LENIN ON ORGANIZATION
rade Akimov frankly declared that he regarded
“their aim (i. e. Plekhanov’s, Martov’s and mine,
namely, to create a controlling organization of
revolutionaries) as unrealizable and dangerous”;
he sticks, as does Comrade Martynov* to the idea
of the economists that an “organization of revolutionaries”
 is unnecessary. He is “full of the belief
that life will penetrate into our Party, whether we
bar its way by Martov’s formula or by Lenin’s formula.”
 There would be no need to dwell upon
this “khvostist” conception of “life” if it were not
shared by Comrade Martov. The second speech
of Comrade Martov is as a whole so interesting
that it is worth a detailed analysis.
Comrade Martov’s first argument is that the control
 of the Party over members who do not belong
to Party organizations “is possible, in as much as
the committee, having entrusted a certain function
to a certain person, is able to supervise its execu-*
 Comrade Martynov, it should be said, wants to dissociate
himself from Comrade Akimov; he wants to show that conspiracy
 (here the Russian word for conspiracy is used by
Lenin.—Trans.) does not mean conspiracy (Lenin here uses
the word of Latin origin.—Trans.), that the difference in
these words conceals a difference of meaning. What that
meaning is, neither Comrade Martynov, nor Comrade Axelrod,
 who is following in his footsteps, has explained. Comrade
Martynov “pretends” that in “What is to he Done?” (as also
in the “Tasks”) I did not definitely declare myself opposed
to “narrowing down the political struggle to a conspiracy.”
Comrade Martynov wants to make his hearers forget that
those whom I fought had failed to see the necessity for an
organization of revolutionaries, as Comrade Akimov fails to
see it now.

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