Speaking on Dec. 5, 1917, before the Central Executive Committee of the Soviets on the subject of the right of constituents to recall their representatives, Nikolai Lenine, the head of the proletarian Government of Russia, made the following remark: "The State is an institution for coercion. Formerly it was a handful of money-bags that outraged the whole nation. We, on the contrary, wish to transform the State into an institution of coercion which must do the will of the people. We desire to organize violence in the name of the interests of the toilers." The April issue of Current History Magazine contained a general outline of the manner in which the makers of the social revolution applied this principle of Statehood to the solution of various problems of home government. The present article will deal more in detail with some of the acts of the Bolshevist legislators. There is no better way of gaining an insight into the views and intentions of the present rulers of Russia than to study the abundant output of their legislative machinery.

CONTROLLING PRODUCTION

Lenine's Government has worked out an elaborate scheme of State control over national production and distribution as a preliminary step toward the complete socialization of the country's industry and commerce. The semi-legislative, semi-executive organs created for that purpose form an intricate hierarchy of affiliated elective bodies and corporations of a large and ill-defined jurisdiction.

In the first place, there have been instituted so-called Soviets of Workmen's Control, (decree of Nov. 27, 1917.) These are made up of representatives of trade unions, factory committees, and productive co-operatives, and aim at regulating the economic life of industrial plants using hired labor, the control in each enterprise being effected through the elective bodies of the workmen, together with the representatives of the salaried employes. The executive organs of the Soviets of Workmen's Control have the right to fix the minimum output of a given firm, to determine the cost of the articles produced, to inspect the books and accounts, and, in general, to supervise the production and the various business transactions. Commercial secrecy, like diplomatic secrecy, is abolished. The owners and controlling agencies are responsible to the State for the safety of the property and for the strictest order and discipline within the precincts of the establishments. The local Soviets are subordinated to provincial Soviets of Workmen's Control, which issue local regulations, take up the complaints of the owners against the controlling agencies, and settle the conflicts between the latter.

The Central All-Russian Soviet of Workmen's Control issues general instructions and co-ordinates the activities of this controlling system with the efforts of the other administrative organs regulating the economic life of the country.

The members of this central institution of control, together with representatives from each Commissariat (Ministry of State) and also expert advisers, form the Supreme Soviet (Council) of National Economy, instituted by the decree of Dec. 18, 1917. This body directs and unifies the work of regulating the national economy and the State finances. It is empowered to confiscate, requisition, sequestrate, and syndicate various establishments in the field of production, distribution, and State finances. The Supreme Council is divided into several sections, each of which deals with a separate economic phase. Among other tasks devolving upon these sections is the drafting of the law projects for the respective Commissariats. Bills affecting national economy in its entirety are brought before the Council of the People's Commissaries through the Supreme Council of National Economy.

ECONOMIC REGULATION

On Jan. 5, 1918, the Institute of Local Soviets of National Economy was created, "for the purpose of organizing and regulating the economic life of each industrial section in accordance with the national and local interests." Affiliated with the local Soviets of Workmen's and Soldiers' Delegates, they are subject to the authority of the Supreme Council of National Economy. They are made up of representatives from trade unions, factory committees, workmen's co-operatives, land committees, and the technical personnel of industrial and commercial establishments. The inner organization of these bodies is elaborate. There are sections, divisions, (of organization, supply and distribution, labor, and statistics,) and business offices.

Here are some of the functions of these Soviets. They must:

1. Manage the private enterprises confiscated by the State and given over to the workmen, such as, for instance, a number of factories in the Ural mining district.

2. Determine the amount of fuel, raw materials, machinery, means of transportation, labor, &c., needed by the given industrial section, and the amount available in it.

3. Provide for the economic needs of the section.

4. Distribute the orders for goods among the individual enterprises and work out the basis for the distribution of labor, raw material, machinery, &c.

5. Regulate transportation in the section.

6. See to it that all the productive forces should be fully utilized both in industry and agriculture.

7. Improve the sanitary conditions of labor.

LAND COMMITTEES

The activity of the Soviets of National Economy is restricted to the field of industry. Their counterpart in agriculture are the so-called land committees.

The decree relating to agrarian socialization, voted by the Bolsheviki at 2 A. M., Nov. 8, 1917, recommends the use of a certain nakaz, (mandate,) based on 242 resolutions passed by village communities, as a guide in putting the land reform into practice. Article 8 of this nakaz, which is a paraphrase of the agrarian program of the Social Revolutionists, reads thus: "All the land, upon confiscation, forms a national agrarian fund. The distribution of the land among the toilers is taken care of by local and central self-governing bodies. * * * The land is periodically redistributed, with the growth of population and the rise of the productivity of agricultural labor."

For the purpose of putting this program into operation and regulating the economic life of the village generally there have been instituted land committees, (decree of Nov. 16,) one for each volost, (rural district including several villages.) They are to be elected by the population of the district and exist as separate institutions, or function as an organ of the volost zemstvo, wherever this is found. The duties of a land committee are many and complex. It takes inventory of all the land in the district and allots to each village its share of plow land, meadows, and pastures, seeing to it that the land should be equitably distributed among the individual toilers and correctly tilled. It grants lease of lands and waters, not subject to distribution, receives the rent and turns it over to the national fund. It regulates the supply and demand of agricultural labor, takes charge of the forests, fixes prices of timber, receives and fills orders for fuel from the State, and takes the necessary measures to preserve the large, scientifically conducted agricultural establishments.

The delegates of a number of volost land committees, together with representatives of the local zemstvo and the Soviet of Workmen's and Soldier's Delegates, form a county committee. The latter, in its turn, sends a delegate to the Provincial Land Committee. The Main Land Committee, which heads the whole system, is an independent institution on a par with the central State organizations. It is a large group of people, consisting of the Commissariat of Agriculture, together with representatives from the following bodies: The Commissariats of Finance, Justice, and Internal Affairs, the provincial Land Committees, the All-Russian Soviet of Peasants' Deputies, the All-Russian Soviet of Workmen's and Soldiers' Delegates, and the political parties.

NO MORE LANDLORDS

The Bolsheviki have been careful to extend the abolition of private land ownership to city real estate. By a special decree they abrogated the property rights in city land and in those of the city buildings whose value, together with that of the ground they occupy, exceeds a certain minimum, fixed in each municipality by the local authorities, or which are regularly let for rent, although their value does not exceed the minimum. The land and the buildings are declared public property. The dispossessed owners retain the right to use the apartment they occupy in their former property, provided the apartment is worth no more than 800 rubles of rent per annum. In case the value of the apartment exceeds this maximum the former owner pays the difference to the local Soviet of Workmen's and Soldiers' Delegates. All the rent which formerly went to the landlord is now paid to that institution or to the Municipal Council. Not more than one-third of the sum thus collected is to be used to meet the various needs of the community; 10 per cent. of it goes to the national housing fund; the rest forms the local housing fund for erecting new buildings, laying out streets, and making other improvements.

COMPULSORY INSURANCE

Municipal socialization of land values, while manifestly intended to benefit the poorer classes, directly affects all the elements of the city population. Other measures enacted by the Bolsheviki are restricted to the proletariat, and properly belong to the field of specific labor legislation. Thus, a law has been passed limiting the working day in both industrial and commercial establishments to eight hours, and further regulating the work of women and children. Furthermore, a minimum wage of the hired workers has been fixed in each section of the country. But by far the most radical and characteristic innovations launched by the Bolshevist Government in this line of legislation are those relating to compulsory insurance of workmen.

On Dec. 29 there was created the Institute of Insurance Soviets, with an executive organ in the form of a Chamber of Insurance. It is the intention of the Government to introduce compulsory insurance for laborers against sickness, unemployment, invalidism, and accidents. The regulations published so far relate only to the first two forms of insurance. The respective decrees rule that throughout the territory of the Russian Republic all hired workers, without distinction of sex, age, religion, nationality, race, and allegiance, are to be insured against sickness and unemployment, irrespective of the character and duration of their work. Salaried employes and members of liberal professions are not subject to this regulation.

At the moment the workman is hired by the employer he automatically becomes a member of two fraternities. In the event of his illness, one furnishes him free medical aid and a weekly allowance equal to his wages; the other assures him the equivalent of his wages if he loses his employment and becomes an unemployed workman. The latter term the law defines as "any able-bodied person depending for subsistence chiefly upon the wages of his (or her) labor, who is unable to find work at the normal rate of remuneration fixed by the proper trade union, and who is registered in a local labor exchange or trade union." The workmen contribute no dues to the fraternities. The income of the latter consists mainly of the payments made by the employers. The owner of an establishment using hired labor must contribute each week to the health insurance fraternity 10 per cent. of the sum he pays out as wages, and at least 3 per cent. of the same sum to the unemployment insurance fraternity. The administrative machinery of this novel form of insurance is worked out with much detail.

It is natural to ask how the various institutions described above are working, if they are functioning at all. It is clear that the smooth working of a great number of cumbersome and wholly novel administrative agencies in a body politic torn by an unprecedented social upheaval amid the horrors of a twofold war would be little short of a miracle. Moreover, it appears that the Bolsheviki have already grown disappointed in some of their political dogmas, notably in the unrestrained and ubiquitous application of the elective principle. Nevertheless, the query, in its entirety, can hardly be adequately answered at present. The time is not far off, however, when it will be possible to say whether the measures decreed in the name of the dictatorial will of the Russian proletariat have taken root or—and this alternative is more probable—whether they have remained merely codified day-dreams.