(12) October Revolution: Significance of the Constituent Assembly

An additional item on the Constituent Assembly that I discussed in the previous post in this series.

Martin McCauley and Dominic Lieven in their current article on Russian history for Britannica Online present the dismissal of the Constituent Assembly in January 1918 after its first and only meeting as the last gasp for democratic government in Russia during the course of the revolution.

Lenin, at the Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets in October (November, New Style) 1917, managed to secure and head a solely Bolshevik government - the Council of People’s Commissars, or Sovnarkom. The Bolsheviks also had a majority in the Soviet Central Executive Committee, which was accepted as the supreme law-giving body. It was, however, the Central Committee of the Communist Party, the Bolsheviks’ party, in which true power came to reside. This governmental structure was to last until the convocation of the Constituent Assembly in January 1918. However, when it became clear that the Bolsheviks did not hold a majority, Lenin disbanded the assembly, setting the stage for civil war. If the October Revolution was accepted as democratic - supported by a majority of the population - then it ceased to be so soon after this event. In the immediate post-October days, a majority of the Bolshevik Central Committee favoured a coalition government, and Lenin eventually had to give in. Some Socialist Revolutionaries were added in December 1917, but the first and last coalition government remained in office only until March 1918 ... [my emphasis]

To be clear on the dating, the Bolsheviks renamed their party the Communist Party in March 1918, weeks after the Constituent Assembly had been dismissed.

Tauride Palace (2016), where the Constituent Assembly met in January 1918
(Source: Andrew Shiva/Wikipedia/CC BY-SA 4.0)

Rex Wade also provides some valuable context in The Russian Revolution (2017):

Part of the problem for the Constituent Assembly’s adherents was that for the worker, soldier and peasant masses the importance of the assembly had declined. It was still desirable in some vague way, but no longer essential. The soviets – through the Congress of Soviets, the Sovnarkom and local soviets – had already acted to fulfill their main aspirations, making the Constituent Assembly less important, even unnecessary. The Decree on Land had given the peasants land; they did not need the Constituent Assembly to decide that. The soldiers’ yearning for peace had been met by the armistice, which validated the new government in their eyes andmade the Constituent Assembly less important. For the workers, the new Soviet government had given them “workers’ supervision” and various other benefits. For all these key constituencies, what then was the practical purpose of the Constituent Assembly? Moreover, Soviet power and the soviets, central and local, were their institutions, responsible to them and representing their aspirations. The Constituent Assembly, on the other hand, represented all social and political groups and therefore was to be viewed with apprehension; the “bourgeoisie” might somehow yet use it to wrest control of power and nullify their gains. [my emphasis]

I'm leery about using "inevitable" for particular developments in this period in Russia. But Wade also concurs that, given the constellation of political actors, dismissing the Constituent Assembly effectively made civil war inevitable:

The assembly planned to reconvene at noon [January 6, 1918, Old Style], but before then the Bolshevik–Left SR led Central Executive Committee ordered its dissolution and Red Guards prevented the delegates from reentering the meeting hall. Immediate efforts by the SRs to stage demonstrations in support of the assembly were broken up by force, and longer-term efforts on its behalf foundered on popular apathy. The indifference to its fate outside political circles indicated the extent to which the population was politically weary and had little understanding of or care for abstract political symbols or democratic procedures.

The dispersal of the Constituent Assembly effectively marked the end of the revolution, now to be followed by civil war. By this action the Bolsheviks announced that they would not be voted from power. If they could not be voted from office, then political struggle was no longer an option and the only alternative was armed opposition. Only by force could they be removed. Civil war was inevitable and would now determine the future of Russia and its peoples. [my emphasis]