Tseretelli's report on the course and issue of the negotiations was a
sort of funeral oration over a whole period of the Revolution. It turned
out that neither Kerensky nor the professional elements had consented to
responsibility toward the new semi-representative institution. On the
other hand, outside the limits of the Cadet Party, they had not
succeeded in finding so-called "efficient" social leaders. The
organizers of the venture had to capitulate on both points. The
capitulation was all the more eloquent, because the Democratic
Conference had been called exactly for the purpose of doing away with
the irresponsible regime, while the Conference, by a formal vote,
rejected a coalition with the Cadets. At several meetings of the
Democratic Soviet which took place prior to the Revolution, there
prevailed an atmosphere of tenseness and utter incapacity for action.
The Soviet did not reflect the Revolution's march forward but the
dissolution of the parties that had lagged behind the Revolution.

Even previous to the Democratic Conference, in our party faction, I had
raised the question of demonstratively withdrawing from the Conference
and boycotting the Democratic Soviet. It was necessary to show the
masses by action that the fusionists had led the Revolution into a blind
alley. The fight for building up the Soviet power could be carried on
only in a revolutionary way. The power must be snatched from the hands
of those who had proven incapable of doing any good and were furthermore
even losing their capacity for active evil. Their method of working
through an artificially picked Pre-Parliament and a conjectural
Constituent Assembly, had to be opposed by our political method of
mobilizing the forces around the Soviets, through the All-Russian
Congress of Soviets and through insurrection. This could be done only by
means of an open break, before the eyes of the entire people, with the