The speeches did perhaps help the Coalition
Government to sense the situation with which it had to deal, though the
Conference showed that the Coalition Government was unstable, and that
the extreme ideas of the Bolsheviki had penetrated deeply in the broader
masses. Again the Bolsheviki attacked the principle of coalition, and
demanded that revolutionary democracy take over all authority.
Then came the Kornilov affair, which in its conception was an effort on
the part of the constructive groups, including the moderate socialists, to
discredit the extremists, and establish a stronger government, free from
party ties and party programs, representing a national movement to organize
"all the vital forces of the country," to use again the phraseology of
the revolution. But there was a misunderstanding, and also perhaps it was
premature--"revolutionary democracy" was not yet sufficiently sobered
to accept a program of common constructive effort. The movement had the
opposite effect; it split the country into two openly hostile camps, and
brought revolutionary democracy still more under the influence of the
extremists. The Coalition Government fell to pieces, and a Directorate of
Five, with almost dictatorial powers, still headed by Kerensky, assumed
authority.
The Bolsheviki now demanded the absolute and final renunciation of
the principle of coalition, and the formation of a purely socialistic
government.
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