The violent schism that would develop between Lenin and Martov arose from their definition of “party member”. In reaction to What Is To Be Done?, Martov formulated a detailed constitution for a future RSDLP, which indicates that he had had serious concerns about Lenin’s centralism before the Second Congress. His draft constitution followed an article he wrote in April 1903 for Rosa Luxemburg’s Social Democratic Review in which he sketched the concept of a flexible, less centralised party. In the article Martov posed the key question before Russian Marxists as “how to reconcile the urgent need for conspiracy with the yearning for the creation of a broadly-based social-democratic party of the working masses”.20 He suggested that as long as the party was united by revolutionary theory it should encourage initiative and relative autonomy amongst its constituent elements.
Martov’s draft attempted to do several things. It widened the membership criteria; the rights and independence of local committees and organising bodies was explained in detail, with the power of the central control organs to co-opt and to close down local bodies restricted; and rights were given to national and regional bodies to allow for the integration into the party of semi-autonomous bodies such as the Polish social-democrats and the Bund. The relative independence of the two main bodies of the party–the Central Organ (the ideological centre, located abroad) and the Central Committee (the organisational centre, located inside Russia)–was established, to allow freedom of thought and policy formulation. That Martov, never the fanatical organiser that Lenin was, took the trouble to map this out reveals his unspoken concerns for the Congress. His draft “was meant to cater for the widening and growing of the party; it would enhance local initiative of the committees and thus make for a certain weakening of centralisation”.21
Lenin produced a shorter counter-draft and mocked the length and verbosity of Martov’s. But Martov’s was necessarily longer as it sought to protect the rights of members and local committees against central diktat, and provide an appeals process. Lenin’s was shorter because central diktat trumped all else. At the time, Martov was not inclined to formally challenge Lenin. Although irritated by the “hypertrophy of centralism” of Lenin’s plans, his primary focus for the Congress was the same as Lenin’s–to ensure that a united party emerged on the basis of Iskra’s programme. Other differences seemed secondary. Martov, acknowledging Lenin’s eminence in organisational matters, withdrew his draft and allowed Lenin’s to go before the Congress. He merely told Lenin that he would probably query some of the membership criteria.
Although there were disagreements with the Economists and the Bund, the Iskra delegates had a clear majority and carried the day on the party programme. Having agreed this, the Congress moved to the precise formulation of a member. Lenin proposed a definition, which was “Anyone who accepts the party’s programme and supports it by personal participation in one of the party’s organizations is to be considered a member of the Russian Social Democratic Workers’ Party”. Martov proposed a slightly different wording, which was “Anyone who accepts the party’s programme, supports the party by material means, and renders it regular personal assistance under the guidance of one of its organisations is to be considered a member of the Russian Social Democratic Workers’ Party”. On the face of it there was hardly any difference, and members not privy to the prior disagreements between Lenin and Martov were astonished that the Congress divided so sharply on the issue.
If the issue was the two formulations alone, it would have been absurd. But it was not. As Martov told the conference, revealing publicly the differences between them:
I agree with Lenin that in addition to organisations of professional revolutionaries we need ‘loose organisations’ of various types. But our formula is the only one to reflect our aim to have the organisation of professional revolutionaries linked with the masses by a series of other organisations. In our view, the workers’ party does not consist solely of the organisation of professional revolutionaries, but of the latter plus all the leading active elements of the proletariat.22
Lenin responded that under Martov’s definition “absolutely anyone could be a member”. Martov replied, “Yes, if you like”.
After a heated debate a vote was taken. Lenin’s formulation was rejected by 28 votes to 23. On the crucial question of party membership, Martov had won. This was a bitter blow to Lenin. Having lost this important battle Lenin knew it was essential that he retain control of Iskra’s editorial board, and he threw everything into doing so. It was in this battle, and the tactics Lenin employed to get his own way, that the newly formed party cracked wide open.
Having lost on the membership, Lenin demanded that his personal supporters form a majority on the Central Committee. Martov refused, and in response Lenin used his agents to spread rumours about Martov’s personal and political weaknesses. Only a few days old, the party was already dividing into “hards” and “softs”, with men like Bauman, Krasikov and Shotman (who threatened to beat up a delegate who switched from Lenin to Martov) reveling in macho postures of revolutionary extremism.23 Because of the animosity now infecting the Congress, some of the delegates, principally the Economists and the Bundists, departed. The Bundists under Liber also had major disagreements with the Iskra faction’s attempt to annex the Jewish proletariat to the RSDLP. Aside from this issue, they had generally supported Martov.
With the Bundists gone Lenin now secured a majority to reduce the Iskra editorial board from six to three (removing Axlerod, Zazulich and Potresov, thus leaving Lenin and Plekhanov to outvote Martov on all major issues–or so Lenin supposed). As the Congress broke up in acrimony Lenin was quick to dub his own supporters “Bolsheviks” (Russian for “Majoritarians”) and Martov’s “Mensheviks” (Russian for “Minoritarians”) on the basis of the final vote for the editorial board, ignoring entirely the bigger, more representative and significant vote on the membership clause, which he had lost. Martov made the almost incredible political mistake of letting the labels go unchallenged.
So the RSDLP appeared to split on the minor matter of the composition of Iskra’s editorial board. But that was deceptive. As the future Menshevik leader Theodore Dan put it in his magnum opus The Origins of Bolshevism, although Lenin and Martov had appeared united on key issues at the beginning of the congress, it became clear over the course of the congress that it was not a matter of different shadings of view “but of two tendencies of organisational thought and practice that were hard to reconcile”.24 Lenin was his doctrine personified. In his manipulation of delegates, his bullying and slandering of opponents who had until the Congress been his comrades and friends, his will to dominate regardless of the consequences, he had alienated many in the party. It was not very long before a key participant, Pavel Axelrod, went public with the underlying philosophical divergence between Bolshevism and Menshevism.
In an Iskra article “The Unification of Russian Social Democracy and its Tasks”, Axelrod proudly acknowledged that “the triumph of revolutionary social democracy over other trends in our party was officially confirmed and proclaimed at our second congress”, but went on to ask what the party must do to bring that triumph to the Russian masses. In doing so, he attacked those who were “fetishists of centralisation”. He argued that it was not possible to develop a politically conscious working class “when the party members have been turned into so many cog-wheels, nuts and bolts, all functioning exactly as the centre decides”.25 Axelrod’s article established a key element of Menshevism, namely that “Russian social democracy must be converted into a mass party controlled from below and composed of politically mature workers”.26