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

THIRD ALL-RUSSIA CONGRESS OF SOVIETS465We never had any illusions on that score, and we know howdifficult is the road that leads from capitalism to socialism.But it is our duty to say that our Soviet Republic is asocialist republic because we have taken this road, and ourwords will not be empty words.We have initiated many measures undermining the capitalists’rule. We know that our power had to unite theactivities of all our institutions by a single principle, andthis principle we express in the words: “Russia is declaredto be a Socialist Republic of Soviets.” (Applause.) Thiswill be that truth which rests on what we must do andhave already begun to do, this will be the best unificationof all our activities, the proclamation of our programme, acall to the working people and the exploited of all countrieswho either do not know at all what socialism is, or,what is worse, believe that socialism is the Chernov-Tsereteli mess of bourgeois reforms which we have tasted andtried during the ten months of the revolution and which wehave become convinced is a falsification and not socialism.And that is why “free” Britain and France did all theycould during the ten months of our revolution to prevent asingle copy of Bolshevik and Left Socialist-Revolutionarynewspapers from entering their countries. They had to actin this way because they saw that the workers and peasantsin all countries instinctively grasped what the Russianworkers were doing. There was not a single meeting wherenews about the Russian revolution and the slogan of Sovietpower was not hailed with stormy applause. The workingpeople and the exploited everywhere have already come intoconflict with their party top leadership. The old socialismof these leaders is not yet buried like that of Chkheidze andTsereteli in Russia, but it is already done for in allcountries of the world, it is already dead.A new state—the Republic of Soviets, the republic ofthe working people, of the exploited classes that are breakingdown the old bourgeois barriers, now stands againstthe old bourgeois system. New state forms have been created,which make it possible to suppress the exploiters, toovercome the resistance of this insignificant handful whoare still strong because of yesterday’s money-bags andyesterday’s store of knowledge. They—the professors,