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With all due respect to all philistines, the dictatorship of the proletariat does just consist in giving a hiding to the classes that were previously supreme, before forcing them to recognize the new order and to submit to it.

Leon Trotsky

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Leon Trotsky
Age: 60 †
Born: 1879
Born: January 1
Died: 1940
Died: January 1
Autobiographer
Diplomat
Historian
Journalist
Military Personnel
Philosopher
Politician
Revolutionary
Writer
N. Trotsky
Lev Bronstein
Lev Davidovich Bronshtein
Lev Davidovich Bronstein
Leon Trotski
Recognize
Consist
Respect
Previously
Class
Dictatorship
Order
Submit
Doe
Classes
Giving
Hiding
Philistines
Dues
Proletariat
Supreme
Forcing

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Fascism is nothing but capitalist reaction...
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The people will have the right to elect their representatives from a list of candidates [who have been approved by the Party].
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In Stalin each [Soviet bureaucrat] easily finds himself. But Stalin also finds in each one a small part of his own spirit. Stalin is the personification of the bureaucracy. That is the substance of his political personality.
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If you cannot convince a Fascist, acquaint his head with the pavement.
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[Vladimir] Lenin died in January, 1924 three months later [Joseph] Stalin expounded in writing Lenin's conception of the proletarian revolution.
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I wrote a study about this question, The Lessons of October, which served as a pretext for my elimination from the government.
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What shall we call an immediate possibility? In 1923 the situation in Germany was profoundly revolutionary, but what was lacking for a victorious revolution was a correct strategy.
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Workers – men and women – of all countries, place yourselves under the banner of the Fourth International. It is the banner of your approaching victory!
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In 1925 - 27 the revolution in China was destroyed by the false revolutionary strategy of the Stalinist faction. To this last question I consecrate my book, Problems of the Chinese Revolution (issued by the Pioneer Publishers, New York 1932).
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There is a limit to the application of democratic methods. You can inquire of all the passengers as to what type of car they like to ride in, but it is impossible to question them as to whether to apply the brakes when the train is at full speed and accident threatens.
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Dialectical thought is related to vulgar thinking in the same way that a motion picture is related to a still photograph. The motion picture does not outlaw the still photograph but combines a series of them according to the laws of motion.
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As for us, we were never concerned with the Kantian-priestly and vegetarian-Quaker prattle about the sacredness of human life. We were revolutionaries in opposition, and have remained revolutionaries in power. To make the individual sacred we must destroy the social order which crucifies him. And this problem can only be solved by blood and ir
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In a serious struggle there is no worse cruelty than to be magnanimous at an inopportune time.
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Fascism is a caricature of Jacobinism.
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Let us not forget that revolutions are accomplished through people, although they be nameless. Materialism does not ignore the feeling, thinking, and acting man, but explains him.
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The pillars of Hercules of the United States are vulgarity and stupidity.
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Revolutions are always verbose.
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The Federated Republic of Europe-the United States of Europe-that is what must be. National autonomy no longer suffices. Economic evolution demands the abolition of national frontiers. If Europe is to remain split into national groups, then Imperialism will recommence its work. Only a Federated Republic of Europe can give peace to the world.
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Ideas that enter the mind under fire remain there securely and for ever.
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The party that leans upon the workers but serves the bourgeoisie, in the period of the greatest sharpening of the class struggle, cannot but sense the smells wafted from the waiting grave.
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