of the palace the picture changed. There stood armed guards and at
the orders of the usurpers, the Bolsheviki, they refused to let
the delegates pass into the Tavrichesky Palace. It appeared that,
in order to enter the building, the _delegates had first to pay
respects to the Commissaire, a satellite of Lenine and Trotzky,
and there receive special permission_. The delegates would not
submit to that; elected by the people and equipped with formal
authorization, they had the right to freely enter any public
building assigned for their meeting. The delegates decided to
enter the Tavrichesky Palace without asking the new authorities,
and they succeeded in doing so. On the first day the guards did
not dare to lift their arms against the people's elected
representatives and allowed them to enter the building without
molestation.

There was no struggle, no violence, no sacrifices; the delegates
demanded that the guards respect their rights; they demanded to be
admitted, and the guards yielded.

In the Tavrichesky Palace the delegates opened their meeting; V.M.
Chernov was elected chairman. There were, altogether, about forty
delegates present. They realized that there were not enough
present to start the work of the Constituent Assembly. _It was
decided that it would be advisable to await the arrival of the
other delegates and start the work of the Constituent Assembly
only when a sufficient number were present_. Those already there
decided to meet daily at the Tavrichesky Palace in order to count
all the delegates as they arrived, and on an appointed day to
publicly announce the day and hour of the beginning of the
activities of the Constituent Assembly.

When the delegates finished their session and adjourned, the old
guards had been dismissed for their submissive attitude toward the
delegates and replaced by armed civilian followers of Lenine and
Trotzky. The latter issued an order to disband the delegates, but
there were none to be disbanded.

The following day the government of the Bolsheviki dishonestly and
basely slandered the people's representatives in their official
announcement which appeared in Pravda. That lying newspaper wrote
that the representatives of the people had forced their way into
the palace, accompanied by Junkers and the White Guards of the
bour