is a weapon which can
only be used effectively on rare occasions. It is impossible to rekindle
frequently and at will the sacrificial passion necessary to make a
successful general strike. This the leaders of the proletariat of Russia
overlooked. They overlooked, also, the fact that the masses of the workers
were exhausted by the long series of strikes in which they had engaged and
were on the verge of starvation. The consequence was that most of the later
strikes failed to accomplish anything like the ends sought.

Naturally, the government was recovering its confidence and its courage in
proportion to the class divisions and antagonisms of the opposition. It
once more suppressed the revolutionary press and prohibited meetings. Once
more it proclaimed martial law in many cities. With all its old-time
assurance it caused the arrest of the leaders of the unions of workmen and
peasants, broke up the organizations and imprisoned their officers. It
issued a decree which made it a crime to participate in strikes. With the
full sanction of the government, as was shown by the publication of
documentary evidence of unquestioned authenticity, the Black Hundreds
renewed their brutality. The strong Council of Workmen's Deputies of St.
Petersburg, with which Witte had dealt as though it were part of the
government itself, was broken up and suppressed. Witte wanted
constitutional government on the basis of the October Manifesto, but he
wanted the orderly development of Russian capitalism. In this attitude he
was supported, of course, by the capitalist organizations. The very men who
in the summer of 1905 had demanded that the government grant the demands of
the workers and so end the strikes, and who worked in unison with the
workers to secure the much-desired political freedom, six months later were
demanding that the government suppress the strikes and exert its force to
end disorder.

Recognition of these facts need not imply any lack of sympathy with the
proletariat in their demands. The class struggle in modern industrial
society is a fact, and there is abundant justification--the justification
of necessity and of achievement--for aggressive class consciousness and
class warfare. But it is quite obvious that there are times when class
interests and class warfare must be set aside in favor of larger social
interests. It is obviously dangerous and reactionary--and therefore
wrong--to insist upon strikes or other forms of class wa