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The tactical slogan of the Bolsheviks in the bourgeois-democratic revolution of 1905. For the first time the question of the revolutionary interim government was scientifically posed and developed by the party of Lenin-Stalin. In the brochure "Two tactics of social-democracy in a democratic revolution" Lenin wrote: "A party that has set itself the goal of overthrowing the government must think about what kind of government will replace the old, overthrown government. A new question arises about a temporary revolutionary government” (Lenin, Works, vol. VIII, p. 36). The Third Congress of the RSDLP in the spring of 1905 adopted a decision on the revolutionary interim government. The named Congress: 1) pointed out the significance of the revolutionary interim government in the bourgeois-democratic revolution of January, 2) determined the attitude of the social democracy towards the revolutionary interim government, 3) to find out the conditions, depending on which the participation of social-democrats in this government is permissible, and 4) recognized the need for constant pressure on this government from the armed proletariat led by social-democracy [see VKP(b) in Resolutions..., part 1, 6th edition, 1940, p. 44-45].
“The revolutionary government,” wrote Lenin, “is necessary for the political unification and the political organization of the insurgent section of the people,” first and in that part of the act, which is narrowly fought against the tsarist revolution by the revolutionary army, and then in the whole state... A revolutionary government is necessary for the immediate initiation of political transformations, in the name of which the revolution is taking place, for the organization of revolutionary people's self-government, for the convocation of a truly nationwide and effectively constituent assembly, for the implementation of these "freedoms" without which the correct expression of the will of the people is impossible. A revolutionary government is necessary for the political unification of the insurgent part of the people, which in fact and finally broke with the self-defiance, for its political organization. This organization is, of course, only temporary, just as the revolutionary government, which takes power in the name of the people, to ensure the will of the people, to act through the people, can only be temporary.” (Lenin, vol. VII, pp. 383-384). A revolutionary interim government — an organ or organizational form of the revolutionary democratic dictatorship of workers and peasants under the leadership of the proletariat.
The Bolsheviks also believed that a number of conditions were necessary for the victory of the revolution, and the creation, as a result of a victorious uprising, of a revolutionary government, which would be able to uproot the roots of the counter-revolution of Japan and convene a national Constituent Assembly. Under favorable conditions, the Bolsheviks considered it possible to take part in this government in order to bring the revolution to the end. As a result of the defeat of the Revolution of 1905, the revolutionary interim government was not created. The Soviets of Workers' Deputies that emerged in 1905 were only the rudiments of a revolutionary government, the prototype of the future dictatorship of the proletariat (see Revolution of 1905-07 and Deterioration).
Source: Translated from the Great Soviet Encyclopedia Vol. 48 (1941), p. 383-384.