9 "State and Law under Socialism"*
Introductory Note
The Stalinist revolution from
above had by 1936 accomplished most of its economic and political tasks, and
its incipient proclivities for greater legal formality and stability were now
becoming increasingly apparent. The Party pendulum was beginning to swing away
from legal nihilism and towards legal stability and socialist legality, and
Pashukanis must certainly have been aware of the fact that the leftist
tendencies which he seemed to represent were a major obstacle to this impending
shift.
As Professor Hazard describes in the Foreword to this volume, Pashukanis was nevertheless still politically pre‑eminent within the Soviet legal profession. His colleague, Krylenko, had been appointed the first U.S.S.R. Commissar of justice. In addition to his other roles and titles, Pashukanis was appointed Deputy Commissar, and was assigned special responsibilities in the drafting of the new constitution which would supersede the now outdated Constitution of the U.S.S.R. of 1924. The trend towards greater legal stabilization, and towards a greater reliance on law as an instrument of regulation and control, was readily evident both in the drafting process and also in the statutory changes occurring in the areas of contract law, collective farm law and family law. The clear direction of these changes, and of the forthcoming new constitution, was away from the nihilistic and
* "Gosudarstvo i pravo pri sotsializme", Sovetskoe gosudarstvo (1936) no. 3, pp. 3‑11; partially translated into English in M. Jaworskyj (ed.),
Soviet Political Thought: An Anthology (1967), Johns Hopkins University
Press, pp. 315‑323.
"STATE AND LAW UNDER SOCIALISM" 347
eliminationist
orientation of economic law towards the rehabilitation of the legal form as it
was articulated during the New Economic Policy.
Pashukanis, as theorist and
symbol of the earlier legal policy, stood in the path of this swinging pendulum.
It was, after all, he who had originally characterized all law as "bourgeois"
and through the success of his General Theory popularized this view not merely
among Marxist legal cadres but even more widely among individuals in positions
of authority who thought it convenient to think of themselves as being above
the law. Moreover, Pashukanis was clearly identified with opposition to the
idea of "socialist law" and he remained the leading advocate for the
active process of the withering away of law.
Sensing, at last, that he was
officially and publicly out of step with the Party's changing policies on state
and law, Pashukanis rushed into print with his third and final self‑criticism.
This appears below. In this rather abject statement, Pashukanis applauds
Stalin's dicta at the April 1929 Plenum of the Central Committee, at the XVIth and XVIIth Party
Congresses, and elsewhere, that socialism demands the highest concentration of
state power. Pashukanis admits that his General Theory had therefore been seriously
deficient in that socialism in practice consisted, not in the imminent
withering away of the legal form, but in the preparation for the conditions of
this process. Under socialism the legal form disappears only with respect to
the ownership of the means of production, but it necessarily remains in
operation in the sphere of distribution. Only a Soviet socialist system of law
can create the conditions for the transformation to the higher phase of
communism.
This recantation was, however,
insufficient to save Pashukanis from the purges. The pendulum completed its
swing with the ratification of the new Constitution of the U. S. S. R. in
December 1936. A month later, in January 1937, Pashukanis disappeared, a victim
of Stalinism.
"State and Law under Socialism"
The liquidation of the exploiting
classes has been completed in our country.1 This now poses the
problem of the Soviet state as the political superstructure of the classless
socialist society.
Colossal socio‑economic
advances have led to the creation of a uniform type of socialist relations of
production in the towns and countryside, and thus to a new stage in the
development of the dictatorship of the proletarian state and Soviet democracy.
The question of the role of state
and law under socialism now assumes a tremendous theoretical and practical
significance. It is therefore necessary to recall a number of Lenin's and
Stalin's theoretical propositions‑it is necessary to begin with these in
order to clarify the significance of state and law during the period of
socialism. We must distance ourselves from the mistakes and confusion on these
questions, including those errors made by jurists.
In his State and Revolution Lenin
precisely and clearly solves the question of the nature of the state under
socialism. He makes a sharp distinction between communists and the diverse
types of anarchist theorists.
We are not
utopians [asserted Lenin] and we do not "dream" of immediately having
no administration or subordination; these are anarchist dreams and are based on
a lack of understanding of the tasks of the dictatorship of the proletariat. At
root they are foreign to Marxism and in practice they only delay the socialist
revolution until the time when human nature is different. No, we want a socialist revolution with
people as they are now‑with people who cannot do without subordination,
without supervision, without "overseers and auditors".2
Lenin's State and Revolution was directed not only against opportunist, reformist and Kautskyist distortions of Marxism (distortions which lead to compromise with the bourgeois state and the refusal to
"STATE AND LAW UNDER
SOCIALISM"
349
destroy the bourgeois state
machine), it was also aimed at the petit bourgeois and anarchist dreamers who
counted on the immediate elimination of political authority, state
organization, and the organization of coercion and compulsion‑"on
the second day" of the proletarian revolution.
Lenin's work was evoked both by
the necessity of distancing himelf from Kautsky et al., and by the necessity of confronting the
anarchic mistakes and confusion of Bukharin. In those
years Bukharin had published a series of articles in
which he developed and preached the anti‑Marxist theory of the "explosion"
of the state and that the proletarian party had to emphasize the principled
hostility of the working class to the state.
Lenin's position on law is equally
clear. "Without lapsing into utopianism", he wrote, "it is
inconceivable that people will immediately learn to work without any legal
norms after the overthrow of capitalism. The abolition of capitalism does not immediately provide the
economic premises for such a
transformation.3
These compressed positions must
be developed in our theoretical work as an all‑round, detailed study of
the role of the socialist state and socialist Soviet law. Such studies are even
more necessary because the lack of clarity on the question of the state under
socialism is not exhausted by Bukharin's articles
which relate to the period of the imperialist war, about which I have written,
but they are also encountered much later.
At the April Plenum of the
Central Committee in 1929, Comrade Stalin showed the deep divergence between
the anarchist theory of "explosion "‑defended by Comrade Bukharin‑and the Marxist Leninist theory of the
destruction and smashing of the bourgeois state machine. Comrade Stalin scoffed
at the pretentiousness of Bukharin and his followers.
They claimed that in putting forward their confused non‑Marxist theory of
"explosion", Bukharin had fought better and
more correctly against Kautsky than had Lenin.
It was not accidental that the
role of the proletarian state was placed at the centre of the whole Party's
attention in those years when the country started to approach the final victory
of socialism with rapid strides.
Comrade Stalin explained, at the XVIth Party', Congress, that the path to the future
communist, stateless society lies in the all‑round consolidation of state
power. He repeated this thesis
350 PASHUKANIS: SELECTED WRITINGS
at the January Plenum of the
Central Committee and the Central Auditing Committee in 1933:
The elimination
of classes is not achieved by suppressing class struggle, but by intensifying
it. The withering away of the state will not happen by weakening state
authority but through its maximum consolidation. This is vital if we are to
destroy the remnants of the dying classes and to organize a defence
against the capitalist encirclement which is still far from eliminated, and
will not soon be eliminated.4
Finally, at the XVIIth Party Congress, Comrade Stalin again spoke out most
sharply against the opportunists who, on the occasion of the approach to the
classless society, had tried to project their ridiculous ideas concerning the suppresssion of the class struggle and the weakening of the
dictatorship of the proletariat.
It is understood
[said Comrade Stalin] that the classless society will not come of its own
accord. It must be achieved and constructed by the efforts of all working
people‑by consolidating the agencies of the dictatorship of the
proletariat, by the development of the class struggle, by the elimination of
classes, by the liquidation of the remnants of the capitalist classes‑in
struggles with both internal and external enemies.5
Because of the efforts of the
working people the classless society has now been basically constructed. But
only an opportunist could think that the further development and consolidation
of the socialist system can come by allowing nature to take its course, or that
the elimination of classes means that there is no need for either the
dictatorship of the proletariat or for the state. Lenin argues:
The essence of
Marx's theory of the state can only be mastered by understanding that the
dictatorship of one class is
necessary not only for every class society in general, not only for the
proletariat after it has overthrown the bourgeoisie, but also for the entire historical period that separates
capitalism from "a society without classes", i.e. from communism. The
forms of the bourgeois state may be extremely varied, but their essence is the
same: in one way or another all these states are, in the final analysis,
necessarily dictatorships of the
bourgeoisie. Inevitably, of course, the transition from capitalism to
communism will contain an abundance and variety of political forms, but their
essence is the same: the dictatorship of
the proletariat.6
" STATE AND LAW UNDER SOCIALISM"
351
From this excerpt
(extraordinarily rich in content), it follows that the proletarian state will
preserve its position during the whole period from the overthrow of the
bourgeoisie to communist society. Whatever the possible variations of political
form, the essence and content of this state will be the dictatorship of the
proletariat.
Soviet power is the state form of
the proletarian dictatorship, and it has assumed world historical significance.
But the Soviet state will not remain an inert entity; it will develop in
accordance with victories in the struggle for the abolition of classes.
The construction of a classless
socialist society will open a new era in the unfolding of Soviet democracy (a
new constitution, a new franchise law). But this change in political form will
entail the same essence. This essence is the dictatorship of the proletariat.
Basically, although we have
constructed a classless socialist society we have still not achieved the higher
phase of communism. The basic difference between socialism and communism, or
between the lower and higher phases of communism, consists in the fact that
socialism is characterized by the domination of public socialist property, and
proceeds are distributed according to labour.
Communism is characterized by the consolidation and development of public
property, and distribution is according to need.
The development of socialist
forces of production and culture‑which enables distribution according to
need‑signifies the elimination of the contradiction between mental and
manual labour, and the transformation of labour into man's primary need. It signifies a condition in
which people are capable of working without "overseers and auditors",
without legal norms, without coercive force, and without the state.
The process of the withering away
of the state can therefore begin no sooner than the disappearance of the
coercive nature of labour. This constitutes the basic
economic premise for the process of withering away, for the gradual demise of
state power.
Recall that in his Economics of the Transitional Period Bukharin put
these processes in the following order: first the abolition of the armed
forces, then the instruments of oppression, prisons etc. and finally the
coercive nature of labour.
Lenin reverses this order. What Bukharin placed at the end, Lenin places at the beginning,
as the first fundamental premise without which it is impossible to speak of the
instigation of the process of withering away.
352 PASHUKANIS: SELECTED WRITINGS
Even in our milieu the theory
existed that the actual process of withering away had begun with the October
Revolution and that, therefore, it should be proceeding at full speed during
the period when classes were being abolished and the classless socialist
society was being constructed. But this was a false and opportunist theory. It
was false because it did not take into account the fundamental economic premise
without which there cannot even be any discussion of the superfluousness
of the state.
Confusion on the question of the
withering away of the proletarian state began with the fact that this question
was itself conflated with the question of the nature of the proletarian state
as a semi‑state‑‑‑as a state which, in
contradistinction to exploitative states, does not strive to be eternal but
which, on the contrary, prepares the conditions and premises for the actual
destruction of the state. After the proletariat has overthrown the bourgeoisie
it creates a state of a special type. This does not represent the power of an
exploiting minority over the majority, but it is a weapon of the labouring majority used against the exploiters.
The Party Programme
peaking of the gradual involvement of all the toiling people in the work of
state administration (which is made possible by the Soviet system)‑concludes
that:
The full
execution of all these measures represents a further step along the road begun
by the Paris Commune. The simplification of administrative functions, and the
raising of the cultural level of the workers, will lead to the destruction of
state authority.7
The question therefore concerns the preparation of the conditions for
the withering away of the state. This withering away will only become possible
in the second phase of communism. The creation of the conditions for the future
stateless organization does not represent a process of reducing state power,
but a process of consolidating it. This is especially done by bringing larger
and larger masses of working people into the administration of the state.
There is no barrier between the
state apparatus and the mass of working people in the proletarian state. This
very state apparatus‑in the broad sense of the term‑represents the
sum of the masses' organizations.
The special role of mass organizations, trade unions and all other organizations of working people, are characteristic of our proletarian state and correspond to its nature. This feature of our state exists, of
"STATE AND LAW UNDER SOCIALISM" 353
course, from the very moment when
this state arose, i.e. from the October Revolution. But the development and
consolidation of these special features by no means represents the weakening
and withering away of state power because of its inutility.
There is contradiction and
antagonism between the bourgeois state and society. We do not have this
antagonism. Our state includes mass workers' organizations, and the activity of
the state apparatus is simultaneously social activity. Our state ownership of
the means of production is social ownership. Accordingly, we can see that the
mass organizations are constantly and increasingly involved in the work of
administration and supervision, and that they are responsible for specific
concrete tasks. Yet this does not mean that a process of the weakening and
withering away of state power is occurring. This is one of the ways of
strengthening state power. The maximum development of the workers' participation
signifies the strengthening of the state apparatus which is persuasive,
ideologically influential and can use power, compulsion and force as well.
The socialist state administers
not just people, but also things and the process of production. In his speech
to the First Congress of Councils of the National Economy, Lenin argued that:
there is no
doubt that the more the conquests of the October Revolution, the deeper will be
the transformation that it initiated. The more implanted the conquests of the
socialist revolution and the strengthening of the socialist system, the greater
will be the role of the councils of the national economy. These are the only
state organizations to retain a firm position. Their position will be
consolidated the nearer we are to the establishment of a socialist system, and
the less room there will be for a purely administrative apparatus, for an
apparatus which only conducts administration. After the resistance of the
exploiters is finally destroyed this apparatus is condemned. This apparatus of
administration‑in the real and narrow sense of the term, this apparatus
of the old state is doomed to wither away. The apparatus of the Supreme Council
of the National Economy will expand, develop and become stronger: it will conduct
all the most important activities of the organized society.8
The victory of public socialist
property in the town and country, and the successes of state planning and
administration of the entire national economy, will further strengthen the role
and significance of the apparatuses conducting the state's economic activity.
These
354 PASHUKANIS: SELECTED WRITINGS
agencies will be retained in the
stateless, communist society because even there where "labour
is the primary need of life"‑Iabour and
economic life must still be organized. During the period of socialism the
agencies which direct the socialist economy are state agencies. The
administration of things and processes of production are inseparable from the
administration of people, and from the functions of power, state coercion and
state legislation.
The expanding role of state
planning and the consolidation and broadening of the economic agencies is the
process whereby the socialist state is consolidated. It by no means signifies
that the state is beginning its final withering away.
Despite the basic construction of
a socialist classless society, it must be understood that the class struggle
continues. Further work is essential both for the socialization and re‑eduction of the working masses and for the suppression of
recalcitrant and hostile elements. These latter continue to oppose socialism,
continue to offer resistance and to act deceptively. The state apparatus‑a
coercive apparatus‑is crucial in combating the enemies of socialism.
Finally, it is also necessary to defend ourselves against capitalist
encirclement. The defence of the socialist motherland
demands ceaseless attention to the strengthening of the Red Army and of all the
armed forces of the socialist state.
Socialism is a system based on
the social character of the means of production. Distribution is according to
the quantity and quality of labour. This means that
we must have a national supervisory and accounting organization to oversee labour and consumption patterns. For this legal norms‑and
an apparatus of coercion, without which law is nothing‑are necessary.
Socialist society is organized as
a statist society. The socialist state and socialist
law will be fully preserved until the highest phase of communism. Only at this
phase will people begin to work without overseers and legal norms.
It is just as opportunistic to
assert that law will wither away under socialism as it is to affirm that state
'authority should wither away the day after the bourgeoisie was overthrown.
In this context it is appropriate
to offer once again deserved criticism of those erroneous positions put forward
by the author of The General Theory of
Law and Marxism. This is 'essential if the old mistakes and confusion are
not to be repeated in other forms and other ways.
"STATE AND LAW UNDER
SOCIALISM"
355
Since distribution according to labour bears some similarity to the equivalent exchange of
commodities, thus Marx and Lenin argued that bourgeois law will only be fully
abolished under socialism with respect to the ownership of the means of
production. Private property is replaced by public property. But in the area of
distribution, law is effectively "bourgeois law" because it
represents the application of an equal scale to factually unequal individuals.
It preserves actual inequality among individuals because in equalizing
quantities of labour it does not consider qualitative
differences in physical strength, abilities, family influences etc.
This principle of reward
according to labour is a socialist principle. It is
applied in a society in which each person can give nothing but his labour, where there is no exploitation, crises or
unemployment, in a society where the ruling principle is "he who does not
work shall not eat", and where the state guarantees the real right to
work. This "bourgeois" law, therefore, does not and cannot have
anything in common with the class interests of the bourgeoisie. This law is
established by the proletarian dictatorship and is the law of the socialist
state. It serves the interests of the working people and the interests of the
development of socialist production. The condenscending
attitude that this law is "bourgeois" benefits only the anarchic
theories of the "left wing" and the champions of bourgeois equality.
While Marx referred to the
necessity of distribution according to labour as a "shortcoming"
of socialism, it is nevertheless obvious that this expression is a relative
one. The discussion refers to shortcomings in comparison with the higher phase
of communism: and only this.
However, this question was
totally misrepresented in The General
Theory of Law and Marxism. Law, state and morality were simply declared to
be bourgeois forms which cannot be filled with a socialist content and which
must wither away in proportion to the realization of such content.9 This
grossly mistaken position, foreign to Marxism‑Leninism, distorts the
meaning of the proletarian state, distorts the meaning of proletarian communist
morality, and distorts the meaning of Soviet law as the law of the proletarian
state which serves as an instrument in the construction of socialism.
The real and concrete history of
Soviet law as a weapon of proletarian policy‑which the proletariat used
at various stages to
356
PASHUKANIS: SELECTED WRITINGS
defend the conquests of the
revolution and the reconstruction towards socialism‑was replaced by
abstract and mistaken conclusions about the withering away of law, about the "disappearance"
of the legal superstructure etc.
Confused conclusions on the
withering away of the "form of law", as a phenomenon inherited from
the bourgeois world, distracted from the concrete task of combating bourgeois
influence and bourgeois attempts to distort Soviet legislation and Soviet law.
The theoretical position which
initiated this anti‑Marxist confusion was the concept of law exclusively
as a form of commodity exchange. The relationship between commodity owners was
asserted to be the real and specific content of all law. It is clear that the
basic class content of every system of law‑which consists in the
ownership of the means of production‑was consequently relegated to the
background. Law was deduced directly from commodity exchange according to
value; the role of the class state was therefore ignored, protecting the system
of ownership corresponding to the interests of the ruling class. The essence
should be: which class holds state power?
The great Socialist October
Revolution attacked capitalist private property and instituted a new socialist
system of law. The main thing in the Soviet concept of law is its socialist essence
as the law of the proletarian state. After the victory of socialism and the
liquidation of the pluralist structure of the economy, law did not begin to
wither away. Rather, this was the period when the content of Soviet socialist
law‑both in the town and country‑mirrored uniform socialist
relationships of production.
The theory of the "bourgeois
nature" of all law persistently conflated such different things as the co‑existence
of the private entrepreneur and the economic accountability of socialist
enterprises, capitalist exchange and exchange by co‑operatives and
agencies of the proletarian state, the equivalent exchange of commodities
according to value and the socialist principle of distribution according to labour.
In this theory, socialism was
essentially contrasted to exchange, and economic accountability with control by
the rouble. With respect to the withering away of
exchange and money, and the transition to direct commodity exchange, "leftist"
pseudo‑theories
"STATE AND
LAW UNDER SOCIALISM"
357
are in the same logical category
as theories which stress the "withering away of law" and the "disappearance
of the legal superstructure".
These mistaken theories were
harshly criticized at the First Congress of Marxist Theorists of the State.
Emphasis was placed upon the great importance of Soviet law as law which
proceeds from the dictatorship of the proletariat and which finds its strength
therein:
... For us it must be indisputable
that although Soviet law deals with different economic structures, its power
and movement and nevertheless has but
one source‑the October Revolution the dictatorship of the proletariat ...
Such facts as the transformation of the proletariat into the ruling class, the
creation of the Soviet state, the nationalization of the basic instruments of
production, the nationalization of land, transport, banks and the monopoly of
foreign trade all these are starting points which imprint themselves on Soviet
law and which give it its special quality.10
The theory that the specific
quality of law is the facilitation of equivalent exchange was criticized and
defeated after the discussions of 1930‑1931. However, the positive aspect
of this task‑the broad and all‑round development of the system of
Soviet socialist law‑has not yet been accomplished. Our work in this area
still remains backward. Such decisive moments as: the adoption of the Law of
August 7, 1932, concerning the sanctity and inviolability of socialist
property; the decisions of the XVIIth Party Congress
on the liquidation of classes; Comrade Stalin's speech at the January Plenum of
the Central Committee and Central Auditing Committee of 1933 on the new tasks
of revolutionary legality‑were only used for relevant legislation in
specialized areas (economic law, criminal law etc.). The general theory of
Soviet socialist law has still not yet developed anything thorough and
systematic. Decisive conclusions must be drawn from this fact.
The attempt to provide Soviet
socialist law with a complete system could not have triumphed in 1930, because
this was the time when all out collectivization was taking place (and the liquidation
of the kulaks as a class was in process).
Also recall that practical
attempts to create new codes suffered failure at this time. But this happened
in such a way that a number of zealots, who championed the system of Soviet law
as proletarian or socialist law, tried to initiate (under the banner of
developing this
358 PASHUKANIS: SELECTED WRITINGS
system) various politically
dangerous and anti‑Party orientations. These included the liquidation of
NEP in the towns concurrently with the liquidation of the kulaks, and the
abolition of civil law for the collective farms which would essentially have
meant their transformation into state enterprises.
The opposite trend also took
place‑the declaration that various relations of production were socialist
when in fact they were not. Recall the social revolutionary "theories"
of Professor Rosenblum, to the effect that the petty
commodity producer (and the peasant who works the land) also build socialism.
Also mistaken were Comrade Stuchka's attempts to base the system of Soviet law on the
principle of equivalence equivalence in the sense of
compensation according to labour, and equivalence in
the sense of the guarantee that no property (including kulak property) would be
expropriated without compensation. Such a "system" would be an
effective impediment and obstacle for the development of socialist progress.
We struggled against these
distortions and criticized attempts to construct the system of Soviet law in
isolation from the policy of the dictatorship of the proletariat and from its
tasks during the period of transition. We also insisted that Soviet law must
enjoy the maximum mobility and flexibility during the period of full‑scale
socialist offensive. But in itself this criticism was not sufficient because we
failed to show clearly the conclusions that. could be derived for Soviet law
from the tremendous economic advances and those class relationships which have
characterized the full‑scale socialist offensive. But this obligation was
all the more pressing for us because earlier we held the confused view
concerning the withering away of all law under socialism.
We have now come to the period
when Soviet socialist law formalizes‑within the state of victorious socialism
and on the basis of socialist property‑the domination of uniform
socialist relations of production in the town and country. We are in the period
when socialist relations of production in industry and agriculture are firmly
stabilized. Public socialist property, and distribution according to labour: these are the cornerstones on which we can and must
construct the system of Soviet socialist law.
This is an immense task, most
gratifying, and it has practical value. In a whole array of areas we still have
not yet codified our
"STATE AND LAW UNDER
SOCIALISM"
359
legislation. The old codes, which
were planned for the co‑existence of, and struggle between the capitalist
and socialist sectors, are only effective in isolated areas and often only
through some of their articles. Most provisions are ineffective. Whether you
take the Civil Code, the Land Code or the Labour
Code, none of them can be applied as codes any more.
The task before us is to express
in Soviet law‑in an appropriate, integral and completed code these new
and uniform relationships.
When the new Constitution is
adopted this task will become urgent, but it will be facilitated by the
Constitution. This is because the bases of the socialist legal system will be
formulated in the new Constitution; its draft has already been adopted by the
Plenum of the Central Committee of our Party.
From the economic and legal
perspectives, one of the most fundamental questions concerns the co‑existence
of two different types of socialist property: state property (i.e. property of
all the people) and collective farm property (i.e. property of the
cooperatives).
From the legal perspective, one
of the most important tasks is to elaborate this distinction and to identify
the features of these two types.
The development and consolidation
of public socialist property (in its state and collective farm/co‑operative
forms) assumes the consolidation of the personal property of working people.
Socialism signifies the fullest protection of the rights of the individual, of
the rights of each member of socialist society, of a society of free working
people in the town and country.
This question of the personal and property
rights of the working people has been insufficiently developed by us.
In our works on economic law‑particularly
in Vol. 1 of A Course on Soviet Economic Law, there was almost no
room for the working person, for man, because everything was absorbed by the
problem of the relationship between economic units. Questions of civil law were
almost absent.
This was wrong of course. The
problem of personal and property rights‑and of their protection‑is
an immense theoretical and practical task.
The socialist state protects
not only public socialist property; it also protects the supplementary
agricultural plot of the collective
I360
PASHUKANIS: SELECTED WRITINGS
farmer, protects his personal
property, the personal property of each working person.
Not long ago there was a
scholarly conference of the fascist professors of law in Berlin. They decided
that the concept of man should be excluded from civil law: this concept, they
argued, was so broad that a foreigner, a non‑Aryan, and "even"
a Jew might be encompassed by it.
Against this racist gibberish,
against this unbridled chauvinism, we propose the defence
of the personal and property rights of each member of socialist society.
Soviet socialist law must protect
the conquests of the revolution, the security of our socialist state and
socialist public system, public socialist property, discipline, personal
property rights and the consolidation of the socialist family.
Here there arises the great
problem of the relation between Soviet socialist law and socialist morality. We
must particularly stress, in the context of the role of the courts, the close
bond between our criminal law and our socialist morality.
The decisions of our Soviet
courts‑made on the basis of our laws‑are a method for morally
influencing those who are not directly involved in a given judicial hearing‑the
entire society.
The task of socialization and re‑education
is now being pushed to the forefront more and more. In practice the court is an
agency which uses coercion and repression; simultaneously, it acts by
persuasion and re‑education.
The practice of the application of Soviet socialist law is that of intensified struggle and the infliction of heavy blows on the remnants of our class enemies. Our court is an agency of the proletarian dictatorship and it will remain as such. But the court therefore has another task‑re‑education. This must not be isolated from the tasks of coercion and repression. The practice of applying Soviet law in different areas is a massive cultural and educational task. The introduction of socialist legality, socialist legal concepts, the achievement of the correct relation between the citizen and the socialist state this is what is required in the area of the practical application of Soviet law. This is what must be considered in its theoretical development.
\"STATE AND LAW UNDER SOCIALISM"
361
Notes
1. This is a revised transcript of a report to
the Moscow Legal Institute,
conference on theory, April 3, 1936.
2. V. I.
Lenin, The State and Revolution (1917),
LCW, vol. 25, p. 425.
3. ibid. p. 467.
4. J. Stalin, Problems of Leninism (1933), Partizdat', Moscow, p. 509.
5. ibid. p. 580.
6. V. I.
Lenin, The State and Revolution (1917),
op. cit. p. 413.
7. Programme and Charter
of the All‑Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) (1933), Politizdat, Moscow, p. 21.
8. V. I. Lenin, Sochinenii, vol.
23, p. 36.
9. See E. B. Pashukanis, The General Theory of Law and Marxism (1926), Moscow, 2nd edition, p. 105.
10. E. B. Pashukanis, "For a Marxist‑Leninist
Theory of State and Law", The Soviet
State and Revolution of the Law (1931),
no. 1, p. 24.