f the laws governing elections to the Duma; autonomy for
Finland and Poland; the expropriation of state and private lands in the
interest of the peasants; a comprehensive body of social legislation
designed to protect the industrial workers. In a word, the program of the
Duma was a broad and comprehensive program of political and social
democracy, which, if enacted, would have placed Russia among the foremost
democracies of the world.

The boldness of the Duma program was a direct challenge to the government
and was so interpreted by the Czar and his Ministers. By the reactionary
press it was denounced as a conspiracy to hand the nation over to the
Socialists. That it should have passed the Duma almost unanimously was an
indication of the extent to which the liberal bourgeoisie represented by
the Constitutional Democrats was prepared to go in order to destroy
autocracy. No wonder that some of the most trusted Marxian Socialists in
Russia were urging that it was the duty of the Socialists to co-operate
with the Duma! Yet there was a section of the Marxists engaged in a
constant agitation against the Duma, preaching the doctrine of the class
struggle, but blind to the actual fact that the dominant issue was in the
conflict between the democracy of the Duma and the autocracy of Czarism.

The class consciousness of the old regime was much clearer and more
intelligent. The Czar refused to receive the committee of the Duma,
appointed to make formal presentation of the address. Then, on May 12th,
Goremykin, the Prime Minister, addressed the Duma, making answer to its
demands. On behalf of the government he rebuked the Duma for its
unpatriotic conduct in a speech full of studied insult and contemptuous
defiance. He made it quite clear that the government was not going to grant
any reforms worthy of mention. More than that, he made it plain to the
entire nation that Nicholas II and his bureaucracy would never recognize
the Duma as an independent parliamentary body. Thus the old regime answered
the challenge of the Duma.

For seventy-two days the Duma worked and fought, seventy-two days of
parliamentary history for which there is no parallel in the annals of
parliamentary government. For the sake of the larger aims before it, the
Duma carried out the demands of the government that it approve certain
petty measures placed before it for the formality of its approval. On the
other hand, it formulated and passed numerous measures up