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Xerox University Microfilms 300 North Zeeb Road Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106 77-2338 ANTKIEWTCZ, Henry John, 1942- LEON WASILEWSKI: POLISH PATRIOT AND SOCIALIST.

The Ohio State University, Ph.D., 1976 History, Europe

Xerox University Microfilms , Ann Arbor, Michigan 48106

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1976 PLEASE NOTE:

The following dissertation contains broken and indistinct print. Filmed in the best way possible.

UNIVERSITY MICROFILMS LEON WASILEWSKI* POLISH PATRIOT AND SOCIALIST

DISSERTATION

Presented in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree Doctor of Philosophy in the Graduate School of The Ohio State University

By Henry John Antkiewicz, B.A., M.A. *****

The Ohio State University

1976

Reading Committee* Approved t>y

Charles Morley Michael W. Curran Carole R. Rogel Adviser Department of History VITA

January 1, 19^2 . . . . . Born - Hamtramck, Michigan

1959-1963 ...... Regents Scholarship, University of Michigan Ann Arbor, Michigan

1963...... B.A., University of Michigan Ann Arbor, Michigan

1963-1965 ...... Peace Corps« Upper Primary Teacher, Tanzania, Africa

1967 • • M.A., University of Michigan Ann Arbor, Michigan

1967-1968 ...... National Teaching Fellow, Findlay College, Findlay, Ohio

1968-1969 ...... Instructor, Findlay College, Findlay, Ohio

1969-1970 ...... Kosciuszko Foundation Grant, University of ,

1970-1972 ...... Teaching Associate, Department of History, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio

1972-1973 ...... National Defense Foreign Language Dissertation Grant, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio

19 7 3 -I975 ...... Teaching Associate, Department of History, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio

1975 ...... Researcher and Photographer, Labor Education Research Service. The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio 1976 Teaching Associate, Department of History, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio

FIELDS OF STUDY

Major Field: History of . Professor Charles Morley

History of and the . Professor Michael W. Curran

History of M o d e m China. Professor Chang Hao

History of Nineteenth Century Europe. Professor Carole R. Rogel TABLE OF CONTENTS

Page

VITA...... ii

INTRODUCTION...... 1

Chapter

I. YOUTH...... 11

A. The Tradition...... 11 B. Ambience and World View...... 15 C. The ...... 18 D. Education...... 27 E. Career...... 30

II. AND ...... 32

A. Nationalism...... 32 B. Socialism ...... kj C . The Russian Bogey...... 52 D. Austrian Social Democracy...... 58 E. German Social Democracy...... 63 F. Polish Social Democracy...... 72

III. RUSSIA AND RUSSIAN SOCIAL DEMOCRACY...... 83

A. External Problems...... 83 B. Internal Problems ...... 93 C. The Russian Tradition.. 101

IV. POLISH SOCIALISM...... Ill

A. Party Organization...... Ill B. Jews...... 117 C. Galician Ukrainians...... 130 D. Federalism...... 135 Page

Chapter

V. THE REVOLUTION OF 1905...... 1^-7

A. PPS Schisms...... 147 B. Russian Constitutionalism...... 153 C. Russian Socialism and its Polish Supporters...... 161 D. Polish Aspirations ...... 167 E. True ...... 180

VI. ETHNICITY AND NATIONAL INDEPENDENCE...... 185

A. Ethnic Problems ...... 185 B. Wasilewski's Coals...... 191 C. Peoples in Question ...... 196 D. The Ukraine...... 201 E. Che ton...... 209 F . ...... 216 G. Assimilation and Scientific Socialism...... 223

VII. FAILURE OF ...... 230

A. The Polish ...... 230 B. Soviet Russia...... 232 C . ...... 236 D. The Lithuanian Reef...... 24-2 E. War...... 249

CONCLUSION...... 255

ADDENDUM...... 266

BIBLIOGRAPHY...... 267

v INTRODUCTION

If any one nation shows throughout many centuries a will to express itself as an entity in the form of a state, then all attempts to arrest in one way or another thif= r ^sential process on the one hand hinder the formation of class forces, and on the other bring an element of chaos into the general historical development of the world. Mykola Khvyl'ovyi

The restoration of the Polish Republic and the emergence of Soviet Russia produced a violent and bloody war between these two new states at the conclusion of . The

Russo-Polish War of 1920 was a direct result of the animosity built up between the and the Bolshevik

Party, both of which achieved victories in the struggles for power in their respective countries. This dramatic and con­ tradictory struggle between the forces of national liber­ ation on the one hand and the dictatorship of the prole­ tariat on the other has not yet produced its Tolstoi to im­ mortalize it in fiction. Historians have only now begun to ignore the cliches that became current as a result of the

1 obfuscatory propaganda of "both sides in the period of time 1 which led up to this bloodletting.

National propaganda is the easiest type of propaganda

for Westerners to understand, because it is almost entirely based on national conflicts caused by disparate and contra­

dictory ambitions of nations, a situation identical with that

traversed by the emergent nation-states in modem Western history. According to this view, the Russo-Polish con­

flict resulted from the conflicting aspirations of two 2 emerging nation-states coveting the same territories.

The Bolshevik interpretation claims that the Russo-

Polish conflict was a contest between and Russian internationalism. fought on behalf of all workers regardless of nationality, while fought 3 on behalf of all Poles regardless of class.

4 , White Eagle, Red Star (London, 1972) is the most recent and objective treatment of the Russo- Polish War itself from the Polish view.

2 The foremost exponent of this point of view is Hans Kohn in his books entitled The Idea of Nationalism (New York, 1956) and The Age of Nationalism (New Y o r k , I 9 6 2 ).

•^The role of Polish communists here is an obvious exception. The statements of Lenin, Stalin, or any other Bolshevik on this topic are too numerous to cite. See A. Samsonov, ed., A Short History of the USSR (, 1965). Vol. II, p. 88ff. Istoriia SSSR (Moscow, 196?). Vol. VII, p. 5o8ff and W. P. and Zelda K. Coates, Armed Intervention in Russia, 1918-1922 (London, 1935). P* 295ff. The most important document is "Tezisy TsK RKP(b); 'Pol*ski front i nashi zadachi"' ("Theses, CC RCP(b); 'The Polish The propaganda of the PPS (Polska Partia Soc.jalistyczna,

Polish Socialist Party) is the least understood of all the political tendencies in the development of Russo-Polish antagonism. Branded nationalists "by the and viewed as dangerously similar to the Bolsheviks themselves

"by the nationalists, these Polish socialists combined the social aspirations of the one with the patriotic aspirations of the other. Leon Wasilewski was one of the chief spokes­ men of these aspirations. His facility with the pen, his knowledge of languages, his research into the ethnic pro­ blems of eastern Europe, and his rank in the party’s hierarchy all combined in him to produce the chief inter­ preter of the federalism advocated by the Polish Socialist

Party under the leadership of Jozef PiZsudski.

This dissertation is an attempt to understand the lib­ eration propaganda of Leon Wasilewski. To understand his attempt to restore Poland to the map of Europe, one must also understand his position as an implacable foe of the concept of "all the ." He opposed each and every all-Russian stance, tsarist or Soviet, which claimed

Front and Our Tasks*") in G. Belov, ed., Direktivy glavnogo kommandovaniia krasnoi armii (1917-1920): S b omik dokumentov (Moscow, 1969), No. 599* See also Tadeusz Teslar, Propaganda bolszewicka podczas wo.jny polsko-rosy.jskie.i 1920 roku (Warsaw, 1937). 4 suzerainty over such ethnically non-Russian territories as

Red Russia (in Polish ) and Black Russia (on the upper reaches of the Niemen) and such non-Russian peoples as the

Little Russians (Ukrainians, Ruthenians) and White Russians

(Byelorussians). He also opposed the Russian civilizing mission among the western and southern Slavs and inveighed against the justification of Russian eastward expansion under the slogan of Yellow Russia.

Since there is a pervasive fiction that all Poles and

Russians hate each other or that there is a common bond uniting all Slavs, I have spent some time on the development of

Wasilewski*s ideas from the environment of his early youth to the maturity they attained in the socialist movement. I have then attempted to see how these ideas fared in their application to the concrete events of political realities.

The Russo-Polish War of 1920 helped place in perspective four issues fundamental to the understanding of Leon

Wasilewski and his role in the PPS. These issues also shed light on the positions taken by the PPS and its leader

Jozef Pilsudski.

The first issue concerned the compatibility of nation­ al independence and proletarian internationalism. Is there necessary conflict between national independence and working class internationalism? Wasilewski thought not. He denied any inherent conflict for he argued to have internationalism one must have the cooperation of nations. nations 5 would be nations of proletarians. Although Wasilewski did

not cite the Communist Manifesto which described the role

of a class in certain historical circumstances as a nation­

al class, Wasilewski firmly believed that the national

mantle devolved from the gentry to the bourgeoisie, and

after the industrialization, democratization, and enlighten­

ment of society, it further devolved to the proletariat. Ll The proletariat was the final repository of nationality.

This conflict between national independence and class

internationalism raised a corollary problem. Was the quest

for Polish independence, the desire to reestablish a Polish

state, even if along socialist lines, at variance with the

Marxist belief in the withering away of the state? In

reality this was a non-problem for the bolsheviks as well

as the PPS. The withering away of the state was a theoretical

position that had application to some time in the future.

Lenin sought to seize a state through which to introduce

socialism while Wasilewski hoped to create a state for the

same purpose.

Zl "The working men have no country. We cannot take away from them what they have not got. Since the proletariat must first of all acquire political supremacy, must rise to be the leading class of.the nation, must constitute itself the nation, it is, so far, itself national, though not in the bourgeois sense of the word." , The Communist Manifesto (Chicago, 195*0» p. 33* A second issue concerned the distinction "between patriotism and nationalism. Was there any difference between them? Wasilewski always referred to himself and the PPS as patriotic never nationalistic. He used the term patriotism with approbation. Wasilewski was a patriot in the same sense that Jaures in France, Bebel, Liebknecht and Vollmar in Germany, and the Fabians of England were unabashedly patriotic. When the Great War broke out almost the entire membership of the Second International revealed that they were patriots. Furthermore, Marx and Engels themselves sought the unification of Germany, as well as other nation­ al areas, and only the most purblind can describe them as nationalists’. Some of Wasilewski*s best work was directed toward discrediting Polish nationalism. He spent his career presenting the Poles with a socialist alternative to nationalism. The vision of the socialist nation, a nation of workers, was different from the nationalist nation which preserved class distinctions and thus, according to

Wasilewski, preserved injustice.

Wasilewski had studied and understood well the trans­ formation nationalism had undergone from its liberal phase since the to the failures of the Mazzinis in the 1848 revolutions across Europe. The newer nationalism, arising from the ashes of 1848, was devoid of humanitarian feeling and justice. Wasilewski treated with opprobrium the organic, integral, racial, or chauvinistic which all suffered from the disease of national egoism.

These new nationalists were not motivated by the love of

their people but by the hatred of aliens. Throughout his

career, Wasilewski emphasized the necessity of cooperation

with the workers of other nations. To him patriotism was

the antithesis of nationalism and patriotism was not in­

compatible with internationalism.

A third issue raised by Wasilewski*s career and the

Russo-Polish War was whether he and the PPS were really

Marxists at all. The newspapers Wasilewski edited bore the

slogan "Workers of the World Unite" on the masthead. He and

the PPS looked to Marx as the founder of modern socialism.

To the extent that the members of the Second International

were Marxists, Wasilewski and the PPS were Marxists also.

On the other hand, Luxemburg and Lenin pressed for more

militant policies prior to the Great War. They expressed

their disgust at Zimmerwald with Social Democracy’s almost

overwhelming acquiescence to war, and the definition of

Marxism was altered by the Third International; to this ex­

tent neither Wasilewski nor the PPS qualified as Marxist.

Wasilewski, in fact, remained a socialist. The Third Inter­

national derisively called those people socialists or

Social Democrats who did not become communists. The Third

International used the words socialist and Social Democrat

pejoratively. Confusion here is compounded because

Wasilewski's party did not have the traditional words Social Democrat in its name and he spent a good deal of time polemicizing against the established Social Democrats of Germany, -Hungary, and Russia. Thus, while

Luxemburg's followers eventually became communists,

Wasilewski's friends remained socialists. Wasilewski was as much a socialist as Jaures and Bebel (whose was more deeply ingrained than his) as well as Vollmar or the

Fabians (whose Marxism was less deeply ingrained if visible at all). In some concrete respects Wasilewski's socialism was not Marxist at all. Finally, Wasilewski and the PPS drew away from the Second International to the degree that that institution became less responsive to the cause of

Polish independence.

The fourth and final issue concerned Wasilewski's attitude on the broad question of the rights of national­ ities. Was the PPS goal of federalism, the union of a number of nationalities into a state, merely another way of describing the traditional expansionist outlook of the

Polish gentry which had undergone a transformation through industrialization to include the commercial bourgeoisie?

Political expansion beyond national territory can be brand­ ed imperialist. Some confusion arises if the territory sought is ethnic or historical irredenta just acquiring a consciousness of nationality. But this can be only a partly satisfactory answer since it lumps the USA from

British rule to the present, with Russia from Muscovy to the Soviet Union, as well as with Portugal from the

Lusitanian federation to the Salazar state with "overseas provinces" including Timor, Macao, and Mozambique.

Wasilewski's solution to German, Austro-Hungarian, and

Russian imperialism was a federation of states which to­ gether would be strong enough to withstand Germanization

and . This solution was not the traditional

Polish solution of establishing a strong empire over non-

Polish territories to weaken competing empires which was more a nationalist aspiration of the National Democrats.

Wasilewski sought the emergence of a new political organism, a federation of equal peoples, united as socialists, with the industry of Poland and the vast population of the

Ukraine.

In brief, Wasilewski saw the main tenets of his creed and his propaganda as internationalism, patriotism, socialism, and federation. To understand Wasilewski properly one must discard the attempts to force him into the mold of the old-fashioned imperialism of the defunct, eighteenth century gentry Republic or the mold of the New

Imperialism of the turn of the century which was supported even by some socialists in Germany, Great Britain, and elsewhere. Wasilewski belonged more properly to another tradition. He belonged to that part of Polish history which sought liberation through insurrection in the nineteenth century in cooperation with other nations, primarily the Russians, under the 1830 slogan "for your freedom and ours."

The heritage of Poles who fought for freedom on both sides of the Atlantic was never denied by Wasilewski. Wasilewski*s own ideas, based on this heritage, were appropriated by the

Promethean movement which arose in Poland after the Great

War. Prometheism was a plan to break up the Soviet Union by the through inciting and abetting wars of national liberation among nations subject to com­ munist centralism.^ Wasilewski saw himself not as an imperialist but as a foe of imperialism whether tsarist or

Soviet, traditional or socialist. It is ironic that the

Prometheans, who borrowed so heavily from Wasilewski in terms of the importance of national liberation, should emphasize a conception personally detestable to Wasilewski— the unitary, bourgeois, and nationalist state.

^Sergiusz Mikulicz, Prometeizm w polityce II Rzeczyposnolite.i (Warsaw, 1971 )• CHAPTER I

YOUTH

0 Lithuania, my native land.

Mifikiewicz

The national composition of the Lithuanian population is very checkered.

Wasilewski

A. The Szlachta Tradition

Leon Wasilewski descended from a line of szlachta

(gentry), the Woyszwillo, who had originally lived in that

part of Lithuania known as . One member of this

family lost his ability to document his lineage and for a

sura of money purchased his way into the rolls of the

Wasilewski family. Heirs of this branch of the Wasilewski

family had moved to Polish , where both Leon's great­

grandfather and grandfather had been employed as organists

on a large Polish estate. After Leon’s father had married

the estate's Germanized Czech tutor, the Wasilewski family moved to St. , where he gained employment as the

organist at the St. Stanislaus church. There, in the capital

of all the Russias, Leon Wasilewski was b o m in I8 7 0.*

1 # / For material on Wasilewski's life see: Wladyslaw F o b o g - ^ Malinowski, "Leon Wasilewski, szkic biograficzny," Nieuodleglosc. Vol. XVI (1937); Leon Wasilewski, "Moje wspomnienia ukrairiskie," Soohadv. Vol. VII (1932) and "Ze wspomnien," Z Pola Walki. Vols. XVI (1973) and XVII (1974). 11 Throughout the centuries, the Polonized Lithuanian szlachta had become indistinguishable from the Polish szlachta which lived in ethnically Polish lands. The military alliances which followed the personal union of the

Polish and Lithuanian dynastic houses in marriage; the

Lithuanian conversion to Roman Catholic Christianity, which was Poland's religion; the Union of Lublin, which made the

Grand Duchy of Lithuania inseparable from the Polish Crown; the religious Unia (union) which created the Uniate church among the formerly Orthodox Ukrainian and Byelorussian sub­ jects of the Grand Duchy; the trauma of the partitions of

Polish territory by the Prussians, Russians, and Austrians; the failure of the Kosciuszko uprising; and, finally, the

Insurrection of I83I against the — all of these historical events forged a common tradition for the Polish and Lithuanian szlachta and bound them to a common fate.

The cultural and political bonds between the upper classes of the Polish Crownland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania were strengthened in adversity and this same adversity fostered a nostalgic sentimentalism among the szlachta. They looked to the past for the greatness of accomplishments of the rzeczpos-polita (republic or commonwealth) in which their ancestors played major roles. 13 This tradition of cooperation and unity of interests

between the Polish and Lithuanian szlachta. based on common

religious ideals, common enemies, and a common conception of

the value of the rzeczposnolita for their social status,

economic welfare, and political control, encouraged the

szlachta to participate again in rebellion against the Russian

Empire in I8 6 3. While this revolt followed its predecessors

into failure, it had three important results for Poland which

fundamentally changed the political environment. The first was that the szlachta was to be punished with the loss of its lands by confiscation. This occurred mainly, in the so-called kresy (borderlands), inhabited primarily by Lithuanians, Byelo­ russians, and Ukrainians, where the szlachta was not originally 1 • Polish but had been Polonized. Losing its estates, the

szlachta lost the political power and the status to influence

society culturally. Secondly, Polish culture itself became a target of Russian oppression since its main exponent was the patriotic and rebellious szlachta. Roman Catholicism

suffered too, for it bound the peasantry of various ethnic groups to Polish culture. Russification and the spread of

Orthodox Christianity were the solutions of the empire to forestall any such future turbulent outbreaks against the rule

of the . Finally, to make tsarism more palatable to the majority of Poles, land reform was more generous to Polish peasants as a reward for not heeding the szlachta1s call for revolt than to the Russian peasants, only recently freed from 1^ serfdom. This policy had the added attraction of indebting

the tillers of the soil to the tsar for eliminating serfdom

and of recognizing him as the guarantor of their freedom and

lands against the rapacity of their former fedual masters. The political decision of the Russian Empire, on the one

hand, to force an economic wedge between the szlachta and the

Polish peasantry and, on the other hand, to force a cultural

wedge between the Polish or Polonized szlachta and the

Lithuanian, Byelorussian, or Ukrainian peasantry was an ex­

cellent plan tailor-made to hamstring the political ambitions

of the szlachta. This sudden blow to the political pre­

dominance of the szlachta should not obscure the fact that

the szlachta had been steadily losing its monopoly over

political leadership in the nineteenth century, especially in

the urban commerical centers. The Insurrection of I863 it­

self showed that the lower middle class urban elements par­

ticipated actively in the revolt and that the direction of the

struggle for independence from the Russian Empire was passing

. to the middle classes and intelligentsia. In the less eco­

nomically developed areas, especially those without growing

commercial centers, this Insurrection of 1863 followed tra­

ditional patterns of revolt involving primarily the szlachta 2 and at times the peasantry.

2 The impact of the Insurrection of I863 is dealt with by R. F. Leslie, Reform and Insurrection in Russian Poland. 1856-65 (London, 1 9 6 3 )j M. V. Misko, Pol'skoe vosstanie 1863 goda (Moscow. 1962)} and Tadeusz Lepkowski, Polska: Narodzinv nowoczesnego narodu. 1764— 1870 (Warsaw, 19677^ 15 B. Ambience and World View

Leon Wasilewski's father, although by descent a member of the szlachta, was an organist by family profession. Since he was not a member of the typical landowning szlachta. Leon's father was nevertheless influenced by the szlachta tradition of patriotism. He had not participated in the Insurrection of 1 8 6 3, for he had been arrested that year for his anti-

Russian sentiments and spent a few months in prison shortly before the rebellion broke out. The tales of this uprising, told by father to son, deeply influenced Leon in the patriotic szlachta tradition. Leon Wasilewski's reminiscences show the intensity with which he felt the humiliation of Great

Russian domination over Poland. As a child during the Russo-

Turkish War of 1 8 7 7-7 8, young Leon tore the legs off his toy metal soldiers in Russian uniforms to give the advantage to those in Turkish uniforms. When the peace following the war allowed the repatriation of Turkish prisoners of war to the

Ottoman Empire, young Leon traveled to the railway station and presented the departing Turkish officers with flowers.

His father was the major influence in producing a Polish patriot of Wasilewski. Aside from hearing the stories of the kresv szlachta (borderland gentry), who were often as regionally particularistic in sentiment as they were patriotic to the concept of the rzeczpospolita, Wasilewski was in­ fluenced by living physically in the capital of the Russian Empire and receiving his schooling there. His experiences

in St. Petersburg corroborated his prejudices, inherited

from his father, against the Russian Empire which, to the

Wasilewskis, was the most detested of the partitioning

powers. His antipathy toward Austria and may have

been assuaged somewhat by his fond regard for his mother, a

Germanized Bohemian.-^ She spoke no Russian and her Polish

was atrocious. His father forbad her to use the German

language domestically, for he feared Leon's Germanization

as much as his Russification. As a result, the future patriot learned a Byelorussian-influenced Polish at home, and the akcent 'koroniarski'(the standard accent of ethnic

Poland) was strange to him at first. When Wasilewski went to see a Polish play for the first time, he confessed that it was only halfway through the second act that he began to understand the actors' pronunciation. In addition to Polish, his father taught him Latin and his mother taught him German while he learned Russian on his own. Although raised a

Roman Catholic, Leon inherited his parent's strains of anti­ clericalism and religious toleration and eventually turned to rationalism.

3 * , "Tobog-Malmowski, "Leon Wasilewski," p. 1 5. Pobog-Malinowski implies that her influence on her son, aside from the , was superficial compared to the influence exercised by his father. Armed at home v/ith these patriotic ideas and linguistic aptitudes, Wasilewski went to his first school, a private

French school. Then he attended the Siestrzencewicz

(county) school in St. Petersburg which was organized on the

Polish model but used the exclusively for instruction. After a term in the Fifth Petersburg Gymnasium

(a college preparatory secondary school), he attended a private gymnasium. Bored with his gymnasium education be­ cause of incompetent teachers, both Russians and Russified

Poles, and the exclusive use of the Russian language, he did poorly and had to repeat the fourth year. Since Wasilewski was both a bright student and well prepared by his home and early education for intellectual activity, he channeled his energies toward*literature, which he already had been reading from an early age, mastering the Polish and Russian classics.

He mused about a career in literature, and this musing blossomed into a deep interest in languages and the study of

Slavic culture.

Influences upon Leon from the home and his experiences in the Russian educational system began to give his thinking an elementary political direction as he matured. By the time of Alexander II*s assassination, Wasilewski declared: "I was consciously a Pole...under the influence of my father I felt myself a decided democrat." Leon Wasilewski knew who he was and what he disliked. He was only beginning to find the 18 means to express himself. Alongside his interest in the

Slavic area, he noted there grew an "absolute hatred for

Russia...and everything inspired with opposition to the

Russian government or which was forbidden for political reasons evoked c.my3 sympathy." He went so far as to carry with him a photo of Herzen, the great Russian revolu­ tionary writer and friend of the Polish Insurrection of 1863.

Wasilewski also attended the funeral of the Russian satirist

Saltykov-Shchedrin, which became the occasion for a demon­ stration of university youth against the government.

C. The Ukraine

As Wasilewski's interest in the study of the Slavic area and antipathy toward Russia grew, he focused his atten­ tion on the Ukraine. Motivated by his cultural and psycho­ logical environment, Wasilewski became an early Ukrainophile.

A political motivation led him to the Ukraine also, but it was too vague to be more than a general hope or dream.

I became interested in Ukrainian affairs to some extent through intuition, without external stimuli. This interest arose from my anti-Russian frame of mind, in­ culcated at home, and the vague feeling of the necessity of a common struggle of Poles and Ukrainians against Russian domination.

All quotations in this chapter are from Pobog-Malinowski, "Leon Wasilewski" and Wasilewski, "Moje wspomnienia ukrainskie," 19 Ukrainian literature impressed Wasilewski at first in translation and more so after he mastered the language.

Ukrainian-speaking individuals, however, were very rare in

St. Petersburg even if they were ethnic Ukrainians. While at the Russian gymnasium, Wasilewski remembered that

among my friends there were even those whose surnames ended in -enko a typical Ukrainian surname suffix a . They were, however, completely Russified and as a result I could not expect any stimulation leading to interest in Ukrainian culture. On the contrary, it was I, having become interested in Ukrainian matters, who attempted to awaken in them a feeling of being nationally distinct from the Russians, but to no avail.

Leon Wasilewski's profound interest in the Ukraine forced him to ponder the historical role of Poland as over­ lord of half the Ukraine and to arrive at some political conclusions. He was aided in this task by the poetry of the great writer of the Ukraine, .

The anti-Polish mood of Shevchenko's 'Hajdamacy' c Ukrainian Haidamak; a Cossack rebel or bandit => did not deeply impress me compared to the ending of the poem which referred to the Jesuits as the sowers of dissension between Poles and Ukrainians which suited my then very anti­ clerical, democratic mood... On. the other hand, the unfavorable tone of Russian journalism toward the Ukrainians deepened my, I would say political, sympathies to the Ukrainian movement whose importance I in­ stinctively understood.

Seeking more information on the Ukraine, Wasilewski went to the Slavic Bookshop, a St. Petersburg bookstore run by a Croatian patriot and Panslav, Krunoslav Heruc. In this bookstore he had access to a variety of Slavic publications.

He met other Slavs: Bulgarians, , and Slovaks, and he also made the acquaintance of Radovan Kosutic, a Serb. At that time Kosutic was working with the Polish publicist

Erazm Piltz, an active campaigner for conciliation with the

Russian Empire. Although most of the people that Wasilewski met here were interested in Slavs in general, their sym­ pathies were frequently too Russophilic for his tastes.

Yet this was one of the only places which provided infor-

» y ^ mation on the Ukraine and the other Slavic areas. Kosutic happened to be one of the persons who had such information.

He received Slavic newspapers from outside the Russian Empire, and these included not only the Russophile one? ,but also, papers like the Ukrainian nationalist Dilo (Deed) from

Lwow, which did not circulate in Russia but was allowed to

Kosutic for his personal use. Kosutic' let Wasilewski read his collection of the Slavic press and Wasilewski most en­ thusiastically read Dilo. Kosutic', whose sympathies were actually opposed to the official Russian aims and who favored the cause of the more nationalist Ukrainians of Galicia, aided him in translating this paper which mirrored these views. At this time, Wasilewski established his involvement with Galicia and its Ukrainian population. Along with trans­ lations from the Serbian, Wasilewski wrote reviews of

Ukrainian publications in Galicia for Piltz*s Kra.i (Country). 21 Wasilewski used "both the techniques and translations appear­

ing in Dilo as models of reporting and sources of linguistic

information. So began his career as a publicist and a

Slavist.

Through the Slavic Bookshop, Wasilewski made the

acquaintance of Afanasii Vasil'ev, a Panslavist who sought

the expansion of Orthodox Christianity and the adoption of

Church Slavic as the language of the Slavs. He made contact

with the Ukrainians of Galicia, for he felt, as did many

others, the population there was ripe for exploitation by

Russian Panslavism. Through some misunderstanding, he

thought that the newly founded Radical Farty (1890) was

more sympathetic toward Russia than the Nationalist Party.

Vasil'ev obtained Narod (Nation), the organ of the radicals

established by and Mykola Pavlyk, and Wasilewski

secretly read this illegal publication with the aid of

Heruc, who acted as an intermediary. This publication drew

Wasilewski closer toward an interest in the radicalism and

socialism of the influential father of Ukrainian socialism,

Mykhailo Drahomaniv.

Access to the Russophile, nationalist and radical press

of Ukrainian Galicia made Wasilewski an expert of sorts on

that area. His gift of a few copies of Dilo to St. Peters­ burg university students, 'Wasilewski's "first 'real live'

Ukrainians," introduced him to Ukrainians who were interested 22 in their own cultural heritage. Through them, Wasilewski

came to know the Ukrainian students at St. Petersburg

University and their organization, Sich (Cossack fortified

settlement), and its , the "obviously secret" library of Ukrainian publications.

Wasilewski's new Ukrainian friends were Drahomaniv-

oriented. Although sympathetic to this trend, Wasilewski had some reservations.

These reservations had a 'nationalistic* bias. For me the followers of Drahomaniv were too cosmopolitan, too Russophilic while it was primarily its separatism and its elemental anti-Russian nature which drew me to the Ukrainian movement and of which I barely perceived any conscious manifestations among this youth. Above all, I was grieved that the Ukrainian students do not speak among themselves in their mother tongue while I, a Pole, who in addition had never been to the Ukraine, taught myself to speak Ukrainian not at all badly.

Even in this early period, while Wasilewski was still attend­ ing the gymnasium, he believed that a movement with a political character had to reflect the culture of the people with which it was concerned. Since he already considered himself a democrat, only a democratic movement could do this.

Cosmopolitan programs which toned down national aspirations were abstractions and had little relevance to the needs and realities of the common people.

Galicia was the lodestar of the Ukrainian separatist movement for Wasilewski because it attracted the attention of the Ukrainian university students in St. Petersburg.

The Russian Ukrainians could speak village Ukrainian, but more sophisticated ideas were expressed in Russian; in

Austrian Galicia, on the other hand, Galician Ukrainians had

textbooks written in Ukrainian. Wasilewski hoped this fact

would prove to the Russian Ukrainians that the Ukrainian

language too was sophisticated enough to express concepts

previously thought to be expressible only in Russian and

that it would discourage the Russification of the Ukrainians.

To familiarize Russian public opinion with modem Galician

Ukrainian fiction, Wasilewski made a translation of

Nataliia Kobryns'kyi's "Vyborets" ("The Elected Represent­

ative") for the journal Russkoe Bogtstvo (Russian Wealth).

The main sources of knowledge on Ukrainian affairs for

someone living in St. Petersburg, like Wasilewski, were from

Ukrainians who migrated there to work and from Ukrainian publications. Many of the St. Petersburg Ukrainians had been Russified, Ukrainian publications in the Russian Empire were few or controlled by Panslav enthusiasts, and Ukrainian

publications from abroad, especially from Galicia, were fre­

quently inaccessible. On occasion, literature could be

smuggled into Russia by people like Baroness Yexkull, a philantrophist and Ukrainian sympathizer, whose contacts high in the administration allowed her luggage through

customs without inspection. Frequently, more conventional 2k means of smuggling were used. Still, people were the hest and safest source of Ukrainian news and knowledge. A

Panakhvda (requium mass) was held annually on the anniversary

of Shevchenko's death at the ' cathedral followed by a banquet. Leading members of the liberal Russian intelli­ gentsia joined the St. Petersburg Ukrainian colony at these festivities. But probably the most important spark to spread the feeling of Ukrainian nationality within the St. Peters­ burg colony, as elsewhere among Ukrainians, was the appear­ ance of Ukrainian theater troupes which occasionally visited the capital. One could hear or meet actors from the Ukraine and even Galicia who used the on stage and in every day communication among themselves. The troupes were supposed to present a play in Russian (an obligatory section of an evening's performance) along with the one in

Ukrainian. Although the audiences at these performances were not composed of Ukrainian majorities and political and national feeling among the Ukrainians was not highly developed, Wasilewski did participate in one walkout from the auditorium by a few Ukrainian youths in the gallery when the Russian play was announced.

Through his acquaintance with an unusual Russian,

Wasilewski became better acquainted with the actors. A naval staff captain by the name of Vasilii Alekseev requested

Heruc to suggest to him a tutor of the . 25

Heruc recommended Wasilewski, who went to meet his student and found a man who wished to write a history of the Ukraine,

Alekseev was a Great Russian passing as a Ukrainian. He spoke Russian with a Ukrainian accent garnished with a few

Ukrainian phrases. Here, a Great Russian was in the process of becoming a Ukrainian, voluntarily and with panache. He fabricated a legend of a Ukrainian ancestor exiled to Vologda guberniia () for taking part in an anti-Moscow up­ rising. Alekseev shaved, grew a Ukrainian-style mustache, and wore a simulated 's outfit. He gave parties for the Ukrainian youth to which Wasilewski too was invited and opened his house to the actors of the Ukrainian troupes. On one occasion, he created the atmosphere of an authentic ethnic

Ukrainian Christmas celebration. Wasilewski viewed these get togethers as a development in the recognition of Ukrainian national identity, and on every possible occasion he en­ couraged the feeling of Ukrainian separatism.

At the same time that Wasilewski made the acquaintance of Alekseev, he also met K, Arabazhyn, a historian of litera­ ture and a Ukrainian of the Drahomaniv stripe who wished to establish the Ukrainian movement on the basis of socialism and the peasantry. Arabazhyn's group had contacts with the

Galician radicals Franko and Pavlyk and introduced the true

Ukrainian national movement to 'Wasilewski. The result of this information was Wasilewski's study, "New Tendecies Among 26 Galician Ukrainians," published in Russkoe Bogatstvo in

I8 9 3 . Although thankful to Arabazhyn for his information

on the Ukrainian movement, Wasilewski had some criticisms

of his politics.

As a matter of fact, while I sympathized with the social radicalism of the followers of Drahomaniv, I recognized the reactionary quality of the Galicians who sought conciliation with the Poles. At the same time I came to like the anti- Russian nationalism of c other Ukrainians3 ...

Arabazhyn did not use Ukrainian in his daily life and worked

not for the Ukraine but for Russia. Wasilewski jokingly re­

ferred to himself as a Ukrainian 'patriot.' He sought the

’development of an autonomous Ukraine" which he viewed as the

"future ally of Poland in her battle with Russia." He

wished the Ukraine to become a "normal nation" and so he

valued most those tendencies which led to this normalization.

Wasilewski was enthusiastic about the appearance of the first

number of Zanysky (Proceedings) of the Shevchenko Academy of

Sciences in Lwow, because he felt that possession of a

Ukrainian body of knowledge (wlasna nauka), scientific and

academic research in the Ukrainian language, was an element

in establishing a normal nation.

The first article that Wasilewski wrote in Ukrainian

was a comment on Arabazhyn's entry on Galicia in the Russian

Entskiklopedicheskii Slovar' (Universal Encyclopedia). This

article was sent to the newspaper Narod in Lwow. 27 As this was my first article in Ukrainian, I asked the editor to correct my usage. How surprised 1 was when on receiving the issue of "Narod" with my letter, I read the note attached to it by the editor, Pavlyk, who wrote that he changed not a word in the article and ex­ hibits its style as a model for Galician writers.

D. Education

The Serb, Radovan Kosutic, who guided Wasilewski toward a deeper interest in the problems of the Ukrainians had, in the opinion of ’Wasilewski, the perfect way to study Slavistics.

Coming from Novi Sad in Austria-Hungary, Kosutic’ decided to study at the various Slavic universities in , Cracow, and Lwow to acquaint himself better with Czech, Polish and

i • • Ukrainian affairs. Wasilewski decided to follow this example and in the Autumn of 1893» at the age of 23. he left St.

Petersburg for Lwow in Austrian Galicia. While auditing the

Polish lectures at the University of Lwow, he finally learn­ ed to speak the Polish language properly. For a time, he worked there for the Przeglad Wszechpolski (All Polish Review) for which many future National Democrats worked also.

Wasilewski deepened his knowledge of the situation and problems of Ukrainian Galicia through meetings and discussions with Franko, Pavlyk, and other political activists; through discussions with the radical and nationalist branches of the

Ukrainian student movement; and through attending university 28 lectures on Ukrainian topics such as Professor Omelian

Ogonovs*kyi's on Ukrainian language and literature.

Wasilewski wrote an article for Franko's newly established

Zhvtie i. Slovo (Life and Word) on the topic of contemporary developments in the study of folklore. Wasilewski was the only Pole at Ogonovs'kyi's lectures and was extremely sur­ prised when the professor gave a synopsis of his article during a lecture and praised it highly. On the whole,

Wasilewski remembered the professor's lectures as not too interesting and, since they were given right after lunch, the students had to struggle to keep from falling asleep.

Aside from his studies and literary efforts, Wasilewski kept up contacts with both the older radicals, Franko,

Pavlyk, and those with a peasant-oriented view, and the younger ones who leaned more toward socialism and the urban population. Wasilewski was even invited to a party congress, admittedly a small affair, by Franko and Pavlyk.

In the Autumn of 189*1-, Wasilewski decided to go to the

Czech University at Prague but not before he made an ad­ venturous and illegal journey to Kiev for which he was almost arrested. In Prague he attended lectures by Masaryk and made contact with Frantisek ifeho^ by means of a letter of intro­ duction from Franko. &eho3~ was a Czech ethnologist who was interested in the Ukrainians of Galicia, especially the

Huculs, and collected a large number of publications and 29 photographs concerning them. Since Czech society was

primarily Russophile in outlook, it did not view the Ukrainians

as a separate ethnic group from the Russians. Wasilewski noted that the Czechs considered Ukrainophilism as an

'Austrian intrigue* and as a movement which was basically

anti-Slavic.

To counter these anti-Ukrainian tendencies in Czech

thought, Wasilewski spent some time in developing an "anti-

Russian yet integrally Ukrainophilic propaganda" among his wide contacts with Czech youth. By this means he was able

to influence Frantisek Hlava^ek, a future Czechoslovak

diplomat and politican, to the Ukrainophile side.

Mikhail Mikhailovskii, tbe editor of the

Russkoe Bogatstvo, requested Wasilewski to write a column

entitled "Notes from Austria," while he was in Prague.

Wasilewski wrote for this journal, except for a five year hiatus when he was in London, until the Great War broke out

in 191^. Before he left Prague in I8 9 5 , Wasilewski wrote a biography of Drahomaniv who had just died in Sofia. It

appeared in a publication of Masaryk's and later in one

controlled by Pavlyk, and the latter said of it, according

to Wasilewski, that "it was the best foreign necrology of

Drahomaniv."

Following Prague, Wasilewski*s next stop was Zagreb, where he studied Southern Slavic affairs. From here he visited Rijeka (Dalmatia), Ljubljana (), Venice and 30 Budapest. Yet no matter where he was, Wasilewski would try to visit his friends, the Lwow Ukrainians, annually.

Ukrainians and Ukrainian problems continued to dominate his interest. On one visit to Lwow he heard Mykhaiio

Hrushevs'kyi, who had arrived from Kiev to accept the first appointment to the chair of Ukrainian history, deliver his opening lecture.

E. Career

Wasilewski was never graduated from a gymnasium or a university and decided that his version of formal education, his peripatetic scholarship at Slavic universities, was at an end. He needed a career. His interest in ethnology, focused on the Slavs but particularly the Ukrainians, could have easily led him to a career in ethnography. He could have also pursued a career in belles-lettres or literary criticism with emphasis on the Slavic tongues.

Although Wasilewski never abandoned interest in either ethnology or literature, his choice of career drifted in a different direction. Wasilewski was keenly aware of politics and deeply concerned with the fate of Poland. He decided to join the Polish socialist movement with the express aim of resurrecting an independent Poland by revolutionary means.

He became a propagandist, pamphleteer and polemicizer for the Polish cause. His unlikely choice of ideology for Polish independence was Marxist socialism and not nationalism. Wasilewski saw as his task to attempt to bridge the gap between a people's desire for national recognition and their duty to socialist internationalism. The Poles were a nation bereft of their state. The Ukrainians were an ethnic group which should be encouraged to develop a nation­ al identity. Both groups were hindered in their aspirations by tsarist Russia. They had a common enemy and, so Wasilewski felt, they were natural allies. CHAPTER II

NATIONALISM AND SOCIALISM

The patriot loves his own country. The nationalist hates all countries but his own.

Lord Cecil

A. Nationalism

As Leon Wasilewski*s interest in active politics

burgeoned, he established contact with a large variety of

political organizations. Toward the turn of the century,

political activity was more open and diverse in Galicia

than in the other two Polish partitions. In Lwow, its

capital, the most active Polish cultural and political

center of all Poland, Wasilewski decided to join the Liga

Narodowa (National League). Founded in 1893, it was a

progressive organization comprising many political tendencies with the goals of independence and democracy. This same

organization evolved into the National Democracy of Roman

Dmowski by 1897 and would constitute the single most im­

portant mass party in opposition to the PPS up to the

cataclysm of WW II. The supra-party National League, as well as the relative freedom of the politically vibrant

LwiSw, attracted many Poles, especially from the somnolent and oppressive Russian partition.

32 33 Quickly disillusioned with the National League,

Wasilewski did not publish an analysis of its deficiencies until 1 9 0 2 .* Basically, he claimed the movement had lost its oppositional character. As the National League deveop- ed into the National Democracy, it achieved a popular following centered on its newspaper Frzeglad Wszecivpolski

(The All-Polish Review). Its following grew fast especially among the youth. As a mass movement, it was based on the people, but, in reality, according to Wasilewski, it was an elitist movement concerned with the intelligentsia. The leadership, the urban intelligentsia, was using the masses to pursue its own ends. Originally, the National League and the National Democrats had called for insurrection.

Now they were afraid of the word. Their call for Polish in­ dependence therefore rang hollow. Wasilewski saw their slogans as empty rhetoric festooning opportunistic aims.

Their duplicity was underscored by their propaganda. The

All-Polish Review, their newspaper for the urban intelligentsia, came out against the Boers in the Boer War while Polak (Pole). their newspaper aimed at the peasantry, supported the Boers.

1B. czl. L. N, (A Former Member of the National League) cLeon Wasilewski:? , "Rzecz otzw. Narodowei Demokracyi" ("The Problem of So-Called National Democracy'* , Przedswit. Nos. ^-11/12 (1902). 3^

Just as their attitude toward independence was thus exposed "by thier duplicity in regard to the various social strata to which they appealed, their attitude toward democ­ racy proved to he equally suspect. Instead of struggling for the rights of the people, the NDs complained ahout ha.jdamaczyzna (banditry) and class-struggle. As their support of democracy waned, their primary concern, and especially Dmowski's, was a transformation of their organ­ ization to nationalism on the Prussian order at the expense of the liberal traditions of democracy and the mass character 2 of socialism.

2 On the problems of German liberalism see Leonard Krieger, The German Idea of Freedomi History of a Political Tradition (Boston, 19577- According to George Lichtheim, Marxism: An Historical and Critical Study (New York, 1970) 2nd ed. rev., pp. 58^ 82-63» Marx supported the liberal bourgeoisie*s attempts at German national unification, the Bismarckian solution of the north, while he abandoned the attempts of German democracy, the burghers, artisans and peasants of the south and west, to attain the same national unification. If the English and French idea of liberty was the freedom of the individuals of the nation from excessive government interference and the German conception of liberty was the freedom of German individuals to act within the state structure to attain the unity of the nation, then the Polish idea of liberty was the right of the individuals of the nation to pursue the freedom to have a state which would act on behalf of the sovereign nation. Needless to say, Wasilewski faced the same real dilemma of national unifi­ cation that Marx didt should unity be based on liberalism or democracy? Wasilewski more firmly chose democracy but did not eschew the aid of liberalism to gain Polish inde­ pendence. Wasilewski was most disturbed by the rise in the pop­ ularity of nationalism, its capture and perversion of the honorable tendencies of the National League, and the trans­

formation of this organization into a National Democracy based on the worst traditions of Prussian-German nationalism.

This tendency had already been labeled "national egoism" and

Wasilewski heartily agreed with this characterization of the

ND program. National Democracy, the embodiment of national

egoism, challenged the older concept of patriotism! regard

for the fatherland and its liberties. Wasilewski had a

strong distaste for the organic or integral nationalism then prevalent in central and western Europe, but he did differentiate between two categories of nationalism.

Nationalism developed either from inner wellsprings of strength or from aggrandizement of other nations. Wasilewski said the NDs were guilty of developing in the latter manner.

Wasilewski was a patriot and not a nationalist. He could heartily agree with Sir Norman Angell, the British

journalist and economist writing in the 1 9 3 0 s, on nationalism:

Political nationalism has become for the European of our age the most important thing 36

in the world, more important than civili­ zation, humanity, decency, kindness, pity; more important than life itself.3

Wasilewski was a patriot in the same sense that the members of the Second International were patriots. Patriotism is a feeling, an emotion. Nationalism is an ideology. Chau­ vinism (akin to jingoism) is excessive or "blind patriotism and it historically preceeded nationalism. The French con­ tribution to the m od e m definition of nationalism was the twist A. M. Barres gave it in the 1890s in the context of the Boulanger and Dreyfus affairs. Barres advocated complete loyalty to the state despite scandal or injustice to protect the nation. Charles Maurras added monarchy as the concept which united all national sentiment into an integral whole.

The German contribution to the idea of modem nationalism evolved from Herder and the reaction to the cosmopolitanism i and universalism of French philosophy. This was the organic conception of the nation although the word itself was not used until much later. The failure of the 1848 Revolutions, the writings of Heinrich von Treitschke from the 1860s, and those writers who compared the body politic to a living

•^Robert R. King, Minorities under Communismi Nationalities as a Source of Tension Among Balkan Communist States (Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1973) p. "57 37 organism added a new dimension to what had been patriotism and produced organizations like the Hakata in Prussian

Poland. The Austrian nationalists contributed a virulent anti-Semitism to the definition of m o d e m nationalism. The

Polish nationalists, the NDs, were unimpressed with the appeal to a monarchy but they were quite taken by the organic and integral aspects of nationalism. They even succumbed to anti-Semitism. As this definition of nationalism arose in

Europe at the turn of the century, Wasilewski, members of the PPS, and other like minded people recoiled in horror and sought to present a decent alternative to those who passion­ ately believed in the national struggle but could not stomach nationalism.

The words nation, nationality, nationalism, national liberation, people, fatherland, and patriotism are used synonymously and indiscriminately. However, nationalism at the end of the nineteenth century became an ideology that was qualitatively different from the emotion of patriotism

James Joll, The Second Intemational. 1889-1914 (New York, 1956); Krieger, The German Idea of Freedom, esp. Ch. 5» Michael Curtis, Three Against the Third Re-public 1 Sorel, Barris and Maurras (Princeton, New Jersey, 1959) esp. pp. 242-54i P. G. J. Pulzer, The Rise of Political Anti- Semitism in Germany and Austria (New York, 1964) Chs. 14-20, 22; , My§li nowoczesriego Polaka (London, 1953) which originally appeared in 1903i and for national liber­ ation during the Napoleonic era see Hans Kohn, Nationalism. Its Meaning and History (Princeton, New Jersey, 1955) pp. 32-34. once it ceased to "be a means to achieve a specific political

and (the liberal state at and national unification at

Frankfurt and Rome in 1848, also national independence at

Warsaw in I8 6 3) and became the end itself. The patriotic

value of nationality in attaining political goals was re­

placed by the nationalist idea that all political goals

emmanated from nationality. This can be clearly seen in the

development of the National Liberals in Germany, the Action

Fran^aise in France, and National Democracy in Poland. Al­

though there are vast differences*among these parties, they

have in common the fact that nationality is ideological.

Nationalism is its own reason for existence.

The Prussians had taught their lesson too well. The NDs

followed the lead of the German Hakata. This was an economic

and cultural organization which lobbied for expansion of

ethnic German interests against the Poles. The policies of

the Hakata revolved around the extension of the German

Besitzstand (property holdings) in non-German or ethnically mixed areas adding to the patrimony through legalistic,

economic and cultural confrontation. Paralleling the

Haikatist attitude toward the Poles, the NDs focused their

animosities on the Ukrainians of Galicia. In both cases,

Wasilewski concluded, the Hakati'sts and the NDs used an

organic conception of nationalism to justify the extension

of the national patrimony through the use of intimidation

and force against other ethnic groups. National egoism was reactionary. 39

The NDs were not even sincere in their nationalism, for they did not have an all-Polish apparatus. They concen­ trated on the Russian partition, acclimated themselves to their Galician exile, and ignored Poznan. In their various political maneuvers, they allied themselves with all sorts of opportunists, clericals and.reactionaries. In effect, for Wasilewski, Dmowski and his NDs were opportunists par excellence.

Wasilewski noted that the NDs evolved curiously in their Galician exile. They began by attacking the Polish conservatives* the Polish parliamentary ko2:o (circle) in

Vienna, the Polish government and Diet in Galicia, and the

Cracow Conservatives or stanczyks. At first the NDs espoused the cause and sought the support of the urban youth and the peasantry. Then the NDs withdrew their support from the urban youth when they became more interested in socialism. ND ardor for peasant populism cooled also, and they decided that the populists had fulfilled their historical mission and were now redundant. What had transpired, claimed

Wasilewski, was that the NDs quickly became a part of local

Galician politics. Their exile in the Galician Piedmont marooned them in a locality separated from other Poles be­ cause of their growing timidity. They exchanged their all-

Polish character for a safe existence under the Hapsburgs.

They even came to support the very conservatives they pre­ viously railed against. Marxist analysis allowed Wasilewski to pinpoint the ex­ planation of this mysterious development by finding the class basis of the N0s support. They quickly shifted to the right because of the realities of the Galician situation and began to represent exclusively the urban middle classes, the in­ telligentsia. They lost support of the urban youth and peasants when they tempered their program. But in tempering their program, they gained the support of the conservative large landowners. Thus did the NDs become reactionary according to Wasilewski, for they made an alliance with the class regarded as the most reactionary to Marxists, the one based on exploitation and perquisites of caste. As the PPS was a class party based on the proletariat, so the NDs be­ came a class party based on the urban intelligentsia and landowners. The NDs represented privilege and opted out of <5 the opposition.

The bitterness with which Wasilewski came to regard the NDs must also be understood through his previous contact

^Wasilewski exaggerated the ND loss of peasant or urban youth support. In fact Wasilewski*s concern with the con­ tinued ND attractiveness to peasants and urban youth, as seen in the copious propaganda on the subject, belied his claim that they had ceased to support this party. with them.^ As the PPS and NDs came into violent conflict, their polemics declined in tastefulness. Previously, the

NDs had tried to point out the errors of the ways of the socialists "hut did not attack them with clothing in tatters like Mr. Ostoja, nor with a foaming mouth like

Mr. Dmowski, now with a pail of filth in hand like 7 Mr. Poplawski."' The original ND hope to use the PPS as its auxilliary, as a means of approaching the proletariat while circumscribing PPS activities exclusively to this class, had failed. Only the PPS, Wasilewski claimed, was the true representative of a modern, progressive and united

Poland.

This metamorphosis from patriotism to nationalism irritated Wasilewski. Dmowski was trained as a physician and was easily attracted to the organic concepts of nationalism. Wasilewski was heir to a different tradition.

For him, patriotism was loyalty to oatria (country) and respect for libertas (liberty). In this regard, Wasilewski was very much influenced by a classical European political tradition. It was traceable to the pre-partition

Adam Prochnik, "Leon Wasilewski w Polskim ruchu socya- listycznym," Nleoodlegldsc, Vol. XVI (1937)» p. 120. He claims that this was the only organization Wasilewski joined in Lwow and that the "not entirely clear circumstance" of his participation in it ever was fully explained. Of course, these articles are an apologia and act of contrition on Wasilewski*s part for association with such a group.

'7rWasilewski» » "Rzecz o N. D.," No. 10, pp. 371-72. The men mentioned were prominent ND propagandists. 42 rzeczpospolita (the Polish Commonwealth, res publica, or gentry republic), the medieval Holy Roman Republic (or more commonly, Empire), the ancient Roman Republic, and the

Greek polis. Patriotism evoked a long and glorious

European tradition, the fruit of centuries and millenia of political life, in contrast to the barbarism of despotism.

The nationalists abjured this enlightened tradition.

The French Revolution dramatically marked off the era

in which liberty was a privilege of the few extended by ruler to subject and the era in which liberties were guaranteed to all citizens as rights held equally before the law. Due to the economic transformation of Europe produced by capitalism,

society was being reorganized according to the principle of

all.citizens having equality before the law. The pride of

European civilization became justice. The nationalists were

discarding both equality and justice for ethnical primacy.

Patriotism, therefore, was not an archaism beckoning

Wasilewski and his ilk backwards in time to a szlachta Com­ monwealth. It was an idea which had spread from the demo­

cratic Polish szlachta. which had fulfilled its historical role according to Wasilewski, to the new basis of society, the working class. 43

For Wasilewski, then, nationalism was opposite to patriotism in focus and the negation of its spirit.

National Democracy was not even truly Polish;

Abondoning all the ideals of past Polish democracy, the NDs began to import into Poland that which blemishes and shames the societies of western Europe* hakatism with all its, even the most minute, characteristic features from Berlin; barbarous anti-Semitism from Vienna; and the slogan ’nationalism' from Paris.®

National Democracy was not only a failure as an opposition movement, but it was also a perversion of the ideal of justice.

B. Socialism

Polish independence was the prime concern of Leon

Wasilewski. Patriotic organizations like the National

League attracted him because they had this same goal in mind.

Once, however, nationalism replaced patriotism in this organization, that is once the ideals of justice and humanitarianism of Mazzini were replaced with the egoism, hatred, and hubris of Treitschke, Barres and the Austrian anti-Semites, Wasilewski withdrew from it. The only alternative for him was to turn to socialism. In its

8Ibid., No. 11/12, p. 420 collectivist outlook socialism offered an answer to the organization of the liberation struggle which was congenial to him. Marxism was the most impressive of the socialist schools of thought, and Wasilewski unashamedly acknowledged that he was drawn to Marxism not for its theoretical dis­ cussions of socialism hut for the facts that it favored

Polish independence and was a vital revolutionary force.

Wasilewski*s Marxism was much like the Marxism of Jean

Jaures.^

Although Jaures was trained in philosophy and had studied Marx as an academic, both he and Wasilewski shared the feeling that a patriotic love of the nation was not con­ tradictory to internationalism. Here they agreed with the liberal patroit Guiseppe Mazzini who sought the unification of Italy. But Wasilewski and Jaures were socialists and claimed additionally that patriotic love of nation was not contradictory with socialist internationalism either.

Jaures once said, "I find men mediocre who are unable to recognize in the present the accumulated force of the gran­ deurs of the past and the gauge of the grandeurs of the 10 future." The progressive aspects of a people*s history

^Harvy Goldberg, The Life of Jean. Jaures (Madison, 1 9 6 2 ).

lOjohn Bowie, Politics and Opinion in the 19th Century; An Historical Introduction (New York, 195*0, p. 4-40. 45

were nothing to he ashamed of. The republican revolutionary

tradition in France and the szlachta insurrectionary

tradition in Poland were positive historical experiences of

the two nations. It was up to people like Jaures and

Wasilewski to see that these traditions not be lost to

socialism.

Marx himself was no patriot in this sense. As a matter

of fact he consistently emphasized class solidarity over national solidarity. Jaures and Wasilewski are not today

recognized as direct lineal descendants of Marx in their

respective countries, that honor falling to Jules Guesde and

Rosa Luxemburg. Still, Wasilewski and Jaures were heirs of

the Marxist tradition if only in its cadet brances, in the

same way the Second International is regarded as Marxist.

Marx differed from the socialists of the Second Inter­ national, Jaures, and Wasilewski in two other ways. One

concerned justice. To the likes of Wasilewski and Jaures,

justice was a proper and positive goal. To Marx justice was a transitory ideal that changed with the changes in the 11 economic substructure. It was much wiser to concentrate

on real and material issues, claimed Marx, than on the

illusory goals of sentimental humanitarianiasm. But the

justice of the Dreyfusard's cause in defending the republic

11 Isaiah Berlin, Karl Marx: His Life and Environment (London, 1973)» P* 9. k6

and the justice of the PPS cause in espousing national lib­

eration and cooperation with other enslaved nations evoked

a real political response from the French and Polish people.

Marx did not ignore the appeal of justice and he willingly

exploited such a sentiment for his political ends. Unlike

Wasilewski or Jaures, Marx did not find justice an end in

itself.

Another area of contention between Marx and the Marxists

of the Second International, Jaures, and Wasilewski concerned

the dialectical method of analysis. Marx never abandoned the

dialectical approach to thinking. Neither Wasilewski nor

Jaures used this methodology rigidly nor dogmatically.

They did abandon it to a great degree but not entirely like

Bernstein and the revisionists. Jaures kept it as a living

and changing general framework. He always tried to unify and not to split it. Wasilewski retained it inso­

far as it upheld the necessity of revolution which to him

always meant a social struggle for the liberation of

Poland.

The application of the dialectical method tied into

another related aspect of Marx's thought. Marx detested

liberalism and would never compromise with it because it

diluted the revolutionary desire to change society,

violently if need be. The essence of liberalism is com- promise and peaceful resolution of problems. Marx wanted to 12 change society not reform it. Jaures entered parliament

to change society peacefully as well as to save the re­

public. Wasilewski, devoid of the opportunity to enter such

an institution of the liberal state, praised very highly all

the trappings of the liberal statei voting, majority rule,

parliamentary government, liberties, and minority rights.

The Marxism of the Second International to which

Wasilewski was attracted was different from the Marxism of

the Luxemburgs, Guisdes, Lenins, and later the Gramschis

especially regarding patriotism, justice and compromise.

Yet Wasilewski, like Jaures and many others, if not quite a

Marxist was a socialist. He believed in a collective society

that respected the individual and he foresaw the eclipse of

capitalism. Socialism provided not only justice for the

working people of Poland but for the people of Poland as

Poles as well. Nationalism, emerging as an ideology counter

to socialism at the end of the nineteenth century, was anti­

thetical to Wasilewski*s view of humanitarian!sm and justice

for all people. As socialism was vital and positive, nationalism was blind ethnocentric, and bankrupt.

If National Democracy offered no real solution to

Poland’s problems, the socialists, the PPS, did. Wasilewski

became well acquainted with the program of the PPS through

its paper Przed^wit (Dawn) during the early 1890’s. He had

12Ibid., p. 10. ^8

seen this paper in St. Petersburg, where he received it from both Russian and Polish friends sympathetic to social­

ism. Although he was impressed by socialism, he was not

thoroughly convinced by it.

I had not yet penetrated very deeply into the very substance of socialism. I was attracted more by its revo­ lutionary and conspiratorial aspects than by its theory. I was a sincere democrat but then I did not yet appreciate the position on class struggle and I did not wish to read Marx's 'Capital', which had then appeared in Polish translation, be­ cause it bored me.^3

In Lwow, he had had close contacts with populist ac­

tivists but in the long run socialism attracted him most.

Two points convinced him to enter the socialist movement and

dedicate his life and talents to it. First, since its found­

ing in 1892, based on the Paris Program formulated by Polish

socialists abroad, the PPS consistently advocated an inde­

pendent Poland made up of all three of the partioning powers'

Polish territories. To a man of Wasilewski's temperament,

the PPS program was just while the ND program was iniquitous,

opportunistic, and chauvinistic. Second, the ideology of

the PPS was based on the thought of the two , Karl

Marx and Friedrich Engels, who provided a theory of action

and an organizational structure to implement goals in the m o d e m world. What is more, Marx and Engels frequently ad-

■^Prochnik, "Wasilewski," p. 116. vocated Polish independence as a progressive step against the reactionary and oppressive Russian Empire, which they perceived to be the main threat to the development of socialism in Europe, preserving, as it did, the status quo and being its main prop. The populists lacked a dynamic program and the NDs focused on Germany as the main enemy.

The PPS had an ideology, and organization, and an all-Polish field of vision.

An array of Polish socialist parties was b o m in the

1880's. The Polish Socialist Party (PPS) which preached socialism and national liberation was almost immediately racked by a split, which produced Rosa Luxemburg's SDKPiL.

The SDKPiL opposed national liberation and sought close co­ operation with German (SPD) and Russian (RSDRP) Social

Democracies. The German SDs were losing their sympathy for

Polish independence at the close of the century and the

Russian SDs never had much interest in Polish liberation.

Toward the end of the decade a third Polish party emerged in

Austrian Poland, the PPSD. It was rather provincial, con­ centrating on the Poles of Galicia, and generally in the mold of the parent Austrian Social Democracy. The issue which kept these socialist parties from agreement with each other was whether national liberation was compatible with 50 i/j, social change. Wasilewski thought it was.

Wasilewski worked among the PPSD members and came to

know many of them quite well, especially Ignacy Daszynski,

their leader. He esteemed Daszynski highly, especially since

he attacked the anti-Polish position taken by Rosa Luxemburg

at the meeting of the Socialist International in Zurich in

1893-

It was in I896 in St. Petersburg that Wasilewski read the PPS resolution on independence presented at a meeting of the International in London. He discovered that a member of

that PPS delegation was traveling through the Russian Empire

and would soon speak secretly on that meeting. Wasilewski went to hear the speaker, a comrade Wiktor, who was in reality Jozef Pilsudski. That same year Wasilewski went to

Zurich where he met many leading socialists and finally made

the decision to join the ZZSP (Zwi^zek Zagraniczny Soc.ialistow

1 lb The Austrian Social Democracy, Sozialdemokratische^ Partei Oestereichs, active since 1 8 9 0 , formally split their party into its six ethnic constituent parts in 1897. Polish Social Democracy of Austria, active since 1892, emerged as the Polska Parti.ia Soc.ialno-Demokratyczna (PPSD). Polish Social Democracy also emerged in the Russian Empire as Soc ialdemokrac.ia Krolestwa Polskiego i Litwy (SDKPiL) in 1893. . v. Russian Social Democracy appeared a s Rossiiskaia Sotsial*-Demokraticheskaia Rabochaia Partiia (RSDRP) in 1898 and solidifying in 1902. German Social Democracy, Sozialdemokratische Partei Deutschlaiids (SPD); the oldest of the SD parties, was legalized in 1890. 51 Polskich. Association of Polish Socialists Abroad, which

was a PPS auxiliary. Pilsudski, who was asked for a char­

acter reference for Wasilewski, wrote that he was "congenial

and intelligent" but "he keeps contact with all the devils

on earth" in order to study their political movements.^

By the end of 1896 he was accepted as a ZZSP member.

Wasilewski brought with him into the ZZSP, and eventually to

the PPS, an insistence that the future independent Poland

should consist of the Polish land of all three partitioning

powers, and, what is more important, "a knowledge of 16 nationality problems." Both these items would aid him

in emphasizing that the national liberation of Poland de­ pended on the cooperation of other subjugated nations. The articles which he wrote for the ZZSP organ Przedswit showed that he had journalistic abilities. A reorganization of the

editorship of Przedswit brought him the job of editor against the wishes of Pilsudski who considered him a neophyte.

He was also elected to the ZZSP Centralizac.ia (executive).

Thus, within a year of his joining the Association of

Polish Socialists Abroad, Wasilewski attained two important posts in it. In 1 8 9 8 , he moved to London to take up his

duties as editor.

■^Leon Wasilewski, Jozef Pilsudski jakim go znalem, (Warsaw, 1935). p* 9.

*^Prochnik, "Wasilewski," p. 12^. 52

C, The Russian Bogey

The ideas in the articles which Wasilewski had sent to

Przedswit before joining the party and which he advocated while he was its editor began to develop in a more concrete and structured manner into the train of thought that he would use to propagate the cause of the PPS independence movement for the rest of his life. His first article, even before he joined the party, was sent to Przedswit while he was at the University of Zagreb during the academic year

1895-96* The themes in this article would recur throughout his career.

Entitled "Our objectives in the face of Russophile

Tendencies among the Slavs," the article began by noting the trepidation with which European socialists viewed the Russian

Empire. To them it was the major obstacle to the rise of socialism in Europe. He tied this thought to the plight of the Polish working class by claiming that "the conscious

Polish proletariat understood very well that the main and most 17 dangerous enemy of freedom movements is Russian tsarism."

The tone was set by identifying Polish interests with the general European fears of tsarism as the enemy of freedom and socialism. In this tone, a plea was hidden for the West to recognize or reaffirm that Poland is a part of the great

17 ^ St. Os...arz cLeon Wasilewski'a , "Nasze zadania wobec pr^dow moskalofilskich wsrod Slowian," Przedlwit, No. 5 (1898), p. 2. Western tradition of civilization. Wasilewski feared that this was a fact easily forgotten by Realpolitikers who attempted to discount the attempts of small states or state­ less nationalities to assert or reassert themselves in the m o d e m world dominated by industrialized great powers.

Many people, socialists among them, said the Russians were not a part of the European tradition but were a civilization of the Asiatic and despotic type. Wasilewski was never so explicitly crude. However, he would heartily agree with this generalization. After he became actively interested in socialism, he carefully differentiated between peoples and states. Character assassination of entire peoples was the forte of the nationalists not the socialists.

Wasilewski, the PPS, and Poles in general succumbed, and still do, to a euphoric feeling of superiority to the

Russians. That they did so from feelings of antipathy for alien ways, folk antipathy, is understandable for it is the character flaw of any national group. A feeling of hatred for the conqueror was added to this natural antipathy.

Finally, there existed the feeling of superiority of a people living in the most industrialized part of the tsarist Empire but who were ruled by a predominately agricultural people. It was true that most Poles were peasants but a proportionately higher percentage of them participated in the modern, capitalist, and industrial economy. This is much the same position of todays 5^ industrial Basques being ruled by peasant Spain.

The tsarist empire was the enemy of Western civilization

in its two most valuable manifestations, freedom and social­

ism. Russophilism (Moskalofilstwo) was a most dangerous

aspect of Russian influence in the Balkans and especially

in Austria-Hungary. Wasilewski sadly reported that among

the Czechs, Slovaks, Croats, and Slovenes "the people are

Russophile," and not .just the intelligentsia. The explan­

ation of this enigmatic popularity among the people for the

Russians was simple. The Slavic nationalities of Austria- Hungary were threatened by Germanization and Magyarization.

They therefore sought succor from the White Tsar of Russia,

the ruler of a country not only culturally similar to their

own but also the only powerful Slavic state. The ideas of romanticism and nationalism which emerged in the nineteenth

century encouraged both the development of ideas of Slavic

cultural unity and a political counterpart in Russian Pan­

slavism. Russian military defeats were weighted against her military successes. The liberation of Bulgaria in 18?8 pro­ foundly helped the Russian image among the Slavs and en­

couraged Russophilism among them. Wasilewski sought to under­

stand the causes of this popularity of the Russians and reached this conclusion. There are three main reasons for Russophilism: the ideas of a common Slavic identity transformed into political Panslavism with Russia at its head; the agitation of paid Russian agents; and finally the in­ fluence of Russian literature. All of these merge with the result that today's Russophilism appears in various forms.

Wasilewski perceived four forms of Russophilism. In the first form, the Russophiles were sincere in their beliefs, and they emphasized the historical rights of their own group while denying these same rights to others. An example of this were the Czech supporters of the claims of the crown of St. Wenceslaus who denied the equally valid Polish territorial claims to some of the same lands. They sought

Russian support for their claims, and their politics were democratic, even radical. Naive variants of this form also could be found outside the . One variant was very

Russophile, and bad news about Russia upset them, but they realized "even the sun has spots." The Slovaks and

Slovenes who awaited liberation were typical of this form.

A second variant was "exclusively Russophile" and was willing to "sacrifice Slavdom (except for ctheira own tribe) as an offering to Russia." This variant was found mostly in

Moravia, was Orthodox in religion, and was almost exclusive­ ly composed of members of the intelligentsia.

18Ibid.. p. 4. The "Russophile politician" was the second form of a

lover of Russia. The example was found mainly in the Czech lands and Croatia and only among the intelligentsia. They used pro-Russian sympathies only to frighten the Austro-

Hungarian authorities. If the Russians should occupy their country they were convinced that they could "lead their northern brothers up the garden path." These "politicians" used the Russians cynically and were ill equipped for spread­ ing pro-Russian feeling among the masses.

Not even the most ardent of the Russophiles wanted com­ plete unity with Russia but sought their own national develop­ ment, except for the Ukrainians of Austria-Hungary. Those who sought complete union with Russia, the third form of

Russophile, also came with two variants. The Old Russo­ philes knew nothing about Russia and wanted to return to the use of the Church Slavonic language. They were subsidized by the Russians, and their priests did have some influence over the people. The more recent Young Russophiles had no influence among the people and their language was Russian.

They had more real knowledge of Russia than the Old Russo­ philes.

A fourth form of Russophile, very rare and found only among the Ukrainians, was the "progressive Russophile."

The progressive political activists, Drahomaniv and Pavlyk, were good examples of this form. 57

Their eyes turned to Russia with the hope that the 'new' Russia will take on a completely different character than today's and will very quickly transform into a hotbed of freedom, civilization, etc. To the category of the progressive Russophile camp can be added all those indifferent ones...1?

People who were impressed with Russian literature entered this latter category.

This analysis of Russophilism among the Slavs, which went leagues beyond the facile analyses of those who cate­ gorically divided the various Slavs into allies or enemies of their cause, was possible because of Wasilewski's inter­ ests and experience. He had first hand knowledge of the situation among the Slavs for he had studied at Lwow,

Prague, and Zagreb. His knowledge of party programs came from a knowledge of the propaganda of the various groups.

His understanding of the Russian problem also provided a clear solution to combat Russophilism through the use of journalistic propaganda. The propaganda of the Russian

Slavic Committees, which abetted Russophile sympathies, had to be challenged with kontr-agitac.ia (counter-propaganda).

The propaganda of the NDs had to be countered, too. Among the Galician Ukrainians an attitude had to be developed whereby the common people would become aware of both the menace of the Russian government and the fact that there

19Ibid.. p. 5- were Poles, represented "by the PPS, who were sympathetic and

supportive of Ukrainian aspirations toward independent

cultural and political development. Wasilewski perhaps

argued too sanguinely when he said that a little explanation

was all that was necessary to convince the progessive Russo­ philes of the danger Russia posed to the proletariat. His

advice for work among other progressive, democratic, or

radical Slavs was much sounder. He proposed that FP3

activists write letters to newspapers in various languages

to present the Polish case and to' expose the dangers of

Russophile sympathy. Tsarism was incompatible with the political renaissance of oppressed Slavic cultures.

Wasilewski himself devoted his early career to these infor­ mative tasks among fellow Slavs.

D. Austrian Social Democracy

It was in the Hapsburg monarchy where Wasilewski got his first taste of Polish socialist victories. He went

there to cover the 1897 elections. He met, among others,

the prominent Austrian SD, Victor Adler. Hot one socialist v/as elected in Vienna to the Vth curia, the one based on universal manhood suffrage. He traveled to Cracow to av/ait

election results and here he witnessed victory. Ignacy

Daszynski won overwhelmingly in Cracow and there was another success in Lwow. ’Wasilewski hoped that the PPSD would align more closely with the PPS, for he thoughtthey were doing 59 good work if only they could he weaned away from their pro­ vincialism. Both the party and Daszynski had potential.

When the repressive government of Badeni, a Galician conser­ vative and its one-time governor, fell in Vienna in 1897. the cries 'Pfui Badeni' were naturally heard. But Wasilewski reported, there were no 'Pfui Polen' cries because of the goodwill toward Daszynski, Badeni's antithesis. Instead, 20 there were cries of 'Hoch Daszynski'.

The PPSD was on good terms with its fraternal German

Social Democratic Party of Austria. When Rosa Luxemburg attacked the lack of internationalism among Poles at the

1900 meeting of the International in Paris, Victor Adler, a leader of Austrian SDs, jumped to their defense and pointed to Daszynski as an excellent example of Polish internation­ alism. However, Daszynski did not share the goal of inde­ pendence with the PPS but agreed with Karl Kautsky,

Austrian-born and the pope -of Social Democracy in Germany, 21 on 'autonomy of living nationalities.' The context of

Kautsky's remarks revolved around the Austro-Hungarian

Empire and its preservation. He argued that the "modern national idea1' was not a "deception or hallucination" as a

20 St. Os...arz cLeon Wasilewski^ , "Upadek Badeniego" ("Badeni's Downfall"), Przedswit, No. 1 (I8 9 8 ), p. 6.

21 L. Plochocki cLeon Wasilewski? . "Zamkniecie dyskusyi" ("The End of the Discussion"), Przedswit, No. 10 (1901), p. 366, "too one-sidely materialistic" Marxist critic, presumably

Rosa Luxemburg, maintained. This national idea was grounded

in the needs of the people for three reasonst 1) the need

of the bourgeoisie to secure a market; 2) the general

"aspiration to political freedom, to democracy...the aspir­

ation to full popular sovereignty" where the people can be

free from any coercion whether from "a person, a class, or

another nation;" 3) the dissemination of national literature 22 and the growth of literacy among the popular masses.

Kautsky concluded by saying that only one class, the pro- 23 letariat, could bring national freedom to the people. J

Wasilewski understood and agreed with these three sources of the modem national idea and he was pleased that someone had fathomed that the popular masses and the industrial pro­ letariat too had aspirations in these directions and not just the bourgeoisie. Like Kautsky, he felt the proletariat ex­ pressed the national idea in its most just and progressive aspect. Unlike Kautsky, he placed independence above autonomy.

22Karl Kautsky, "Der Kampf der Nationalitaten und das Staatsrecht in Oesterreich," Die Neue Zeit, Vol. XVI, No. 17 (1897/98), Pt. 1, p. 517.

23Ibid.. No. 18 (1897/98), Pt. 2, p. 561. 61

Wasilewski asked, "was Austria necessary to us Polish socialists?" and his answer was a politic, but qualified no.

The Polish szlachta was very much in favor of autonomy for

Galicia and looked to the Hapsburgs as the heirs of the

JagielPons. The scheme for autonomy was an outgrowth of the

"very desiccated 'Jagiel'lonian idea’" of federation which would reduce the conditions of the people of Galicia to that of their compatriots in Russia. He did back the slogan for autonomy based on the liberal rights of universal, direct, equal, and secret election but this was really a temporary solution, biding time until socialists achieved unqualified independence. Wasilewski attacked with equal force the ND bourgeois conception of a resurrected Polish Commonwealth ruled by the szlachta as a federation of various ethnic lands.

Theoretically Kautsky did come out for an independent

Poland, but he was not specific about the various lands which would comprise it. He viewed the future independent Poland as arising from the coordinated efforts of Polish socialists in all three partitions in conjunction with the Social Dem­ ocrats of those countries all struggling together for the

2 Zf ' eLeon Wasilewski^® , "Dwie autonomie" ("Two Autonomies"), Przedswit. No. 6 (I8 9 8 ), pp. 1, 2. 62

common-goal of a socialist society. What he would not abide was the pretention to a restitution of historical Poland.

The future Poland was to be based on the lands of the ethnic

Poles.'Wasilewski could not but agree with Kautsky. He did wonder why Kautsky and other socialists did not under­

stand that the PPS did not represent the position of the reconstitution of historical Poland; he did insist on the re­ birth of ethnic Poland.

We find the remark that we ought to concern ourselves with the 'con­ struction of a national Polish state' and not with 'rebuilding of the old historic Poland', totally gratuitious. If we were striving to rebuild 'historic' Poland then we would not consider either Silesia, Prussian as well as Austrian, or Prussian Ivlazovia as our terrain but we would cede them on the principle of 'historic right'... We also would not support the aspirations of the Ukraine for independence nor desire to create a union with Lithuania on .the principle of voluntary federation.

To Wasilewski the position of the FPS was clear, but it took time for the comrades in the neighboring socialist parties to understand it due to the propaganda of the SDKPiL, on the

one hand, and the NDs and Polish conservatives, on the other.

Poland was to be reestablished on ethnic principles,

federated or allied to its neighbors.

2^Karl Kautsky, "Der Munchener Parteitag," Die Neue Zeit, Vol. XX, No. 26 (1901/02), p. 806. ------26 uLeon Wasilewski?, "Z prasy" (From the Press), Przedswit, No. 10 (1902), p. 386, 63

E. German Social Democracy

As much as there was sympathy and intellectual camaraderie between the PPS and the PPSD and between the

PPSD and German SDs of Austria, to Wasilewski it was most important to keep the sympathy of the Social Democracy of

Germany. The SDs of Germany composed the strongest socialist party in Europe in wealth, members, and power. The German

SDs also considered themselves the direct heirs of the thought of Marx and Engels.

In the sometime internecine ideological warfare among the followers of what came to be known as "Marxism", the final authority was Marx himself. Just as orthodox and

Monophysite Christian scholars quarreled over the nature of

Christ and based their exigeses on biblical quotations, so did the Social Democrats who thumbed through and perused carefully the works of the master to glean ammunition to support a favored position. Among the many questions treated in this manner was that of national independence.

This question, in fact, was one to which Marx had not specifically devoted much time. To him the national state, exemplified by Great Britain, France, and later, Germany, was a creation of the bourgeoisie. The eastern empires of

Austria-Hungary, Russia or Turkey were polyglot remnants of feudal times where modern capitalism was just beginning to grow at the end of the nineteenth century. Also, the larger ethnic groups which were without national recog­ 64 nition were mostly agrarian. Marx, opposed to the frag­ mentation of large economic units and vehement about the

"idiocy of rural life," paid little attention to either

the rights of any small nationalities or the rights of

large agrarian nationalities. Marx's main concern was with

the proletariat emerging in an industrialized society

organized capitalistically. The refinement of Marxist theory to take into consideration the problems of national liberation and independence struggles came after Marx's

death in the political and economic circumstances peculiar

to the turn of the century.

Yet there was one national struggle to v/hich Marx paid

considerable attention. He lavished praise on the Polish

insurrectionary tradition and tried to gain support for the

frequent struggles to overthrow the partitioning powers.

This was the tradition to which Wasilewski pointed in

justifying the PPS stand on Polish independence. While it

was true that Marx's sympathies lay with the Poles, they were

not derived from "Marxist" sociological analysis. Marx's

conception of the value of national independence was a 28 political one. In Marx's view the main threat to European

27 Marx and Engels wrote favorably on the German and Italian struggles for national unification. Eventually, they favored Irish independence also. 28 Robert A. Kann, The 1-iiiltinational Empire: Nationalism and National Reform in the Hapsbure Monarchv. 1848-1918 iNew York, 1970), Vol. II, p. 4l. — 65

progress was the reactionary Panslavism of the Russian

Empire. The Poles were one of the only national groups

actively working as an irritant to frustrate the aims of

the Russian Empire. Hence, it was the fact that the Foies

consistently put up a spirited struggle against the Russians,

and not that they were the representatives of a modern

bourgeoisie striving for national statehood, which caused .

Marx to support them.

Engels went further than Marx and classified the various

national groups according to whether they were progressive

or reactionary. For Marx only the Germans of central

Europe deserved statehood, for they were the only enlightened

and progressive group, especially in the Hapsburg Empire.

Engels conceded that the Magyars and Poles could join the

Germans in national rights.^ His classification was guided

by the historical experience of east-, the

development of class differentiations among the German, Poles,

and Magyars, and the attitude of the nationalities toward the

Kann, Multinational Empire, Vol. I, p. Kann pro­ vides an extensive bibliography. In addition see, Friedrich Engels, "The Magyar Struggle," in David Fernbach's edition of Karl Marx, Politcal Writings. (New York, 197*0. Vol. I, pp. 2165-217. It seems that Engels was the "nationality expert" for the articles bearing on this problem are signed by him. See also Henry M. Christman, ed., The American Journalism of Marx and Engels. (Mew York, 196 6) and Engels’ "Revolution and Counter-revolution in Germany," in Karl Marx and Frederick Engels, Selected Works (Moscow, 1 9 6 9 ), Vol. I. On Foland see Celina Bobirfski, Marks _i Engels a svr&vry -polskie do osiem- dziesiatych lat XIX wieku (VJarsav;, 1967). 66

184-8 Revolutions. In E n g e l s ' taxonomy, the reactionary nationalities were those who helped crush the revolution, the Czechs and the Croats and, of course, the nationally in- 30 dependent Russians.■*'

Now, the heir to this Marxist, pro-Polish sympathy was

German Social Democracy. Toward the end of the nineteenth

century, a transformation occurred in this pro-Polish tradition

in the German party. Wasilewski noted this change and seri­

ously considered making his home in Upper Silesia in order

to become a political activist in a part of Poland where

the socialist movement was weak and where the German socialists were ignoring an opportunity to gain the support of the Polish working class. Wasilewski considered this change of attitude as an example of "opportunism" on the part of the German com­ rades who justified their stand in a "scientific manner" but

-^Although they soon changed their opinion, Marx and Engels initially praised the Czechs as revolutionaries early in the Revolution of 184-8, Note the difference in attitude Engels and Wasilewski had toward the whole idea of whether a nationality was progressive or reactionary, especially the Croats and Czechs. Engels con­ demned these two nationalities on the purely functional grounds that they had opposed the 184-8 Revolution which was, by defin­ ition, progressive. Wasilewski, on the other hand, looked more penetratingly into the problem and concluded that only certain class strata could be accused of being reactionary in a given nationality while other class strata could be won over to the progressive side regardless of nationality. In addition, Wasilewski was cognizant of the appeal of great and awesome ideas to oppressed nationalities no matter how crudely garbed or cynically used. Some Czechs and Croats used the image of the White Tsar in much the same way that Georgians today evoke the memory of Stalin or Idi Amin uses the visions of Hitler. Of course, more than a generation separates Engels and Wasilewski, 67

ignored Marx's actual stand on Poland. "We have 'Marxists'

looking askance at our aspirations for independence," 31 Wasilewski complained.

Wasilewski's task was to show that Marx supported

Polish independence and that the German "Marxists" should

continue to do so. He used as proof the memoirs of Colonel

Lapinski who led an expedition by sea from London to Lithuania Q O during the 1863 insurrection. Lapinski related a story of

the conversation held in Aleksandr Herzen's room in London

in early I863 with himself, the Russians Herzen and Nikolai

Ogarev, the Italian Guiseppe Mazzini, and the French radical

Alexandre Ledru-Rollin present. They were joined later by

Marx. They were discussing a Polish-Russian alliance of

revolutionaries and Lapinski noted that on this topic:

...Marx, occupied with his roast beef, raised his head slightly and plainly de­ clared that in his opinion there can be a larger or smaller uprising in Moscow as had occurred in the past, that anyone not wearing peasant clothing might be cudgeled to death, but there would never be a revolution there. On the next day the rebels would return to perhaps a more severe rule of some grand duke, khan or tsar without whom, like bees without a queen, they cannot live.33

31 St. Os...arz c Leon Wasilewski3 , "Karol Marks a powstanie 1863 roku" ("Karl Marx and the Insurrection of 1 8 6 3") ■ Przedswit. No. 9 (1902), p. 321.

<=sic3 Lapinski, Powstancv na morzu w wyprawie na Ljtwe. (Lwow, I8 7 8).

•^?Wasilewskia7 "Karol Marks, "pp. 321-22. 68 This scotched a Folish-Russian alliance. Wasilewski used this argument to destroy the hopes of those German socialists who had a rosy view of the Russian revolutionary potential.

Wasilewski continued to relate Lapinski's further con­ versation alone with Marx where the latter said the Russians were the instigators of the Polish partitions while the

Germans were the "servants of the executioners.” Marx said it was the duty of the Germans to help the Poles, for they had caused the Poles so much grief. Money to raise a German

Legion to help the Poles was discussed (and later, Marx and a friend spoke to the Duke of Brunswick on this account) and the difficulties this enterprise presented were* acknowledged.

According to Lapinski's account Marx said that when this legion would encounter the "Muscovites, who among all nations are perhaps the one sincerely disliked by the Germans" their enthusiasm would warm for the struggle. "Although German enthusiasm does not catch quickly, it is more durable than the weak French flame," Marx noted. And VJasilewski's own conclusion:

If Marx would hear that there are people calling themselves his followers and pupils who do not recognize the right of the Polish proletariat to national independence would he not repeat his famous comment to them: 'No, sirs, I am not a Marxist?'-^

^ cVJasilewski^,"Karol Marks," p. 32^. Lapinski's account is accepted as genuine by Jerzy W. Borejsza, W kr^gu wielkich wvgnancow, 18^8-1895 (Warsaw, 1 9 6 3 ), p. 3 8 8. Borejsza, however, concentrates on Marx and the expedition. He does not comment on the Marx's anti-Russian statements. 69 Wilhelm Liebknecht and August Bebel, leaders of German

Social Democracy, inherited this pro-Polish tradition of sympathy from Marx and Engels. At their party congresses they had continuously protected Polish interests and attacked Russian backwardness and barbarism. With the trans­ formation of attitude that occurred toward the turn of the century some members of German Social Democracy began criticizing the development of Polish socialism in Germany's

Polish territories. Liebknecht and Bebel roundly blasted . these Germans as chauvinists. Wasilewski's favorite des­ criptive term for these types was Hakatists. those Germans who pursued the spreading of German culture at the expense of the Poles. The result of this change of heart toward the •

Poles was the weakness of socialism in Prussian Poland.

Wasilewski agreed that Polish socialism was weak in the

Poznan area because there were few workers there, and in that situation any socialist party would be an anomaly.

However, in German Silesia, which was heavily industrialized, there was no significant Polish socialist movement if com­ pared to the Polish socialist movement in Austrian Silesia.

He placed the blame for not organizing the Polish working class in the laps of the German SDs of Silesia and their o c policies of discrimination and Germanization. ^ Under

-^cLeon Wasilewski^ , "Socyalizm czy Hakatyzm," Przed£wit, No. 2 (1898), p. .2. their leader, Dr. Winter, the Silesian SDs "blamed the poor electoral showings on the Poles who pursued their own course and did not join the German socialist movement.

Wasilewski claimed exactly the opposite and said socialists achieved no victory at the polls, as did their comrades in

Austria, because the Germanizing policy of the SDs naturally frightened Poles away. Dr. Winter and his comrades found support in Rosa Luxemburg. This SDKPiL leader, influential in the SPD as well as in the Russian movement, was also the newly appointed editor of the Sachsiche Arbeiter Zeitung

(Saxon Workers1 Newspaper). Wasilewski thought her polemics o "sometimes exceeded the bounds of decency."^

As German Social Democracy slowly lost its revolutionary stance, a new left emerged in Germany centering around

Luxemburg and it caused serious disputes but no split in the German movement. 1 One of these disputes centered on the Mitterand affair, in which a socialist accepted a

^ St. 0. cLeon Wasilewskisr , "II zjazd niemieckiej partyi socyalnodemokratycznej" ("II Congress of the German Social Democratic Party"), Przedswit, No. 10 (1898), p. 7-

*^This swing to the left, occurring over a number of years up to the Great War and barely perceptible at the time, affected not only Luxemburg*s Germany but her native Poland, Lenin*s Russia, and Antonio Gramsci*s Italy as well. Since the Bolshevik revolution, the importance of this leftist tendency has been emphasized to the extent of eclipsing the role played by the other Marxists of that time. 71 position in a "bourgeois cabinet in France. Luxemburg was categorically opposed to this kind of cooperation while

Wasilewski approved of it but only for western Europe where parliamentary democracy was well entrenched. The left had no use for parliamentarianiam while Wasilewski felt attracted to it as a positive aspect of Western civilization.

In these disputes the bombshell fell in 1898 with the

appearance of Eduard Bernstein*s evolutionary interpretation

of Marxism which came to be called revisionism. Wasilewski thought the impact of Bernstein's articles was "very de­ moralizing" because they were not immediately answered and they appeared "when the party was readying itself for the struggle to conquer political power..."^® Wasilewski agreed with the orthodox defense of Marxist doctrine presented by

Kautsky who focused his attack on the impossibility of the peaceful development of socialism except, as Marx had argued, for England. Dogma aside, there was the practical problem of Polish independence. Bernstein's approach seemed to preclude the seizure of power by-revolutionary means.

Revisionism was not relevant to the PPS or the Polish

-^cWasilewskis, "II zjazd," p. 8. 72

situation. As a matter of fact revisionism was an intellectual

and theoretical current only where Marxism was accepted

entirely as in Germany, Austria-Hungary, and Russia.

Wasilewski, like Jaures, was not a Marxist in emphasizing

patriotism and justice and deemphasizing the dialectic. And

for those same reasons neither Wasilewski nor Jaures can he

called revisionists. 39

F. Polish Social Democracy

In the meantime, the PPS struggle with Polish Social

Democracy (the SDKPiL) over who was the true representative

of the Polish proletariat continued:. The socialists of

Poznan, who belonged to the German Social Democracy hut who

included Poles, called for the dissolution of the PPS. hO Wasilewski labeled them social-Hakatists. This term

countered the term invented by Rosa Luxemburg to describe

the PPS. She claimed that its members were not Social

- ^ G e o r g e Lichtheim, Marxism, An Historical and Critical Study, (New York, 1970), 2nd ed., rev., p^ 278. Wasilewski was an "indigenous" socialist like Jauris, pp. 2?8-79. See also Peter Gay, The Dilemma of Democratic Socialism; Eduward Bemsteirirs Challenge to Marx (New York, 1952).

^0cLeon Wasilewski*, "V zjazd P.P.S. zaboru pruskiego" ("V P.P.S. Congress of the "). Przedlwit, No. h (1900), p. 22. 73 Democrats who sought social revolution through class

struggle hut social-patriots who used socialist phraseology

to hide their nationalistic aims. The only hope for the

Poles, Wasilewski continuously argued, was an end to German-

ization and the establishment of a separate PPS in German ho territory on the model of the Polish party in Austria.

The difficulty between the PPS and Rosa Luxemburg

hinged on the term internationalist. Any proper Marxist, by definition, had to be an internationalist. For

Luxemburg this meant that national aspirations were not the

primary concern of socialism. National claims were irrelevant

to future socialist victory and had to be subordinated to

class struggle and growing interdependency, which precluded .

small, and again, by definition, backward, nations from

existing. National aspirations, especially on the part of

small ethnic groups, were a slap in the face of socialism, progress, and logic. They were simply an expression of bourgeois nationalism.

How could you have internationalism without nations,

asked Wasilewski. The SD parties of various European states

got along fairly well. Some nations in Europe did not have

^ J . P. Nettl, Rosa Luxemburg (London, 1 9 6 6), Vol. II, p. 853. kp St. Os...arz cLeon Wasilewski^ , "Po zjezdzie" ("After the Congress"), Przed|wit, No. 5 (1900), pp. 4-5. states and were oppressed by other nations. Why should

these nations not be liberated? As an example of true

internationalism among the Germans, Wasilewski singled out

the grand old man of German Social Democracy, who died in

1900, Wilhelm Liebknecht. "With the death of Liebknecht the

last practical internationalist goes to his grave," mourned 43 Wasilewski. J The implication here, of course, was that

Rosa Luxemburg was a theoretical or impractical inter­ nationalist with no appreciation for national liberation.

The wreath which Wasilewski's group sent to Liebknecht*s funeral was inscribed, "Soldier of the revolution, enemy of 44 tsarism. c Signed,3 Polish Socialist Party."

The solution to the croes of German Poland was not the •

assimilation of the Poles into the German Social Democratic

movement but ukra.iowienie, the naturalization of Polish

socialism on Polish territory, the creation of an atmosphere

for the development of Polish socialism and its establish­

ment on a national basis. This was the antithesis to the

deracinating proposals of the SDKPiL and, more and more, of

the 3PD regulars. He gave as an example the German trade

^cLeon Wasilewski? , "Wilhelm Liebknecht, 1826-1900," Przed^wit, No. 8 (1900), p. 1. L. W.'s emphasis.

^ c L e o n Wasilewski? , "Luzne notatki" ("Loose Notes"), Przedswit, No. 8 (1900), p. 32. 75

union movement which was not attracting Poles successfully.

It was only logical, thought Wasilewski, that a Polish

union movement using the Polish language in its propaganda

would have more success.^ Polish socialism was insignificant

in German Poland because the party actives were mostly emigres,

and even the socialist newspaper was published in Berlin and

not on the spot. Until the PPS was naturalized in German

Poland no one would take the Poles seriously "because we

would always bring to mind the African dandy parading in a 46 top hat not possessing the bare essentials of clothing."

Someone asked, Wasilewski thought it was Dr. Winter, what

would happen to the unity and strength of .German socialism if

the French in Alsace and the Danes in Schleswig (Wasilewski'

added the Lithuanians in East Prussia) demanded their own

party? Would they too become as nationalistic as the Poles?

Wasilewski's reply was obvious: this type of thinking was

the work of the social-Hakatists or chauvinists. Once the

Polish movement became strong "on a territorial basis" (na

gruncie kra.jowym) then German-Polish relations would become

h< L . PI. cLeon Wasilewskin , "W sprawie zaboru pruskiego" ("Concerning the Prussian Partition"), Przedswit. No. 11 (1900), p. 16.

46 St. 0s...arz cLeon Wasilewski3 , "W chwili przeibmu" ("On the Threshold"), Przedswit. No. 4 (1901), p. 124. 76 if, n similar to relations among socialists in Austria. '

Wasilewski quoted approvingly an article sarcastically

"branding Luxemburg and her friends *kulturtraegerzy *, the

"bearers of the higher Germanic civilization among the Slavs

and especially the Poles.

The question was not one of deracination versus nationalism. These were simply the emotional catch-words used "by the polemicists. The real question centered around party organization. The goal of "both Luxemburg and

Wasilewski was a socialist state. To attain this goal

Luxemburg proposed a struggle within the existing state boundaries of Europe, each proletarian within a state

supporting its socialist party, and each party in a general

alliance with the proletariat abroad. Wasilewski and the

PPS thought a more efficient way to organize the struggle

would be to acknowledge ethnic cohesiveness as a more im­ portant and just principle than the accident of birth with­

in artificial and arbitrary boundaries. The working classes

of all ethnic groups could be mobilized more quickly

through their aspirations for liberation and a general

^ Leon Wasilewski , "Z prasy" ("From the Press"), Przedswit, No. 6 (1901), p. 2 3 2 . L. W.*s emphasis. K O Leon Wasilewski , "Dalsze dzieje socyalhakatyzmu" ("The History of Social-Hakatism, Continued"), Przedswit, No. 7 (1901), p. 275. 77 alliance among all the proletarian movements, ethnically

"based, could plausibly strike a blow for socialism by a concerted attack on the imperial powers. Russia was the major focus because it posed the greatest threat to lib­ eration. Luxemburg thought this improbable for she did not foresee the Great War and denied and decried the appeal of the idea of national liberation to the proletariat.

Wasilewski too did not foresee the Great War but he was more optimistic about the efficacy of national liberation in the socialist struggle.

To keep this goal of independence alive in the minds of socialists, Wasilewski denounced the PPSD position on autonomy as an ineffectual half-way measure and did the same to the proponents of Polish autonomy in Germany among the FPS members themselves. This was a provincial and a bankrupt policy.^ It was not for nothing that the Luxemburg inter­ nationalists as well as the German nationalists both looked apprehensively at the PPS. By denying the right of Polish independence and even autonomy, they acknowledged the tremendous disruptive potential the Poles could cause. These were the choices: ignore Polish national aspirations, leaving their supporters to the NDs to exploit and concentrate on

L\, 9 L. Plochocki rLeon Wasilewski^ , "Odpowiedz na artykul M. Lusniu ("An Answer to 15. Lusnia's Article"), Przedswit. No. 8 (l901),pp. 2 9 ^-9 5 . 78 class struggle (Luxemburg)} strive for autonomy within existing boundaries (Daszynski); or attempt to harness the' struggles for national liberation to the class struggle

(Wasilewski).

As an example of the successful union of the ideas of class struggle and national liberation in the past, Wasilewski chose to exhibit the career of Bolesitaw Limanowski, who, in

1881, founded a party called the Polish People which emphasized socialism, democracy, and patriotism as the proper goals for

Poland, This was in contrast to another socialist organ­ ization, Proletariat, established by Ludwik IJarynski in

1882. The latter was decidedly not patriotic but emphasized class struggle over national liberation and was, therefore,

Luxemburgist in terms of internationalism. In the 1880's then, there existed in microcosm the issues and tendencies which divided socialists and which continued to divide them at the turn of the century and even later. In a statement of approbation on Limanowski's life, Wasilewski tried to explain why he thought Limanowski was great. He could have been more popular in his time if he had eschewed socialism

K. Dziewanowski, The Communist Party of Poland (Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1959)» P * 1^. 79 and emphasized only the then popular ideas of democracy and patriotism, noted Wasilewski, hut "Limanowski was a con- 51 sistent patriot and democrat, hence he was a socialist..."^

Limanowski's ideas and career were certainly reminiscent of

Wasilewski's .^

Since Liehknecht's death in 1900, German Social

Democracy had given up its neutrality on the Polish issue and had become chauvinistic. Its most recent pronouncements were pro-Winter. Wasilewski complained about this change but now he felt there could be no more reliance on the good will of the great German party. The Polish aim according to

Wasilewski should be the growth of an "independent and separate socialist movement on Polish territory* in Upper

5^0 cLeon Wasilewski 3, "Socyalizm-Demokracya-Fatriotyzm", ("Socialism-Democracy-Patriotisiri'), Przedswit. No. 8 (1 9 0 1 ), p. 318. L. VJ.'s emphasis.

■^However, 'Wasilewski distorted the true character of the Proletariat party by claiming that its subordination to the Russian Peoples' Will party in an alliance of cooperation was purely tactical and temporary. Rosa Luxemburg, in a recently discovered manuscript,took Wasilewski to task over this distortion by contending that the Russo-Polish socialist alliance of 1884- was made on principle, in the true sense and understanding of internationalism, and not expediently. Wasilewski bent the truth in order to claim Proletariat as a progenitor of the PPS. "Pol'skii i russkii sotsializm v ikh vzaimnom otnosheni^," Archiwum Ruchu Robotniczego. Vol. 1 (1973)» pp. 44-45. See also Lucjan Blit, The Origins of Polish Socialsm (Cambridge, England, 1971). 80

Silesia and Poznan. Hope for cooperation with the

Germans had paled. German and Polish Social Democracy cooperated now very closely in their struggle with the PPS.

Wasilewski's awareness of the failure of the German support for the just resolution of the Polish problem brought the need for a final attack on the propagators of autonomy within his own party. Some argued that "autonomy of the Polish areas of Prussia" should be the proper slogan for Poles in Germany, just as "autonomy for living nation­ alities" was the slogan for Austria-Hungary. The latter slogan was deemed attainable by its propagators, but

Wasilewski did not believe that even the author of the former believed it possible. What the slogan did in

Prussia was to confuse the issue. As for Austria, Wasilewski continued, Kautsky himself would drop the slogan once his

'optimism* faded. The concept of autonomy was not inherent £$|L in philosophical or programmatic thinking. The proper slogan was independence. The proper means was self-reliance.

■^St. Os...arz cLeon Wasilewski* , "Zarz^d partyi niemieckiej na usiugach socyalhakatyzmu" ("The Administration of the German Party at the Service of Social-Hakatism"), Przedswit, No. 9 (1901), P* 323*

^ L . P2Tochocki cLeon Wasilewski a , "Zamkni^cie dyskusyi" ("End of the Discussion"). Przedswit, No. 10 (1 9 0 1 ), pp. 3 6 6-6 7. 81

The German party congresses had begun to question the role of the PPS in its Prussian sector. How and by whom had this anti-Polish attitude evolved. "It is then a fact that beyond the Luxemburg-Gogowsky-Winter trio who for personal reasons desire not to reach harmony" with the PPS, the general German membership wanted to heal the conflict with the Poles but they did not entirely understand the Polish-

German issue. Why were the Germans so handicapped? They had to rely on their information about Prussia on the per- verters of reality, "the various Gogowskys and Winters, much less Rosa Luxemburg, consciously falsifying the truth and professionally cultivating the art of lying for a long time."

But then again, Wasilewski knew you could not expect much from Luxemburg and her type. Her group was numerically small but vociferous. What was really tragic was that the German

SD leadership stopped supporting Polish independence. Bebel called for neutrality on the issue and the German party feared "persecution" by the German government for supporting

Polish independence.^ To Wasilewski this was simply oppor­ tunism and another reason why Poles in Germany had to establish their own socialist movement.

•55 St. Os...arzLeon Wasilewski3 , "Po zjezdzie monachijskim" ("After the Munich Congress'^, Przedswit. No. 10 f (1902), pp. 3 6 2 , 3 6 3. Gogowsky was an SFD member from Poznan. 82

Occasionally an agreement could be reached as in 1903 when the PPS was temporarily given control over Polish affairs in Prussia over the followers of Luxemburg. ^ But there could be no lasting agreement between the PPS and

Luxemburg. Her power and influence were growing and she made only tactical concessions.

The experience with Social Democracy in Austria-Hungary showed Wasilewski that a mass party could be established and could be victorious in elections. It also showed him that there could be cordial relations between Polish and

German canrades. His experience with German Social Democracy, however, showed him the limitations of Polish reliance on a different nation's party. The Germans were ineffective in caring for Polish interests. Retaining a deep sympathy for the German movement, he realized that the blame for poor relations was not primarily the fault of the majority of the

Germans but the work of the Pole, Luxemburg, and her Polish and German coterie.

-^fcLeon Wasilewski-** , "Dwa zjazdy" ("Two Congresses"), Przedswit, No. 2 (1903)» p. ^2. CHAPTER III

RUSSIA AND RUSSIAN SOCIAL DEMOCRACY

Scratch a Russian, find a Tatar.

A. External Problems

The Social Democrats of Germany and Austria-Hungary could at various times be sympathetic to Polish problems.

Even though they hesitated finally at incorporating in­ dependence for Poland in their programs, there was at least talk of autonomy in the party meetings and some support in the past as well as the present for independence from individual socialists. Russian Social Democracy was a different matter. i/Jasilewski gave it very little respect and was pessimistic about its future. His attitude toward

Russia had not changed since the beginning of his sojourn in central and western Europe. It had even been reinforced by the general low esteem that the Europeans held both for the weak Russian Social Democracy and the autocratic tsarist regime. Wasilewski devoted considerable thought and space to both Russia as a whole and to the Social

Democratic movement there.

He had already identified Russophilism toward the tsarist state as the major enemy of Poland and also of

83 socialism and the enlightened traditions of Western

civilization. He had noted that many Europeans were disposed

to fear Russian barbarism and, for Poland's sake, he hoped

to capitalize on these apprehensions. Many Slavs had come

to the conclusion that there was a Slavic community of

interests which was best protected by the only powerful

Slavic state, Russia. Wasilewski posed two questions on this topic. Were there any all-Slavic interests? Did an all-Slavic policy lay in Poland's interests? In both cases he answered in the negative. As evidence he listed the border conflicts among various Slavs. He especially pointed to the anti-Polish Czech stance in Hapsburg Silesia.

During elections there, an alliance emerged between Czech f and German bourgeoisie to fight against the Polish working class. On the whole, however, the Germans were regarded as the gravest enemy by the Czechs. Wasilewski understood very well the threat that the Germans posed to the Poles, and he understood why the Young Czechs, a bourgeois party, raised the cry of the German menance to rally all Slavs, especially the powerful Russians, together to face this common threat.

For 'Wasilewski, the Germans were not the only enemy. The

Russians were even more to be feared. The Czechs themselves 85 pursued an anti-Polish policy. Other Slavic peoples had

their own conflicts. "If there are no common interests

there can "be no common politics," Wasilewski concluded.^ 2 Paramount among Poland's enemies was Russia. It was

not an enemy "because it had an all-Slavic conception of

politics "but "because this conception was perverse.

Wasilewski could understand why so many Slavs were Russo-

. philic and intrigued "by Slavic unity, but he could not under­

stand why they overlooked the problem of the brutal

Russification of Poland. On occasion his disinclination

toward Russia caused a rather unscientific coloring to

appear in his opinions. When two Russian teachers were

overheard deprecating the Polish language in school, he

called for retribution* "Will not the students of the

school summon up the courage to give a good beating to the 3 Russifying pedagogues?"

■^0 wLeon Wasilewski^ , "Farsa Slowianska" ("Slavic Farce"), Przedswit, No. 1 (1898), p. 14. 2 Russia was an enemy to German Social Democracy too. Both the leadership and the rank-and-file looked down upon Russia as authoritarian and barbaric, a threat not only to German civilization but to socialism as well, since Germany had the largest and strongest Social Democratic movement in Europe. As the French Socialists, like Jaures, protected the democratic gains of the Revolution, the German socialists protected the social gains of the labor movement. Polish socialists, devoid of a state, threw their loyalty to an idealized state which embodied the heritage of the insur­ rectionary szlachta and the democratic populace.

3 ^cLeon Wasilewskra , "Pedagogowie— rusyfikatorzy" ("Teachers-Russifiers"), Przedswit, No. 4 (1898), p. 22. 86

Engels had once likened Russian diplomacy to Jesuitical duplicity. Whereas Loyola’s students were criticized for the means they employed to attain their ends 'Wasilewski claimed that the Russians even got support for their means.

Thus, they even surpassed the Jesuits. The Russians were getting sympathy from western European powers for tsarism's expansionist aims. How was this possible given the tradition­ al fears of Russian expansion?

Well, because Russia always must lend succor to unfortunate mankind! It must always protect or liberate some­ one. As is well known it has a democratic mission in Poland, the protection of the peasantry which is 1 by the unmerciful lanuxurus.

Russia had become a sought after ally and the western powers shunted aside indignant complaints about Russian barbarism.

Even the Jesuits, grumbled Wasilewski, could not get away with this duplicity. "In a word," Wasilewski wrote, "Russia will not take a step but to make someone happy and to gain the appreciation of all tender souls.He gave many ex­ amples of how this was occurring in the Russian Empire and yet, he exclaimed, there were people who did not appreciate or understand this "civilizing mission of Russian tsarism."

Zl cLeon Wasilewski^? , "SprySprytny krok" ("A Clever Step"), Przedswit, No. 9 (1898), p. 1.

5Ibid. 87

Unfortunately, these people, the oppressed within tsarist

Russia, were ignored by Rpaloolitiker governments seeking

to gain Russian friendship. While Russia was consolidating

her position at home, she was considered an important and

powerful state to woo abroad. Nothing succeeded like

success. Germany deflected Russian ambitions to the east to keep

her av/ay from the interests vital to the in

central Europe. As understood by Wasilewski, the Russian

civilizing mission, ever since Feter the Great, was char­

acterized by an urge to the sea. Expansion had been directed

not only to the Baltic and Black Seas but also toward the

Pacific. Russia's potential for conflict was with 3ritish|

German, and Chinese and Japanese Empires. Wasilewski pre­

sented a Marxist analysis of the Asian theater of Russia's

urge to the sea.^

The , began Wasilewski, was caused by

the competition of foreign capitalists for the Chinese

market. The Russian bourgeoisie supported the tsarist

governments attempts to conquer China as a market for

Russian goods. Since the Chinese were on a lower plane of

economic development, once conquered they would emigrate to

^St. Os...arz cLeon Wasilewski^ , "Rosya a Chiny" ("Russia and China"), Przedswit. No. 12 (1900), pp. 18-23. the more developed areas of the tsarist empire. This mi­ gration, the Yellow Peril, though Wasilewski did not use these words, v/ould not be an actuality in the near future.

The more real danger, said Wasilewski of this adventure in the east, would be for the future of the Russian working class as a movement. The bourgeoisie v/ould move their industries eastwards to be near sources of cheap Chinese labor and the huge Chinese market. The Russian working class will atrophy while the bourgeoisie will strengthen itself. The intelligentsia, the traditonal source of opposition in Russia, would acquiesce to this international

Russian success and would be bought off by the lure of jobs in the.conquered lands.

Fantastic as this analysis was in hinting at the fear of masses of Chinese moving into European Russia and then maybe elsewhere to eastern Europe, it was simply a red herring tactic. At the time politicans like Wilhelm II and Theodore Roosevelt as well as writers like Stanislaw

Witkiewicz and Jack London used the image of the Yellow Peril, some seriously believing in it, others using it merely as a literary device. This idea was not an integral part of

Wasilewski’s thought.

Wore fantastic was the Marxist respectability in which

Wasilewski*s argument was clothed. Even if this analysis v/ere only long term speculation, it is not convincing today and probably v/as viewed as unrealistic in its own day. He wrote off the Russian intelligentsia too casually; over­ estimated the strength of the "bourgeoisie to move their capital investments in such quantities eastwards, forsaking the west; and underestimated the resourcesfulness of the

Russian proletariat to make itself heard. To believe that tsarist successes in the international arena would ally various classes was to be very pessimistic about Russia indeed and too glib a Marxist not to perceive the real ten­ sions in Russian society. Wasilewski was prescient only in his concluding thoughts. Russian expansion in China would conflict with Japanese imperial interests and this would lead to war in Asia once Korea lost its independence.

i Very curiously, throughout this arpuement on the mean­ ing of imperialism in Asia and its impact on eastern Europe,

Wasilewski never condemned Japanese imperialism. To under­ stand this paradox, his position on the Boer War must be examined.

Russian tsarism is our greatest and most irreconcilable enemy. Everything which increases its power contributes to the lengthening of our political imprisonment and the consolidation of international reaction. Everything which weakens it facilitates our struggle and brings near the day of international victory. Injury to Russia should be the point of departure of international politics of the revolutionary pro­ letariat in general and above all the Polish proletariat. The advantages of the enemies of Russia are to a certain degree our advantages too...7

Although Wasilewski expressed sympathy for the Boers

and understood the burdens that growing militarism brought

on British society, he pleaded the British case because of of the implications of a strong Britain as an enemy of Q tsarist Russia. Any enemy of tsarism was a friend of his.

Hope for an independe.it Poland lay in weakening Russia, and

this meant strengthening and encouraging Russia's major

imperial enemies: Britain and Japan. In international

politics Wasilewski became the student of the same Real- politik which he denigrated in others. Given that national liberation of the Polish proletariat was his goal, then his support for any ally which made Russia weak was consistent and, perhaps, eminently realistic. Still he may be faulted in intellectual consistency for failing to support enthusiastically Afrikaaner national libeiration.

In fact, national liberation was not a goal of many "pro­ gressive" thinkers of that era. Most Marxist socialists

Leon Wasilewski^ , "Wojna" ("War"), Przedswit. No. 12 (1899), p. 2. O cLeon Wasilewski^ , "Z prasy" ("From the Press"), Przedswit, No. 2 (1900), pp. 17-18. regarded it as a suspect idea. A Fabian socialist like

George Bernard Shaw wedded his politics to imperialism, and thought he was not anti-Boer he was convinced of the beneficent attributes British imperial rule would bring the Afrikaaners. Friedrich Naumann, the founder of the

National Social Party in Germany, in a different context but in the same era, tried to unite imperialism with nationalism based on the working class. His object was a greater Germany. Both Shaw and Naumann had two things in common with Luxemburg: their thoughts were geared to the benefit of the working class, and they had no use for small state entities. Wasilewski*s sympathy with stateless o ethnic groups differentiated him from Shaw or Naumann.

Yet his long range goal of national liberation was focused on eastern Europe and he devoted little thought outside that geographic area. His immediate goal was Polish inde­ pendence, so for tactical reasons he abandoned the

Afrikaaners in a decision which must have cost him anguish,

Wasilewski was baptised into the art of politics by learn­ ing to juggle the demands of power politics and principles,

^A. M. McBriar, Fabian Socialism and English Politics, 1884-1918 (Cambridge, England, 1 9 6 2 ), pp. 119-128; Hans Kohn, The Mind of M o d e m Germany (New York, 1969)* pp» 283- 284. Bernard Semmel, Imperialism and Social Reform; English Social-Imperial Thought, 1895-1914 (Garden City, New York, 1968)7 Ch. YI. 92 minimalist and maximalist programs, and tactics and strat- 10 egy.

Wasilewski's hopes lay in an imperial confrontation in east Asia. In this respect his connection of national liberation with international politics seemed to be well founded. PPS hopes rested on a Russian crisis as the only means of independence. This was the cornerstone of their policy. The problem of Germany and Austria-Hungary was secondary. Once the British and the Japanese realized their common interests in opposition to Russian imperialism they signed an alliance in 19 02 which coordinated their efforts and lead Wasilewski and the PPS to think that war was

« imminent. For Wasilewski, this clash would cause "the un­ avoidable conflict in the Far East which will result in 11 the triumph not of world barbarism but of progress."

10 It is not surprising that this development of Wasilewski's thought, adjusting principles to reality, should produce unusual results. Jaures himself, a pacifist, greeted France's military alliance with despotic Russia and encouraged Italian socialists to support the Triple Alliance even though Italy was a potential threat to France via this alliance system. Goldberg, Jaures, pp. 200, 301.

11 St. 0 s...arz c-Leon Wasilewski^ , "Z powodu traktatu angielskiego-japonskiego" ("On Account of the Anglo- Japanese Treaty"), Przedswit, No. 2 (1902), p. 42. 93

3 . Internal Problems

Russia, as an imperial power, posed grave problems externally and some people were aware of this. What about the situation within Russia? What internal problems pre­ vented progressive development? According to Wasilewski, the intelligentsia had been the traditional conscience of Russia and the source of opposition to despotic tsarism.

The non-revolutionary intelligentsia, if it had not been co-opted as supporters of the government through the successes of imperial expansion, was ineffectual because of a mis­ placed faith in the goodwill of the tsar. Tolstoi was a good example. A member of the non-revolutionary intelli­ gentsia, he was a thorn in the side of the government. Hi's opposition was expressed in a petition to the tsar which con­ cluded with a plea to improve conditions in the empire.

This conclusion is immensely char­ acteristic of a Russian thinker. Tolstoi, and along with him many sincere and progessive Russians, very sincerely believes that autocracy can very easily accom­ modate itself to the freedom and well being of the masses of people— with religious toleration, freedom of education, equal rights for the nationalities, etc. 12

1 2 ^n. a., Leon VJasilewski.3 , "Z prasy" (’From the Press’^ Przed£wit. No. 1 (1901), p. 1^7- 9k

3y definition, the tsar was antithetical to all progressive aspirations. The progressive intelligentsia was naive to place its hopes in the tsar.

The intelligent government bureaucrat had no such liberal delusions about the tsar. Wasilewski used Sergei

Witte, Minister of Finance and Economy and leading proponent

of industrialization at the turn of the century, as an

example. He contrasted the European and civilized Witte with the reactionary of the Holy Synod, the

"Asiatic" Konstantin Pobedonostsev. The latter supported the autocracy because he was a reactionary. 'Why did an in­ telligent and cultivated man like Witte support bureaucratic t centralism and not a constitution and self-government?

Because, noted Wasilewski, he understood "only autocracy, based on strict centralization, guarantees the cohesiveness of Russia.L i b e r a l reforms would lead to the autonomy of the borderlands and this in turn would lead to the dis­ integration of Russia. Pleas like Tolstoi’s fell on imper­ vious ears in the government and among the tsar's advisors.

13 St. Os...arz cLeon Wasilewski:* , "3amow2radztwo, samorzad, konstytucya i kresy" ("Autocracy, Autonomy, a Constitution and the Borderlands"), Przed^wit. No. 8 (1901). p. 28k. L. W.'s emphasis. 95 To disabuse those who argued that the empire was be­ coming stronger since the reforms of Alexander II, Wasilewski countered that the Russia of his day was in domestic chaos comparable to that faced by the illustrious tsar-liberator.

However, Russia was a great power. Under Witte the economy had made great strides, but hardly anyone except some workers and some members of the intelligentsia were calling for a 1A constitution. The Russian workers, too, had the same faith in the tsar that the non-revolutionary intelligentsia had.

At times liasilewski's criticism of the Russian pro­ letariat was just as severe as his criticism of the Russian state. The editors of Przedswit had to print an explanation of disagreement on certain points in one of his articles.

Wasilewski argued, in discussing factory reforms in Russia, that the Polish worker and peasant were antipathetic to the tsar while the Russian workers, as well as the peasants, had favorable feelings for the tsar and this attitude would be difficult to alter. VJasilewski was keenly aware of the importance of tradition.^ Hindsight may cause the reader to smile at this naive overemphasis on historical tradition

1 it S St. Os...arz «--Leon Wasilewski:? , "wskazania przeszlosci" ('Lessons on the Fast"), Przedswit, No. 6 (1902), pp. 201-02.

■^.St. 0s...arz d e o n wasilewski3 , "Kilka slow w sprawie rosyjskiego ruchu robotniczego" ("A Pew Words on the Russian Labor Movement" Przedswit, No. 6 (1897). p. 10. but it_ took a whole generation, a score of years, to belie this argument. The Polish tradition was one of antipathy to the tsar while the Russians held the tsar-father in reverence as their paternalistic protector. The factory reforms would redound to the credit of the tsar, gaining

support for him among the workers, and thus would hinder the growth of their consciousness as a revolutionary class. It was beside the point that a Russian maximalist could argue in the same vein. Wasilewski was a Pole and his insights into the Russian workers' movement must not be misinter­ preted or misread, for they would color other peoples' attitudes toward the PPS. It was no wonder that the editors

« disclaimed these sweeping judgments bordering on slander, of a fraternal, if underdeveloped, proletariat.

An opposition to autocracy was organizing on the right track but was just beginning to grow. This was the Social

Democratic movement established by the revolutionary intelli­ gentsia which achieved its intellectual credentials primarily in exile abroad. In Switzerland Pavel Aksel'rod, one of its early writers who became a Menshevik, differentiated between 97 the proletarian movements of east and west Europe in order to explain their different paths of development. Wasilewski 16 agreed with this analysis.

Aksel'rod argued that the east was absolutist and bureaucratic, and capitalism was in the elemental stage of capital accumulation. The west had passed this stage.

Realizing this, the first modem Russian socialist group, the Emancipation of Labor, founded in 1883, retained the positive elements of its antecedent revolutionary populism.

It fell into the trap of Economism, which supported the use of the strike to wrest better living standards and wages from employers, while it lost sight of the further goals of

Marxist socialism. Economism sought the advancement of the interests of capitalism because it in turn would produce a poletarian movement. But the commercial and industrial bourgeoisie did not have political power in Russia. They did not run the government but were under its protection, receiving privileges from it. The Russian proletariat was not an isolated class, for they were not the only ones alienated by the government. Other politically alienated classes were the peasantry, the free professions, and the

16 St. Os.. .arz cLeon Wasilewski=» , "Z socyalistycznej publicystyki rosyjskiej" ("From Russian Socialist Journalism"), Przedswit. No. 9 (I8 9 8 ). The Aksel'rod work was K voprosu o sovremennvkh zadachah i taktike russkikh sots ial*-demokrat0v (Geneva, 1 8 9 8 ). 98 noble landowners, as well as the bourgeoisie. The ineffec­

tiveness of the Economists position was that they concen­

trated on only one class, the proletariat, and only one

issue, the economy.

Aksel'rod called for the reactivation of the political

struggle and the widening of the base of the revolutionary

movement by including other oppositional elements and

alliances with other classes. Wasilewski completely agreed.

He disliked the Economists with their narrow conception of the socialist struggle. For Wasilewski, the importance of

coalitions of various classes in society to overthrow

despotic tsarism in the pursuit of socialism was just as

necessary a tactic as the coalition of various peoples to '

overthrow the same tsarism in the pursuit of national lib­

eration. But Wasilewski did not differentiate between

socialism and national liberation. For him they were the

same. In the modern era the nation was the working class.

Supporting the strike movement was a limited tactic.

Aksel'rod foresaw two alternatives to the future develop­

ment of the proletarian struggle. Either the proletariat

fought under the banner of the bourgeoisie for economic

ends as their trade-union predecessors had in the West, or* 99 the proletariat could free itself from its subordinate position under bourgeoise leadership and form its own party, taking in some of the sympathetic intelligentsia, and fighting tsarism conjointly with the bourgeoisie.

Aksel'rod favored the latter and Wasilewski concurred.

What Russia needed was a Russian SD party with an activist political program.

A politically activist SD party, Aksel'rod continued, would get support from the upper classes, because, although they were exploiters as in the West, they were also clients dependent on the state, which they did not control as their counterparts did in the West.

Looking over Aksel'rod's curious brochure we see that while he soberly views the deficiencies of the social- democratic movement in Russia, he treats the conditions of the develop­ ment of this movement very optimis­ tically. .. and he is immensely in­ clined to exaggerate boththe oppo­ sitional strength of Russian society as well as the importance of the social-democratic movement in the politicaiL life of contemporary Russia. '

1’^cWasilewski5 , "Z socyalistyczne j publicystyki, " p. 1 1 . 100

For Wasilewski, Aksel’rod's analysis was sound enough, but he was much too optimistic about the future of Russian

Social Democracy. Criticizing another author, unnamed, in the same article, Wasilewski found that he was even more optimistic than Aksel'rod in the potential for support by Russian

obshchestvo (society, public opinion) for opposition and revolution. This author foresaw the development of a liberalism of landowners joining the liberal professions in which Wasilewski perceived "the same 'society' in which various Russian revolutionaries had already placed their hopes." The unnamed author, Aksel'rod, and similar Russian c thinkers were deluding themselves. "The entirely fictional noble 'opposition' and the very problemmatical 'opposition' of the liberal professions" awaiting the "moral support" of the workers was a mare's nest of unsubstantiated hopes. If this was the way that Russian thinkers viewed Russian reality and upon which they based their hopes for a develop­ ment of a Russian workers movement allied to "problematical" classes also in "opposition" to the tsar, Wasilewski thought there was very little hope in getting realistic support for

Poland. The liberal professions and nobles were patriotic and the proletariat was weak. Russian opposition could offer little help to Poland. For this reason Poland must separate from Russia as quickly as possible "because the 101

continued common intercourse with this monstrous political

organism threaten every European facet of our national life 18 with extinction." The Polish liberation movement was

willing to receive aid from other classes and other

socialist parties, but understood the weakness of exclu­

sively relying on them. The PPS emphasized the working

class and marshalled Polish resources for the liberation

struggle. Wasilewski feared that the Russian socialists

would become mired in the 'opposition* poses of the

various other Russian political groups or would become

opportunists. In any case the Russian socialist movement

was a weak one in comparison to Polish socialism.

< C. The Russian Revolutionary Tradition

Within the Russian revolutionary tradition Wasilewski perceived two branches, one led by and the

other led by Alexandr Herzen.^ Neither were Marxists and

Herzen was not as practical as Bakunin, because he thought

tsarism could be progressive and he also exaggerated the

revolutionary potential of Russian obshchestvo. Even

Bakunin who sought solutions in terms of overthrowing the

1 8Ibid.. pp. 7 , 8 .

^T. W-o cLeon Wasilewski^ , "Bakunin a powstanie I863 roku" ("Bakunin and the Insurrection of 1 8 6 3"), Przedswit, No. 3 (1900), pp. 9-10. 102 tsarist government "greatly exaggerated the oppositional worth of that 'unofficial* Russia." Bakunin suffered from a belief in the revolutionary potential of Russian society, an occupational hazard of all Russian revolutionaries, and a misty Pan-Slav feeling. Wasilewski noted that he had an

"exaggerated faith in the possibility of a general Slavic struggle for freedom and an even more exaggerated faith in

Russian revolutionary 'democracy'..." which was eager to overthrow tsarism. This belief convinced Wasilewski that he did not understand the actual conditions and aspirations of the Russians, Poles, or Slavs "and dreamt the most fantastic dreams." At least Bakunin considered that a solution to the Polish question was a step toward the solution of Russia's own ills.

Bakunin's goal was a Slavic federation to replace tsarist despotism. According to him Russia's problems de­ rived from the Petrovian state system. "The German foundations of the Petrovian state have rotted," he stated categorically, and now decaying were "all the deformities produced by the monstrous union of Tatar barbarity and

German political thought..." When this all collapsed and

Nicholas I's slogan of autocracy, orthodoxy and nationality 20 was smashed only the "people" would remain.

20 Ibid. , No. b (1900), p. 3. 103

To Bakunin, the Russians were the most important people

in the coming revolution simply because of the size of their population. The revolution itself would start in Poland.

Crucial to Wasilewski was Bakunin's insistence that individual peoples from the borderlands should decide for themselves their own political future and with whom they may wish to federate.

With the failure of the Polish Insurrection of I8 6 3.

Bakunin's optimism changed to pessimism, but he still be­ lieved in Russo-Folish amity. According to Wasilewski, he finally realized

that the Polish insurrectionists, fighting above all for the inde­ pendence of the fatherland, by no means shared his *= Bakunin's=» extreme revolutionary views and even were afraid of them, not believing that the Polish cause profitted from "U\e adher­ ence of people like Bakunin. 21

Bakunin came to realize- the doubts and hesitations of

Herzen and his co-worker Nikolai Ogarev on the Polish

question, but he continued to work with the Folish revo­

lutionaries .

2 1 Ibid., p. 5 . 10^

They cHerzen, Ogarev, and their followersn approached participation in the Polish affair digesting the doubts of doctrinaires and theore­ ticians, Bakunin removed his doubts to a future time and threw himself entirely into the whirlpool of practical revolutionary action. Herzen was beset by doubts whether the road of the Russian socialists and the road of the Polish insurrectionists was one and the same. Bakunin decided this question affir­ matively, as his healthy revolutionary instinct prompted him, that the lib­ eration of Poland must consequently22 lead her to radical social reforms.

The failure of the I863 insurrection was a disappoint­ ment to both Bakunin and Herzen. Bakunin, evolving toward anarchism, continued to value the Poles. Iierzen now shied, av/ay from them and reposited his confidence in tsar

Alexander II, who he hoped, according to Wasilewski, would become a , a peasant revolutionary, to reform society, but from above. Herzen viewed the obschina

(peasant commune) as the organizing principle of the future socialist society. Poland which had lost this type of land tenure to private and individual landownership had to be saved by the tsar.

2 2 Ibid.. p. 6. 105 Herzen, as Drahomaniv correctly claims, despite all his Voltairianism and St. Simonism was a Moscow Slavohile or, "better yet, a Great Russophile who aspired to give a Great Russian stamp to Voltarianism and socialism. 23

Forty years had passed and Wasilewski wondered which tradition, Herzen’s or Bakunin’s, had survived in Russia, t Herzen’s heirs were the radicals and the liberals

"phlegmatically wiggling their toe in their shoe." They have lost Herzen’s humanitarian feelings while they have greatly emphasized his Russophilism. "And the heirs of

Bakunin, the Russian revolutionaries? It is better not to speak of them because it would lead us to unhappy re- 2Ll flections..." i As the intelligentsia’s opposition weakened in the face of government reaction, the one bright spot in Russia was the labor movement. 23 But factory proletariat comprised only

2 3 Ibid., p. 7 .

2 ^Ibid., p. 8 . L. W . ’s dots.

23The PPS was based on the strong labor union movement of Poland. Unlike the weaker Russian labor unions which had little success in turning the Russian SDs away from the goal of revolution, and unlike the powerful German labor union movement, especially that segment led by Georg von Vollmar, which had purely economic and parliamentary goals and succeeded in turning the German SDs away from revolution, Polish labor retained the goal of Polish independence through revolutionary struggle. On Vollmar see David Rosen, German Social Democracy Between Bismarck and Bernsteint Georg yon Vollmar and the Reformist Controversy,~1890-1895, Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation (Madison, 1975J.Vollmar was a patriot (p. 6l) who disliked Russia (pp. 6l, 6 9 ). 106

1 .7$ of the population while the peasants made up 82$.

Wasilewski said that these statistics must make one look

"soberly" on the meaning the Russian labor movement. The

PPS had given some aid to the Russian movement but was

stymied by the major problem of its disunity. The Russian

workers' movement was split up into many parties and factions.

"In a word, we see presently in Russia only the weak begin­

nings of activity in the direction of the establishment of a strong united party on which we could depend in our struggle

with tsarism," said Wasilewski. He thought it would be a

long time before such a party could be established in Russia.

Student disturbances spread throughout Russia in 1901'.

Significantly the students were aided by workers but not •

obshchestvo. Wasilewski concluded that it was the workers 27 who counted in a revolutionary situation not the obshchestvo*

But there was no single workers' party to exploit the sit-

26 B. P-in deon Wasilewski^7 , "W sprawie ruchu rosvjskiego" ('On the Question of the Russian Movement"). Przedswit, No. 1 (1 9 0 1 ), p. 21. Rose Luxemburg criticized Wasilewski's use of statistics by complaining that the pro­ portion of peasants to proletarians in ethnic Poland was similar to Russia and that if the kresv were included this proportion would be even less favorable. "Pol'skii i Russkii sotsializm v ikh vzaimnom otnoshenii," Archiwum ruchu robotniczego, Vol. I (1973). p. 5^. Her article was in answer to L. Plochocki t'Leon Wasilewskia , Vzaimnve otnosheniia pol* skikh i russkikh sotsialistov (London, 1902). 27 /St. Os... arz c Leon Wasilewski^ , "Z powodu ostatnich wypadkow w Rosyi"("0n the Recent Incidents in Russia"). Przedswit. No. 3 (1901), p. 8 3. 107

uation. Wasilewski did note an important change, for

Rabochee Delo (Workers' Cause), the organ of the Union of

Russian Social Democrats called, from abroad, for "political" nQ demonstrations among the workers.60

There were some signs of political activity, there were

some disturbances, and some workers did help support the

demands of the students. Wasilewski admitted this and was

heartened by it. For some reason the socialist press in the

West had chosen to see the disturbances in Russia as the

beginning of a great revolutionary movement. Russian

emigrants exaggerated what was happening and their western

friends were prepared to believe them because "the hatred • of tsarist despotism and the fear of a Cossack flood is so

strong in the progressive circles of Western Europe that

they tend to ascribe a greater than realistic meaning to what weakens tsarism."2^ This was the point Wasilewski

tried to make to the Western socialist parties particularly those with a rising militant wing which was sympathetic to

Russia like the followers of Rosa Luxemburg. The Russian movement was to be discounted for various reasons. The

opposition of the various levels of social strata to tsarism

28 t 0 tLeon Wasilewski^ f "Socyalisci rosyjscy wobec ostatnich zaburzen uniwersyteckich" ("Russian Socialists and the Recent University Disturbances"), Przedswit. No. ^ (1901), pp. 137-38. L. W.'s emphasis.

2 ^St. Os...arz eLeon Wasilewski^ , "Zludzenia" ("Illusions"), Przedswit, No. 5 (1901), p. 1 6 2 . 108

was weak and disunited. The proletariat, which should he a

leader in the opposition, was undeveloped. The progressive

intelligentsia was intimidated by the government while the

nobility and bourgeoisie lived by the sufferance of the tsar.

The bourgeoisie did not seek a constitution for that would

mean sharing and further diluting whatever power or privilege

they had attained. And the workers? In terms of "quantity

and quality" they were too weak. "Our Russian comrades have long years of hard work before the Russian working class

will become fully conscious of its goals and a powerful army

of the active revolution."

The failure of attaining any significant gains follow­

ing the student demonstrations of early 1901 showed these •

weaknesses.

In general, the course of events of this year's Hay Day holiday in Russia eloquently confirms, on the one hand, a significant development of class consciousness already in the working masses, and on the other hand, the imperfection and unpreparedness of socialist organizations. Unity in these undertakings, like the Hay Day celebration, can only be guaranteed with the existence of a coherent and centrally directed party organization but this as it seems is^still far in the future for Russia. ^

3°Ibid., p. I6 3.

-^rLeon Wasilewski^* , "Z zycia rosyjskiego" ("Prom Russian Life"), Przedswit, No. 8 (1901), p. 301. 109

As political assassinations mounted in number while the

new century grew, they finally reached the l-Iinistry of the

Interior, where its head, the reactionary V. K. Plehve, was

killed in 1904. Many now hoped that with the removal of

Plehve and his replacment by Sviatapolk-Iiirskii, a man of

more modern views, a change in government policy would

result, amounting to a new era in Russian politics. Wasilewski

dissented: " Sviatopollc-Mirskii is a person whose name cannot serve for a program." 32 His ideas on liberalism and

representative government were a sham. If this was to be

the new era it too was bankrupt.

The chaos that led to the of 1905 .

began in Poland late in 1904. Mass demonstrations occurred

and they replaced the small conspiracies of the past. The

immediate cause of the Polish outburst was a protest against

mobilization for the war against Japan. 33 Here at least

there was a new era breaking along the horizon.

To Wasilewski, Polish nationalism had little to offer.

He found hope only in socialism. Although there was

tremendous sympathy from the Austrian 3Ds for the PPS, the

32B. P-incLeon Wasilewski3 , "*Nowa era* w Rosyi" ("•New Era' in Russia"), Przedswit. No. 9 (1904), p. 370. His name contains roots meaning holy and peace.

33 c-Lecm. Wasilewski3 , "13 listopada w Warszawie" ("November 13 in Warsaw"), Przedswit. No. 10/12 (1904), p . 451. 110

Austrians lavished their aid on the FF3D of Galicia which was rather provincial in nature. The German SDs, once the bearers of hope for Polish independence, got caught up in revisionism and the anti-independence revolutionism of

Luxemburg and her SDKPiL followers. As for Russian Social

Democracy, for all intents and purposes, it did not count because it was not unified, and even if it were unified it would still be weak. As long as socialism was weak in Russia the great enemy of progress remained the rapacious imperialism of tsarism. CHAPTER IV

POLISH SOCIALISM

The International Socialist congress in Paris indignantly scores the "barbaric political oppression of Russian tsarism committed against the Polish and Finnish nations and exhorts the proletariat of every nationality suffering under the absolutist yoke to join in a united struggle against this common enemy of socialism and de­ mocracy.

Declaration of 2nd International, 1900

A. Party Organization

The organization of socialist parties within each of the three partitioning powers of Poland had problems and peculiarities. The PP3D of Austria was autonomous but had' cordial relations with Vienna. The non-Luxemburg Polish socialists of Germany fought harder and harder to gain rec­ ognition of a special status from Berlin. In Russia the problem was even more complicated. There, Social Democracy was weakened by factionalism which split it into mutually antagonistic units. There also existed other socialist, but non-Marxist, mass parties. Each faction had its own idea of socialist organization in the Russian Empire. The

Socialist Revolutionaries (SRs) felt that the Foies should

111 1 decide for themselves their own fate. The Bolsheviks

strove for a united all-Russian front made up of members

of all the constituent parts of the Russian Empire. The

PPS Poles sought the organization of parties along ethnic

lines, with each group hound by loose federal ties. Most

Russian Social-Democrats recognized the importance of ethnic

organization but not of federal ties and insisted on geo­

graphical unity of the lands under the tsarist scepter

dominated by a single socialist party apparatus. To com­

pound this problem of ethnic or geographical organization

and the ties between distinct parties, there was the ad­

ditional problem of describing ethnic Poland and the areast

the Poles thought they had a right to organize. The Russian

Social Democrats disputed PPS claims not on ethnic but on

geographical grounds. This was the problem to which

Wasilewski geared his attention. His claims to independence

rested on a conception of ethnicity in such a way as to en­

courage strivings for national liberation among the various peoples lying between the ethnic Russians and Poles. This way, he hoped, no all-Russian flood would be able to drown the national consciousness of smaller peoples, and free relations among free peoples could arise without centralist direction from the Great Russian capital.

1 The Sotsialistv-Revdliutsionery were organized by 1902 from a number oT populist groups. This problem of organization had a still vivid histor­

ical background. In the past the Polish Commonwealth had

ruled vast tracts of land stretching from the Baltic to the

Black Sea. These lands eventually came under the rule of the

Russian Empire. Ethnically, the area was neither Russian nor

Polish. In the beginning of the twentieth century, the Poles

were represented there by the szlachta landowners, a small middle class, islands of peasants, and some industrial work­

ers. The Russians were represented predominantly by the

bureaucracy and the army, but there were also small settle­ ments of Old Believers. The indigenous people had varying

degrees of national consciousness. There were also large numbers of Jews who were treated sometimes as a religious group, sometimes as an ethnic group. The historical back­ ground of this ethnically mixed area was inherited by the

socialists, and each party tried to establish a claim to work exclusively in this area.

The problem, as Wasilewski saw it, was to show the world

socialist movement that Russian socialism was weak and divided.

He hoped to avoid disappointment based on misplaced hopes and false strategies. Hand in hand with this problem, his

other task was to lay the claim for exclusive PFS activity in

ethnic Poland and paramount PPS influence among the ethnic groups between the Foies and the Russians.

According to Wasilewski and the PPS membership, the most irritating thing that the Social Democrats of Russia did was to ignore the PPS. Divided amongst themselves the Russian

SDs, with an organization primarily in exile and made up of of the intelligentsia, had little contact with or support from the workers at home. Nevertheless, the Russian SDs spoke for the Russian movement with the same air of authority that the German party spoke for the German movement. Their publications contained little information on what was, to

Wasilewski, the most active, the most extensive, and the most well-disciplined socialist party in the Russian Empire.

Even (Spark), the popular organ of the RSDRP edited by

G. V. Plekhanov, the great thinker of Russian Social De­ mocracy, contained almost nothing about the FPS, much to 2 Wasilewski1s chagrin. From very early then the most in- • fluential SDs of the future, those around Iskra. were singled out for insensitivity to the Polish cause.

Zaria (Dawn). the Russian SDs' scientific-political journal, edited by the three grand figures of early Social

Democracy, Plekhanov, Vera Zasulich and Pavel Aksel'rod, com­ mented on the lack of precision of the SD stance toward the non-Great Russians. Zaria claimed that the nationality question was not worked out because there was no political life in Russia for public opinion to be expressed on this issue. In any case, the SDs favored samoopredelenie. no

B. P-incLeon Wasilewski3 , "Z socyalistycznej publicystyki rosyjskiej"("From Russian Socialist Journalism"), Przedswit. No. 10 (1901), p. 373* 115

matter how vague this term was. For example, the Finns

should be given back their autonomy, which they lost in

1899, but the Ukrainians "do not need it." VJasilewski

bristled at this point: "This is a matter whose solution

must be unconditionally left to the very interested nation­ al- ality." The Russians, continued Wasilewski, as good inter­

nationalists should support the socialist movements every­

where and not make decisions on which deserved autonomy

and which did not.

Only the SRs were beginning to show sympathy for the

Polish problem. Their mass circulation publication, Svoboda

(Freedom). in addition to including an article by Fi3rsudski,

printed a very favorable article on Poland. "We must note" wrote VJasilewski "that in the Russian socialist press, es­ pecially that earmarked for the wide working masses, for the first time we come across such a sincere and sympathetic declaration on the Polish problem."^

O 3t. Os...arz tLeon 'Wasilewski^ , "Dwie partye rosyjskie" ("Two Russian Farties")i Przedswit. No. 7 (1898), p. 17. Samoonredelenie can be interpreted to mean anything from autonomy to independence. It is equally as vague as the terms Selbstbestimmung and self-determination which are its translations in German and English.

^tLeon Wasilewski*, "Z prasy" ("From the Press"), Przedswit. No. 8 (1902), p. 310.

^ ~bid., No. 9 (19 0 2 ), p. 353. 116 Finally, in October of 190*1- the Russian SDs published a paper, Sotsial'demokrat (Social Democrat), designed for the masses of Russian workers. Wasilewski warmly greeted this publication, whose aim was to become

the link between the working masses and that socialist intelligentsia which in effect, up to this time, composed the Russian SD party. The nearness of the party to the mass of workers undoubtedly will influence the normalization of relations in the bosom of the very par.ty in which, primarily as a result of its separation from the terrain of the worker, elements have multiplied, having nothing in common with socialism, elements which are chauvinistic and at the same time anti-democratic (vide 'Iskra').

Unfortunately, this newspaper was published abroad and was cut away from the masses. Its attitude toward the national­ ities "oppressed by tsarism," however, was the same as Iskra's:

"all-Russian." There was good nev/s and bad news with the emergence of this publication. Wasilewski applauded the SDs for finally directing a publication at the working masses.

Too long had SD affairs been run in exile with no direct con­ tact with workers' needs. However, now that contact was established with the workers, the Russian SD tradition toward national liberation had not changed. Although Sotsial'demokrat was predominantly Menshevik, it was published by the Bolshevik

^fcLeon Wasilewski?, "Bibliografia" ("Bibliography"), Przedswit. No, 9 (1904), p. 397* 117

dominated Iskra. When it came to the nationality question

both as well as Bolsheviks were Great Russians.

B. Jews

The strongest socialist party to emerge in the area of

historical Lithuania was the Bund.^ It had contacts with

the Jewish population of the entire area of Foland ingested

into the Russian Empire through the partitions. As long as

the Jewish socialists confined their organizational battle

to the PPS, the Bund was supported by the Russian SDs. Once

the Bund pressed for recognition of their exclusive right

to organize Jewish workers, then the Russian SDs attacked

them. The Plekhanovites acknowledged as normal the separa- i tion of Jewish workers from Polish and Lithuanian workers.

As soon as the Jewish workers tried to loosen ties with the

Russian workers the Plekhanovites attacked them for national­

ism and accused them, according to Wasilewski, of "surpassing cthe hatred ofa the social-Hakatists toward the PP3 of the

Prussian partition."®

n Alfremevner vidisher arbeter Bund in Lite, Poyln un Russland. the General Workers' Union in Lithuania, Foland, and Russia, founded in 1897 in Wilno.

8 c L e o n Wasilewski-a, "Z prasy," Przedswit, No. 9 (1901), p. 3^2. One way of telling that the Russian socialists were all-Russian centralists and infected with chauvinism was from the way they referred to the Jewish question and, in connection with this, the Polish problem. When even Russian socialists became inured to using phrases like "among the

Jews of the western province (!!)" 1'Jasilewski showed his irritation and astonishment by appending two exclamation points to the statement. The western province referred to was Lithuania, and this non-historical and non-ethnic desig­ nation was borrowed from the Russian chauvinists intent on deracinating the area and prying it away from Western civi­ lization. Most Russian socialists batted not an eye when ' using this imperialistic and chauvinistic vocabulary. Again, whenever there was mention of the Jewish workers' movement

"in Russia (?) and Foland" Nasilewski was puzzled and in- q serted a question mark after Russia. To Wasilewski there was no Jewish workers' movement in Russia because there were no Jews there. Jews lived mainly in Poland-Lithuania and that was where there was a socialist movement. To call these areas Russian or to include them in an all-Russian organiza­ tional conception as the Russian Social Democrats did was to adopt the terminology of the imperialists.

n 3. F-inr:Leon liasilewskiu , "Z socyalistycznej publicystyki," Frzedswit, No. 10 (1901), pp. 37°» 37^ • 119 V/asilewski, it seems, was not entirely consistent in his application of arguments to this problem. To support the cause of Poland and the other non-Russian nationalities he used the argument of the right to self-determination. To argue the case for Poland's special interest in the border­ lands, he relied on historical precedent. In referring to

Russia he defined it as ethnic Russia. He denied Russia that historical argument for the accrual of territory through pact or conquest which he used to support Poland's case.

That, in reality, this was not an inconsistency to Wasiiewski was explained by his understanding of the partitions and disappearance of Poland. To him this was a great crime and one of its perpetrators, Catherine of Russia, was guilty of an injustice to humanity. Anyone who refused to right this injustice was himself guilty of the same charge.

The proper attitude toward Jews was a problem which plagued the PPS as well as the Russian SDs. The major con­ cern of both the Russian and Polish socialists was to deny the Jews the status of nationality. The Russian SDs tried to convince their Jewish compatriots that the overthrow of tsarism would best be accomplished by the coordinated effort of the working classes of all of Russia's nationalities and ethnic groups. Since Russia v/as a multi-national state and since the Russian SDs perceived nationalism as a bourgeois and anti-socialistic disease, a united multi-national work­ ing class front was essential for socialist success. 120 The FPS too wanted a united effort of all the working

classes against tsarism, hut they distrusted the leading

role claimed by the Russians. They also tried to entice

the Jewish working class to the PFS. Like the Russian SDs,

they too agreed that the primary difference between Jewish workers and Christian workers v/as a religious one and not a national one. Since religion assumed less importance to

socialists than, say, nationalists, and since Marxist theory had relegated religion to eventual extinction, both the

Polish and Russian socialists felt that the difference be­

tween Jews and Christians would, like the state, wither away.

Both the Poles and the Russians hoped that the Jews would

choose to assimilate to their own nationality and not the

other's. Thus, they believed, there was no basis for the

Bund's insistence on autonomy, for Jews would eventually be­

come Foies or Russians.

.Since his youth, Wasiiewski had been infected by a rationalist and anti-clerical tradition. He accepted the

socialist theories on the weakening of religion and he felt that no distinction should be made between workers of

Christian and Jewish backgrounds. He applied his interests in ethnic problems to the solution of the Jewish problem.

He attempted to prove scientifically that Jews were being assimilated, slowly to be sure, and that artificial barriers were set up which protected their uniqueness. 121

Assimilation, 'Jasilewski argued, followed along lin­ guistic lines. In America, Jews easily assimilated "because

they were few in number and little anti-semitism existed.

But this did not mean that they became undifferentiated from

other Americans by those who

correctly understand assimilation as the acceptance by the Jews of the language of the surrounding people. Hence in this sense Jews in the Jest assimilated but did not stop being Jews with regard to religious con­ fession, the possession of certain separate traditions and living sympathies for co-religionists in other countries. 10

This, after all, can be said of any religious or ethnic group. Assimilation does not preclude feelings of sympathy for those from the same tradition or in similar circumstances

elsewhere.

The situation in Poland was varied, for there were dif­ ferent conditions in the different partitions and even within the same partitioned territory. In Prussian Poland the situation was identical to western Europe. Usually, after

Germanization, the Jews emigrated to western Germany.

IJasilewski said one could not speak of the Jews as a nation­ ality problem in Foznan, Upper Silesia, or western Prussia.

Galicia had to be thought of in two parts, the western and the eastern. Fewer Jews were in the west, but emigra-

10 T. Ij- o cleon Jasilewski^ , "Kwestya zydowska jako zagadnienie narodowe" ("The Jewish Question as a national Problem"), Przedswit, No. 5/6 (190*0» p. 225. 122 tion was greater there, especially among the better ed­ ucated and the wealthier classes. Wasiiewski saw in this lessening of the number of Jews in a given area, both abso­ lutely and relatively, proof for the eventual elimination of the Jewish problem through the greater impetus for assim­ ilation. In the eastern part of Galicia, where Jews were more numerous, they were learning Polish and a little

German, while in the western part they learned predominantly

German but recently were also beginning to learn Polish.

Western Galicia resembled Prussian Poland, although assim­ ilation and emigration were not changing the proportion of

Jews in society as fast as in Prussia. re­ sembled Lithuania and the Ukraine where the proportion of • change in the population was favoring the Christians but where the process proceeded very slowly. Jews in eastern

Galicia were learning Polish but not on a society-wide scale and only through schooling and in the larger .

There were fewer statistics for Russian Foland, but

Jasilewski claimed that the number of Jews there was de­ clining relatively and, in some -powiatv (counties), abso­ lutely. They were holding their own only in large cities like Uarsaw and £o'dz. Russian anti-Semitic laws prevented more rapid assimilation.

A change in political realities could change these patterns of development. V/asilewski thought writers on this 123 topic neglected this aspect. If the Germans had taken over

the Kingdom of Poland and Lithuania, then the Jews would have

"been assimilating to German culture on the pattern of

Prussian Poland and western Galicia. The rise of an inde­

pendent Poland would change the assimilation patterns in

the favor of the Poles.

The major difference between eastern and western Europe

regarding the Jews was that the Russian created and

supported a which prevented free movement

and assimilation of Jews. When this Pale finally fades into

history or is destroyed, Jews will move to other parts of the

Russian Empire and the artificial barriers to assimilation-

wili be replaced by the normal and natural ones: religion,

culture, language, and sympathies. It was these natural barriers to assimilation which were .slowly broken down in

the West and, as Wasiiewski foresaw, the same would eventu­ ally happen in eastern Europe.

As a step toward the eventual assimilation of Jewry, as well as Christianity, to the ideals of the rationalist,

socialist, and just political organization, Jews must be granted civil rights along with the Christians, even if this may seem antithetical to the final goals of socialist society.

Jews must be granted equal rights

even in.the national sense if the Jews themselves will demand this. From this point of view we have to struggle against any anti-semitism even if it is dressed in the garb 12^

of 1 Social Democracy' as among the Great Russian chauvinists of 'Iskra'. It is just the same our socialist duty to paralyze all the attempts of the 'Bund* toward sep­ aration of the mass of the Jewish proletariat in our country, under the apparent necessity of defend­ ing 'special? interests of the Jewish proletariat, from the struggle for the dearest interests of the entire working class.H

The Bund, as a founding member of Russian Social Democ­

racy, was originally closely tied to it. The Jewish prole­

tariat v/as of interest to the Poles of the PPS, because they

lived v/ithin the old boundaries of the commonwealth where many Christian Poles lived. Yet instead of flocking to the

PPS as the Christian proletariat did, the Jewish proletariat i was flocking to its own, separate party which had close ties

to the Russians. Wasiiewski found this both strange and un­ necessary.

Economic exploitation of Polish- German- Jewish capital makes itself felt on them, the Jewish workers, the same way it does on the Polish or Lithuanian cChristianra worker. The oppression of the occupying power torments the Jewish proletariat like the Polish or Lithuanian. Vie share a common fate and thus too we should follow common paths in fight­ ing for a better destiny. . . 12

11 Ibid.. p. 229.

12cLeon Wasilewski-a, "Sprawa proletaryatu zydowskiego ("The Case of the Jewish Proletariat"), Przed^wit. No. 4 (1 8 9 8 ), p. 1 . 125 All the workers of the former Polish Commonwealth were being exploited. These workers had a champion in the PPG, the internationalist, socialist, and mass party which repre­ sented all the workers of the former Commonwealth no matter from which ethnic or religious group they originally hailed.

Jewish socialism,. which had its beginnings in Lithuania, used activists who were forced to rely on the Russian language in their study circles. Faced with the competition of the mass party PPS,the Jewish activists had to adopt Yiddish as their working language in order to approach the working people. Jewish socialism had other problems.

These young activists were "children of the Jewish bourgeoisie" and of course this affected their views.

Wasiiewski felt that Jewish solidarity, even though it was socialist, would benefit the Jewish bourgeoisie, for the

Jews had been forced almost exclusively into becoming a caste of traders.

Being profitable for the bourgeoisie this separation is just the same immensely harmful to the Jewish proletariat because it delays the development of its class consciousness, confuses its social views and weakens its powers for the struggle with the bourgeoisie in the same manner as our famous 'national unity', ex­ ploited knowingly by, c ours conservative and progressive Gtanczyks. Jewish solidarity and unity burst under the pressure of social-economic 126

development. Class antagonism heightens more and more in Jewish society.^3

Jewish separatism was bad, for it only benefited, the

Jewish bourgeoisie. In h'asilewski' s opinion, Jewish sepa­ ratism v/as similar to the separatism advocated by the Polish nationalists not, mind you, the PPS. For the working class the bourgeoisie was the enemy. Poland's problem v/as that it had been partitioned and the occupying powers became yet another enemy. The PPS tried to gear the struggle against the bourgeoisie and the imperialist partitioning powers.

The Bund, by cooperating v/ith the Great Russian chauvinist

SDs, and by using their language and symbolism, v/as playing into the hands of the enemy.

Folk antipathies for people with different ethnic char­ acteristic existed. This was a fact. There was no need to exacerbate them. Only the future world would eliminate many of these distinctions throught the process of progress and modernization. liasilewski warned that an emphasis on confes­ sional distinctions on the part of the Jews would only lead to anti-Semitism on the part of the Christians. The under­ standing of the ignominy of anti-Semitism did not preclude

"the open antipathy to those Jews who play s. role as govern­ ment collaborators in the annexed lands and even in Congress

Poland." The had gone over to the govern-

^ Ibid.. p. 3 . 127 ment in large numbers "because the government had crushed the power of the Polish szlachta through serf-emancipation.

To this extent the Jews were realistic. Their advancement could come through the Russians who had political power, not the Poles who had lost it, but '.Jasilewski insisted on a wider perspective.

The task of international socialism is to weaken the power of tsarism at any cost... Since the government quite correctly sees the greatest danger for itself in centrifugal tendencies of the separatistic '■borderlands' P okra in'7. then socialists should support these tendencies with all their might. ^

This was a lot to ask of the Russian socialists. But theni

Jasilewski had little hope for them in any case. They wer'e

steeped in the Great Russian traditions of centralism and chauvinism. The Bund, instead of fighting against Russi­ fication, was supporting it in the same way as the Jewish bourgeoisie had accommodated itself to it.

The acknowledgement of the existence of real antipathies felt for different ethnic and religious groups on the folk level, consisting of a well-known attitude toward the stereo­ type of the peculating swarthy Gypsies, mysterious ear-locked shtetl Jews or the brutish Slavic, Baltic, or Finnish peasant communities, was a step toward understanding conservative

l4Ibid., pp. 3 , fc. 128

societies. There were profound differences even within

the folk communities where the same people, basically, were

differentiated by cultural, religious, economic, and linguis­

tic custom. The Karaim, fundamentalist Jews who denied the

authority of the Halacha (custom and exegetical w r i t i n g s

since the Talmud), thought of other Jews as heretics and

were, in turn, frequently not recognized as Jews themselves.

The same may be said of the Uniates regarding their attitudes

toward Catholic Poles or Orthodox Ukrainians. These examples

of internal and external folk differences can be multiplied

a hundredfold.

Ethnic antipathy could, under pressure, transform itself

into national antagonism. To make blanket statements about

national antagonism resulting from folk differences, and

therefore decrying these differences, was to be too glib.

Internationalism did not mean ignoring ethnic traits as the

Luxemburgists would have it. Some socialists, even in the

FP3, were arguing that there were some strictures to inter­ nationalism, that one's own ethnic group or nationality de­

served preference or emphasis over others in struggling for

freedom. Wasiiewski did not think that this latter idea re­ presented a correct Marxist attitude any more than the former did. There were no strictures on internationalism, for this was not a mere abstraction to 'Wasiiewski. Workers had real

common interests, and to deny this by placing conditions on

internationalism, emphasizing one's own groups above other 129 groups, was to deny the class struggle of all the workers.

Wasiiewski gave a few examples to prove or clarify this contention. The German proletariat v/as suffering at present not because of the immigration of many Folish workers but that these Polish v/orkers were strike breakers. Was this an example of national antagonism? Of course not, responded

IJasilewski. It was an economic problem, a labor problem, not a problem between nationalities. It was in the interests of the German workers to normalize the development of the Folish economy, which the partitions had disrupted, and in the inter­ ests of the Polish workers not to send scabs to Germany but concentrate on the development of Poland. Both tendencies’,

Germans ignoring the Polish problem and Poles immigrating 'to

Germany, interfered with socialism's natural development.

A strong Polish economy, which presupposed Polish control, would prevent emigration for bread.

The Russian worker v/as in a different position from the other v/orkers in the Russian Empire because he v/as privileged by having government protection and, therefore, he v/as harm­ ful politically to the non-Russian workers. The PPS was opposed to the immigration of such workers into north-east

Poland (Bialystok) for political and not national reasons.

In a recent tailor's strike there, the Jewish workers were upset because Polish v/orkers from Warsaw went and took ad­ vantage of the strike to get jobs. In this situation the PPS opposed both Polish and Russian workers 130

"because the issue was a strike of workers, who happened to he Jewish and indigenous, and who were threatened hy Folish

and Russian strikebreakers. The issue here was not national but economic.

On the question of whether the PFS should support

Russified Jews in Lithuania, VJasilewski replied "But of course!" with the hope that eventually the noxious Russian

influence would be neutralized. They must be made to see that the PPS was an internationalist party. Support for the

Bund, on the other hand, was a different matter altogether.

To this we reply that Russifying tendencies, in police or some other guise, are harmful to the proletariat of the countries yoked by Russia, re­ gardless of any national or confessional differences. For that reason the struggle against the- all-Russian tendencies of the Bund is supported among the Lithuanian Jews because it cleanses it from harmful accretions and puts the movement back on the right track. 15

The same must be encouraged among the Ukrainians too.

C. Galician Ukrainians

The Ukrainian radicals of Galicia, '/asilewski's friends, were undergoing intellectual fermentation at the turn of the century and were splitting up into various political camps.

■DeLeon Wasiiewski^, "Jeszcze w sprawie znaczenia ruchu rosyjskiego dla nas" ("Once More on the Question of the Meaning of the Russian Movement for Us"), Przedswit. No. 7 (1899), P. 11. 131 Some evolved toward socialism, while others evolved toward nationalism. The process v/as similar to that of the demo­ cratic radicals in the Polish National League which had also split up into its component parts of nationalists and socialists. Wasiiewski counted on the socialists to protect the interests of the Ukrainian worker as both a worker and a Ukrainian, not as a Russian or a tool of the Russians.

Drahomaniv, the father of Ukrainian socialism, had never properly understood the national question, said Wasiiewski, and had worked from the noxious position of "all the Russias."

In politics he only further developed the ideas of Herzen and Bakunin who sought to transform Russia, one and indivisible, into a similar state organization, one and indivisible, based however on a new principle copied from Switzerland and England. Drahomaniv never understood that each nation-must comprise a separate cultural type and must establish a separate political organism.

Politics in this corner of the world v/as truly entering a new era. Wasiiewski had consistently supported the

Ukrainian democratic Radicals of Galicia, for although they were peasant oriented, they were progressives; they insisted on the Ukrainian character of the people and did not allow any confusion of themselves with the Russians. As the con­ cepts of industrial democracy slowly penetrated somnolent

•^cLeon Wasilewskia, "Ze spraw rusinskich" ("From Ukrainian Problems"), Przedswit. No. 7 (18 9 9 ), p. 1 9 . 132 Galicia, Marxist ideas gained currency. The fledgling

Ukrainian Social Democracy, like its Polish counterpart the PPSD, was developing firmly within the framework of 17 Austrian Social Democracy. Sharing the same provincial defects as the PPSD, the Ukrainian Marxists were not

Russophile in the Drahomaniv tradition.

This emergence of yet another Social Democratic party based on a long-ignored eastern European nationality cor­

roborated the thought of VJasilewslci, who saw the future in terms of nationally based socialist parties struggling for social justice and sovereignty. Could Lithuanian and

Byelorussian developments toward socialism be far behind?

And what of the other oppressed ethnic groups and national­ ities in eastern Europe and especially in the prison house of nations— the Russian Empire? Admittedly, modern indus­ trialization had not penetrated into eastern Europe on the same scale as it had in western Europe and these develop­ ments were projected into the future. For IVasilewski and the PPS there v/as no doubt that ethnic groups would develop nationally based socialist parties. It was the wave of the future. These various movements had to be encouraged and properly coordinated for the twin goals of national lib­ eration and social justice. This was the policy l/asiliewski pursued.

17 Ukrains'ka Radikal’na Fartiia. Ukrainian Radical Party, founded in 1391 by Franko and Favlyk. Ukrain'ska Sotsial- Bemokratichna Fartiia, Ukrainian Social Democratic Party, founded m 133 There was an immediate dancer in the short run to all these hopes. Many former prominent Radicals, like Franko,

joined the Ukrainian National Democratic party formed in 1899 hy Professor I-Iykha'ilo Hrushevsfky of Lwow University.1^ This party was the exact counterpart of the Polish NDs and received the same treatment from VJasilewski. It was a mass party which sought the union of Galicia and the heavily Ukrainian populated Bukovina federated within the Russian government state system. Like the Polish NDs they hoodwinked the masses of workers and peasants and got their support from the urban 19 intelligentsia and richer peasantry. As the PFo en­ couraged the emergence of a progressive socialist party among the Ukrainians the national egoism of the,Folish NDs. provoked the emergence of its equally chauvinistic and dis­ tasteful Ukrainian double. Both ND parties were a threat to socialism because they were mass parties and they thrived on national antagonisms.

The remaining Ukrainian Radicals of Galicia who were in­ dependence-oriented were rapidly losing support to the SDs and NDs. Pavlyk, who remained a Radical, continued to defend the Ukrainian cause. Although he was being passed up by new

1 •° "'Ukrains* ka Katsional'no-Dernokratychna Fartiia, Ukrainian National Democratic Party.

IQ / ot. Gs. . .arz t-'Leon 'Jasilev’ski'3 , "Ze spraw rusinskich," Frzedswit, No. 2 (1900), p. 22. developments, he still held the respect due to a founding:

Ukrainian activist. He even had to be taken to task for his

misrepresentation of an important article written by 20 Wasiiewski. Favlyk had read this article in a garbled

version in a Lwow newspaper and such were the misappre­

hensions between Poles and Ukrainians of Galicia that he

misread VJasilewski's intentions toward the Ukrainians. To

allay Pavlyk's fears that the PPS had any aggressive designs

on the Ukrainians, VJasilewski wrote him two letters. In

them, he tried to explain his desire for the Ukrainians and

the Poles to fight for independence together and to arrange

relations between themselves, after independence was achieved,

and according to their own wishes. Pavlyk printed one of the

letters in his newspaper and admitted that VJasilewski's

article had been misquoted in the Lwow newspaper, but he also

added a curious comment on that Polish newspaper which

"understood the essence of P.'scWasiiewski's3 brochure and

omitted his clear statement on Ukrainian autonomy. This was

extremely characteristic cof Poles^ ..." Jasilewski became

livid by this convoluted logic.

The chauvinistic 'Kational Democrat' once wrote that the Ukrainian radicals are paid off in rubles just like the Russophiles.

PO L. Piochocki (St. Os...arz)cLeon VJasilewski;^ We wsnolnem .iarzmie (London, 1902). For Fiisudski's criticisms of Wasiiewski' s article see VJladyslaw Fobog-IIalinowski, Jozef Pilrsudski. 1867-191^ (London,cn .d.?), pp. 131-32. 135

'./hat would Pavlyk say if someone considered this to he charac­ teristic... of the activities of the radicals. 21

To Pavlyk*s observation that the "best intentions" of the brochure were foreign to most Foies and that these pood intentions "change into hegemony and moralization" Wasiiewski replied,

we are not concerned with any 'love' of the Ukrainian's for us but of linking and coordinating the efforts of all the national­ ities oppressed by Russia to the overthrow of tsarism precisely in the interests of all these nation­ alities . 22

National antagonisms were still common in eastern Europe and it would take socialism some effort to eradicate them. In’ any case, Ukrainian radicalism in Galicia became a historical relic, for Pavlyk's paper closed with this exchange with

VJasilewski.

D. Federalism

The same political transformation which occurred among the Poles in Russia and Austria was occurring now among the

Ukrainians of Galicia. The advent of industrialization, the influx of socialist ideas, the shift of the radical and pri-

21cLeon Wasiiewski?, "Z prasy," Przedswit. No. 7 (1 9 0 1 ), p. 263.

99 Ibid.. p. 264. 136 marily peasant parties toward the exclusive support of the

wealthier peasantry caused the emergence of socialist parties

to fill the needs of the new conditions. It was obvious to

VJasilewski that the peasantry still was an important sector

of society and that any future success rested on a careful

analysis of its aspirations and a program to gain it as an

ally of the urban working class. The traditional distaste

for the peasantry among Marxists was being cast aside by

people as varied as Lenin and the Italian Gramschi. The

role of the peasantry was especially important in southern

and eastern Europe, where its numbers were very high and

where it formed a majority of any given ethnic group.

VJasilewski, too, felt that an alliance of the two classes, < the urban and rural proletariats, was possible and essential

to attain the goals of the PPS.^3

The Polish NDs had carried propaganda successfully into

the countryside and had developed a moral sway there. This

ND superiority in the villages had to be rooted out by the

2 %asilewski's attitude toward the peasants was unlike Vollmar's or Bernstein's because he sought the support of the peasantry for the independence struggle while Vollmar and Bernstein sought a justification for the existence of private property. Rosen, Vollmar. pp. 206, 207; Eduard Bernstein, Evolutionary Socialism: A Criticism and Affirma­ tion (New York, 1 9 6 7 ) , pp. 66-71. Marx foresaw the disap­ pearance of the small peasant landowner and while Wasiiewski did too, he probably would have put this disappearance off to a more distant future in the case of the greater agricul­ tural predominance in the eastern European economy. For the views of Antonio Gramschi, who was twenty years younger tha Wasiiewski, see The Modem Prince: and Other Writings (New York, 1967); see also Guiseppe Fiori, Antonio Gramschi: Life of a Revolutionary (New York, 1971). P.PS, for it was Hakatist and "based on the coercion of the

Ukrainians, Lithuanians, and Byelorussians, the very groups the PPS sought as allies in the independence struggle.

Wasiiewski aimed at a policy which sought to pry the Folish peasantry away from the national egoism of the NDs and con­ vince the non-Polish peasantry that the PPS harbored no imperialist intentions toward them. This was very difficult due to the tradition of Polish exploitation of the peasantry during the time of the szlachta Republic and the continued szlachta exploitation under tsarist rule in these lands.

VJasilewski had to put distance between Folish socialism and

Polish imperialism; which were deliberately confused by those people who would thrive on national antagonism and chauvinism.

Only socialism, as VJasilewski conceived it, could avoid national antagonisms among ethnic groups and so the PPS en­ couraged the emergence of socialist parties among these peoples. Yet there was the problem of low and different rates of industrial development among these agricultural peoples of which the PPS was very well aware. The establish­ ment of separatist Lithuanian and Ukrainian socialist parties from the oppressing powers had to be placed within a larger conception that would prove the viability of the agricul­ tural nationalities of eastern Europe in the face of the vast imperial powers.

Ue do not exaggerate, however, the matter of the final formulation of relations of Lithuania and the Ukraine to Poland. Surely, the proper one for us would be the voluntary federal union of Lith­ uania as well as the Ukraine with Poland. Regarding Lithuania we simply do not foresee any form of autonomous existence aside from a close union with Foland. ..'ith the Ukraine we would be connected by looser ties. ^ Here in a very clear and concise manner VJasilewski for­ mulated a policy for the agricultural lands, developing

at different rates toward industrialization, which would not

change fundamentally throughout his life. Lithuania and

Poland would form a federation as in the past. The Ukraine might be tied to Poland only in a mutual protective alliance.

The Byelorussians, the least developed in terms of national i consciousness, would simply have their civil rights pro­

tected in Lithuania pending future development. Lithuania was to become Poland's Scotland.

The special problem of the Bund, the strongest party in

Lithuania, was now apparent. It was strong in Lithuania, con

ceded VJasilewski, but only temporarily.

From the time however that the local Christian workers' organ­ izations assume their proper place in the life of the country cLithuaniaP the role of the 'Bund' as a party possessing separate political aspirations which cannot count on the support of the majority of people in Lithuania, the indepen-

Zgorzknialv (Bmbittered) c-Leon V/asilewskizr , ”Z powodu artykulow tow. i'.azura" ("On Account of the Articles by comrade kazura"), Przedswit, iJo. 9 (1901) • pp. 329-329. 139

dent political role of the 'Bund' will "be reduced to zero.25

Lithuanian, Folish, and Byelorussian Christians outnumbered

the Jews, and in time they would establish a strong movement

and finally hegemony.

The 'Bund', as an organization created for precisely the opposite political needs of the Jewish masses, will lose its reason for existence at the moment of the consolidation of a socialist movement in Lithuania among the Chris­ tians with a distinctly separatist cha­ racter tifrom the Russian Empire^. The Jewish proletariat, presently demoral­ ized by the spiritual heirs of Muravev, an intelligentsia economically bred on Marx, and politically bred on Ilovaiskii, will have to unite with the Christian proletariat and actively support its political aims.2® The Bund was dangerous because it did not represent the national aspiration of all the people of Lithuania and had fallen into the Realnolitiker trap of supporting Great Russian aims, to the Jews* own eventual harm, which even the Russian

SDs supported. The Bund, like the Russian SD centralists, was out of touch with the natural evolution of feelings, from ethnic to national, in eastern Europe.

In the Ukraine, the problem was slightly different, for the Ukrainians did not have a separatist movement as strong

2 % b i d . , p. 329. L. ’.I.*s emphasis.

2 ^Ibid., p. 3 3 0. Mikhail Muravev was the "hangman" of^ the Polish insurrections of the nineteenth century. Dmitrii Ilovaiskii was an author of official Russian history textbooks. 1*K)

as the Christiana of Lithuania but the process of derussi­

fication was proceeding apace among the younger intelligentsia.

Uasilewski decided that the task of the Polish intelligentsia

of the borderlands v/as to "help the Ukrainians nationalize 27 themselves and to socialize ^their-*3 political ideals."

Once a worker-peasant movement of any proportion arose, Uasilewski surmised that it would be easy to initiate an

anti-tsarist alliance with it. Uasilewski did not stop with

just these ethnic groups to consider alliances or common

action, although they were the ones most crucial for his

plans for Poland. Uherever there was Russification, i.e., 28 among the Buryats, there was a potential ally. Except for

the Estonians, all the highly developed European nationalities

had socialist movements and parties of various sizes and

effectiveness. The Georgians, Finns, and Ukrainians were 2 q the most important. 7

The program to be followed by the socialists of the

various nationalities and ethnic groups v/as derived by

Wasiiewski from the resolution passed at the meeting of the

2nd International in Paris in 1900 quoted at the beginning

2 7 Ibid.. p. 3 3 0.

2®cLeon Wasiiewski^, "Luzne notatki" ("Loose Notes"), Przedswit. No. 3 (190*0, pp. 186-87.

29b . P-in cLeon Wasilewskia, "Z ruchu rewolucyjnego na 'kresach"' ("From the Revolutionary Movement in the 'Bor­ derlands'"), Przedswit. No. 5/6 (190*0, pp. 229-232. 1^1

of this chapter. For socialists, despotic and imperialist

Russia was the major enemy. For Foies, the enemy was a

despotic Russia gathering in "all the Russias" and any

other territory the tsars could acquire and then Russifying

its inhabitants.

Tsarism's Russification and economic exploitation of con­ quered lands prevented their "natural development." Denat­

ionalization or deracination v/as a policy designed to harm the working class most because it did not possess the eco­ nomic means to portect its own interests through bribing tsarist officials. With the decline in the "civilization and economy" demoralization of the masses ensued and the numbers of "renegades" increased who were willing to sell out their compatriots for a "Judas' reward" to the author­ ities. In a socialist context, Wasiiewski argued that "the development of class consciousness of the working masses is immensely hindered" because the worker was led to believe that the factory owner, too, v/as oppressed by the alien government and tended to sympathize with him on the basis of nationality to the detriment of the class struggle. The situation was very bad for the Foies in Germany, where a constitutional government existed but where the Folish v/orkers had no representatives to care for their interests.

3°eWasilewskia, We wspolnem iarzmie. pp. 2, 6. Poles in Germany voted for their oppressors, "the Folish

bourgeoisie, just because they were Poles." But the "most

frightening" oppression was in Russia, where there was no

constitution at all. The Russians considered everything

governed by them to be Russian. Since approximately half

the people in the empire were not Russians, they oppressed

the other half. Russians used "the means of oppression"

common to all invaders "but Russian national oppression is even worse due to her political structure and the backwardne of her conditions." If the cultural level of the overrun country was at a higher level than that of the invader, then the culture of the overrun country was pressed down to the level of the invaders' development. Polish workers at Lodz, who had been able to shorten their work day, were forced to return to the old work hours by the government to be on a par with the workers of St. Petersburg. Since Russia v/as harmful to social and national progress, the solution for anyone living in the Russian Rmpire v/as "the complete sepa­ ration from despotic Russia," for then "free development" was possible. This in itself was "the first condition for the triumph of socialism."

For IJasilewski this v/as an extremely important point.

He believed, like Harx, that the victory of socialism over

v ^Ibid., pp. 6-9 . 1^3

capitalism followed certain inexorable laws. This Marxist

political and economic development was natural, that is, it

followed certain laws of nature as did all the realms of

natural, physical and social sciences. To this extent, and

to the extent that they both had a distaste for tsarist

Russia, VJasilewski and Marx shared a common conceptual frame­

work. Where they differed was on the justifications for

Polish independence. Marx saw the Foies as an irritant to

the reactionary Russian state system, Wasilewski saw the

Poles as the socialist vanguard of the Russian Empire.

With little faith in the socialist development of an

agrarian Russia, he looked not to the peasant discontent of

t the masses to transform society but to the inexorable develop­ ment of the working classes in the western Russian Empire

on the model of the development of the working class in the

West through industrialization. The Russian conquest of

Poland, which became the most highly industrialized part of

the Russian Empire, hindered the natural development of

Poland into a modern state. Thus, the return to a natural

condition, the independence and sovereignty of the Polish people through a struggle of national liberation, was a necessary precondition for the free development of Foland which would lead inevitably to socialism, as Marxists be­ lieved was happening elsewhere in Europe. 144

Poland's Russian connection retarded the success of socialism. Still, Foies had an obligation to remember.

An obligation results from our struggle for independence v/hich we should never forget. Let us remember that we are not the only ones who are prisoners of tsarism, that still many other nationalities are shackled to the same fetters, who suffer just as we. Our interests are the same, we have the same enemy and hence our struggle with it should be the same. iJe should encourage and spread sepa­ ratist feelings (that means having separation as a goal) among the nationalities yoked by Russia. Each of us who in whatever manner comes into contact with them should impart to them the necessity of tearing away from Russia and the need for a common struggle with the goal of the destruction of tsarism. ^3

Because Poland was the most industrialized part of the

Russian Empire, it had this obligation to encourage the forces seeking to dismember it. Poland also had a creative role to play.

The obligation to create a united anti-tsarist power falls above all to us Poles. For over a hundred years we unceasingly struggled with the occupation. ■de, therefore, have succeeded in developing ourselves in this struggle and testing various meth­ ods and choosing the best. Foies are scattered all over the Russian 'borderlands' which immensely eases making contacts everywhere. Final-

-^3Ibid. , p. 9. 145

ly, in Russia, the Poles have developed the strongest revolution­ ary organization which has written on its banner the slogan of the liberation of not only Poland but also the other yoked peoples from the fetters of tsarist im­ prisonment. 34

Uasilewski received additional support for the socialist

foundations of national independence from Karl Kautsky whom

he quoted approvingly. The independence of a nation is a natural and indispensable foundation of the contemporary class struggle. The people must be free from all points of view if the proletariat is to have the power and the will to step into the struggle with its social enemy with total absoluteness. For the normal and universal develop­ ment of the proletariat national independence is no less necessary than universal suffrage, freedom of the press and association.35~

Actually Kautsky was arguing in the Austrian context for a federal solution to the nationality problem in the Hapsburg domains, not for Polish independence. Both centralism and federalism based on historical kingdoms and provinces had become impossible as solutions to the Kapcburg problems of state organization. Kautsky continued: "Only one possibility

^ I b i d .. pp. 38-39. ^cL eon Wasilewskip, "Socyalizm czy Hakatyzm" ("So­ cialism or Hakatism"), Przed^wit. No. 2 (1 8 9 8 ), p. 4. L. W.'s emphasis. remains: a federalism of nationalities, the destruction of

traditional provincial boundaries, a new order for Austria

on the basis of linguistic boundaries. Although Uasilewski

agreed with what Kautsky said about national freedom and

federalism, Kautsky meant it to preserve Austria-Hungary while IVasilewski saw in it a program for the independence

of Poland and a political reorganization of eastern European nationalities into a state system strong enough to withstand both Germanization and Russification.

-^Karl Kautsky, "Der Kampf der Rationalitaten," Die Neue Zeit, Vol. XVI, Ro. 13 (1897-98), Pt. 2, p. 55^» CHAPTER V

THE REVOLUTION OF 1905

Down wi-th the tsarist Duma!— Long live the Constituent Assembly in Warsaw!

1905 Slogan

A. PPS Schisms

The defeat of Russian imperialism at the hands of the

Japanese imperialists in the war of 190^-05 provided the

people of Russia with tremendous revolutionary possibilities.

The arguments of the various Polish and Russian socialists

could finally be put to a test to fathom the real strengths'

of the parties* theories of action and their organizational

abilities. By the time the acid test could be given to the

PPS program, an important and far-reaching schism developed within the party. Since 1903 two factions had emerged.

One group, the "elders," upheld the old insurrectionary

tradition of armed struggle for national independence in

conjunction with the other oppressed nationalities of the

Russian Empire. This group included many "old" hands of the PPS like Wasilewski and Pilsudski himself. The other

group, the "youths," played down the cell for national

liberation and decried any anti-Russian insurrection. They

were more optimistice about the revolutionary capabilities 1^7 of the Russian working class and hoped that the anti­ capitalist class struggle would unite the Polish and Russian proletariats against the exploiting supporters of the empire.

The "youths" accused the "elders" of putting the patriotic struggle above the class struggle. The "elders" replied that the "youths," denying the legitimacy of national lib­ eration by adjusting their aims to mere autonomy, were in fact willing to see the National Democrats achieve political power in Poland as a progressive step, in strict Marxist terms, in the development of society toward the future socialist struggle of exploited against exploiters. The

"elders" of the PPS felt confident in their ability to give'

Poland a socialist government or, more likely, a mixed socialist-progressive government and felt no need to be hindered by either an immature Russian socialism unwilling to seize the opportunity of the revolutionary situation or the theoretical dogmatism of the Realnolitiker "youths."

These "youths" sought class allies rather than patriotic allies and felt that Poland inevitably had to pass through a stage of native bourgeois domination because the Poles, without the support of the Russian working class, could never establish a viable Polish government by themselves.

Even if a Polish government were established, it would not last long in the economic sense, since Polish industry would face a vastly curtailed market- with the loss of Polish access to the Russian Empire. 1^9 In the revolutionary situation of 1 9 0 5 * "the "youths,"

who now controlled the PFS executive, called for an autonomous

constituent assembly to sit in warsaw. I’Jasilewski correctly

interpreted this to mean that the "youths" had given up the

independence struggle and had accepted Rosa Luxemburg's

SDKPiL- program of "organic incorporation" of Poland into the

economic system of the three partitioning powers. Wasilewski

and the PPS called for a constituent assembly also, but one which recognized the sovereignty of the Polish people.

The "youths" had removed tfasilewski from the editorship

of Przedswit in 1903 and had almost replaced him on the FF3

Committee Abroad but he was still able to have an article published in his former newspaper in the of 1905 which criticized the program of these "youths."* In that article Wasilewski complained that although the "youths" conceded that there would soon be a revolution in Russian

Foland, they neglected to answer two questions: "what will this revolution be like, and what will be its results?" The

"youths'" position on the first question was that although it might be an armed revolution it would not be like the

Insurrection of I8 6 3. It would not be anti-Russian but anti- government. wasilewski contended that this change in position only confused people, especially the peasantry, since the FP3 had always stood for an armed uprising against the Russian

1 L. Fiochocki «=Leon iiasilewski-^ , "Caveant Consules!" ("Consuls Beware"), Przedswit, No. ^/5 (1905). PP* 193-^. 150

occupation. In reference to the second question, the

"youths' omitted all mention of the goal of an independent

Poland with democratic institutions. Instead, they foresaw a Poland dominated by the native bourgeoisie, the KDs. To

Jasilewski it was unbelievable that this kind of program appeared in a party paper. This was too similar to the aim

of the NDs, who sought an independent Poland in order to exploit the workers and peasants.

The "elders" retained the slogan of independence be­ cause they had a clear view of the present situation. The

"youths" abandoned this slogan because they misinterpreted the situation in Russia itself. The propaganda of the SDKPiL and the Russian GDs had paid off among the "youths." The

"youths" took the activities of Father Gapon's state sponsor­ ed workers' movement as revolutionary. They deemed it essential that the strong Polish workers' movement had to coordinate itself with a weak and frocked movement in Russia.

Instead of calling for independence from Russia, the "youths" hoped to link up with the Russian movement, assuming it to be stronger than it actually was, to force concession from the top. To the "youths," indpendence was an impossible dream and the revolution had to mature over a period of many years.

The -"youths" demanded a popular parliament which was expanded into a constitutional assembly to attain orawn oranstwowe usamodzielnienie (political independence in the legal cense). This goal was deliberately worded vaguely to mean anything between autonomy and independence. The

"youths" were adamant about avoiding a Polish war of inde­ pendence against Russia. This was, in effect, the SDKFiL program. Abandoning independence meant that the Folish movement should lower its aims to call for an all-Russian republic. Focusing on an all-Russian policy meant post­ poning socialism's natural development in Poland by harness­ ing it to the less developed Russian movement. Poland had no army, police, or government to fight against. These were all Russian institutions. Of course, Jasilewski conceded the necessity to coordinate the anti-tsarist struggle but since the Russian socialists were so weak it was wise to develop ties with the oppressed Lithuanians, Latvians, Byelorussians, and Ukrainians. Even if there were a coordinated, all-Russian rising v;ould not Russian troops and police be disarmed and p expelled from Poland?

The October Manifesto of 1905 was a direct result of the chaos following the Russo-Japanese Jar and was a con­ cession in the direction of consitutional government. A call for exiles to return to the empire accompanied it.

V/asilewski returned to Jarsaw, where the "youths" delib­ erately could not find anything for him to do so he went on to Jilno. From there he traveled to 3t. Petersburg and

2 * Adam Frochnik, "Leon Jasilewski w polskim ruchu socyalistycznym," irieoodlegaroscf, Vol. XVI (1937)» pp. 151-5^* iloscow doing party work, /retting a first-hand look at the revolution, and contacting socialists of various nationalitie oppressed by tsarism. As the counter-revolutionary reaction began to succeed, Uasilewski fled back to Cracow.

The split in the PPS which surfaced in 1903 was formal­ ised at the November, 19 06 IXth party meeting in Vienna.

The "elders" created their own group called the PPS Revo­ lutionary Faction, and Uasilewski became editor of its paper

Robotnik, to counter the propagaiida of the which the "youths" continued to publish. The "elders" were dubbed fraki (factionalists) by their erstwhile brethren, while the "youths" who called themselves the "left" were promptly given the appellation "moderate faction" by their former • comrades. Uasilewski worked on the fraki Robotnik until the outbreak of the Great War.

This was not the only schism to wrack the PPS at this time. Pilsudski's emphasis on armed struggle, rather than waiting for the revolution to happen as a result of inex­ orable laws, caused him to call for the cooperation with any

Polish group willing to attempt the armed overthrow of the

Russian government. This meant contacts not only with pro­ gressives but even the IiDs. At first Uasilewski expressed reservations about the transformation of a purely socialist independence movement into a united front of cooperation for national liberation, but he quickly acquiesced to Piisudski's 153 wishes. Others among; the "elders" did not, and they split O away to form the PPS Opposition.-'

3.- Russian Constitutionalism

In the era of revolution, reaction, and war, from 1904 to 1914, VJasilewski leveled his propaganda on three problems.

One was the Luxemburgist anti-independence tendency which found advocates among the FPS "moderates." Another was the centralist tendency among the Russian CDs who insisted on an all-Russian movement coordinated by St. Petersburg.

A final one was the constitutional tendency whose advocates argued that Russia was developing along the normal lines of a Rechtsstaat (state based on law) rather than on coercion and that parties within the empire must become legal and 4 respectable rather than secret and conspiratorial. All of these tendencies, in one way or another, played down what i/asilewski considered the real dangers of the oppression of national and individual rights. He rejected these three tendencies as highly unrealistic.

\Leon Jasilewski, Jo'zef Pilsudski. pp. 119-122. 4 his conception of a constitutional state was expressed in Jsrolczesne nans two konstituev.ine (Cracow, C1905-3 ). His attacks on Russian constitutionalism were included in L. F3rochocki £leon UasilewskiJ Rosy.iskie nartye nolitvczne i. ich stosunek do snrawv rolskie.i (Cracow. cl905xi ); Leon Fiochocki cLeon .iasilewski-j , Rosy a "konstitucyjna" wobec Polak<4w (Cracow, 1913); Leon .iasilewski. Rosva wobec Folalcdw v: dobie *konstitucyjnej* (Cracow, 1 9 1 6 ). 'Jhile other socialist or progressive parties trusted to

tsarist .'roodwill and opted to try legal activity by partici­

pating in the Duma elections, the fraki categorically boy­

cotted the Duma and constitutional tsarism, hasilewski said

that no matter what the composition of the Duma might be,

...it will never be that for which the Polish proletariat fought for up to this time, for which it shed so much blood. he wish to decide our own fate. Ue ourselves wish to order the internal relations of our country and the relations of Poland to Russia as well as to Lithuania and the Ukraine, our nearest neighbors. For this reason in the present revolutionary period we have enunciated a clear, un­ equivocal and firm demand, he demand a CONSTITUENT assembly in hARSA’;. 5

This constituent assembly must be elected by the workers

according to the four-tail system of "universal, direct,

equal and secret voting." It was obvious that neither the

tsar nor the Russian bourgeoisie, the chief beneficiary of

the October Manifesto, would ever grant this to the Foies,

so it could only be achieved by "armed revolutionary struggle.

Do not forget, reminded I/asilewski, that the Russian govern­

ment was not only despotic but also an alien "occupying"

^cLeon Wasilewskia , "Dlaczegomy bojkotujemy Dumg" ("Why We Boycott the Duma"), Robotnik, No. 201 (1 9 0 6 ), p. 2, L. W.'s emphasis. 155 power. The Duma would still be an imperial institution for protecting Russian interests and would only pacify and mislead the revolutionaries.

Prussia provided an example of the problems national minorities faced in an ostensibly constitutional state.

The Foies there faced discrimination in landownership,

education, and language use. The Prussians even attempted

to teach the Poles religion and prayers in C-erman.

German workers strive to conquer already existing political arrange­ ments on the proletariat's behalf. Polish workers have to strive to create such institutions through which the Polish people themselves could administer all their own affairs. 0

In concentrating so much on overthrowing the alien

occupation and developing native institutions, were Uasilewski

and the fraki really guilty of the accusations of the Luxem- burgists in Polish and German Social Democracy, the Russian

Social Democrats, the PPS "Left" and IPS "Opposition"? Gas

Uasilewski a nationalist, and had beabandoned the class

struggle as Fiisudski had as early as 1906 and certainly n bv 191o? Some argue that Pilsudski never was a socialist.

... . 11 n. a. , Leon '..asilewski17 , "Gtrajk dzieci w zaborze pruskim" .'The Children's Strike in the Prussian Partition"), Robotnik. No. 201 (1906), p. 3 .

7 . . The opinion of the Piisudski expert s.t the University of Uarsaw, Andrzej Garlicki, expressed in seminar 1 9 6 9 -7 0. In answering this question, one must understand that

Wasilewski was a socialist in the western European sense of the word, where class struggle could be carried on in a legal manner protected by liberal institutions. There the Marxist dialectic unfolded inexorably and the working class in­ evitably edged its way into power. This could be properly labeled "revisionism" except that Wasilewski, whose Marxism has already been analysed, favored an armed struggle of liberation in Poland. Wasilewski never forgot the working Q class and never was a nationalist. He never placed the interests of landlords, even if they were Poles, over the interests of the common people, whether they were Polish,

Ukrainian, Byelorussian, or Lithuanian. Commenting on the '

1906 election reform in Austria which extended suffrage to all male adults, Wasilewski concluded that it would in general hurt the position of the landowning nationalities* the Poles, Germans, and Italians. This law did have some defects; it was universal and not equal, but it was a great o step forward for the working people.7

^lodzimierz B^czkowski, a nationalist co-worker of his, complained in his necrology that Wasilewski did not understand the younger generation's 'nationalist expres­ sions.' "Leon Wasilewski," Biuletyn Polsko-Ukrainski, Vol. V (1936), No. 51/52, p. 526.

^cLeon Wasilewski^ , "Powszechne giosowanie w Austrii" ("Universal Suffrage in Austria"), Robotnik, No. 202.(1906), pp. 2-3. To underscore the correctness of his factions' in­ sistence on independence as a goal, Wasilewski meditated again on the successes of the NDs. The nationalists had support from all segments of society. Yet, availing himself with Marxist methodology, Wasilewski knew that class con­ tradictions existed in such a movement and that the middle classes did not really have the interests of the workers or peasants in mind. Oppression forced the "masses who were still consciousnessless or befuddled by the NDs..." into the arms of the National Democrats who paraded as the only 10 patriotic party in Poland. Socialists, too, were patriots when they represented the desires of the masses. The bourgeoisie was not the only class which could be patriotic.'

This was what the other socialists forgot. Socialists must be patriotic, especially in an occupied country, in order to prevent the masses from gravitating to the nationalists.

As the reaction reestablished its control in the empire,

’Jasilewski pointed out the counter-revolutionaries to be

watched in Russia's borderlands. These were the Lithuanian

clergy and the Polish szlachta. One feared the Polish lan- 1 1 guage while the other feared land reform. These two

1 0Ibid.

11 / / cLeon Wasilewskia , "Z 'kresow' panstwa rosyjskiego" ("From the 'Borderlands' of the Russian State"), Robotnik, No. 208 (1907), p. 3. 158 groups were unnatural but real allies in Lithuania and Byelo­ russia. The clergy and szlachta were again the enemy in

Galicia. The allies of Polish socialism in Galicia were the

Ukrainians and the PFS should support them against the counter-revolutionary Folish elements. The PFS should run candidates in Galicia but should also support Ukrainian progressives. "And as to the Ukrainian districts," added

Wasilewski, "our fraternal Ukrainian Social Democratic party will staff them and both Poles and Ukrainians will 12 vote for these candidates." .Jasilewski's attitude here

showed the continuing sympathy he had for the urban and

rural working masses, no matter of what nationality, in

opposition to the Folish landowning class.

what this attitude toward the enemies of the revolution

did not explain was why he recommended boycotting the Duma,

disparaged the Prussian assembly, but encouraged legal work

in Galicia. There were two reasons. First, Russia was the

seat of the strongest Polish revolutionary activity and it was also the center of the most dreaded enemy of Folish in­

dependence. Why abandon a strong movement and a revolution­

ary situation to one's worst enemy? Second, conditions were least harmful to Foies in Austria, less so in Germany, but

12 rLeon Wasilewskia , "Z zaboru austriackiego" ("From the "), Robotnik. No. 212 (1907), P- 3. the fraki had lees influence there. Russian Poland was the

heartland for the future independent country to which the

other partioned sections would gravitate. Poles had legal

possibilities in Austria, to a lesser extent in Germany and,

since 1905t come in Russia and therefore the tactics in

these three areas were different.

Another way of viewing the problem of the boycott of the

Duma was to weigh the policies of the parties who decided to

support the Duma and were in favor of some sort of parlia­ mentary guarantee of minority rights in the Russian Empire.

The constitutional movement in Russia was spearheaded by the

Cadets (Constitutional Democrats). These Cadets, according

to Jasilewski, did occasionally act in a revolutionary

manner and had helped the working class, but to a true

socialist they were merely temporary allies. The Folish

counterpart to the Cadets were the Progressive Democrats

who did not even have the pretentions to being revolutionary.^

Once established in the Duma, the Cadets, led by the Russian

liberal Pavel Ililiukov, would soon lose their revolution­

ary stance, predicted Jasilewski.^

■^rLeon Wasilewski^ , "Po wyborach" ("After the Election"), Robotnik, No. 212 (1907), p. 1.

^Leon Wasilewski^ , "Z Rosji" ("Prom Russia"), Robotnik. No. 212 (1907), p. 2-3. The Cadets were eventually outmaneuvered "by the govern­ ment and lost their power in the Duma. They were replaced by the more moderate constitutionalists of the 3rd Duma of

1907, Alexander Guchkov's Octobrists, who were never confused 1 3 with revolutionaries. J To 'Jasilewski this 3rd Duma was the

embodiment of the "counter-revolution" and proved that the

Russian constitutional movement could be neither revolution­ ary nor progressive. "Its vast majority," he said, "is com­ posed of Black Hundreds of various sorts." Despite the

constitutional legalism of the Octobrists, -Jasilewski viewed

the 3rd Duma as a seat of the fulmination of the Black

Hundreds, the violent, anti-liberal, anti-semitic, Great

Russian rabble rousers and pogromists. This was the

attitude he perceived in this constitutional body regarding

the "interests of the people and the ’aliens’ c. non- 1 fi Russiansa." The composition of the 3rd Duma proved beyond a doubt that the tactic of boycotting the Dumas was a correct

one. Cadet revolutionary activity died down, and the

Octobrist successors showed little solicitation for either the working class or the non-Russian nationalities. The

Duma was not the vehicle of the liberation of peoples or the working class.

1 3 -'The Polish I ostgoowa Demokrac ja and the Russian Konstitutsionnaia-Demokraticheskaia Partiia as well as the Oktiabristy all emerged in 1 9 0 5 * 16 cLeon Wasilewski? , "Trzecia Duma" ("The .Third Duma"), Robotnik. No. 226 (1908), p. 2 . 161

C. Russian Socialism and its Polish Supporters

Even as the middle class constitutionalist parties

dropped their revolutionary rhetoric or acclimated themselves

to a theoretical constitutional monarchy, Social Democracy began to support a policy of participating in the Duma.

Social Democracy made the gesture of trying to use the Duma

as a platform for revolutionary speeches since even they realized that they could not capture the Duma for social- 17 ism. The Polish 3Ds, following Luxemburg's precept of

'organic incorporation,' which meant that Poland was once and for all economically incorporated into the three par­ titioning empires, united their efforts for Duma support with their Russian comrades.

In this manner it c RSDRPa really eased its n. SDKPiLn task: it does not have to think; the Russian com­ rades think for it and it benefits from a ready-made program and attempts to incorporate in its life that which they consider applicable. * 8

The Polish SDs supported the Duma elections only because it was the tactic of the Russian SDs. According to ufasilewski, the Polish SDs did not understand the Folish masses, who were in favor of boycotting the Duma as much as they were

17 / fcLeon Wasilewski:?, "Duma jako osrodek rewolucyjny" ("The Duma as a Revolutionary Center"), Robotnik, No. 215 (1907), p. 1. 18 cLeon Wasilewski^, "Socyalcentralisci w opalach" ("Social Centralists in a Rage"), Robotnik. No. 203 (1906), p. 3. in favor of national liberation. The Folish SDs were forced into the absurd position of claiming that by voting the Foie were actually boycotting. This was nonsense. The Polish SD even mimicked the Russian 3D support for the Cadets by sup­ porting the Progressive Democrats who did not even claim to be revolutionary and were not really comparable to the

Russian liberals.

Russian Social Democracy split formally in 1903, before the PFS schism, into 3olsheviks and Ilensheviks. Although their attitudes toward organizational principles held these two factions apart, .Jasilewski understood that their stands on issues important to the Foies were rather similar. He frequently lumped both factions under the empty rubric of '

Russian Social Democracy. They shared, to Uasilewski1s odium, an all-Russian view of party organization and oppo­ sition to national independence of the constitutent parts of the Empire. These attitudes were traced by Uasilewski to the all-Russian and anti-national concepts of the Great

Russian capitalist bourgeoisie and the landed nobility.

The Russian socialists, he thought, fell into the trap of arguing the case for the bourgeoisie and nobility.

The term Social Democracy was an empty one for Russia because it did not represent a unified movement there.

Uasilewski used it as a convenience to describe both 3D factions. Social Democracy in Foland, although unified, did not represent many members. Uasilewski played down 163 both Russian unity and Polish membership, but the amount of

time he devoted to these two Social Democracies belied his

estimation of their lack of importance. He did distinguish the differences and similarities in all these movements.

The Bolsheviks were similar to the SDKFiL in terms of tactics. The ilensheviks were similar to the FFS "moderates"

(or "left") with their "calm evolutionary parliamentary 19 struggle" which was opportunistic. The Mensheviks

like our moderates are subdued by a complete lack of faith in the revolution and put faith in the bourgeois opposition... The Bolsheviks lean toward the con­ viction that a resolute revolu­ tionary struggle is necessary but even among them one does not see completely clear views on the aims and means of this struggle. 20

The most important trend in contemporary Russian Social

Democracy was what Wasilewski perceived as a broadening of

worker membership in the party and participation in the

struggle. Previously there had been an excess of intelli­

gentsia in Russian socialism which had "had a bad influence

on it." 21 This change in the class composition of the

19 cLeon Wasilewski3 , "Konferencja ogolnopartyjna ("General Party Conference"), Robotnik. No. 23 ^ (1909), p. 1; "Mienszewicy o nas" ('.'Mensheviks About Us"), Robotnik, No. 20? (1907), p. 4; and "Z Rosji" ("From Russia")1 Robotnik. No. 212 (1907), p. 3 . 20 cLeon Wasilewskia , "Widoki rewolucji w Rosji" ("Images of the Revolution in Russia"), Robotnik. No. 230 (1 9 0 8 ), p. 2 . 21 Ibid. 16k Russian party still did not have a chance to change Social

Democracy's attitude toward Polish separatism. A joint meeting of the Bolsheviks and Mensheviks was still able to agree that Polish independence was not in the interests of

22 •< Russian Social Democracy.

."Jhat the Russian Social Democratic leadership thought of Poland could not be helped. They were only now becoming a mass party. .Jasilewski faced a more serious enemy closer to home. He devoted a great deal of his time to Luxemburg and her attempt to woo the PPS "moderates." He thought Rosa

Luxemburg and her SD tactics were in serious error. She had no comprehension of the phenomenon of the great attraction :of the proletariat to the cause of national Democracy. The NDs* were only using the proletariat, but they understood its 2 S desire for national liberation. The SDs obtusely ignored this natural desire for independence. Only the PPS grasped the political desire for liberation and truly represented the economic and social aspirations of the proletariat. The

PFS would throw out both capitalist and imperialist op­ pressors. The SDs overlooked legitimate grievences and be-

22 / # cWasilewski? , "Konferencja ogolnopartyjna," p. 1. 23 / ^e-Leon Wasilewski? , "Nasz stosunek do robotnikow •narodowcow'" ("Our Attitude Toward 'Nationalist* Workers"), Robotnik, No. 209 (1907)» p. 2. 165 came lost in dogmatic principles. The result was that they

looked on the FT3 fraki in a romantic light, not as knights ph. errant hut as "erring knights."

These attacks were countered by 'Jasilewski, who defended

his party's Marxist revolutionary stand: "3ased on immovable

scientific foundations it r;PF3 fraki J takes into consideration

the critical achievements of socialist knowledge and the ex­

perience of practical politics of the past number of years." The Foies must be prepared for the coming revolutionary

situation and not lose another chance by being surprised by

events, as all socialists were in 1 9 0 ^-0 5. Foies had to be

trained for an uprising and had to form a peoples' militia,

because "only the militarization of the popular masses can *

assure us victory." The fraki stand on armed revolutionary

struggle was different "from the stand of those revolution­

ary moderates who think that it is only necessary to pro­

duce phrases, in writing and at mass meetings, about armed

uprising and this conquer the military might of tsarism."2^

The hope of the "moderates" was a pipe dream which itself was

the result of the worst form of wool gathering. For a revo­

lutionary, preparations had to be made.

2 ^- cLeon Wasilewski^ , "Z wydawnictw Frakcji Umiarkowanej" ("From the Moderate Faction's Publications"), Robotnik, No. 213 11907), p. 3* The pun does not exist in the original.

2^cLeon Wasilewskra , "Po zjezdzie" ("After the Meeting"), Robotnik, No. 213 (1907). p- 1* 166

Marx had opposed conspiracies as the vehicles of social transformation. Change in society occurred through mass struggle. Wasilewski followed this theme in a polemic with the SDKPiL. He opposed "palace conspiracies and military conspiracies." The former did not change society. The latter, which Luxemburg supported, stressing the necessity of winning over the military to the cause of socialism, was

"complete nonsense." It was nonsense especially in Poland where "the military has nothing in common with the people of the country..." What Wasilewski hoped to accomplish here was to prove that the ID tactic of trying to revolutionize the army was false. After all, the army in Poland was not

Polish. It was not even entirely Russian either. 'Jasilewski was also reacting to the criticism that the IPS was conspir­ atorial.

V/e pose the question completely, clearly, and unequivocally, stating that the victory of the working class can only he a result of an armed mass movement guided against an army loyal to tsarism. As a result of this pre­ mise v/e strive to fit our movement and our organization to the tasks of armed struggle waged by the class conscious masses of the working people. From this arises the neces­ sity of militarizing these masses and this is the goal we are striving to reach. The 3Ds and the left also speak and write about the corning armed struggle but they do nothing toward ensuring the people's victory in this struggle. Listening to their hollow phrases of the coming armed conflict, one ha.s the impression that the strength of tsarism will crumble as 167

a result of prattle about the revo­ lution just as the walls of 3iblical Jericho once crumbled from the sounds of Israelite trumpets. Vie, however, understand that the loudest horns will not insure revolutionary victory if the • working people, if the popular masses in the towns and villages, are not prepared for the struggle. And here the insincerity of our opponents emerges, like a needle through a bag, in the matter of ap­ proaching the tasks of the armed move­ ment. Here lies the source of all the accusations of our so-called conspir­ atorialness. They talk abou£ an armed movement but not seriously. ^

As time would show, these accusations doubting

Luxemburg's revolutionary credentials were unfounded but

Wasilewski was right, if he referred to German Social

Democracy which had lost its revolutionary zeal long ago.

Wasilewski was correct in another aspect of his evaluation though, for as Luxemburg remained a revolutionary in 1913 she had not prepared her followers sufficiently for the armed struggle. Her contributions to socialism were theo­ retical, not practical.

D. Polish Aspirations

In supporting the Polish claim for independence against the Russian, Polish, and German SDs, Wasilewski was compelled

26 Ibid.. p. 1. For Luxemburg's view on the problem and a comparison with Lenin see Nettl, Rosa Luxemburg, Vol. II, p. 528. 168 to defend even the halfway measure of autonomy of the various

Polish nationalists, liberals and conservatives. Social

Democracy, led by the propaganda of Luxemburg in Germany and

Poland and Lenin in Russia, was coming around to the view­ point that any talk of autonomy, much less independence, was reactionary. While in opposition to participation in the

Duma and purely for the sake of propaganda, Wasilewski sup­ ported any Polish stand on autonomy rather than the anti­

independence stand of the socialist. Wasilewski was forced to argue that a four-tail system of government selection would not only help the nationalists, but v.'ould help the proletariat too. Those leftists who categorically opposed

autonomy were playing into the hands of the Black Hundreds. 2 '7

Was this simply opportunism on the part of a man for whom

independence was the primary concern?

The senseless activity of * Social Democracy' and our 'left' greatly con­ tributed to the success of the IIDs pushing those workers into its orbit who, as a result of positions of the SDs and the 'left', lost the faith that socialism was struggling also for national freedom.

Whatever returned the Polish nation to its natural tendencies

2^cLeon Wasilewski =» , "Przeciwnicy autonomii" ("Opponents of Autonomy"), Robotnik. No. 218 (1907), p. 2.

28 cLeon Wasilewskia , "Narodowa Demokracja a Autonomja" ("National Democracy and Autonomy"), Robotnik. No. 218 (1907), p. 1. 169 of development must be supported, the four-tail system, the

eight-hour day, land reform, and even autonomy were at least

steps in the direction of normalizing the Polish situation.

Independence was in inexorable goal of nations as socialism

was of society. After all, "just as agricultural serfdom had 29 to pass so too must factory serfdom pass." 7 Similarly ethnic

groups became nations.

Wasilewski now had to clarify the situation as to the

revolutionary or evolutionary approach to the Folish problem.

Polish workers had no recognized union organization nor parliamentary representation to protect their interests.

They were on a less developed economic plane than in western

Europe but they also lacked normal native institutions.

Up to that time c the advent of socialism 3 we can and must struggle for concessions, which would bring us gradually closer to our final goal, for social reforms, which would render capitalist exploita­ tion less acute. We are not struggling for the violent de­ struction of capitalism today but for preparing the ' ground on which capitalism with its exploitation could be replaced by a just social system, a socialist system. But this goal we cannot reach today through violent means.™

29 7cLeon Wasilewskia , "W przededniu nowego lokautu" ("On the Eve of a New Lock-out"), Robotnik. No. 219 (1907), p. 2 .

30 J trLeon Wasilewski^ , "Jeszcze o terorze ekonomicznym" ("Again on Economic Terror"), Robotnik, No. 227 (1908), p. 3 . The PPS had a very clear minimalist program as well as a maximalist one. Its maximalist program of socialism and national liberation was unique to Poland with the exception

of the Georgians and Armenians of Transcaucasia. Its minimalist program, however, resembled the goals of German

Social Democracy. The PPS was truly revolutionary in the

sense of national liberation. In the socialist sense it was

evolutionary. It was no wonder that the PPS received the

odium of Luxemburg’s SDKPiL and Lenin's Bolsheviks on both these grounds. It was also no wonder why this unique pro­

gram was so little understood or had such minimal appeal to

other socialist parties in Europe except for some weak and nascent ones in the Russian Empire.

This whole question of revolutionary or evolutionary

approach was raised by the use of economic terror as a

tactic. Although Wasilewski grudgingly gave it his appro­ bation, he disliked this type of violence. He defended it because the Polish workers did not have the recourse to the most elementary forms of protection, as in western Europe,

and had to rely only on violence against factory owners

and foremen. Economic terrorism was a beloved tactic only 171 of certain anarchists. In the circumstances it was the only

way to punish brutal overseers and stool-pigeons.-^ The cause of misery in Poland was the lack of normal

institutions to protect the workers. The western European

workers did not suffer from "the Russian political system

and the occupationist administration of despotic tsarism"

which caused such heavy "blows" to Poland. "Thus,"

V/asilewski stated, "at every step we see that the primary

reason of all our present day misery and neglect is due to

none other than the occupation, the despotic tsarist system.

Until this occupation was destroyed, Poles would not be able

to help themselves achieve socialism.

The PPS "left's" pronouncement on Poland's future

political arrangements was not sincere. "It changes from

independence, to the constituent assembly and federation,

very quickly to autonomy..." allying the "left" with the

SDs and the so-called realists. This "left" called for a mysterious "'elementalness' in the armed struggle" but not

consequentially.

3 Both Lenin and Luxemburg grudgingly approved of this kind of small scale violence also. This feature certainly was not central to their way of thinking either.

^2cLeon Wasilewskiti , "Przyczyny ngdzy" ("The Causes of Misery"), Robotnik, No. 228 (1908), p. 1. 172

And he who speaks of an elemental armed struggle, casting aside any thought of the technical preparation for this struggle, either wishes to give up the working masses to an inevitable massacre, or lies in claim- ^ inr that he strives for armed struggle. ''

'.Jasilewski admitted that the FP3 "left" did not wish to lead the workers to slaughter hut they did lie about armed action.

They deserved the name "moderates" rather than "left."

All socialists parties were essentially alike in their goals except for certain differences in means, because

only the paths which they follow to the ends must necessarily be dif­ ferent for the working people of every country live in different cir­ cumstances. The Trench proletariat does not struggle to attain a republic, the Swiss does not strive for direct lav/making in the form of the initiative and referendum, the German proletariat does not demand universal suffrage for parliament and the proletariat of none of these countries demands national in­ dependence .3^ They all had these various attributes. The Poles did not.

Wasilewski's fraki drew up an eight point program which they thought reflected the special situation of the Polish proletariat and contrasted it with the FF3 "left's" or

"moderates'" program.

3 3Ibid.. p. 2 .

-^trLeon Wasilewski^1 , "Dwa programy— dwie taktyki" ("Two Programs, Two Tactics"), Robotnik, No. 229 (1908), p. 1 . 173

1 . National independence, not 'organic incorporation.'

2. A Uarsaw constituent assembly leading to a lawgiving parliament with a responsible executive, not waiting for a. grant of autonomy from the Russians when and if they pro­ duced a revolution.

3. Unity of all Poles in order to fight the "tsarist occupation and despotism" and alliance with all revolution­ ary socialists of the Umpire, not "identification" with the

Russians.

A. Technical preparation for armed struggle of the masses, not waiting for an "elemental movement of the masses," ignoring preparation and seeking the support of the army.

5. Disorganization of the government by attacking governmental institutions, not opposition to this disor­ ganization.

u. I'iacs struggle and terror, not decrying terror and . viewing the Combat Organization of the fraki as useless,

7. To propagandize among the soldiers to convert them to socialism, not to propagandize among the masses from which the army is recruited. The immediate aim is to destroy the army of the oppressors. The secondary aim is the liberation of the peoples from whom the army is recruited. 174

f. All hope rests on the "armed might of the con­

scious Folish people" instead of on a Duma.

In summary, Masilewski noted these major differences

between the "elders" and the "youths."

The Revolutionary Faction basing itself on the interests of the Polish proletariat, strives with the aid of a resolute and irreconciliable struggle, in alliance v/ith revolu­ tionary elements of the whole Russian state, to achieve those conditions in which the Folish working people could become the complete controller of their own country.

The Moderate Faction, accepting the bourgeois program of autonomy, abjures all struggle and, 'working peacefully in the cultural area, awaits patiently that which will be given, in time, courtesy of the Russian revolution and. for the time being, the Third Duma.J5

The problem of distinguishing between the national and international still exists for the true revolutionary and socialist. For those weaned on Marx the problem can be traced to the union of the Lassallian "nationalists" with the Eisenacher "internationalists" to form a united German

•^I b i d ., p. 2 . 175 socialist party at Gotha in 1875?^ Yet it is difficult to reconcile the desire to defend the German Empire from

Russia hy Bebel and Liebknecht, the grand old men of German

Social Democracy, and their supposed internationalism.

Modem communists find they have to fight nationalism on the one hand and defend national integrity on the other.

The same problem plagued Franz Borkenau, writing during the Second World War, when he attempted to compare the PPS

(not differentiating between "youths" and "elders") to the

Czech National Socialists (Ceska strana narodni socialni) founded in 1 8 9 7 . Both parties had much in common, he argued, especially in their hatred for their own National Democrats, their reliance on the union movement and intelligentsia, and their rupture with Social Democracy over the issue of national liberation. Borkenau viewed this as a tension be­ tween national and international aspects of socialism which was resolved in favor of the national in the case of the

PPS and the Czech National Socialists. The internationalists survived in Poland*s SDKPiL and the Social Democrats of

Austria-Hungary, later of and . After the

■^Robert Kilroy-Silk, Socialism Since Marx (London, 1972), p. 35. Kilroy-Silk uses the terms "nationalist" and "internationalist." 176

Bolshevik Revolution these internationalists gravitated to the communism of the Third International.-^

A German Workers' Party (Deutsche Arbeiterpartei) was formed in Bohemia to protect the rights of ethnic Germans, paralleling the Czech socialist protection of the ethnic

Czech worker. In 1918 this German party changed its name to the National Socialist German Workers' Party. Although the name of this party was preempted by Hitler, it orig­ inated as a variety of socialism and was later annexed by the Nazis.As the German National Socialists of Bohemia and Moravia migrated toward fascism the Czech National

Socialists eventually lost the power of independent action in the newly emerged Czechoslovak state but claimed the support of the bourgeoisie and also claimed to be the

"spiritual trustee of the Masaryk-BeneS tradition.

Benes had been a prominent National Socialist.

-^Franz Borkenau, Socialism! National or International (London, 19^2), p. 117-19.

-^Andrew Gladding Whiteside, Austrian National Socialism Before 1918 (The Hague, 1962), p. 1-3.

-5 0 -^Paul E. Zinner, Communist Strategy and Tactics in Czechoslovakia. 1918-194# (New~York. 19o3). p. 112. See also VSra 01ivov£L, The Doomed Democracy; Czechoslovakia in a Disrupted Europe, 1914-1938 (Montreal" 1972). In comparing the PPS to the Czech National Socialists one must "be aware of the other National Socialisms of

Bohemia and Moravia and Weimar Germany to avoid confusion among representatives of what were really three different traditions* socialism, liberalism, and fascism. Borkenau did not succeed in accomplishing this. Borkenau also suffered from the disadvantage of many commentators on the

PPS by reading Pilsudski for the party and ignoring the many trends within the party. G. D. H. Cole, for example, had this to say about the PPS, "The hatred of Russia went 4 too deep among the P. S. P. c PPS-a leaders for any thought of co-operation even with a revolutionary Russian Govern­ ment to be entertained." This is a reflection of Coles belief that the PPS was not a socialist party and placed national concerns over international, solidarity. He paid scant attention in his multi-volume work on socialism to the

PPS and he treated only Rosa Luxembrug as a legitimate

Polish socialist.

Leon Wasilewski was a socialist. The tradition he represented was antithetical to the national chauvinism or merely the national exclusivity of the Czech and German

G. D. H. Cole, A History of Socialist Thought (London, 1956), Vol. Ill, Pt. I, p. 496. Chapter XIX of Vol. IV, Pt. II published in 1958 deals with Poland. 178

National Socialists of Bohemia and Moravia. Wasilewski

emphasized the need for nationally "based parties as in

Prussian Poland or Ukrainian Galicia, not to divide the population into mutually hostile groups "but to protect one group from the chauvinistic disregard of the other. Both

National Socialisms, the liberal and the fascist, were opposed to the rationality and humanitarianism dear to hi Wasilewski.

Borkenau erred in his interpretation of Polish social­ ism. He did raise an interesting question in this context.

If the PPS were a , was German Social Democ­ racy really an international one?: His doubt is corroborated by another scholar who stated: "What the social democratic leadersc German SDs;j called internationalism was, in its essence, a philosophically conceived idealistic cosmopol- h,o itanism." Another writer noted: "It looks paradoxical, but socialism was international in the nineteenth century; it is national in the twentieth." ^ Finally, another

Whiteside, Austrian National Socialism, p. 112. hp Peter C. Ludz, "Socialism and the Nation," in Leszek Kolakowski and Stuart Hampshire, eds., The Socialist Idea; A Reappraisal (New York, 19740. p. 139*

^Vladimir Y. Kusin, "Socialism and Nationalism," in Leszek Kolakowski and Stuart Hampshire, eds., The Socialist Idea, p. 149. 179 authority claimed that internationalism died with the purge of Radek by Stalin.

If the above mentioned commentators are correct then can it be that socialists, especially Marxists, have never been internationalists? Is internationalism only a red herring for socialism? The PPS "elders" retained national liberation as a goal but this did not necessarily make them nationalists. They never denied their internationalism.

Although Pilsudski and some of his followers abandoned socialism, Wasilewski did not. He constantly strove to unite socialist parties organized on national lines, not to exacerbate their differences. He criticized those parties which did not respect ethnic differences. Also, because he struggled against the partemalism of the various Social

Democracies this did not mean he was no socialist. Since liberal and fascist parties responded to the call for inde­ pendence, this did not make Wasilewski a liberal or a fascist. Independence, socialism, and internationalism were not contradictory to Leon Wasilewski.

^Warren Lemer, Karl Radek, The Last Intemationalist (Stanford, California, 1970TI 180 li:. True Revolutionarior:

The revolutionary situation created by the Russo-Japanese

\?ar forced Luxemburg's GDKTiL to change its tael: and recognize the slogan for autonomy as a legitimate one. However, to

Jasilewcki, the SDKPiL was still "a group separated from real life, a group of bookworms ruminating on theoretical formulas having nothing to say about the affairs which the 45 present has pushed forward for daily resolution." The SDKFiL, because of its "doctrinaire illusions," accused the

PF3 fraki of 'social-patriotism,' of "banditry" and of being a. "zero," forced this comment from iasilewski:

And of the accusation that re honor the uprising of I863 more than the Gt. Fotersburg Gaponade even the stupidest SD probably will admit that the democratic szlachta, who declared armed v.rar on tsarism, de­ serve a greater respect than the dark St. Petersburg throng, which, under the leadership of a police controlled cleric, marched with crosses, icons, and their humble reouests to the tsar-father.

^cLeon Wasilewski^ , "Z powodu zjazdu S.D.K.P.i L." ("On Account of the S.D.K.P.i L. Congress"), Robotnik. No. 235 (1909), p. 2.

^ c L e o n Wasilewski^ , "Nie madre guwemantki" ("Unwise Governesses"), Robotnik, No. 236 (1909)* p* 3- 181

The Poles had a fine democratic revolutionary movement and there was nothing wrong with patriotism, either in the past or the present, for it did not contradict Marxism and it held up favorably to the so-called revolutionary developments in

Russia.

The demoralization of this revolutionary movement in

Russia, along with a similar demoralisation of the govern­ ment, reached new depths with the unmasking of the' a^ent- nrovgcateur kvno Azev v/ho worked as a police spy in the inner circles of the Socialist Revolutionaries. while wasilewski admitted provocation was not an invention of the tsarist government, no government used it as the Russian did. "There it is a matter of immeasurable ignominy and crime there tsarist Russia is unequaled', " was wasilewski*s pithy comment. Azev was possible only in Russia, "in that country of 'illimitable possibility.'"^7 The question Wasilewski posed to the SDs was this: was this the type of immature socialist movement of an underdeveloped country to which they were asking the Poles to subordinate themselves?

k7 'cLeon Wasilewski® , "Aziew," Robotnik. No. 235 (1909), p. 1. 182

The historical contribution of the creators and theoreticians of the PF3 was the formulation of the view that the aspiration to national independence emerges from the needs and interests of the working class in the same way as the aspiration to replace the capitalist system with the socialist.

This contribution van a result of a concentration of "economic

and social as v;ell as political and national" factors. This

stand preserved the proletariat for socialism in the face

of an 3D ideology which tied the fate of the workers to the

industrialists through the concept of the preservation of

'eastern markets,' which would be lost through independence.

It also preserved the proletariat for socialism in the face

of the dreams of independence of the bourgeois nationalists. Until the schism in the PPS, the SDs had been completely

cut away from the masses, while now they had access to them

through the "moderates." Also, the NDs had been weak among

the urban proletariat until this proletariat was forced into

the arms of the NDs by the lack of regard of the SDs for the

people's aspirations for national freedom.

The SDs were overly impressed with the strength of the

bourgeoisie and so aligned their thinking with the bourgeois

^®3t. Os. . . arz c Leon ./asilewski^, "kilka s2ov; w spravde dalszej ewolucyi umiarkowiancow" ("A Few kords on the Further Evolution of the hoderates'J, l-'rzedswit, No. 3 (1 9 0 8 ), p. 99. conception of reality. Just as the revisionists, who did not believe in revolution, were in error, so too were the SDs, who borrowed their ideas from the factory owners of Zodz,

Poland's Manchester, ever loyal to the Russian Empire.

Jasilewski emphasized it was time that national questions be 4 9 considered more seriously.

In his polemics, wasilewski made very little mention of

Lenin. He did comment on him revealingly when he discussed lUlii Martov, the Menshevik leader who was "the most prom­ inent leader of Russian Social Democracy besides. Flekhanov and Lenin. Lenin’s was a name well knovm to students of the Russian movement and was becoming more well known through socialist conferences and through his writing. For wasilewski, Lenin exemplified the problem of the intelli­ gentsia in the Russian revolutionary movement. Since the

Russian 3D party was founded in 1893 it has been character­ ized by "intellectualism." The theoretical Marxism of the early 1380s had no contact with the masses until the 1895

^It. Os...arz cLeon Wasilewski 3, "Socyalni Demokraci v petach ideologii burzuazyinei” ("Social Democrats in the fetters of bourgeois ideology";, Przedswit, lb. 7/8 (1909), p . ^38•

^°Jt. Os...arz Leon 'wasilewski , "Z bagna demoralizacy esdeckiej" ('From the Swamp of ID Demoralization), Przedswit, No. 7/3 U 9 0 9 ). n. 3^8. St. Petersburg strikes. The intelligentsia v.'as outma-

neuvered by Father Gapon in the 1905 revolution. The Russian

SDs were always cut away from the masses and dominated by an

intelligentsia without experience in the workers' movement.

Lacking the brake and regulator which is the healthy instinct of the proletarian working masses, the party intelligentsia always tended to a sectarian walling up of itself in theoretical formulas and doctrinaire fanaticism... The explanation of profound "class" reasons for every disagree­ ment among the intelligentsia, not infrequently arising on the back­ ground of prosaic personal quarrels, is humorous, *1

This was exactly what happened among Flekhanov, iiartov, and_

Lenin who worked well, enough together at Iskra but who each

claimed to be the true representative of the proletariat's

wishes after they fell out. The lesson of 1905 for VJasilewcki arid the fraki was

cleans indeed. An armed fighting force had to be created to

take advantage of any future revolutionarjr situation. Very

little hope for compromise or understanding could be expected t from the Polish and Russian SDs, who would also be involved

in any revolutionary situation, and so other allies had to be cultivated. A federation of socialist states organized nationally might survive the grinding of the twin millstones

of nationalism and Social Democracy.

St. Cs. . .arz Leon '.Jasilewski:? , "Z obozu socyalne.i denokracji rosyjskiej"("From the Camp of Russian Social Democracy"), Przedswit, No. < (1910), pp. 3^0, 3^7* CHAPTER VI

3THNICITY AMD NATIONAL IMDAPNNDPNCN

There were two kinds of slaves, the house Negro and the field Negro. The house Negroes— they lived in the house with the master, they dressed pretty good, they ate good because they ate his food--what he left...

On that same plantation there was the field Negro. The field Negroes--those were the masses. There were always more Negroes in the field than there v.’ere Negroes in the house.

Nalcolm X

A. Dthnic Problems

Thus far Jasilewski’s contributions in the field of propaganda lay in his explanation of the interdependence of the ideas of socialism and independence, his call for a restored Poland composed of all three partitions, his

emphasis of the threat Russia posed to socialism and civili­

zation, and his defense of the correctness of the fraki position in the post-1905 situation. These were all sig­ nificant contributions, but probably the most interesting and creative of .Jasilewski's contributions wa s in the field

185 186 of ethnicity and its meaning for socialism as well as the future of Poland.1

Marx' ana Engels' essentially functional definition of a nationality whose claims for independence should be sup­ ported was simple. They merely asked whether its role, especially in 18^8, was revolutionary or counterrevolution­ ary. Marx viewed the Germans as the revolutionary people and Angels added the Poles and the Magyars. These peoples had a strong tradition of state building and independence and a differentiated and complex class system. Just as there were counterrevolutionary classes, Marx and Engels perceived counterrevolutionary peoples and these were the

South Slavs and, although they were initially revolutionary, the Czechs. These were the ethnic groups which rallied to the Hapsburg throne against the revolutions of 18^8 and were lumped together by them in a rather undifferentiated Slavic

1'Jasilewski used the term "ethnographical material." He used it in distinction to nationality in the same manner that anthropologists do, but he added a political dimension. This anthropological term, ethnicity, has recently been added to the vocabulary of sociology and politics in the United States of America: Mathan Glazer and Daniel F. Moynihan, eds., Ethnicity; Theory and Practice (Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1975) and Michael ilovak, The Rise of the Unmeltable Ethnics; Politics and Culture in the SeventiesTMev.1 York c-1972^ ) . A nationality is an ethnic group v.rhich has the attributes of a nation except for statehood. This is the sense in which most Marxists used these terms. 5'or Ttalin ethnic meant tribal. "Marxism and the Rational Question," ..forks (Moscow, 1953)* Vol. 2. 187 mass having a weak, dead, non-existent, or reactionary state-building tradition. Russia was the single great nemesis of the Revolutions of 181-3 in Austria-Hungary and as such was detested by the scientific socialist. The Poles were the only Slavic people who had a state-building tradition and were a historically progressive force. Throughout the nineteenth century, the Poles had Marxist support for inde­ pendence. To the end of Marx* and Bngels' lives, that was the cum of Marxist thought on nations and their right to independence, aside from the fact that they would eventually disappear as states.

At the turn of the century, the situation in Austria-

Hungary again provided the setting for Marxists to ponder the questions of ethnic groups, nationalities, and nations.

Ag?„in, it was a Slavic people who provided the problem for the Austrian SDs, overwhelmingly German in membership, to solve. The Czechs, branded counterrevolutionary by a half- century of Marxist polemics, had emigrated in large numbers to Vienna, the capital of the empire. They began agitating for certain rights and primary among them was the use of the

Czech language as a medium of instruction in the schools.

At the same time the Czechs of Bohemia, Moravia, and Gilesia began agitating for greater recognition of Czech rights and privileges. Both movements clashed with the prevailing structure of German rights and privileges. The Germans of the Austrian .Social Dernocracj/- feared that the Czech socialists 188 would cease cooperating with the German proletariat if German

cultural hegemony continued in Austria to the detriment of the Czechs and other ethnic groups. Viewing the Czechs as a

counterrevolutionary nationality no longer seemed to he a

correct appraisal of the situation since significant numbers

of them were now proletarians. The German SDs of Austria launched a series of attempts to analyze the new impact of this old problem of national rights on the proletariat.

Leon '/Jasilewski knew the Hapsburg Empire well and followed the developments among the Austrian SDs closely.

Of course, there were many others who wrote on this problem in the multi-national Hapsburg state, but Otto Bauer's thoughts on the nationality question for the Austrian SDs made the strongest impression on l/asilev/ski, In a laconic r> exercise, Bauer produced eight laws of national assimilation."

His contribution to the Marxist analysis of the nationality problem was to liberate Marxist thought from the atrophied stereotypes of nations as either chosen or damned. Bauer ' claimed he had discovered the objective laws governing the

p Otto Bauer, "Die bedingungen der nationalen Assimilation," Per Kampf, Yol V, no. 6 (1912), pp. 2^6-2^?. These laws were distilled from his Die nationalitatenfraae und die sozial- demokratie (Vienna, 1907)". dee the addendum for the text of the lawn. For the use of the sociological term assimilation (acculturation to the anthropologists) see Milton II. Gordon, Assimilation in American Life; The Role of Race, Religion and Rational Origins (Hew York, 19^) • 189 impression or erosion of national consciousness among peoples.

Jasilewski had already arrived at the same conclusions that Bauer reached hut had not ennunciated them in such a systematic and succinct manner. After all, these conclusions were not new hut no one had bothered to set them down before because they were considered too obvious. By the time that the nationality problem emerged again, these common sense observations had to be put down in an orderly manner so as to be given scientific respectability. Jasilewski had arrived at these conclusions by a different path. Ke studied the ethnic habits of peoples and came to his conclusions inr ductively. His studies were his source of information.

3auer went around the other way and approached the problem deductively, applying principles that anyone could agree to.

Once 'Jasilewski came across Bauer's laws he accepted them as essentially correct and repeated them verbatim a number of times in his own polemics. -J

O -?L. Vasilevskii' (Flokhotskii), "Botcializm i natsi- onal'naia ascimilatsiia" ("Socialism and national Assimila­ tion'^ Russkoe Bogatstvo. No. VI (1912) and Sprawy narodowosciowe w teor.ii i w zvciu, (J'arsaw, 1929), p. 16. Criticism of Bauer's laws of assimilation has "been meager. One writer, who thinks the laws very valuable, points to three areas that the laws do not cover well. In the realm of ideology Bauer's laws fail to account for the exclusivity of racist groups and the acceptance of assimi­ lation of non-racist groups. In the political area, or the role of the state, Bauer's laws fail to account for the encouragement of assimilation through granting equal rights and the discouragement of assimilation through the granting of privileges to certain national groups. Finally, the

"character of the social structure” itself affects assimi­ lation i stability opposes it, change enhances it. The most difficult assimilation occurs when change of nationality proceeds without change of place in the social structure.

The first two criticisms of Bauer's laws are well taken.

Bauer was not explicit enough to take into account ideo­ logical and political factors of the problems of assimilation, although he would have no difficulty in explaining away these difficulties by pointing to the law which dealt with culture.

The critic, however, presents only one example for proof.

More importantly he give no proof for this third criticism.

If stability opposes assimilation and change enhances it then

^Jerzy J. Wiatr, Narod a nanstwo (Warsaw, 1 9 6 9 ), p p . 2 9 6 - 9 8 . what must be stable and what must change? Does stability, which implies , always prevent assimilation?

Slaves are readily assimilated into stable societies as are conquerors; look at black African slaves among the

Arabs or the Manchus among the Chinese. The stability of

English society did not prevent the assimilation to it of the conservative Welsh, Irish, and Scots societies, or the assimilation of Byelorussians to Polish or Russian societies, or the assimilation of Poles by Ukrainians. As to the con­ tention that assimilation is most difficult when rank in the social order does not change this flies in the face of the Bauer law which states that assimilation occurs most readily among groups in.the same social class. Bauer is correct when he states that struggles to improve social, political, or economic conditions, in the absence of a national struggle, aid assimilation especially when the privileges of the one group are extended to the other group.

B. './asilev.’sk i ’ s Goals

'.Jasilewski put these laws of assimilation to a differ­

ent use than Bauer. Bauer wished to ameliorate ethnic dif­

ferences to preserve the integrity of the Austro-Hungarian 192 state by preventing fission of the working class into antagonistic groups based on nationalism. To Wasilewski,

Austria-Hungary was dispensible. He aimed to tear ethni­ cally Folish Ga.licia and Silesia from the Hapsburg Umpire.

He actively propagandized among the Empire's Ukrainians, instilling in them a feeling of their common culture with the Ukrainians outside the Hapsburg domains.

Whenever wasilewski wrote of the peoples who lived between the Foies and the Russians he did so with political motivations in mind. His goal was the establishment of an independent Poland. To achieve this he also sought the establishment of other independent states based on ethnic homogeneity. Finally, he sought the federation of these free states to ensure protection from .Russification and

Germanization.

As always, Wasilewski centered his attack on the enemy he knew best. To him liberation could best be achieved by - attacking the Russian Fmpire, backward economically and militarily and the most brutal of the occupying powers.

It was the focus of the animosity of the many peoples it held enthralled. The traditional tsarist aspiration to gather in all the Russian was based on historic, religious, and ethnic claims as well as on claims of strategy, power, and security. In Jasilewski's view, all of the present day political parties from conservatives to liberals to socialists, with the notable exception of the Socialist 193

Revolutionaries, carried on this imperialist tradition of gathering in and retaining all the Russias. Each of these parties wished to preserve the integrity of the Russian state for whatever various and contradictory reasons. Each of them operated from the concept of Russia as a multination­ al state dominated by Great Russians. In east-central Europe this Russian a.im conflicted with an even older Polish imperial aim, not erased by the partitions but exacerbated and romanticized since then by aristocratic and nationalist dreamers, to restore and extend Folish hegemony in the old lands of the szlachta Commonwealth now controlled mostly by the Russian Empire.

Any Polish attempt to lay claim to the kresy lost to the first Folish Republic, those vast expanses between the

Baltic and Black 3eas, was rightfully branded nationalistic, chauvinistic, or fantastic, not the least so by Uasilewski who knew this area well. To his studies and personal experi­ ence of this area he added the iiarxist belief of historical progress to nationhood and socialism through the develop­ ment of capitalism, he viewed the szlachta as drones who had outlived their historical purpose and their aspirations for former Polish territory in the kresy as reactionary and feudalistic claptrap. The nationalists and their plans for the Folonization of kresy peoples were among the first to draw the sting of Tasilewski'c pen. 19^ Uacilewski' s renascent Folish state might or might

not be socialistic, but the state could only be reestablish­

ed and continued by the socialist party. After all, Poland

was less industrialized than England, Belgium, Germany, or

France and he knew that, according to Marx, socialism would

first succeed in the west of Europe, probably in the western

parts of Germany, a country which had the largest SD party

in the world. E’asilewski saw no chance of modern socialism

arising from the Pojssian Empire, and this was a creed

strongly held among Second International Marxists. Since capitalism in Poland was expanding rapidly and

this produced a growing proletariat with the PF3 and other

parties claiming to represent it, the socialists would be

a significant force in the new state. If the state were not

outrightly socialistic due to Poland's relative backwardness

compared to western Europe, then the state would be

liberal because of the strides made by the masses of people

who had entered on political consciousness with the ex­

pansion of literacy and the breakdown of serfdom. But even

the recognition of the democratic masses as a new and impor­

tant part of the Folish polity would not insure the survival

of the state. VJide popular support was necessary for a

Folonia Restitute (i-instored Poland), but ultimate freedom

rested on a series of understandings with other ethnically based popular governments which would emerge in industrially backward eastern Europe. All of these newly emergent peoples 195

would arise on the fall of at least one and hopefully all

four of the reactionary monarchies of eastern Europe. These

newly freed peoples would have to come to terms with each

other in order to settle territorial disputes naturally

arising from the emergence of nationhood in a very ethnically

mixed part of the world. .Jasilewski "believed that free

peoples would democratically elect representatives who would

negotiate in good faith with their neighbors. Eith the ex­

ploiters outvoted by the people and the people led by demo­

cratic and socialist parties, all ethnic problems and ter­

ritorial claims could be resolved at the bargaining table

rather than the field of Liars. In this respect he was like -

Jaures who felt the injustice of the Prussian seizure of

Alsace-Lorraine but did not seek its return through war.

International problems of this sort would be amicably

solved on the accession of socialists to power.

Here was where Otto Bauer*s laws came in. They crystal­

lized thinking on ethnic differences and where assimilation

was probable or possible and where it was not. These laws

gave rationalization and justification for the claims of people whose ethnic consciousness could not be erased by

any policies of deracination. These laws not only but­

tressed certain traditional claims of ethnic groups for recognition but the laws also presented them with an armory

of scientific, objective, and irrefutable reasons with which to convince others. Ethnic claims were not atavisms 196 to a pre-industrial golden age. They were a fact of m o d e m progress, democracy, and socialism. With these laws, Wasilewski could defend Polish claims in the kresy where there were ethnic Poles, as well as defend the claims of Ukrainians in Galicia.

C. Peoples in Question

One did not have to he a formal student of ethnology to

realize that the borderlands and inarches of the Russian

Empire were covered by ethnic mixtures of people like the

splotches of a painted horse. Stalin realized this from his

experience in Caucasia. Wasilewski understood this from his

education and travels. Any peasant in that part of the world

who had traveled to market understood that the borderlands

were ethnically mixed.

Wasilewski's explanation of this was rather simple. He

believed that the Slavs originated on the upper Vistula and

the Carpathian foothills and gradually expanded eastwards

where they came into contact with Lithuanian, Finnish, and

Turkish peoples.^ Through centuries of migrations and in­

vasions, other peoples came to eastern Europe and new peoples

^ Leon P2rochocki c Leon Wasilewski 3 , Ukraina i. snrawa Ukrainska (Cracow 1912), p. 1. 197 were formed from the amalgamation of distinct autochthonous tribal groups and accretions of new settlers. The peoples who had emerged through this process at the turn of the century, and were ready for nationhood, could be counted by the score in eastern and east-central Europe.

No one needed Bauer's laws to tell him that there was a

Ukrainian people, something that only the most chauvinistic

Poles and Russians denied in any case. There was some question as to whether the Ukrainian nationality could build a sovereign state. Wasilewski thought it was com­ petent in this respect. It was composed of Ukrainians proper around Kiev (called Little Russians by the Great

Russians), the Ruthenians of Austria-Hungary, and the

Polesians along the River who sprang from a mixture of Byelorussians and Ukrainians.^ North of the Ukrainians were the Byelorussians (White Russians), an ethnic group which had not yet developed a feeling of nationality to any significant degree but which inhabited an extensive territory. The currency with which the Russian designations of

Nhite Russians for the Byelorussians and Little Russians for

Ukrainians were used, reserving the appelation Great Russian for themselves, was irritating to Jasilewski, deprecatory to

^Ibid., p . 3. the Ukrainians and Byelorussians, and confusing to the non-

Slavs of western Europe. This was a result of the confusion

of the terms Rossiia (Russia) and Rus1 (v:hich had historical

application to Kievan Rus' and modern application to

Ruthenians.) The Great Russians claimed that they, White

Russians, and little Russians, were all of the same ethnic

stock and that the Ukrainians and Byelorussians spoke dialect

of Russian. This was a major argument in favor of the claim

of Great Russians to rule all the other Russians, i.e., the

Ukrainians and the Byelorussians. Rhat '..asilewski tried to explain inhis propaganda was that the Byelorussians and the

Ukrainians were ethnic groups separate from the Russians and had state building capabilities of their own as nation­ alities. It vras exasperating; that foreigners believed these

Great Russian designations and confused these people with

Russians.

Geographic confusion was as exasperating as outlandish claims. Such territorial designations as Red Russia in Old

Galicia and Black Russia, now in Byelorussia, neither of which had anything to do with Russia but derived in meaning from Rus', were always being claimed by Great Russians and confused with Russia by foreigners. 199

Most of Byelorussia was in the former Grand Duchy of Lithuania, a perfect example of the ethnic heterogeneity of this part of the world. The grand duchy's most numerous inhabitants were the Byelorussians. Some Ukrainians lived there, as of course did Lithuanians themselves, and some

Latvians. There were peoples vrho lived sprinkled among these massed ethnic settlements like the Jews of the shtetl

(), the Old Believers who migrated there after the (church schism), and the Tatars descended from

Litold's prisoners of the fifteenth century.^ finally, there were the Poles who lived both in compact and dispersed settlements in the grand duchy. In the Ukraine this

heterogeneity was repeated. There too the Jew lived in the

shtetl, the Pole was frequently the landlord and the Russian

administered the country.

Although Ivasilewski was cognizant of people like the

Karaim (fundamentalist Jews) and the Tatars, he paid most attention to the groups of people he thought would emerge as nations. The Ukrainains were first in his hopes. Then came the Byelorussians. Finally, there were the Lithuanians who

showed a strong state-building tendency but whose territory contained a Polish proletariat and peasantry. Lthnic or

^L(eon) -7(asilev:ski), Litwa i .ie-.i ludy. ( Warsaw, 1907), p. 13. 200

ethno-religious groups like the Tatars, Jews, end Karaim

were being assimilated or eventually would be assimilated.

This could not be said of the Ukrainians, Lithuanians, and

Byelorussians. They v;ould form nations in which the Jewish trader, the Folish landlord, and the Russian bureaucrat

would eventually lose their reason for existence in the new

ethnically based and socialistically oriented state, and they

too.would eventually follow in the footsteps of the Karaim

ana Tatar and begin to disappear or be assimilated. Religious

and political differences would cease to have imortance once

the society was democratized. The trader, landlord and ad­

ministrator would no longer belong to a hereditary caste •» system and be encouraged or forced to do a task because of

his religion, politics, or language. This was no utopian scheme, many people believed that

society's problems could be cured by the democratization of

society. This is still the creed of the modern liberal and

socialist. dasilewski foresaw problems because not only did

the exploiters live in ethnically mixed areas, but the ex­

ploited proletarian and peasant did too. The exploiters would disappear with the advent of socialism, but the large nationalities vrould not. For him there were three regions where Poles were affected end where Bauer's laws might shed

some light. VJilno and Lwow were important Folish seats of culture. These cities which contained large numbers of

Poles, produced some of the most significant Folish cultural 201 contributions as well as contributions to Polish inde­ pendence. The countryside, however, was Lithuanian in

Wilno and Ukrainian in Lwow. Aside from the other classes in these towns, there was a substantial Polish proletariat in them. A third region of inter-ethnic group conflict was the province of Chelm which the Russians attempted to annex administratively. Here the conflict was among the Polish peasantry, the Ukrainian peasantry, and the Russian admin­ istration, with religious overtones added.

D. The Ukraine Uasilevski wrote considerably about the Ukrainians.

They were a vital and large ethnic group with tremendous powers of assimilation. Those people who came to settle among them frequently were inundated by Ukrainian culture.

Historically, there had been a tremendous Polish colonization

effort eastwards into Ukrainian territory, but it was of an unplanned nature and the Polish peasants eventually lost their language, occasionally retaining their religion, but in effect became Ukrainians. The. mixture of the various layers of assimilated ethnic groups, Turkish, Polish, Byelo­ russian, Rumanian and Serbian, added to the internal evo­ lution of the autochthonous inhabitants, produced the 202

Ukrainian nation "with prominent and completely decided Q linguistic and psychic characteristics of individuality."

Uasilewski argued the Ukrainians arose as a people with the foundation of the Halich-Volhynian state in the thirteenth century, after the destruction of Kievan Rus' by the Tatars.9

He derived two important conclusions from his discussion on the origins of the Ukrainian people which he applied, to all peoples. First, ethnic groups or nationalities arose from mixed blood lines and did not form pure races. Racially pure groups did not exist. Second, ethnic groups or nation­ alities had specific characteristics and traits. These were expressed in a common culture and language which could cause* a natural attraction among the members of the same lin­

guistic-cultural groups which could eventually lead to the

development of a nation in the modern sense.

The 15t9 political union of Lublin and the 1596 religious

union of the churches caused the "legal and governmental

assimilation" of the Ukrainian lands to the Folish Crown-

land and the colonization of the Ukrainian upper classes.

Q ^ Tasilewski 17 , Ukraina, p. 1 0 . 9 Henryk Faszkiewicz warns against the misuse of ethnic, tribal, racial, and national names in an anachronistic fashion in his, The Haklnm of the Russian Ration (London, 1963), p. 30h.

/ 203

"The Ukrainian element becomes an ethographic marc,

sli;htod in every circumstance. The peasants, the lower middle class and the Orthodox clergy preserve the Jkrain-

ian nationality..." vrrote .ra.sile\vshi.10

The only institution which preserved a Ukrainian character was the Orthodox church, but even its upper echelons were

Polonised and acceded to the church union. The Ukrainian

cause was revived, again by the who, although of mixed backgrounds and races, came to consider themselves

Ukrainians. According to Jasilewski, these Cossacks con­ sidered two aims as holy: the protection of Ukrainians from the economic exploitation of the Polish or Polonised szlachta and the attempts at religious conversion of the

Orthodox faithful by the Polish Jesuits or Folonized

Uniates.

While the upper classes were Polonized, the Cossacks preserved the idea of Ukrainian nationality into the nine­ teenth century when the Ukrainians became infected with nationalism. The idea of nationalism caused serious prob­ lems in the Hapsburg province of Galicia. This province was settled by Poles in the west and Ukrainians in the east with some Ukrainians in the west and many Foies in the east.

There were in addition many Jews, some Germans, and repre-

10 c .asilevski;?, Ukraina, p. 2 9 . 20^

sentatives of other groups, like the Armenians in smaller numbers, also residing there. Ukrainian nationalists demanded

eastern Galicia as an autonomous Ukrainian territorial unit,

iasilevvski protested against this because the population there was divided, especially between the majority Ukrain­ ian and the largest minority, the Poles. This mixture of nationalities was compounded by the fact that neither one occupied compact swaths of ground but were to be found in variously mixed percentages in the various counties. This, too, was where the important Polish cultural center of Lwow was located.

A reasonable solution to this knotty ethnic problem v;hich could lead to national antagonism and c\'en bloodshed in the pursuit of national independence was fundamental for the solution of other, similar, problems and the realization of Pasilewski’s goals of independence and security of all the national groups of eastern Europe. Uasilewski's grand design emerged through the application of 3auer's abstract laws to the concrete problems of ethnic rivalries within the context of socialist progress. One had to understand properly the principles of ethnic assimilation, argued l/asilewski, in real circumstances such as the developing antagonism between Foies and Ukrainians in eastern Galicia.

According to .Jasilewski's statistics, foies were increasing both relatively and absolutely in eastern Galicia. They were gaining ground among the upper classes of Ukrainians 20 5 and they gained ground among; the German "bureaucracy which married into lolish families. Jews, Armenians, and Vlachs, who had traditionally assimilated to German culture, now were Polonized. 'The Ukrainian masses were the one group which was unaffected by . They ceased to be susceptible to Polish culture in the nineteenth century and began to proclaim militantly their own nationality as their identity.^

The Folish conservatives and the Folish nationalists who violently attacked this national consciousness among the Ukrainians, although for different reasons, did not understand the laws of ethnic assimilation. l/asilewski blamed them for exacerbating the nationality issue through their blindness and greed. Polish democrats and socialists, argued l/asilewski, had to support the aspirations of the

Ukrainian people for cultural autonomy to show them that all

Foies were not enemies of Ukrainian culture. Superimposed on this regional problem was the whole question of Ukrainian people, l/asilewski claimed that Polish democrats and socialists should also support Ukrainian independence.

—— — — — — — — — ——

•^Ibid. , up. 161-63* 206

The early 1900?, saw a rebirth in democratic and social­ ist activity in eastern Galicia. lasilewski approved of this development but also noted that there war no single, strong independence party for all the Ukrainians. The Austrian

Ukrainians were a nation "in the full sense of the term" but the Russian Ukrainians were still mostly "ethnographic material." It was the Russian Ukrainians who held the key for the future of the Ukrainian nation. They had the wide expanse of territory needed for a viable nation. The answer to the various ethnic claims in Galicia was straightforward: independence for the nationalities involved. The dependence of the Galician Ukrainians on the Russian Ukrainians for a viable state meant a liberation struggle feared at the

Russian Fmpire with the Poles as ready allies.

From the moment, however, when the Ukrainian endeavor for independence becomes the program of the sincere Ukrainian democracy then," Rasilewski wrote, "the moment of the facilitation of the P’olish-Ukrainian problem will also arrive. 2

Rasilewski felt that Poles and Ukrainians had to come to an understanding because they shared the same fate. Though

1 2 Ibid., pp. 2 1 5 , 2 1 6 . 207 the Ukrainians were treated worst of all in Russia, the

Poles pot a press there among the Ukrainians because of the activities of the Polish conservatives and nationalists against the Ukrainians of eastern Galicia. The problem of eastern Galicia was that two nations occupied one country.

The immediate solution to this problem was not apparent be­ cause most eyes were focused on the county or provincial level. One had to step back from the problem to understand that there needed to be "a greater understanding of the interests of all of Poland and all of the Ukraine." The

solution was "the appraisal of mutual relations of Poles and Ukrainians on both sides of the border from the point of view of the struggle for independence of both countries."

Only on these grounds were both a "modus vivendi" and "so.iusz"

(alliance) possible between the Polish and Ukrainian people. ^3

In eastern Galicia the laws of assimiltion v/ere working in favor of the Poles; that is, the Polish element there was not only holding its own but was growing and could not be treated contemptuously by the Ukrainian nationalists who wanted a purely Ukrainian eastern Galicia. On the other hand, the Ukrainians there v/ere no longer an "ethnographic mass” with no national consciousness and had to be treated with the respect and tolerance due to a sister nation and not

^3[bid., p. 219- I. i.'s emphasis. 208 slighted or Folonized. when it v.ras finally realized that all Ukrainians and all Foies were struggling to liberate their entire nations and that the major enemy of this inde­ pendence was tsarist Russia, then the problems of eastern

Galicia seemed much less significant, though not unimportant, in comparison. Autonomy for eastern Galician Ukrainians, especially from Folish influences, was not as significant for the Ukrainian nation as independence from the Russians.

'.'asilewski was building a case for the independence of nations, lie tried to place the local problem of Hapsburg

Galicia into perspective. Once the Polish and the Ukrainian nations attained independence they would settle their differ­ ences at the negotiating table because of the good will gen­ erated by each newly liberated nation respecting the rights of otter ethnic groups to nationhood. The laws of assimila­ tion would then be used to help draw the boundary lines between nati ons.

That this solution was somewhat vague should not be sur­ prising. As a politician, Uasilewski wanted to keep some options open in what might be a very fluid situation. If the

Ukrainians were incapable of nationhood, then a claim for the

Foies in Ukrainian territory had to be well staked out. If the Ukrainians wero capable of nationhood then './asilewski hoped for very close relations with a democratic and social­ ist Ukraine, either through military alliance or federation. 209 The results of these close ties would diminish the necessity

to draw tortuous boundaries through gerrymandered districts betv.:een Ukrainians and Poles, for the rights of minorities would be protected by the fraternal governments.

2. Chelm

Another Ukraino-Polish problem bothered Tasilewski and

the FP3. This was the attempt on the part of the Russian

Umpire to create a province of Che2rm (kholm) out of two

Polish provinces and then to Russify the Ukrainian Uniates who lived there. At least the conflict between Foies and

Ukrainians in the Hapsburg domains was the somewhat natural one of two nationalities developing claims of nationhood for the same parcel of land. The problem of Chelm was complicated by the fact that Russian bureaucrats were interfering in the natural process of Polonization of this area to prevent the loss of Russian influence there. The original inhabitants of this projected province were Ukrainians who, with the expansion of Polish power into this area alon-1- with none

Folish immigration, became Uniates in religion and therefore subject to Polish cultural influences. ^

1 b These Polonizing influences had proceeded so far that after the Second World War Chelm was the only one of these territories to be retained by the Polish govern­ ment. l/asilewski knew "Russian tsarism always regarded the

c. religious a union as its mortal enemy. To Orthodox

Russians the religious union which created the Uniate church

instigated the life and death struggle for the souls of

people formerly Orthodox. These people were also little

Russians and therefore part of the Russian nation to be

saved by Russian nationalists from the pernicious influence

of Hestern culture and Catholicism. The religious union

which created the Uniates was canceled by the Russian govern­

ment in the 1880s. At the turn of the century, the Uniates

survived only in the Polish provinces of Russia (and the

Austro-Hungarian lands) and it was for this reason that the

Russians wanted to annex this Polish land. They could then

wipe out the remaining Uniates in the Russian Empire by re­

converting them to Orthodoxy. Since the Ukrainians who

lived in Chelm were Uniates and since there were no Orthodox

faithful there to speak of, the Russian nationalists joined

the Orthodox church in calling for the separation of Chelm

from Poland and saving the population from themselves by fiat. Once the Uniates v/ere reconverted to Orthodoxy, they would be susceptible to Russian culture instead of the '.Vest-

ern culture of the papacy and Polish sympathies.

15 Leon liasilewski, pzie.ie mgczenskie Fodlasia i Chelmszczyzny. 2nd ed., (Cracow, 191£), p . 11. 211

Before the development of national consciousness, one of the primary determinants of self-identification was religious affiliation. The Ukrainians of Che£m were assim­ ilating to Folish culture because of their Roman Catholic orientation and also because they refused to accept Ortho­ doxy when they were pressured to do so. Uasilewski knew the

"greatest resistance £to reconversionj was made by the popular masses. The persecution of Uniates in the lands administered from ’.Jarsaw reached its peak in the era pre­ ceding the 1905 revolution. The Uniate church establish­ ment v;as easily subverted to the Orthodox cause but the faithful were not. V.'asilewski copiously recounted the atroc­ ities perpetrated by the Orthodox on the Uniates and related many of the horror stories produced by this intimidation.

"The whole western European press," he wrote, "was filled with articles describing the rabid barbarism of the Russian

'missionaries'.

The Russians were trying to abrogate, by the use of force, the scientific laws of assimilation which occurred in nature among any two peoples. Although ’..'asilewski did not say so in so many words, he was implying that the assim­ ilation which followed the church union in which Ukrainians

^ ibid., p. 1 5.

Ibid. , p. 3 2 . 212 succumbed, to Polish culture was natural because force was not applied with the severity more common to the modern world. To be entirely fair to I'/asilewski one must say that he understood well how Poles, and others, conquered territory in the pact and the role that force played in it. He did not at all defend Polish expansion but claimed that it happened in the barbaric and pre-modern world, before the era of national consciousness, democracy, and socialism. That is to say, before the discovery of objective and scientific laws which govern natural assimilation.

..’asilewski castigated the Russians for pursuing a policy of assimilation of non-Russians who had either linguistic ; or religious similarities to the Great Russians, a policy which Uasilewcki supported if it dealt with the historical process of Polonisation. Kis concern v/as that the Russians v/ere now using the unnatural pressure of brute force. If things were allowed to develop normally they would do so in

Poland's favor. The Ukrainians of Chelm would became Poles if they were left to their own devices. Catholics and

Uniates would lose their distinctiveness through intermar­ riage while "Polish civilisation gradually gains the Ukrain­ ian masses. Rut the situation was not normal or natural,

18 Leon ./asilewski, La paik avec 1 'Ukraine; Podlachie et Chelm (Geneva, cl917sTT, p. 7. 213 for the Russians used the threat of deportation as a means to ostracise the oworni (recalcitrants) and even applied a great grandfather clause which meant that even Catholics who had a Uniate great grandfather could still "be considered

Orthodox. "'his religious persecution came to an end as a result of the Revolution of 19^5 when the tsar issued an edict granting religious toleration. The forcibly rebap­ tised Uniates left the Orthodo:: church in droves and, to the chagrin of religious and nationalist .Russians, joined the

Polish dominated Roman church. "On the contrary," .'asilewski wrote, "they became Catholics who were fanatically tied to JQ the Roman church and Poles by the same admission." 7

This unexpected result of religious toleration bound the

Russian Orthodox and nationalists closer together in fear of the Polish nationality and, in their conception, a growing anti-Russian Polish nationalism.

Rasilevski predicted, and he was borne out, that many former Uniates would join the Polish army of liberation once it occupied Cheim "to fight for the same thing for ’which their fathers withstood torture and shed their blood." 20

Obviously then, the problems facing CheZm and Galicia were different. The Russians even encouraged the Orthodox clergy of Galicia to come to CheZn and help .spread propaganda

^ Tasilev.'ski, Dzie.je mecsens3:ie, pp. 18, h6-k-7. 214 for the Russian canno. The point .'asilevski underscored

in both there cased was the name. There ’'.’ore certain laws

of assimilation that were universal. The use of force to cha?ige a person's nationality was unnatural. There o u g h t to be unhindered ethnic development and free choice. In the case of the Chelm Ukrainians, their identity was religious and not national and they were becoming Foies.

Since, however, that ideological Folichness of the former Uniates was attained by them through heroic struggles and the sufferings of martyrdom, it became so much more dear to them than the natural Folish peasant's c Chlopa-LachaFolishness ^inherited]? from his fathers and forefathers.2^-

Foelings should not be poisoned between people in an area v.'here national antagonisms were being created and fanned from the outside. Dven according to Russian figures, before 1905, ‘t-10 Orthodox were in a majority in only one county out of ten. Catholics made up 52.^ of Chelm rube rail a (province), Tasilewski felt that even these figures were doubtlessly exaggerated to make the Russian case.22

The logical answer for any problem which might arise be­ tween Foies and Ukrainians., in a situation like Chelm where both people shared considerable sympathies of culture, was

2 1 Ibid., pp. 7S-79.

22jCbid_. , p. 59; For a brief discussion of other statistical claims see, Zdward Chm.ielewski, The Iolish Tjuestion in the Russian "tato Duma (Znoxville, 1970), p. 112. to protect minority rights if some people insisted on being 23 considered a minority. ^ The natural development of the

Ukrainians of this region, where the upper classes were

Polonized as Uniates and the lower classes were becoming

Roman Catholics, was to create a people who became a part of Polish polity without necessarily losing their Ukrainian ethnicity. Historically, the Union of Lublin created a dual Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth in 1 5 6 9. At the Union of Hadziacz, in I6 5 8, an attempt was made to extend this into a triple Commonwealth including the Ukrainians. This latter union failed and, although it was a bit different than what Wasilewski foresaw for Chelm, it provided a precedent for a mutually beneficial pact between the

Ukrainians and Poles rather than a parallel precedent of mutual hostilities. The Unions of Lublin and Hadziacz established a tradition by which a person could become part of the Commonwealth of the Kingdom of Poland, the Grand

Duchy of Lithuania, and the Grand Duchy of Ruthenia (Ukraine) without necessarily having a common ethnic, linguistic, or religious background. One could be gente Ruthenus. natione

Pol onus (Ukrainian by birth, Polish by nationality). This could also be true of the Byelorussians in a future federa­ tion of peoples.

^Wasilewski, La paix, p. 3 8. 216 F. Lithuania.

The third area of ethnic conflict most important for the Poles wac: in the fonner C-rand Duchy of Lithuania which was called the forth went Province by the Russian Umpire.

Gometimes called Lithuania-Byelorussia, this was a country of extremely varied ethnic configuration and political tendencies at the turn of the century.

The Lithuanians began their conquests in the thirteenth century under fendon and quichly expanded their territory to incorporate Byelorussia. Under Olrerd in the fourteenth century they to oh the Uhrair.e from the Tatars. Two facts emerged from these conquests which were important for the •• future development of Lithuania. First, the Lithuanians, as a numerically small people, ruled over large expanses of land inhabited by rr.ore numerous and more "civilised" people, quiclily succumbed to Byelorussian language and culture.

Second, the pagan Lithuanians succumbed to the Orthodox faith. Given the conditions and according to Bauer's laws,

'..aeilewsbi considered this a very natural development.

Due to pressures on Poland and Lithuania from German crusaders and Luscovite expanionists the two states sought alliance. A series of unions emerged between the two states since the marriage of the newly Catholicized Jagiello to the

^ L c o n ’ 'asilewshi, Lltwa i. Dial onus’ (Cracow, a 19123 ), t>. o_ 217

Polish 3ueen uadv/iga in I"''-'. At the 1 ^13 union of Korodlo,

the Lithuanians accoptocl Polish coats of arms and administra­

tive practices. Prom 1510 onwards both the kina of Poland

snd the grand duke of Lithuania v/ere the same person. The

‘./arsav.’ sejn (parliament) of 1 5s3 considered the integration

of the crown and the arand duchy into one state. Put

.Jasilevski noted the "Lithuanian envoys sought a personal union v-hile the Poles strove for a complete incorporation

of the Lithuanian lands to Poland, negotiations broke a own. ..27

Pasilev.’ski perceived a lesson in the development of relations between the crov.11 and the grand duchy, lie was im­ pressed by the various needs of the different people and the necessity to respect then. It v/?.s obvious that to force a people into a political solution was an unnecessary strat­ agem and would most likely be counter-productive. Reason­ able people who understood common threats could easily agree

on mutually beneficial political solutions. As much as

’..’asilevski mused on the past, this v;as a lesson of history which he applied to the present day threats of German end

Russian imperialism, finally, this lesson showed the folly of the policies of Luxemburg and. Dmovski who rode roughshod, in different ways, over the sensibilities of people.

2? .Jasilev.ski, Litv.’a i. .ie.i lud.y. p. 20. 218

At the union of Lublin in 15^9 a compromise was reached whereby Poland received her land claims and Lithuania her

autonomy. The Folonization of the Lithuanian upper classes

was set in motion. Uith the church union which followed,

the aim v?as to wrest the Lithuanian, Byelorussian, and

Ukrainian peasantry from Orthodoxy. Polish culture was re­

placing Byelorussian in the grand duchy.

As in Galicia. and Chelm the Polish element of the

population was dynamically expanding according to ./asilewski.

I-oles made up 10;S of its current population. They lived as

peasants in territories contiguous to ethnic Poland as well

as scattered throughout the territory as around Uilno.

Polish numbers were expanding because the Catholic Byelo­

russians were adopting the Polish language. There were also

non-peasant Poles, like the petty szlachta descended from

early settlers or the Polonized szlachta. who owned consid­

erable estates. Filially there were the proletariat and the

middle classes of the urban areas. Pi2rsudski was born

there, Uasilewski had roots there and many other patriotic

Poles came from the grand duchy.

On the eve of the Great 'Jar, national consciousness had

not finally crystallized among the peoples of the grand

duchy. The people of the area were in the process of

developing an awareness of national consciousness. 219 All segment:.; of Polish society in Lithuania and Byelorussia, more­ over, understand that this country is not Polish and that it possesses its ov;n separate interests... The final crystallization of the in­ dividual nationalities of Lithuania and Byelorussia is an inevitable necessity. Naturally it does not exclude the cooperation of all the local elements on the basis of daily interests and political aspirations. But it must create a constant striving for a mutual understanding of the various national elements with an analogous class base and related pro­ grammatic aspirations. The further development of Lithuania and Byelo­ russia undoubtedly will follov; along the path traced by these tv.’o processes: on the one hand, the crystallization of individual local nationalities; on the other, the formation of common aspirations among elements differen­ tiated nationally.2®

Tasilews!ki did not know for sure which of the nationalities of the g rand duchy would become modern nations but he did have his ovai hopes and ideas on this subject.

...I recognize the Lithuanian national movement as a positive factor striving to transform the Lithuanian (litewsko- zmudzki) speaking population into a Lithuanian nation conscious of its distinctiveness and independent aspi­ rations. I think that all the small Polish islands in compact Lithuanian territory vrill probably disappear, sooner or later, merging linguis­ tically with the population comprising the colossal majority. However, I consider the attempts to spread Lithuanian culture beyond the compact

2®..'asilewski, Li tv a i. Bialorus. pp. 355-56* 220

Lithuanian territory, among the Byelorussian and Byelorussian- Polish people, fruitless. It lacks durable prospects of success and contradicts the natural ele­ mental process which for centuries diminished the Lithuanian territory to the benefit of the Byelorussians. 29

The city of Jilno did have a Lithuanian character also and the speakers of Lithuanian there should have a right to their own language. .Jhile conceding this right to the

Lithuanians, Basilewski did not believe that they "could secure a political way of life independent of their neigh­ bors. " 3°

.’asilewski also supported raising the educational level of Byelorussians by encouraging their ovm language and national consciousness. "I am not, however, inclined to suppose that the Byelorussians could crystalize into an in­ dependent nation as is entirely possible among the Lithua­ nians." The Byelorussians were culturally similar to the

Foies and Russians. In order to counter the gains being made by the Russifiers among the Orthodox population, l/asilewski not only encouraged the development of a Byelo­ russian national character but also sought to strengthen the Polish element in the grand duchy and those elements,

Uniates and Catholics, sympathetic to the Poles.

29 Ibid.. p. XV.

30 Ibid.. pp. XV-XVI. 221

...I consider as very proper not only the defense of Polish cultural gains up to this time but also the expansion of Polish culture among local elements of non-Polish descent.31 VJasilewski was not defending the reactionary landlord

interests of the Polish szlachta. the interests of the Polish-

Lithuanian bourgeoisie in the Russian Empire, or the Polish national bourgeoisie of ethnic Poland which looked upon

Lithuania as a Polish preserve. He v/as simply trying to

explain the historical process by which Polish culture had become significant in Lithuania. The Poles were an "original

element" there, as were the Lithuanians and Byelorussians, and, for that matter, the Latvians, Jews, Tatars, and

Gypsies. Lithuania had an "administrative wholeness" but this did not give it a "natural and separate economic organization."

It was economically bound to Poland through the centuries.

The union of the grand duchy with the Folish crown eventually

caused the decline of Lithuania, compared to Poland, in the face of its internal weaknesses.

Civilizing Lithuania, Poland con­ currently drew much strength from it for the development of its own civilisation which then blossomed also in Lithuania. But in this manner Lithuania, like every 'prov­ ince' was deprived of a significant

31Ibid.. p. XVI. 222

stock of its local power which hindered the already very handi­ capped transformation of Lithuania into an independent terrain £&r the development of its own life.3

By civilization './asilevski meant economy’' as well as

culture. Contemporary Lithuania ,,ras again a province, this

time of the Russian Zrnpire, v:ith the same inability to develop

independently. Limes had changed and national consciousness

was in the air. There were two magnets acting on the peoples of the former grand duchy: an economic and

cultural one from Poland and a political and administrative

one from Russia.33

As usual, t’asilewski left unsaid a specific remedy to

the economic ills of this land. But his intention was

nevertheless clear. Since a significant portion of the

culture and. economy of Lithuania was dependent on Poland,

Zasilewski thought that the peoples of Lithuania, coiild

develop only in cooperation with an independent Poland.

The common enemy of the peopler. of Lithi'.ania and Poland were

the Russians. An independent Poland would respect the rights

of all the nationalities of Lithuania to a free and normal

development of their cultures. An ethnic Lithuania, as an

independent state, would find a natural ally in Poland. Cr,

32 Ibid.. p. 110.

33 Ibid. 223 more probably, bccau.cc the tier: 'were co clone and destinies

so similar, Poland and Lithuania would enter a federal re­ lationship reminiscent of the Union of 15o9. This tine, however, provincialism would not result because speakers of

Lithuanian and .-Byelorussian would have their rights to their language and ethnicity guaranteed. This latter solution was favored by Jasilewski because of the ethnic variegation of

Lithuania.

G. Assimilation and Scientific Socialism

All in all, Otto Sauer's laws of national assimilation equipped .-asilewski with the scientific means with which to collate his data on the various ethnic vrou.ps to show which had continuing vitality and which clid not. J-Iarxist theory showed that noble landowners and later bourgeois capitalists had a limited future. Bauer's laws helped .Jasilevski spread the conclusion that Polish noble landowners and Polish bourgeois capitalists in the borderlands had a limited future

They 'were destined to be assimilated by the majority of the population among which they settled once a socialist and democratic revolution swept eastern Lurope. lolish culture, however, was still making gains among the peasants and the proletariat. This shov;ed that Polish culture ir„ this area was vital and Wasilewski approved of it as a natural ex­ pression of the laws of progress and assimilation. By the same token he opposed Russification because it was based on force and intimidation. 224

Bauer's lav;s corroborated Uasilewski's views on the future of the various ethnic groups in the borderlands, but it was Marxism and rationalism which helped Wasilewski pass judgment on the future of religion and religious identi­ fication. 'Mith economic progress religious distinction be­ came less important. Thus, religious groups like the Old

Believers, the Karaim, and the Moslem Tatars would shortly disappear. Larger groups, like the Jews, would a.lso assim­ ilate to other cultures. Uasilewski hoped it would be to

Polish culture but there was competition from the Russian and German cultures as well. The Uniates were assimilating, some to Orthodoxy most to Catholicism, and even these two religions were quickly losing their traditional importance in modern industrialized society and would have even less in democratic and socialist states.

Other groups of people would survive as nationalities because of their numbers. The Ukrainians assimilated settlers well. This was a very vital people. Then came the

Lithuanians v/ho were developing a consciousness of their own nationality but who had lost a lot of ground ethnically.

The least developed, in terms of national consciousness and the most like an ethnographic mass, were the Byelorussians.

They conceived their identity in religious terms and assim­ ilated to Russian or Polish culture but this would not go on much longer. 225

The Poles showed their ethnic vitality hy continuing

to increase their sphere of cultural assimilation especially

among the former Uniate Ukrainians of Chelm and the Catholic

Byelorussians, "both of whom were predominantly peasant

converts. In Lithuania and Galicia, there was a tendency

to assimilate Lithuanians and Ukrainians of various social

strata because of the more highly developed economy there.

As national consciousness spread, assimilation would eventu­

ally stop, just as with the spread of industrialisation and

democratization the islands of Polish noble landowners would

be washed away. The new states of eastern Europe would have

a tremendous assimilatory drawing power for all the minorities

within them.

Since assimilation occurred, according to Bauer, more

readily among similar classes, then the whole problem of

assimilation was of vital importance for the working class movement. This was the reason socialists became involved with these problems in the first place. The specific purpose

of Bauer's studies was to find cases where assimilation did not occur and the proletariat of the majority had to respect

the ethnic rights of the proletariat of the minority.

Here Bauer, Stalin, and ’Jasilewslci, the most important writers on ethnic problems for socialism, disagreed. Bauer's

theories proceeded from the point of the territorial integrity

of the Eapsburg Empire, and, to preserve this political entity, he made concessions of cultural liberties on a non-territorial 226

or personal basis to the ethnic components of the empire.

Stalin had no use for the Hapsburg Empire or for cultural

autonomy, which he considered a sham. Stalin advocated the

territorial independence of an oppressed nationality, not

mere cultural autonomy. Wasilewski sought both territorial

independence for oppressed nationalities and cultural auton­

omy for those minorities which would inevitably be left in

the newly independent states. M'asilewski wanted to preserve

the vital nations found in a territorial unit while Stalin

v,’anted to merge all ethnic and national groups into the

single culture of the dominant territorial group. Bauer

wanted the solution of the nationality problem to be reached

within the capitalist Hapsburg Empire, while Stalin saw a 3 solution possible only after a socialist revolution.

^ Kann, The liultiliational Empire, Vol. II, p. 172. Joseph Stalin, "Marxism and the national Question," VJorks, Vol. II. What the Austrians called personal autonomy the Russians called cultural autonomy. Personal autonomy was non-territorial, that is, the land one lived on did not determine one's nationality.

Stalin has been overshadowed by Lenin to such a degree that all of Stalin's intellectual efforts have been attributed to Lenin. Eric Hula attempts to rectify this view by recognizing Stalin's originality on the national question in "The Nationalities Policy of the Soviet Union— Theory and Practice," Social Research. Vol. XI (May, 19^), pp. 172-73* Hula contrasts Stalin^ concrete approach with Lenin's abstract­ ness. Robert G. Tucker, Stalin as Revolutionary. 1679-1929 (Kew York, 1973), P* 155> and Adam 3. Ulam, Stalin, the Man and His Era (Mew York, 1973), PP* 119-20, both stress Stalin's credentials as author of this work. For a study highly crit­ ical of Stalin see , The Formation of the Soviet

( f.omnni ri era _ : cC!r:ar>h11dotTd - I Uf AL 1 . rvn- v/ — fiihu _LU wai'u

Vol. I. Assimilation, "by definition, is evolutionary. Stalin

sought a revolutionary solution. Lenin, too, was opposed

to the idea of non-territorial cultural autonomy as an

essentially capitalist attitude dressing the bourgeois idea

of a nation in socialist clothing. Any concession to

cultural autonomy was a compromise with bourgeois national­

ism. The proper concern for a socialist was class revolution.

Any problem not directly connected with class revolution was not a primary socialist problem. Both Lenin and Stalin re­

cognized that nationality questions were a reality and that

they had a potential for aiding the socialist revolution.

For this they considered the concept of territorial inde­ pendence of oppressed nations sufficient. It is important to stress that self-determination always meant the right to secession to Lenin and any oppressed nation had this right to escape its oppressors. Any concession granted to

the "notorious ’cultural-national autonomy*" was oppor­

tunistic.-^

3 5 y. i. Lenin, "The Right of Rations to Self-Determina­ tion," Selected VJorks (Rev/ York, 19^7)» Vol. 3* pp. 642, 644. The right to secession in no way contradicted Lenin's view of the essential nature of international proletarian unity, p. 6 5 2. Other writings by Lenin on this topic are included in Rational Liberation. Socialism and Imperialism. Selected V-fritings (Rev1 York, 19u3T! 228

The extremely intriguing idea of the proletariat as the "national class" which Marx mentioned in the Manifesto has not received much attention. Wasilewski believed that the proletariat was the final repository of national con­ sciousness even in the future socialist society hut he came to this conclusion intuitively and empirically, not through

Marxist dialectics. For that matter, until recently the implications of this statement in the Manifesto had been overlooked even by the scholars. A trend is now emerging of viewing national consciousness and class consciousness not as mutually contradictory doctrines but inseparable and natural ones.

In general the whole Marxist idea of the nation as the spawn of the bourgeoisie in the age of capitalism was accepted by all socialists including Bauer, Luxemburg,

Wasilewski, Lenin, and Stalin. Where they disagreed was on how the idea of the national had developed since Marx dis­ cussed it. Luxemburg felt no need to grant concessions to nationalities since her primary concern was efficient economic production under socialism. Once capitalist ex-

^ Horace B. Davis, Nationalism and Socialism (New York, 1967) and Solomon.F. Bloom, The World of Nations; National Implications in the Works of Karl Marx- ([New York, 19^7). For an opposing view see Robert R. King, Minorities Under Communism, p. 16. 229 ploitation was removed then workers of all ethnic back­ grounds would be able to work together fraternally provided they worked cooperatively in a large territorial unit which 37 provided a large and viable market.-" Stalin and Lenin agreed that large economic units were important but they disagreed with Lujcemburg on the lack of importance of national consciousness as a politically viable force. They were willing to grant concessions of self-determination to those peoples suffering national oppression. They both encouraged class struggle at the same time. Bauer sought national liberties for oppressed people vdthin the framework of Hapsburg Austria-Hungary to preserve the state from the encroachments of Germany and Russia.

Finally, Wasilewski hoped to mobilize the working classes as the most vital element and the most numerous members of the modern concept of nationality toward independence and then to unite the various proletarian nations together to stand up to ilussification and Germanization.

-^Roza Luksemburg, "Kwestia narodowosciowa i autonomia," Jvbor Fism ('.larsaw, 1959), Vol. 2. CHAPTER VII

FAILURE OF FEDERATION

Theory is always gray.

Pi£sudski’s favorite Goethe quote.

A. The Polish Republic

When the war effort of Imperial Germany collapsed, when chaos continued to stem from the February Revolution in Imperial Russia, and when revolutionary chaos and nationalism began to infect the Hapsburg Empire, the second

Polish Rzeczypospolita (Republic) was born in November 1918.

Power gravitated to Jozef Pilsudski, the midwife of Polish independence and the commander of its military forces.

Leon 'Wasilewski accepted the portfolio of foreign minister in the PPS dominated civil government of J|drzej Moraczewski.

IJasilewski was finally in a position to implement his ideas on eastern Europe. That he was not very successful was due to the conjuncture of a whole series of events.

Foremost among them was the military problem which over­ shadowed all political problems in the renascent state.

The occupying German army had to be disarmed and the Foies ✓ of the borderlands, especially of Lwow and VJilno, protected.

230 231 The unity of the Austro-Hungarian, German, and Russian parts of Poland would only be a reality through the establishment of a military presence to protect these territories from disorder and not through idealistic political manifestos.

The very existence of the Moraczewski government in

VJarsaw frightened the Polish national Committee, who lobbied for Folish independence among the Entente powers in Paris.

Heavily influenced by the thinking of the National Democracy and lead by Dmowski himself, the Poles in Paris and their nationalist followers in Poland viewed Fiisudski and. his machinations in v.'arsaw with extreme suspicion and hostility because of his socialist ties. To them the Moraczewski government was incurably left wing. VJasilewski, who had locked horns with the NDs on previous occasions and had done yeoman service for the cause of Polish socialism, was com­ pletely unacceptable as the architect of Polish foreign policy. The impasse between the Poles of Paris and VJarsaw was so complete that I.'D sympathizers in ’./arsaw kidnapped

VJasilewski and moraczewski and thus forced Pilsudski to establish another government, that of the more acceptable

Ignacy Paderewski in January 1919- Neither VJasilewski nor

Moraczewski were injured, they were quickly rescued by

Pilsudski, and though they stayed on in power for a short time they tendered their resignations to the commander-in­ chief. Both Moraczewski and VJasilewski looked upon their ministries as temporary until a more permanent government 232

was established. Yet this government certainly had been the

first choice of Pilsudski, and VJasilewski had not declined

the portfolio. Certain common hopes were held by Pilsudski

and VJasilewski for the future of Foland in this its first

government.

Another problem facing VJasilewski' s tenure in office

was the ideological transformation Pilsudski had undergone

since the Revolution of 1905. Pilsudski was willing to

sacrifice his longtime friend and co-conspirator in order to

bring some semblance of unity to Poles of various political

tendencies. Pilsudski had ceased being a socialist;

VJasilewski had not. Although their views on foreign policy-

remained practically identical, it simply was not politic

to flaunt them either in the face of the unsympathetic KDs

or the suspicious Entente whose ear was held by the Russian

VJhites.

B. Soviet Russia

As foreign minister, .Jasilewski expended his energies

on three specific issues relating to the Russians. All

three of these issues shared in common the question of

normalization of relations between the Polish Republic and

Soviet Russia. VJarsaw sought to legitimize its new position

and on the 17th of November the ministry of foreign affairs

requested the recognition of the western European powers. 233

This note pointedly excluded the mention of Soviet Russia and set the anti-3olshevik tone of the VJasilewski ministry.*

His first direct communications with the Soviet govern­ ment concerned the treatment of the representatives of the former Polish Regency Council in Moscow which the Moraczewski government recognized as the representatives of the Polish

Republic in Russia. Wasilewski informed Grigorii Chicherin, the Soviet commissar of foreign affairs, that formal rela­ tions would not be established until harassment of the mission ceased. Wasilewski was only temporizing. Two of

Chicherin's notes to Wasilewski unsuccessfully tried to 2 explain the :situation and to normalize relations.

A second bone of contention between the two new states was the direction of soviet troop movements. VJasilewski ex­ pressed fear of the advance "vers la frontiere

•polonaise." through an area populated by Byelorussians and

Lithuanians, which Chicherin denied since he claimed that the

Russians and the Poles did not even have a common boundary at the time. Chicherin explained that the Russian army "is not only very far from the Polish borders but besides that

*'Weronika Gostynska, "Polityka Polska v/obec Litwy i 3ialoruci," 2 dzie.iow stosunkow nolsko-radzieckich. Vol. I (1965), p. 31. p Dokumenty i, materialv do historii stosunkow t>olsko- ra,dzieckich (Warsaw, 1962), Vol. II, Hos. 12, 20, 2 6 , 2?. 2Jk

it is separated fro:?, it by Lithuania and a neighboring part

of the Ukraine and at the present time Poland and Russia do

not have a common frontier.'..'hen parts of Lithuania and

Byelorussia were occupied by the Red Army at the end of

December 1913, Wasilewski protested and again refused k diplomatic ties.

Finally, it was Chicherin's turn to protest when a

Russian Red Cross delegation was arrested in Warsaw. Four members of this delegation were murdered as they were being

expelled from Poland while a fifth, assumed dead, v?as only wounded and escaped to tell his story. This further em-

/ bittered relations and Uasilewski was forced to institute

an investigation of this incident.-* Ho capital sentences were given the offenders.

From the beginning Uasilewski stalled the Russians on

the question of recognition, iiany people were unsure of

the durability of the new Soviet state and Uasilewski sought

the more significant recognition of the Entente powers. In

order to influence them on the issue of recognition, he had

to keep his government differentiated from the Bolshevik government in the hoary minds of the Entente leaders who

3Ibid.. Hos. 31, 37.

^Ibid.. No. 37.

5Ibid., Nos. 39, k?, 5k. feared socialism as much as Bolshevism and tended to confuse

the tv/o. For this reason he avoided any real negotiations

with the Soviets on recognition. At the same time, the

Bolshevik Revolution was having an impact on all of Burope

and it found sympathy in some quarters in Foland. The

pro-Bolshevik elements in Poland were demonstrating in favor

of the new order in Russia and were attacking the koraczewski

government for the murders of the Bolshevik delegation.

Added to this was the ND distaste for a socialist government

in '.Jarsaw. This all made the koraczewski government unten­

able and lead to its demise. A Polish historian intimates

that the only solution for this domestic chaos, vrhich might have led to a social revolution in Warsaw, was to raise the bogey of Russian Bolshevik invasion and this is what the koraczewski government had done. To Wasilewski, the Reds were a real military threat slowly advancing toward Poland.

The Bolshevik government was trying to lay claim to the lands that the tsarist imperialists absconded with in 1 7 7 2 ,

the lands illegally taken from Poland and containing no

Russian autochthonous population. To k'asilewski it was not

a question of recognition or revolution but who shall in­ fluence the peoples between ethnic Poland end Russia. IJho-

ever won these peoples for his cause would gain a stronger

^Gostynska, "Folityka Polska," p. 39* 236 position than his enemy. From VJarsaw the Bolsheviks were seen pursuing; the traditional tsarist policy of imperialism hut this time under the guise of socialism. The PFS needed no bogey to raise.

C. Paris

The Paris Peace Conference was scheduled to begin in

January 1919» and still no single delegation represented the interests of Poland in the French capital. The Polish

National Committee and vJarsaw urgently had to reach an under­ standing to present a unified front before the Entente powers.

This was accomplished when the Paderewski government suc­ ceeded the I-ioraczewski government. Paderewski was accept­ able to the left, the right, and the Entente. From the month of March, VJasilewski sat as the representative of the

Polish head of state on the Polish National Committee in

Paris. Both he and Paderewski had the reputations of op­ posing Dmowski's incorporationist policies in eastern Europe.

Paderewski's idealist conception of a united states in east­ ern Europe was tarnished by his consorting with right-wing politicians since the outbreak of the Great 'Jar. Recently

Wasilewski has even been accused of not being openly a federalist and his sincerity impugned as outright duplicity.

7 / rAleksy Deruga, "Przed i po wyprawie wilenskiej 1919 r. ," Z dzie.iov; stosunkow oolsko-radziec ioh. Vol. X (1973)» p. 6 8. 237

In this respect, on the issue of foreign policy, VJasilewski was similar to Pilsudski. They both had definite federalist

ideas based on newly independent national states. They also kept open various options for the protection of Poland such

as military alliance with bourgeois or peasant states. They viewed themselves as being realistic and not enmeshed in

abstract dogmas.

Pilsudski's instructions to VJasilewski were understood by him to further the cause of a federalist Great Foland in

opposition to Dmov'ski's nationalist Little Poland. In Faris

VJasilewski undertook the work at which he was most adept.

He wrote to the local press, chiefly Le Temps, to explain ' the Polish question and he made and renewed contacts with representatives of nationalities oppressed by the Russians.

VJasilewski was warned by Pilsudski that he was ready to move in the question of foreign affairs and especially in the east where

...I do not wish to be either an imperialist or a federalist while I do not have the possibility of speaking on these issues with some kind of authority and with a re­ volver in my pocket. Besides this, since it seems that blather about the brotherhood of people and nations and the American doctrine are beginning to win out on God's earth, I lean very willinglyqto the side of the federalists.

'■'Hasilewski, Jo2 ef Filsudski, pp. 175-76• 238

Power comes from the barrel of a /run. No policy is founded

on weakness. Pilsudski's Great Poland had to have realistic

foundations. He knew that the most immediate stumbling

block to federation was Lithuania. He encouraged ’iasilewski

to organise pressure on Lithuania, from Latvia which would

put the Lithuanians on the defensive on two fronts. Pressure

from the Estonians should be sought likewise. VJasilewski was

also warned by Pilsudski to watch Paderewski

...who is a r?,bid federalist but a person with a rather weak char­ acter, surrendering to influences, and I fear very much that various imperialist rogues may often turn him from the thorny path leading to the federalist paradise.9

The people most favorable to federation or a military com­ pact were the Estonians, and VJasilewski accordingly made the

closest contact with them.

Fortunes were changing in the military and political

situation in the former Grand Duchy of Lithuania. As the

German situation there became more precarious there a-

rose a pro-Berlin Lithuanian government, the Tarvba

(council). It relied heavily on German support and was anti-Polish as well as anti-3olshevik. Both the Poles and the Bolsheviks viewed it as a German puppet. The Germans gave ground to the spreading revolutionary tide from Russia

9 ✓ Adiutantura Generalna I.'aczelnero Dowodztwa. 1918-22 (•Jozef Pilsudski Institute of America, I lev; York), too. 15/^12. 239 and in early January of 1919 they and the Lithuanians

evacuated VJilno. Very soon the Poles evacuated it too. The

Russian Revolution acclaimed the emergence of two new

Bolshevik Soviet states of Lithuania and Byelorussia. How­

ever, these two states were not viable and so a union of the

two, Litbel, was formed with its capital at liilno. The

Tarvba and the Germans removed themselves to Kaunas while

the Foies bided their time in the south-west.

..Iasilewski launched an attack on the shaky Lithuanian

state, governed by the Tarvba. which sought the recognition

of the Entente in Paris. In an article in the French press

he explained the dangerous German influences prevailing in-

Lithuania. "The Taryba," he said, "created by the needs of

German imperialism, is not considered by the majority of the

Lithuanian population as a lega.1 representative of the

country." He could easily say this because the Lithuanians

did not make up a majority of the population in the former grand duchy. He went on to raise the Red menace, which was

sure to have an appeal to the French, by arguing that the

Foies were replacing the Germans there as the "anti-3olsheviku power and the Entente should force the Germans to evacuate

completely. Even a Tarvba-formed Byelorussian regiment had

defected to the Polish command. The Tar.vba was an artificial

creation end had no future. To Pilsudski, he reported on the difficulties the Lithuanians were providing the Folish 2k0 negotiators. The Lithuanians "shriek on all sides" about

Polish expansionism cloaked in a 3altiaue-Pont Duxin alliance, stretching from Finland to Rumania and geared against the Germans and Russians, because of the "presence of the Foies whose imperialism and expansionism exceeds the 1 0 Russo-German."

The Poles mounted a counter-offensive and by April 1919, they took llilno. They could not move earlier because of the war in eastern Galicia: Lwow was secured in the middle of

November 191^, while the province itself was pacified at the end of July 1919. As Tilno fell to Polish troops, '.Iasilewski sent Pilsudski a report from Paris. He informed him that he was eagerly awaiting Pilsudclsi's h’ilno Declaration which promised free elections for all the nationalities of the former grand duchy and would lead to federation with Poland.

Paderewski wished to continue talks with the Tarvba Lithua­ nians in Paris but '.Iasilewski objected. He said, "I per­ sonally think that now all Polish-Lithuanian discussions should cease in Faris and be transferred immediately to 11 darsaw and V.'ilno." Pilsudski wanted to present the Entente powers with a fait accom-pli and .Iasilewski hoped to do the

10 Un corresnondant occasionnel Leon .Iasilewski •=* , "L*action allemande sur le front de Lituanie" (German Activity on the Lithuanian Front), Le Temns (tlay 1 A, L919), p. 4.

n AGi;D. No. 1 (p/733- 2hi 12 same to Dmowski and his anti-federalist incorporationists.

Wasilewski also sought an anti-Bolshevik alliance with the Estonians and Latvians but recognized their difficulties at the moment with the Germans. Also,the present situation seemed to allow for "the conception of some kind of small autonomous eastern Galician state tied to Poland." Some pressure could be placed on the Ukrainians because of their. fear of Admiral Kolchak whose counterrevolutionary successes 1 3 were aimed at both 3olsheviks and nationalists.

While in Paris, Wasilewski continued to urge the recog- nition of the Baltic countries, especially . With the situation changing so quickly in Lithuania and to strengthen Paderewski's hand in gaining the acquiescence of the Feace Conference to Poland's aims in the east, Wasilewski took the extraordinary step of endorsing a pro memoria made by Polish magnates of Lithuania and Byelorussia. These landowners requested the union of historic Lithuania with

Poland or, if an ethnographic Lithuania emerged, the incor­ poration of ethnographically Polish Lithuania, including 1 3 Wilno, in the Polish Republic. J Of course, the landowners

12 Dsiewanowski, Joseph Pilsudski. p. 135. the Wilno Declaration see Jozef Pilsudski, P'isma zbiorov’o (Warsaw, 19?7), Vol. V, pp. 75-76.

13AGKD, ho. 1V733.

1^'iasilewski, Jozef Pilsudski, pp. 192-9^.

^DMHSP-R, Vol. II, pp. 238-39. zkz and '.iasilewski proceeded from different points of view.

The former hoped that their wealth would he preserved if they opted for a Polish state while the latter hoped that either historical or ethnographical Polish Lithuania would become democratized and socialized.

D. The Lithuanian Reef

In July of 1919 '.iasilewski left Faris and began to con­ cern himself almost exclusively with 3altic and Lithuanian problems. In the late summer and early autumn he became the spokesman for Pilsudski in sounding out sympathy for an anti-Bolshevik bloc of powers and also the plenipotentiary of the ministry of foreign affairs on the Lithuanian problem,

iasilewski immediately encouraged pro-Polish propaganda from Lithuanians. He procured among such Polish sympathizers • one Jozef Herbaczevski (Juozas Herbaciauskas), a professor at the Jagiellon University of Cracow. VJasilewski observed:

"since he is an authentic Lithuanian, he speaks and writes in Lithuanian, he exerts a certain influence even though he is somewhat mad."^' This policy did not seem to be gaining 17 much influence in the Taryba of Kaunas. On August 5, 1919,

l6AC:VD, No. 19/1^8L.

^Alfred 2 . Senn emphasizes that the Tarvba actually represented authentic Lithuanian desires, was not a German puppet, and as an institution lost its importance to a number of its genuinely nationalist leaders. Pilsudski (and .iasilewski) misjudged the Taryba as a German tool. The Great Powers. Lithuania and the Uilna mestion (Leiden, i9 6 0 ), pp. 9, 1 6, 18, 19. Uasilev/ski presented the Lithuanian prime minister, Iiyklos

Slezevicius and other members of his cabinet, the assurances that the Polish government had no annexationist aims and that the Poles supported whole-heartedly Fitsudski's VJilno Dec­ laration of April 22. Vasilev/ski made Pilsudski's wishes explicit. He requested free elections in both the Lithua­ nian and Polish-held portions of the country on strictly democratic lines. So that the voters' freedom of choice might not be intimidated, the elections v/ould not be run by the "civilian administration established by the Polish military authorities but by self-governing bodies" the election of which v/as then proceeding. The free elections' v/ould be overseen by two commissars, one Folish and one

Lithuanian, in the various parts of the country. Those elected from Lithuanian and Polish controlled territories v/ould then meet in Hilno and decide the future of the country. Kaunas rejected this proposal while the Folish arms ip still occupied the Lithuania of their claims. '

In my opinion Uasilewski and Filsudski knew Lithuanian public opinion quite well and understood Lithuanian nationalism from their own comparable experience with the Polish HDs. Both Basilewski and Pilsudski used the German menace as a convenient scapegoa.t.

^"AGHD, Ho. 18/126-j, to Slezevicius and the reply. The difficulty with which Poles and Lithuanians faced each other was touched on by Jasilewski in a report on a con­ versation v/ith liykolas Bir^iska (Birzyska). He edited GIT os

Litwy (The Voice of Lithuania) in 'Jilno, a Lithuanian paper in the Folish language, and was, according to VJasilewski, an outstanding Lithuanian national activist. Bir^i^ka con­ ceded the need for closer Folish-Lithuanian cooperation but advised against using the tern federation (unia) because of its historic connection with serfdom. To this VJasilewski took exception in his report. ^ Two factors constantly plagued Uasilewski's conception of federation. One was that it was supported, albeit for different reasons, by the magnates in the borderlands who were of course Folish or

Polonized. This was a kiss of death to the socialists.

Another factor v/as that the new nation-states remembered that their people provided serfs for the old Polish Common­ wealth and that only Polish or Polonized subjects were the elite of society. IJasilewski considered that both these criticisms of federation missed the essential point of his program, given the transformations the world had undergone by the twentieth century. Nevertheless, both this historical memory and the support from contemporary magnates made the socialists' support of federation ring hollow to the non-Poles.

IQ 7Ibid.. Report to Undersecretary of State. 2 k5

wJhile these attempts to influence Lithuanian public opinion and government to the Polish cause were undertaken,

VJasilewski prepared more 'drastic measures in case negotiations fell through. It seemed that liisudski had quickly come to the conclusion that the solution to the problem would be a < military one. Nasilewski was put in charge of coordinating and financing a coup d* etat in Kaunas. This conspiracy to overthrow the government by the underground Folish ililitary

Organization in conjunction with sympathetic Lithuanians was uncovered on August 28 and that night many conspirators were arrested. The uprising was a complete failure just as the negotiations had been. VJasilewski spent until November in 20 vJilno trying to salvage something from this fiasco.

VJasilewski suggested numerous alternatives, among them

Polish military intervention, to regain Folish credibility.

The army could take Kaunas, free the Folish prisoners and force negotiations. The occupation would be only temporary 21 and this would be made clear to the Lithuanians.~ PiJrsudski wisely chose not to act on this advice. IJasilewski reported on-inconclusive interviews with the Lithuanian foreign min-

20Di.iH3P-R. Vol. II, No. 251; AG HD. No. 18/12^8, report. See also Fiotr Lossowski, Stosunki Polsko-Litewskie w latach 1918-20 (Jarsaw, 1966), Ch. 1.

21AGV!D. No. 19/1^84. 246 op ister, Augustinas Yoldemaras. *" He also complained about the Lithuanian newspapers publishing anti-Polish articles in which they "report on the introduction of serfdom in Poland, op etc. ■

'.Vasilev/ski was a "scholarly man, despite his considerable conspiratorial experience," a man typically "not conspicuous o/j. for his organizational and executive abilities.""' Fart of the blame for the failure of the Kaunas coup may be ascribed to him but the situation was beyond anyone's control.

He did not now give up after this failure but changed tack.

Direct pressure on the Lithuanians to come to some accom­ modation with the Poles was abandoned and Hasilewski now ‘ pursued a policy of isolating Lithuania from its neighbors 2 3 on the international level. J lie concentrated on the area he excelled in: propaganda. To counter the anti-Folish views circulating in Lithunaia, he furnished information and articles to the Polish Lithuanian press.

Symptomatic of the breakdown between Poles and Lithua­ nians on national problems was the departure of Herbaczewski

22Ibid., Ho. 19/1559 and Lossov;ski, Stosunki Folsko- litewskie, pp. 154-55*

23AGKD, Ho. 19/1572.

ob. , ^ 'Dziewanov/ski, Joseph Filsudski. p. 1:?.

■^Lossowski, 3tosunki Folsko-Litewskie. Ch. IV, esp. p. 149 2^7 for Cracow. He found it too difficult to "be both a Pole and a Lithuanian in the circumstances, and he underscored the reason for the failure of the politics of federation.

The success of the Kaunas coup d 'etat would have produced a lolonophile government, but it would have been composed of reactionary elements. The FF3 sought federation with

Lithuania to create a strong state capable of withstanding

German and Russian pressures. The federalists of Lithuania sought union with Poland in order to preserve their property or status in society. Theoretically, the most receptive people to federation with Poland should have been the peasant and proletarian masses who wanted to live in a democratic ' state. The type of people who supported FF3 federal schemes were the class enemies of the FP3 program of democracy and socialism. The September muncipal elections in V.'ilno bore out this federalist weakness and confusion. The PFS federal­ ist candidates lost miserably to the Rational Democrat and

Christian Democrat incorporationists.

In January 1920, at the first Baltic Conference in Hel­

sinki, as leader of the Polish delegation pursued his at­

tempts to isolate Lithuania. Before he left Warsaw he met

with Piisudski to discuss Baltic problems. Pilsudski in­

sisted on plebescites in the former Grand Duchy of Lithuania

" ibid., pp. 159. 167. 248 so that tne people themselves could decide their political allegiance and this included ethnic Lithuania as well as

Polish occupied lands. Movements for national independence must be supported and protected and for this reason a common

Finnish, Estonian, Lithuanian, Latvian, and Polish front had to be created to stem the Bolshevik, or German menace. There should also be no separate peace with the Russians but a 27 united effort at negotiations. Kone of these objectives

•was achieved at Helsinki. Lithuania was more anti-Folish than anti-Soviet, the Finns were hesitant about joining an anti-German pact, and the Estonians did not hide their eager­ ness to sign an immediate peace treaty with the Russians. ,

In fact, nev/s of the imminent peace between Estonia and the 28 Soviets was heard at the end of the meeting. Even a com­ mission to mediate between the Poles and Lithuanians which

2° was voted into being never sat. ' Hasilewski failed to establish a common Baltic pact and he failed to gain the support of the 3altic nations for a solution to the problem of Lithuania. Polish-Latvian talks followed in Jarsaw in ilarch but they too led to nothing since Latvia decided to start peace negotiations with the Soviets in April.

^Jasilewski, - Jozef Pilsudski. pp. 214-18. 28 A treaty was signed February 2, 1920. 29 ^iossowski, Gtosunki Polsko-Litewskie. p. 190; D~.IH5.i--R. Vol. ±1, Ho. 303*

-^DMHSP-R. No. 346, protocols1 Lossowski, Stosunki Polsko-Litewskie. p. 191. 2k 9

Hasilcwski next negotiated with the Byelorussians in kinsk, granting them financial aid and cultural concessions in return for support in the coming Russo-Folish peace talks.

E. '.Jar

By i.iarch of 1920, both the Polish and Soviet armies were getting stronger and increasing in number. The number of

Soviet troops coning to face the Poles was increasing with the decline of Hhite resistance. The small-scale running warfare between Russians and Poles continued and now could burst into a serious conflict. Tall: of peace was in the air but the two antagonists remained suspicious of one another.,.

The diplomatic negotiations concerning peace were a "pan­ tomime" on the part of the foreign ministers who had long 32 since lost control over events.- nevertheless, the Polish suggestion that talks be held at their bridgehead of

Barysau (Borysow, Borisov) in Byelorussia was taken as a positive sign although the Soviet choice was Estonia.

•Jasilewski was named to this negotiating team and wrote part of the proposals of the Polish delegation. Filsudski told

VJasilewski his opinion on peace with the Bolsheviks in view of the "zigzags" of the Entente policy toward Russia. He

^Hasilewski, Joaef Filsudski. p. 218; DIIKS-R. Vol. II, Ho. 353. P P -'~i;orman Davies, VJhite Eagle., Red 5tar (London, 1972), P. 99. 250 said: "Zither we make peace seriously or v/e strike, strike, strike until the splinters fly." Further, he commented on the possibilities of an end to hostilities: "I do not o o believe in the possibility of concluding peace now..."'-1

'.’Jasilewski' s negotiation proposals v,-ere drafted with Soviet weakness in mind and the ephemeral quality of true peace in the given conditions. "The demands," he observed "are formulated for the most part as though addressed to a state rtlj. completely defeated by Poland."-^ These maximalist demands were never negotiated, for the 3orysau meeting fell through with the mounting of PiZsudski's Kiev offensive in

April 1920, in alliance with 's Ukrainians.

In the opinion of one historian neither the Polish nor the

Poissian peace conception was a sincere one: "The Soviet

'revolutionary peace' contrasted with FiZsudski's 'strategic peace' .

During the Russo-Polish ’.Jar of 1920, '.Tasilev.rski was stationed in Tallin (Reval) as emissary, a position he assumed in April, From here, he forwarded information to

Tarsaw but he was not in the center of important news. It

J- .Jasilewski, Jozef PiZsudski. p. 221. For the opinions of the Soviet leaders see Fiotr S. '.Jandyes, Soviet-Foii3h Relations. 1917-1921 (Cambirdgo, Fassachusetts, 1939)• pp. 176-30,

^■dffsp-r, vol. n , ho. 3 ^3 .

••'■^.'andycz, Soviet-Folish Relations. p. 183. 251 van during the second Baltic Conference outside Riga in

August that VJasilewski heard about the successful Polish counter-offenseive v:hich saved Warsaw from the Red Army.

A serious Polish-Russian peace was now planned? Wasilewski was sent as one of the Polish negotiators to Riga.

In Riga, as in Paris, the Polish delegation was split between the supporters of a Little Poland and Great Foland.

The supporters of federalism were faced with failure from the beginning because the Soviets would not consider giving up a Ukraine which the Red Army in most part occupied. The

Soviets even brought up the question of eastern Galicia’s future, which was firmly controlled by the Poles. Both delegations dropped their interference in the parts of the

Ukraine they did not control. This was a severe blow to

Uasilevski who pinned the hopes of his career on the Ukraine.

Lithuania was not involved in the negotiations since the

Red Army was nowhere near it. The major concern then ’was the future of Byelorussia. Uasilevski and the federalists demanded the inclusion of I-Iinsk, the capital, in the Folish orbit. The anti-federalists did not want Jiinsk included in the Polish state system and were willing to give it up to the Soviets. The federalists in the delegation were out­ voted by the majority of the Poles despite the fact that the

Soviet delegation was willing to consider an ethnic Byelo- 252

r>< russia tied to Poland.-'' The Boviet delegation hoped the

Poles wTould only inherit trouble with large non-Folish

minorities and the- anti-federalists shared this fear of an

unassiiailable minority in the new state. They were each

willing to give up the Byelorussians. Only .Jasilewski and

the federalists looked optimistically on the role of the

Byelorussians in alliance with the Poles.

'Jasilewski agreed with liirsudski that the Byelorussians

might not be able to achieve a national state at this time 1 but Byelorussians goodwill should be insured for the future

by retaining Byelorussian territory in the Polish orbit 011

which a national "Piedmont" could be organised paralleling'

the role of eastern Galicia for the Ukraine. Otherwise,

centers of national liberation might be formed on the Soviet

side of the border and act as a magnet to the Byelorussians a 7 and Ukrainians living in Poland.-'

In these circumstances, faced by the Red Army occupations

in the Ukraine and Byelorussia, even though the Folish army

was marching on Minsk, and the obstreperous behaviour of the majority of his own delegation, VJasilewski treated the issue

•y'~Aleksander £ados, "VJasilewski w rokowaniach ryskich," Nieoofllealosc, Vol. AVI (1937)» pp. 2.?-"-?-;. For a Polish participants view of the Riga peace talks see Jan Dg/bski, Poko.i rvski; wsnomnienia, uertraktp.c.ie, ta.ino uklady z. Joffem. listv ( Jarsaw, 1931).

•■'"'Vasilev/ski, Jozef Filsudski. p. 21c; Lados, "VJasilewski, " p. 237- 253 of federalism as a lost cause. It has not been explained why the federalistis in Riga did not receive the support of the three federalist strongholds in Poland. Heither the head of state, nor the ministry of foreign affairs, nor the army oq lent their prestige to the negotiators.The reason for this may very well hinge on the personality of Filsudski v;ho probably decided by this time that the Lithuanians, Byelo­ russians, and Ukrainians could not establish states both viable and allied v/ith Poland and thus let negotiations take their ora course with the hope of a stronger Foland as a result. A viable Foland v;as more important than ideas of federation. Aasilewski understood this but continued to work for federation. The national liberation of the borderlands had to be postponed until the future.

For the present VJasilewski was sincerely interested in a lasting peace, a peace which ended only with the Soviet invasion of 1939. A federalist comrade, also negotiating at Riga, made the following observation:

For everyone who knew ’.Jasilewski' s political views, it was quite clear ■ that he v/ould defend the federalist concept. 1-iot everyone presumed, however, that he would at the same time be a supporter of an honest and lasting peace...-”

33£sdos, "VJasilewski," p. 237.

3'Ibid., p. 2 ? A . 2 5^

The borderlands could not be liberated through a Polish-

Russian v;ar. The non-Russians themselves had to develop a

\.Tich for national liberation after they developed a national

consciousness. The Treaty of Riga vas signed by '.Jasilewski

and the others on March 18, 1921. Masilov:s!-:i*s nert assign­ ment v/as to head the Polish commission in charge of delineating

the border v.’ith the Soviets. After heading a similar com­ mission on the Rumanian border, Masilev.’ski receded from the

government activity and returned to academic and party v.rork.

*\ CONCLUSION

I cannot die until I see three things: the collapse of Bolshevism in Russia, the con­ struction of a zoological garden in Warsaw and the foundation of a crematorium in Poland. Those are my conditions.

Wasilewski

Poland, expunged from the map of Europe as a state for more than a century, reappeared in November 1918. However,

Wasilewski's scheme for the reorganization of eastern Eur­ ope into a federation of ethnically based socialist states uniting Poland, Lithuania, Byelorussia, and the Ukraine failed miserably.'1' A secondary plan of military alliances to include Latvia, Estonia, and Finland with the nations of the federation failed also.

Wasilewski made his most important contributions in the realm of the nationality question and its relationship to socialism. Most socialists from Marx and Engels, to Luxem­ burg, Lenin, and Stalin played down the importance of na­ tionality as an organizing principle of the m o d e m social­ ist state and chose to emphasize instead the dictatorship of the proletariat which would emerge victoriously from

1This four nation state was supported by none other than Friedrich Engels in "'Was hat die Arbeiterklasse mit Polen zu tun?", Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, Werke (Berlin, 1968), Vol. 16, p. 160. 256 the class struggle.2 Otto Bauer and the Austrian Marxists recognized the outmoded subjectivity which led to the cate­ gorization of entire ethnic groups into progressive or re­ actionary types, but they were not sufficiently revolution­ ary and sought to preserve the territorial integrity of

Austria-Hungary. For Wasilewski national liberation and the social struggle were the inseparable goals of the state­ less peoples of eastern Europe.

VJasilewski's prime concern was always the liberation of

Poland. He chose the Marxist ideology as the framework for this goal because it was the only dynamic and revolutionary force which had possibility of success in his opinion. Hi&' task, then, was to justify Polish independence within the framework of the social struggle. Nationalism, in the his­ torical sense which Marx had understood it, was the politi­ cal ideology of the bourgeoisie under capitalism. With the destruction of the capitalist system there no longer existed the underpinnings of nationalist thought. It lost its reason for existence. While Wasilewski had agreed-‘Kith this scena­ rio, he argued that Poland too must pass through the natu­ ral Marxist stages of economic development; he rejected the dogmatic Menshevik support of the domestic liberals and

2Horace B. Davis argues for nationality as an organiz­ ing principle of Marxism, Nationalism and Socialism, as does Solomon F. Bloom, The World of Nations: National Impli­ cations in the Works of Karl Marx. 257 capitalists as an unnecessary concession to nationalism and exploitation. Socialists themselves could seize power and establish a government which would protect the proletariat from the rapacity of capitalism in a still developing mod­ e m economy.

To make all this clearly understood to his opponents,

Wasilewski had to emphasize the concept of the nation in

Marxist thinking. He claimed that the idea of nationality did not belong exclusively to the bourgeoisie as a result of the French Revolution, It had devolved from gentry to bourgeoisie to the toiling masses as a result of the eco­ nomic transformations affecting town and countryside. Each • proletariat had a national consciousness. The proletariats of Germany, France, and England were not embarrassed be­ cause of their culture or language. Fortunes of history eliminated the Polish state. For that reason should the Po- lish proletariat give up its culture and language? No mat­ ter how desirable assimilation might seem to the Germans,

Austrians, and Russians, and for that matter some Poles, it had not happened to a significant degree and the Polish Pro­ letariat remained Polish. As power shifted from magnate to bourgeois to proletarian, the concept of national identity shifted also. The proletariat was the new repository of na­ tional culture.

Once VJasilewski was sure of his understanding of the national problem, he carefully prepared the ground for his 258

career. First, he had to liberate himself from the cloying

attraction of opportunistic nationalism. His profound anti-

Russian feelings were directed at the Russian state and not

at the Russian people. As a publicist, he had to show that

German socialism had grown insensitive to Polish needs and

that Russian socialism was still too weak and chauvinistic

to help. The trial by fire of the Revolution of 1905 con­ vinced him that only the PPS of Pilsudski could lead the

struggle for liberation. Other socialist plans or other po­

litical alternatives were all bankrupt. Finally, Bauer's

laws crystallized Wasilewski*s thoughts on the future of

ethnic groups and helped to justify Polish claims in some

areas and claims against the Poles in other areas. The name given to the state entity composed of proletarian na­

tions was federalism. Wasilewski's subsequent failure in

Lithuania sealed the fate of federalism and Poland emerged

as a unitary state.3

The canards slung at Wasilewski's federal program can now be cast aside. Wasilewski was no nationalist and did not aspire to recreate the 1772 boundaries of Poland. In his conception the PPS was not the vanguard of the bourge-

^Dziewanowski claims that the Ukraine was the reef on which Pilsudski's federalism foundered. Joseph Pilsudski (Stanford, California, 19^9)• 259

oisie nor did it seek to restore the gentry republic.**' Wa-

silewski's nationalities' policy, with minimalist and maxi­

malist aspirations, failed.

How Pilsudski applied the researches of Wasilewski, how

he used the concept of federalism are not at issue here. It

has been argued very well that Pilsudski, shedding his so­

cialist mantle, leaned on the zubrv kresowe (borderland bi-

sons), the conservative landowners, to the detriment of his

previous ideals.$ Wasilewski and Pilsudski developed a

close friendship through their common struggle for libera­

tion. Their political ideas were identical except for the

major fact that Pilsudski ceased being a socialist while VJa­

silewski broke with Pilsudski when the latter took power by

c o u p d'etat in 1926. VJasilewski returned to active party

work to help the socialist opposition fight the Pilsudski

regime. Wasilewski remained a socialist? a revolutionary 1 in the sense of national liberation, an evolutionary in the

sense of class struggle.

The quotation at the beginning of this conclusion, at­ tributed to Wasilewski by Pobcfg-Malinowski, sums up his

**\Tozef Lewandowski, Imperializm slabosci (Warsaw, 1967), p. ^6, footnote, hints that PPS federalism derived from Naumann's Mitteleuoropa ideas and that Polish federalism was modeled after German imperialism. In reality there was a much older and indigenous Polish tradition which influ­ enced PPS federalism: the Polish monarchy's relationship with Lithuania and the gentry Republic itself.

5jozef Lewandowski, Federalizm (Warsaw, 1962), p. 252. 260 last wishes. The zoological garden showed his close feel ing for the world of nature. The crematorium underscored his rationalist frame of mind among a people whose Christians were predominantly Roman Catholic. The destruction of Bol­ shevism reflected his life-long animosity to the territorial demands so similar to the demands of tsarist imperialism.

Undoubtedly, Wasilewski's lasting contribution was his insistence on the recognition of the role of national aspi­ rations within the socialist movement. By the same token, he made it more difficult for Poles to be chauvinists or cosmopolitans.

The French socialist Jean Jaures' major concerns were the "revision of Marxism; the anticipation of the Fascist danger; the attempt to combine patriotism with internation­ al solidarity; and the assertion of a humanist socialism re­ flecting la dignite hunaine."^ VJasilewski's concerns were rather similar. He sought independence and workers' inter­ nationalism; patriotism not nationalism; socialism rather than the "neo-Marxism" of Luxemburg, Lenin, or Bauer;'7 and federalism not imperialism. The similarity between

Jaures and VJasilewski was one of temperament. Their con-

^John Bowie, Politics** and Public Opinion, p. 439. As already stated, Lichtheim disagrees with calling him a re­ visionist.

7Ge orge Lichtheim, Marxism, p. 302'. These "neo-Marxists" were b o m in the same decade as Wasilewski. 261

c e m with Marxism, their hatred of nationalism and fascism,

their patriotism, and internationalism, all reflected their Q deep-seated humanitarianism. Wasilewski differed from Jau­

res "because Jaures was more intimate with theoretical Marx­

ism and he had a state worth protecting. There was no Po­

land. Independence and federalism were not Jaures' affair.

Wasilewski was a unique type and the PPS faced unique

problems. Polish liberation was the one constant of his

thought. As his thinking developed from mere opposition

and hatred for Russia and the other occupying powers to so­

cialism and revolution, nothing eclipsed his hope for Polish

independence. The Marxists of the Second International

lapsed into revisionism. First Engels abandoned the need for

an apocolyptic revolution in 189^.9 Bernstein soon followed.

Jaures had never seen its necessity. By the outbreak of the

Great War there was hardly anyone among the socialists who

wished to take advantage of war to strike at capitalism and

bring vast changes within societies and among peoples. The

so-called "neo-Marxists" were not infected by revisionism or

blanket calls for independence. Wasilewski fell between

these two positions. He was not a revisionist because this meant giving up revolution. Revolution was the only hope for

®Leon Wasilewski, 0 drog^ do soc.ializmu j. poko.iu (Warsaw, 1936). Wasilewski claimed that fascism arose as a reaction to communism.

^John Bowie, Politics and Public Opinion, p. ^35* 262 Polish independence. He was a revolutionary for political

goals. He subordinated social and economic goals to the

struggle for national liberation by arguing that only Poles

in an independent Poland can make the social and economic

transformation needed by the Polish people. Poland was not

a province to be administered from St. Petersburg, Berlin

or Vienna.

In the leadership of the PPS the dominant type was a man to whom Marxism was primarily a rationalization of his own moral revolt against social as well as national injustice. But ab­ stract, doctrinaire Marxism had for him little appeal unless adopted to the realities of the country and integrated with the native revolu­ tionary tradition...For the PPS,.revolution meant as much a national liberation as a so­ cial overturn, while for the SDKPiL, the word had exclusively a social content.

This description fit Wasilewski perfectly. His intellectual approach was not dogmatic nor even dialectical. It was em­ pirical, pragmatic, and impressionistic.

The traditions of the PPS were so different from the

Communist Party of the Soviet Union. Once the fascist armies of Europe collapsed before the Red Army in World War

II, the Polish communists of the PPR (Polska Partia Robot- nicza, Polish Workers' Party) were in a position of power.

It is ironical that a merger occurred be tv/e en the PPR and the PPS in 19^8 creating the PZPR (Polska Z.jednoczona Partia

•*-°Dziewanowski, The Communist Party of Poland, p. 39. His italics. 263 Robotnicza. Polish United Workers' Party) which rules Po­

land today.11 This should not be surprizing since there

was a historical precedent for this action in the PPS

"youths'" gravitation to the SDKPiL.

Wasilewski would not have felt comfortable in the PZPR.

There exists today another branch of the PPS tradition in

London that Wasilewski would more heartily approve. This

PPS is a consultative member in the Socialist International

founded in 1951- The Socialist International includes such

members as Gough Whitlam, ? Bruno Kreisky, Austria;

Helmut Schmidt, Germany; Harold Wilson, Great Britain;

Yitzhak Rabin, Israel; Joop den Uyl, the Netherlands; Lee

Kwan Yew, Singapore; Olaf Palme, Sweden; Mario Soares, Por­

tugal; and Franjois Mitterand, France.12

Democratic socialism is a station on the way to achieve

socialism while Social Democracy "does not envisage, or in­

deed intend, the achievement of socialism in a future how­

ever distant.h13 All the parties of the Socialist Interna­

tional have factions which embody this dilemma. In this re­

spect Wasilewski was a democratic socialist for he abandoned

Piisudski and continued the struggle for a socialist Poland,

i:LIbid., pp. 218-220.

12Hans Janitschek, The State of the International," Socialist Affairs. Vol..XXV, No. 6.

1-^Peter Jenkins, "The Social Democratic Dilemma," New Statesman (20 September 1974-) • 264 The communist parties, all of which have socialism as a goal, are presently beset by certain similar difficulties.

The southern European parties, led by George Marchais of

France, Enrico Berlinguer of Italy, and Santiago Carrillo of

Spain, are trying to convince people that they can come to power through democratic means. Carrillo and Berlinguer in a joint statement said "their conception of the democratic advance toward socialism in peace and freedom is not a tacti­ cal attitude but a strategic conviction." Neither the ca­ pitalists of the West, nor the communists of eastern Europe, nor the members of the Socialist International are entirely convinced. Irving Howe is right when he maintains that the ethos of the socialist and the communist is different.^

Wasilewski was definitely a socialist and certainly not a communist. He believed socialism would replace capitalism, but evolutionarily not through revolution. He would ap­ plaud the efforts of Marchais, Carrillo, and Berlinguer in their compromise with liberalism. Yet, Wasilewski would be suspicious of communist motives.

VJasilewski made his contributions by supporting patrio­ tism, internationalism, socialism, independence and federal­ ism. As intriguing as it is to see the relevance of his ideas to the current problems of socialism and communism, it

•^Irving Howe, "Socialists and Communists in European Politics," Socialist Commentary (January, 1976), pp. 4, 5* 265 is important to understand that Wasilewski belongs to his­

tory. He was definitely a product of his time and his so­

lution of federalism died with the emergence of Poland as

a unitary state after the Russo-Polish War. Poland became

even more ethnically Polish after World War II. An obitu­

arist referred to Wasilewski as the last of the Mohicans.^

He was not only one of the last of the generation which

brought independence to Poland. He belonged to a dying

breed which spumed the nationalist conception of Poland but

sought instead a federation of socialist states.

■^"Ostatni Mohikanin," Mysi Polski (1936)., No. 22. ADDENDUM

OTTO BAUER'S LAWS OF NATIONAL ASSIMILATION1

I. The larger the minority, the smaller the attractive power of the majority; the smaller the minority the more certain the assimilation.

II. The smaller the proportion of the minority in the total population the easier the assimilation.

III. Assimilation occurs most easily where the minority is dispersed and lives in the settlements of the majority; assimilation becomes more difficult the more concentrated the minority and the more isola­ ted in terms of distance from the settlements of the majority. Assimilation is completely hampered where the minority settlement forms a completely separate , linguistic community from the majority settlement.

IV. National assimilation occurs more easily the more similar the minority is to the majority in race, culture, religion, and language.

V. Minorities assimilate only when they find a class within the majority similar in circumstance to them­ selves in class standing, occupational interest, work qualifications, and level of culture. Assimi­ lation always means amalgamation with class-fellows.

VI. Economic, social, political, and religious strug­ gles ease assimilation; national struggles impede it.

VII. The stronger a nation is in population, wealth, pow­ er, and culture the greater is its attractive pow­ er foreign minorities in its orbit and the greater the power of resistance of its cowna minorities in foreign areas.

VIII. Assimilation occurs more easily the weaker and smaller the constant epopulation:* increase of the minority and the stronger and more constant the cpopulations increase of the majority.

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