Collected Works of V. I. Lenin - Vol. 26 - From Marx to Mao

382V. I. LENINties, of the Second All-Russia Congress of Peasants’ Deputies,etc.—becoming in fact the slogan of the Cadets andthe Kaledinites and of their helpers. The entire people arenow fully aware that the Constituent Assembly, if it partedways with Soviet power, would inevitably be doomed topolitical extinction.15. One of the particularly acute problems of nationallife is the problem of peace. A really revolutionary strugglefor peace began in Russia only after the victory of theOctober 25 Revolution, and the first fruits of this victorywere the publication of the secret treaties, the conclusionof an armistice, and the beginning of open negotiations fora general peace without annexations and indemnities.Only now are the broad sections of the people actuallyreceiving a chance fully and openly to observe the policy ofrevolutionary struggle for peace and to study its results.At the time of the elections to the Constituent Assemblythe mass of the people had no such chance.It is clear that the discrepancy between the compositionof the elected Constituent Assembly and the actual will ofthe people on the question of terminating the war is inevitablefrom this point of view too.16. The result of all the above-mentioned circumstancestaken together is that the Constituent Assembly, summonedon the basis of the election lists of the parties existing priorto the proletarian-peasant revolution under the rule of thebourgeoisie, must inevitably clash with the will and interestsof the working and exploited classes which on October25 began the socialist revolution against the bourgeoisie.Naturally, the interests of this revolution stand higher thanthe formal rights of the Constituent Assembly, even ifthose formal rights were not undermined by the absence inthe law on the Constituent Assembly of a provision recognisingthe right of the people to recall their deputies and holdnew elections at any moment.17. Every direct or indirect attempt to consider thequestion of the Constituent Assembly from a formal, legalpoint of view, within the framework of ordinary bourgeoisdemocracy and disregarding the class struggle and civilwar, would be a betrayal of the proletariat’s cause, and theadoption of the bourgeois standpoint. The revolutionary