Lenin's Testament
Encyclopedia
Lenin's Testament is the name given to a document written by Vladimir Lenin
in the last weeks of 1922 and the first week of 1923. In the testament, Lenin proposed changes to the structure of the Soviet governing bodies. He also commented on the leading members of the Soviet leadership and suggested Joseph Stalin
be removed from his position as General Secretary of the Soviet Communist Party's Central Committee
.
of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
to be held in April 1923. However, after Lenin's third stroke
in March 1923 left him paralyzed and unable to speak, the testament was kept secret by his wife, Nadezhda Krupskaya, in hopes of Lenin's eventual recovery. It wasn't until after Lenin's death on January 21, 1924, that she turned the document over to the Communist Party Central Committee
Secretariat
and asked that it be made available to the delegates of the XIII Party Congress in May 1924.
Lenin's testament presented the ruling triumvirate
or troika (triumvirate)
(Stalin, Grigory Zinoviev
and Lev Kamenev
) with an uncomfortable dilemma. On the one hand, they would have preferred to suppress the testament since it was critical of all three of them as well as of their ally Nikolai Bukharin
and their opponents Leon Trotsky
and Georgy Pyatakov
. (Although Lenin's comments were damaging to all Communist leaders, Joseph Stalin
stood to lose the most since the only practical suggestion in the testament was to remove him from the position of the General Secretary of the Party's Central Committee.)
On the other hand, the leadership didn't dare to go directly against Lenin's wishes so soon after his death, especially with his widow insisting on having them carried out. The leadership was also in the middle of a factional struggle over the control of the Party, the ruling faction
itself consisting of loosely allied groups that would soon part ways, which would have made a coverup difficult.
The final compromise proposed by the triumvirate at the Council of the Elders of the 13th Congress after Kamenev read out the text of the document was to make Lenin's testament available to the delegates on the following conditions (first made public in a pamphlet by Trotsky published in 1934 and confirmed by documents released during and after glasnost
):
The proposal was adopted by a majority vote over Krupskaya's objections. As a result, the testament didn't have the effect that Lenin had hoped for and Stalin retained his position as General Secretary.
Failure to make the document more widely available within the Party remained a point of contention during the struggle between the Left Opposition
and the Stalin-Bukharin faction in 1924-1927. Under pressure from the opposition, Stalin had to read the testament again at the July 1926 Central Committee meeting. An edited version of the testament was printed in December 1927 in a limited edition made available to 15th Party Congress delegates. The case for making the testament more widely available was undermined by the consensus within the Party leadership that it could not be printed publicly as it would have damaged the Party as a whole.
The text of the testament and the fact of its concealment soon became known in the West, especially after the circumstances surrounding the controversy were described by Max Eastman
in Since Lenin Died (1925). The Soviet leadership denounced Eastman's account and used Party discipline
to force Trotsky, then still a member of the Politburo
, to write an article (see the quote from Bolshevik) denying Eastman's version of the events.
The full English language text of Lenin's testament was published in the New York Times in 1926.
From the time Stalin consolidated his position as the unquestioned leader of the Communist Party and the Soviet Union in the late 1920s on, all references to Lenin's testament were considered anti-Soviet agitation and punishable as such. The denial of the existence of Lenin's testament remained one of the cornerstones of Soviet historiography
until Stalin's death on March 5, 1953. After Nikita Khrushchev
's denunciation of Stalin
at the Twentieth Party Congress in 1956, the document was finally published officially by the Soviet government.
to refer to a set of letters and articles dictated by Lenin during his illness which instruct how to continue the construction of the Soviet state. Traditionally it includes the following works.
legislative powers and changing the nationalities policy which had been implemented by Stalin.
The criticism of Stalin and Trotsky:
Lenin felt that Stalin had a lot more power than he knew how to handle and may be dangerous if allowed to succeed him. In a postscript written a few weeks later, Lenin recommended Stalin's removal from the position of General Secretary of the Party:
By power Trotsky argued Lenin meant administrative power rather than political influence within the Party and pointed out that Lenin had effectively accused Stalin of a lack of loyalty.
In the 30 December 1922 article "Nationalities Issue" or about "Autonomization" Lenin criticized the actions of Felix Dzerzhinsky, Grigoriy Ordzhonikidze
, and Stalin in the "Georgian Affair
", accusing them of "Great Russian chauvinism".
Lenin also criticized other Politburo members. He wrote that
Finally, he criticized two younger Bolshevik leaders, Bukharin and Pyatakov:
Vladimir Lenin
Vladimir Ilyich Lenin was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and communist politician who led the October Revolution of 1917. As leader of the Bolsheviks, he headed the Soviet state during its initial years , as it fought to establish control of Russia in the Russian Civil War and worked to create a...
in the last weeks of 1922 and the first week of 1923. In the testament, Lenin proposed changes to the structure of the Soviet governing bodies. He also commented on the leading members of the Soviet leadership and suggested Joseph Stalin
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...
be removed from his position as General Secretary of the Soviet Communist Party's Central Committee
General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
General Secretary of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union was the title given to the leader of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. With some exceptions, the office was synonymous with leader of the Soviet Union...
.
Document history
Lenin wanted the testament to be read out at the XII Party Congress12th Congress of the Russian Communist Party (b)
The 12th Congress of the Russian Communist Party was held during 17-25 April 1923 in Moscow. This was the last congress of the Russian Communist Party during Vladimir Lenin's leadership, however Lenin was unable to attend....
of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union
Communist Party of the Soviet Union
The Communist Party of the Soviet Union was the only legal, ruling political party in the Soviet Union and one of the largest communist organizations in the world...
to be held in April 1923. However, after Lenin's third stroke
Stroke
A stroke, previously known medically as a cerebrovascular accident , is the rapidly developing loss of brain function due to disturbance in the blood supply to the brain. This can be due to ischemia caused by blockage , or a hemorrhage...
in March 1923 left him paralyzed and unable to speak, the testament was kept secret by his wife, Nadezhda Krupskaya, in hopes of Lenin's eventual recovery. It wasn't until after Lenin's death on January 21, 1924, that she turned the document over to the Communist Party Central Committee
Central Committee
Central Committee was the common designation of a standing administrative body of communist parties, analogous to a board of directors, whether ruling or non-ruling in the twentieth century and of the surviving, mostly Trotskyist, states in the early twenty first. In such party organizations the...
Secretariat
Secretariat of the CPSU Central Committee
The Secretariat of the CPSU Central Committee was a key body within the Communist Party of the Soviet Union and was responsible for the central administration of the party as opposed to drafting government policy which was usually handled by the Politburo...
and asked that it be made available to the delegates of the XIII Party Congress in May 1924.
Lenin's testament presented the ruling triumvirate
Triumvirate
A triumvirate is a political regime dominated by three powerful individuals, each a triumvir . The arrangement can be formal or informal, and though the three are usually equal on paper, in reality this is rarely the case...
or troika (triumvirate)
Troika (triumvirate)
Troika is a committee consisting of three members. The origin of "troika" comes from the term in Russian used to describe three-horse harnessed carriage, or more often, horse-drawn sledge.- Communist states :...
(Stalin, Grigory Zinoviev
Grigory Zinoviev
Grigory Yevseevich Zinoviev , born Ovsei-Gershon Aronovich Radomyslsky Apfelbaum , was a Bolshevik revolutionary and a Soviet Communist politician...
and Lev Kamenev
Lev Kamenev
Lev Borisovich Kamenev , born Rozenfeld , was a Bolshevik revolutionary and a prominent Soviet politician. He was briefly head of state of the new republic in 1917, and from 1923-24 the acting Premier in the last year of Lenin's life....
) with an uncomfortable dilemma. On the one hand, they would have preferred to suppress the testament since it was critical of all three of them as well as of their ally Nikolai Bukharin
Nikolai Bukharin
Nikolai Ivanovich Bukharin , was a Russian Marxist, Bolshevik revolutionary, and Soviet politician. He was a member of the Politburo and Central Committee , chairman of the Communist International , and the editor in chief of Pravda , the journal Bolshevik , Izvestia , and the Great Soviet...
and their opponents Leon Trotsky
Leon Trotsky
Leon Trotsky , born Lev Davidovich Bronshtein, was a Russian Marxist revolutionary and theorist, Soviet politician, and the founder and first leader of the Red Army....
and Georgy Pyatakov
Georgy Pyatakov
Georgy Leonidovich Pyatakov was a Bolshevik revolutionary leader during the Russian Revolution, and member of the Left Opposition.Pyatakov was born August 6, 1890 in the settlement of the Mariinsky sugar factory which was owned by his father, an ethnic Russian, Leonid Timofeyevich Pyatakov.He...
. (Although Lenin's comments were damaging to all Communist leaders, Joseph Stalin
Joseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...
stood to lose the most since the only practical suggestion in the testament was to remove him from the position of the General Secretary of the Party's Central Committee.)
On the other hand, the leadership didn't dare to go directly against Lenin's wishes so soon after his death, especially with his widow insisting on having them carried out. The leadership was also in the middle of a factional struggle over the control of the Party, the ruling faction
Political faction
A political faction is a grouping of individuals, such as a political party, a trade union, or other group with a political purpose. A faction or political party may include fragmented sub-factions, “parties within a party," which may be referred to as power blocs, or voting blocs. The individuals...
itself consisting of loosely allied groups that would soon part ways, which would have made a coverup difficult.
The final compromise proposed by the triumvirate at the Council of the Elders of the 13th Congress after Kamenev read out the text of the document was to make Lenin's testament available to the delegates on the following conditions (first made public in a pamphlet by Trotsky published in 1934 and confirmed by documents released during and after glasnost
Glasnost
Glasnost was the policy of maximal publicity, openness, and transparency in the activities of all government institutions in the Soviet Union, together with freedom of information, introduced by Mikhail Gorbachev in the second half of the 1980s...
):
- the testament should be read by representatives of the Party leadership to each regional delegation separately
- making notes would not be allowed
- the testament must not be referred to during the plenary meeting of the Congress
The proposal was adopted by a majority vote over Krupskaya's objections. As a result, the testament didn't have the effect that Lenin had hoped for and Stalin retained his position as General Secretary.
Failure to make the document more widely available within the Party remained a point of contention during the struggle between the Left Opposition
Left Opposition
The Left Opposition was a faction within the Bolshevik Party from 1923 to 1927, headed de facto by Leon Trotsky. The Left Opposition formed as part of the power struggle within the party leadership that began with the Soviet founder Vladimir Lenin's illness and intensified with his death in January...
and the Stalin-Bukharin faction in 1924-1927. Under pressure from the opposition, Stalin had to read the testament again at the July 1926 Central Committee meeting. An edited version of the testament was printed in December 1927 in a limited edition made available to 15th Party Congress delegates. The case for making the testament more widely available was undermined by the consensus within the Party leadership that it could not be printed publicly as it would have damaged the Party as a whole.
The text of the testament and the fact of its concealment soon became known in the West, especially after the circumstances surrounding the controversy were described by Max Eastman
Max Eastman
Max Forrester Eastman was an American writer on literature, philosophy and society, a poet, and a prominent political activist. For many years, Eastman was a supporter of socialism, a leading patron of the Harlem Renaissance and an activist for a number of liberal and radical causes...
in Since Lenin Died (1925). The Soviet leadership denounced Eastman's account and used Party discipline
Party discipline
Party discipline is the ability of a parliamentary group of a political party to get its members to support the policies of their party leadership. In liberal democracies, it usually refers to the control that party leaders have over its legislature...
to force Trotsky, then still a member of the Politburo
Politburo
Politburo , literally "Political Bureau [of the Central Committee]," is the executive committee for a number of communist political parties.-Marxist-Leninist states:...
, to write an article (see the quote from Bolshevik) denying Eastman's version of the events.
The full English language text of Lenin's testament was published in the New York Times in 1926.
From the time Stalin consolidated his position as the unquestioned leader of the Communist Party and the Soviet Union in the late 1920s on, all references to Lenin's testament were considered anti-Soviet agitation and punishable as such. The denial of the existence of Lenin's testament remained one of the cornerstones of Soviet historiography
Soviet historiography
Soviet historiography is the methodology of history studies by historians in the Soviet Union . In the USSR, the study of history was marked by alternating periods of freedom allowed and restrictions imposed by the Communist Party of the Soviet Union , and also by the struggle of historians to...
until Stalin's death on March 5, 1953. After Nikita Khrushchev
Nikita Khrushchev
Nikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev led the Soviet Union during part of the Cold War. He served as First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964, and as Chairman of the Council of Ministers, or Premier, from 1958 to 1964...
's denunciation of Stalin
On the Personality Cult and its Consequences
On the Personality Cult and its Consequences was a report, critical of Joseph Stalin, made to the Twentieth Party Congress on February 25, 1956 by Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev. It is more commonly known as the Secret Speech or the Khrushchev Report...
at the Twentieth Party Congress in 1956, the document was finally published officially by the Soviet government.
Related documents
This term is not to be confused with "Lenin's Political Testament", a term used in LeninismLeninism
In Marxist philosophy, Leninism is the body of political theory for the democratic organisation of a revolutionary vanguard party, and the achievement of a direct-democracy dictatorship of the proletariat, as political prelude to the establishment of socialism...
to refer to a set of letters and articles dictated by Lenin during his illness which instruct how to continue the construction of the Soviet state. Traditionally it includes the following works.
- A Letter to a Congress, "Письмо к съезду"
- About Assigning of Legislative Functions to GosplanGosplanGosplan or State Planning Committee was the committee responsible for economic planning in the Soviet Union. The word "Gosplan" is an abbreviation for Gosudarstvenniy Komitet po Planirovaniyu...
,"О придании законодательных функций Госплану" - To the "Nationalities Issue" or about "Automomization","К 'вопросу о национальностях' или об 'автономизации' "
- Pages from the Diary, "Странички из дневника"
- About Coöperation, "О кооперации"
- About Our Revolution, "О нашей революции"
- How shall We Reorganise the RabkrinRabkrinRabkrin, RKI or Workers' and Peasants' Inspectorate was a governmental establishment in Soviet Russia and the early Soviet Union responsible for scrutinizing the state, local and enterprise administrations during 1920-1934. It was established on February 7, 1920 to replace the People's...
,"Как нам реорганизовать Рабкрин" - Better Less but Better, "Лучше меньше, да лучше"
Contents of Lenin's Last Testament
The letter constitutes a critique of the Soviet government as it then stood, warning of dangers he anticipated and making suggestions for the future. Some of those suggestions include increasing the size of the Party's Central Committee, giving the State Planning CommitteeGosplan
Gosplan or State Planning Committee was the committee responsible for economic planning in the Soviet Union. The word "Gosplan" is an abbreviation for Gosudarstvenniy Komitet po Planirovaniyu...
legislative powers and changing the nationalities policy which had been implemented by Stalin.
The criticism of Stalin and Trotsky:
- Comrade Stalin, having become Secretary-General, has unlimited authority concentrated in his hands, and I am not sure whether he will always be capable of using that authority with sufficient caution. Comrade Trotsky, on the other hand, as his struggle against the C.C. on the question of the People's Commissariat of Communications has already proved, is distinguished not only by outstanding ability. He is personally perhaps the most capable man in the present C.C., but he has displayed excessive self-assurance and shown excessive preoccupation with the purely administrative side of the work.
- These two qualities of the two outstanding leaders of the present C.C. can inadvertently lead to a split, and if our Party does not take steps to avert this, the split may come unexpectedly
Lenin felt that Stalin had a lot more power than he knew how to handle and may be dangerous if allowed to succeed him. In a postscript written a few weeks later, Lenin recommended Stalin's removal from the position of General Secretary of the Party:
- Stalin is too rude and this defect, although quite tolerable in our midst and in dealing among us Communists, becomes intolerable in a Secretary-General. That is why I suggest that the comrades think about a way of removing Stalin from that post and appointing another man in his stead who in all other respects differs from Comrade Stalin in having only one advantage, namely, that of being more tolerant, more loyal, more polite and more considerate to the comrades, less capricious, etc. This circumstance may appear to be a negligible detail. But I think that from the standpoint of safeguards against a split and from the standpoint of what I wrote above about the relationship between Stalin and Trotsky it is not a [minor] detail, but it is a detail which can assume decisive importance.
By power Trotsky argued Lenin meant administrative power rather than political influence within the Party and pointed out that Lenin had effectively accused Stalin of a lack of loyalty.
In the 30 December 1922 article "Nationalities Issue" or about "Autonomization" Lenin criticized the actions of Felix Dzerzhinsky, Grigoriy Ordzhonikidze
Grigoriy Ordzhonikidze
Grigol Ordzhonikidze ორჯონიკიძე - Grigol Orjonikidze, , generally known as Sergo Ordzhonikidze ; – February 18, 1937) was a Georgian Bolshevik, later member of the CPSU Politburo and close friend to Joseph Stalin...
, and Stalin in the "Georgian Affair
Georgian Affair
The Georgian Affair of 1922 was a political conflict within the Soviet leadership about the way in which social and political transformation was to be achieved in the Georgian SSR...
", accusing them of "Great Russian chauvinism".
- I think that a fatal role was played here by hurry and the administrative impetuousness of Stalin and also his infatuation with the renowned "social-nationalism". Infatuation in politics generally and usually plays the worst role.
Lenin also criticized other Politburo members. He wrote that
- the October episode with ZinovievGrigory ZinovievGrigory Yevseevich Zinoviev , born Ovsei-Gershon Aronovich Radomyslsky Apfelbaum , was a Bolshevik revolutionary and a Soviet Communist politician...
and Kamenev [their opposition to seizing power in October 1917] was, of course, no accident, but neither can the blame for it be laid upon them personally, any more than non-Bolshevism can upon Trotsky.
Finally, he criticized two younger Bolshevik leaders, Bukharin and Pyatakov:
- They are, in my opinion, the most outstanding figures (among the younger ones), and the following must be borne in mind about them: Bukharin is not only a most valuable and major theorist of the Party; he is also rightly considered the favorite of the whole Party, but his theoretical views can be classified as fully Marxist only with the great reserve, for there is something scholastic about him (he has never made a study of dialectics, and, I think, never fully appreciated it).
- As for Pyatakov, he is unquestionably a man of outstanding will and outstanding ability, but shows far too much zeal for administrating and the administrative side of the work to be relied upon in a serious political matter.
- Both of these remarks, of course, are made only for the present, on the assumption that both these outstanding and devoted Party workers fail to find an occasion to enhance their knowledge and amend their one-sidedness.
External links
- Lenin's Last Testament (text)
- On the suppressed Testament of Lenin by Leon Trotsky (written in December 1932, published in 1934, sometimes incorrectly dated as 1926)
- The Trotskyist Opposition Before and Now by J.V. Stalin (1927 Speech Delivered at a Meeting of the Joint Plenum of the Central Committee and the Central Control Commission of the C.P.S.U.(B.) regarding Lenin's "will")
- Lenin's Will - chapter from Another View of Stalin by Workers Party of BelgiumWorkers Party of BelgiumThe Workers' Party of Belgium is a Marxist political party in Belgium. It is one of the few parties that operates as a single Belgian party...
leader Ludo MartensLudo MartensLudo Martens was a Belgian historian noted for his work on francophone Africa and the Soviet Union. Martens wrote on the political history of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, where he has lived and travelled extensively.... - Short article on the Testament from MIA
- 'Forgery of Lenin's Testament' by a Russian Stalinist organisation