From Revolution to “Coup d’État”

Abstract

In his ukase dissolving the Duma on July 8, 1906, Nicholas decreed that another would be convened the following year on February 20. This chapter begins by describing Lenin’s response to that decree: he took the necessary steps to avoid the “awkward” situation the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party found itself in when the First Duma convened. He was determined that this time the Bolsheviks would contest the elections and be prepared to form a party fraction or group should they be successful. Indeed, the party as a whole made significant gains, and Lenin made every effort to use the Duma “rostrum” to advance what was left of the revolution in order to forge the worker-peasant alliance. Only in hindsight was it clear that not much of the revolution remained in place. The Czar’s dissolution of the Second Duma after only three months in existence registered that fact—the end of the Revolution of 1905.