Kerensky continued as Premier and as commander-in-chief of the
army. There were in the Cabinet five Social Democrats, two
Socialist-Revolutionists, eight Constitutional Democrats, and two
non-partisans. It was therefore as far as its predecessors from meeting the
standards insisted upon by many radical Socialists, who, while not
Bolsheviki, still believed that there should be at least an absolute
Socialist predominance in the Provisional Government. Of course, the new
Coalition Ministry infuriated the Bolsheviki. From his hiding-place Lenine
issued a series of "Letters to the Comrades," which were published in the
_Rabochiy Put_, in which he urged the necessity of an armed uprising like
that of July, only upon a larger scale. In these letters he scoffed at the
Constituent Assembly as a poor thing to satisfy hungry men. Meanwhile,
Trotzky, out of prison again, and other Bolshevik leaders were agitating by
speeches, proclamations, and newspaper articles for an uprising. The
Provisional Government dared not try to suppress them. Its hold upon the
people was now too weak.
The Democratic Conference introduced one innovation. It created a
Preliminary Parliament, as the new body came to be known, though its first
official title was the Provisional Council of the Republic.
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