and freedoms are regarded as inviolable, must at the same time make it perfectly clear that the forfeiture of political rights, and whatever limitations may be imposed upon freedom, are necessary only as temporary measures to cope with the attempts of the exploiters to regain their privileges. Concurrently with the disappearance of the objective possibility of the exploitation of man by man, there will likewise disappear the need for these temporary measures, and our party will aim at their restriction and ultimately at their complete abolition.[§48.]
Bourgeois democracy is organised upon the basis of the formal diffusion of political rights and freedoms: for instance, the right of public meeting, the right of combination, the freedom of the press; all citizens being regarded as equal in these respects. But in actual fact, as concerns administrative practice, and above all in view of their economic slavery, under bourgeois democracy the workers have always stood in the rear ranks, and have been unable to any notable extent to realise these rights and freedoms.
On the contrary, proletarian democracy, instead of formally proclaiming rights and freedoms, does in actual fact realise these rights and freedoms first of all and more than all for that very class of the population which was oppressed by capitalism, namely, for the proletariat and the peasantry. For this reason, the Soviet Power confiscates the possessions of the bourgeoisie, i.e. its printing presses, stores of paper, etc., in order to place them entirely at the disposal of the workers and their organisations.
The Russian Communist Party must induce wider and yet wider masses of the working population to avail themselves of democratic rights and freedoms, and it must enlarge the material possibilities in this direction.[§49.]
Bourgeois democracy has repeatedly proclaimed the equality of individuals independently of sex, race, religion, and nationality: but