Memoir of V.N. Arapov. 125. ↩
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GARF, f. 7952, op. 3, d. 263, l. 52. Kochergin recollection. ↩
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GARF, f. 7952, op. 3, d. 275, l. 101. M.G. Ob”edkov memoir. 127. ↩
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GARF, f. 7952, op. 3, d. 274, l. 23; d. 276, l. 188. A.F. Kuznetsov, E.D. Tumanov memoirs. ↩
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GARF, f. 7952, op. 3, d. 374, l. 95; 276, ll. 75. V.I. Lebedev and E.D Tumanov memoirs. ↩
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Trotsky, History of the Russian Revolution, 3: 90. ↩
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Koenker, Moscow Workers, 330. ↩
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Trotsky, History of the Russian Revolution, 3: 240-275. ↩
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Revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Rossi v sentiabre 1917 goda (Moscow, 1961); Revoliutsionnoe dvizhenie v Rossi nakune oktiabr’skogo vooruzhennogo vostaniia (1-24 oktiabria 1917 goda) (Moscow, 1962). ↩
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Rabinowitch, The Bolsheviks Come to Power, 291-292. ↩
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Israel Geltzer, Martov: A Political Biography of a Russian Social Democrat (London, 1967), 172. ↩
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Estimates of the number of Red Guards range from six thousand (Koenker, Moscow Workers, 338) to thirty thousand. Rex Wade, Red Guards Workers’ Militias in the Russian Revolution (Stanford, 1984), 296. ↩
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GARF, f. 7952, op. 2, d. 276, l. 71. E.D. Tumanov memoir. ↩
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GARF, f. 7952, op. 3, d. 276, l. 19. I.F. Toptov memoir. ↩
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GARF, f. 7952, op. 3, d. 276, ll. 73. E.D. Tumanov memoir. ↩
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RGEA f. 9597, op. 1, d. 18, ll. 32-3. Guzhon factory history. ↩
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GARF, f. 7952, op. 3, d. 271, ll. 47-8. Arapov memoir. ↩
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GARF, f. 7952, op. 3, d. 276, l. 19. I.F. Toptov memoir. ↩
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Liberal historians continue to confuse this elementary point about 1917. For example, Mark Steinberg, in Voices of Revolution (New Haven, 2001), 56-57, glowingly depicts the liberals as the “obvious choice for power” who supposedly “believed in a society based on law and proper democratic procedure.” Steinberg largely ignores the liberals’ war profiteering, their repeated efforts to thwart popular elections, their anti-Semitism, as well as their repeated efforts to crush the revolution. ↩
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Rabinowitch, The Bolsheviks Come to Power, xxi. ↩