Subtle Rykov

When long-jawed, saturnine Alexey Ivanovich Rykov, Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars, leader of the Right Wing conservative group in the Communist Party, presented a bill to the Congress of Soviets last week, another of the most cherished ideas of the early Bolshevik leaders was headed quietly for the shelf.

Violent anti-religious propaganda has been as intrinsic a part of Communism as anti-capitalist propaganda. However, active persecution of the Greek Orthodox Church ceased in Russia two years ago. Perceiving that harsh tactics had, if anything, a stimulating effect upon oldtime religion among the peasants, the Soviets ignored secret services and the hiding of ikons in closets, the wearing of beads under shirts, and adopted subtler methods. They encouraged foreign missionaries to enter Russia, thinking to weaken Orthodoxy by competition.

So successful have these missionaries been, notably the Baptists and Methodists, that last month the Soviet Central Committee deemed it necessary to issue new orders, confining the missionaries to spiritual work only (i.e., prohibiting social welfare work) and making the local congregation the largest unit of missionary organization (TIME, April 22).

The Rykov bill of last week could be regarded in one of two lights. It was drawn as an amendment to the Soviet Constitution and it proposed to grant the Russian people the right to practice religion freely. At face value, this seemed a tremendous step away from the Redness of the Founding Fathers. But long-jawed Rykov explained that it was meant, not as a defense of religion, but as a new, supremely subtle combative measure. Said he to the Commissars :

"Remove the stimulus of persecution, and the churches will languish. . . The fight against religion can only succeed if linked with mass progress and deep penetration in the masses of scientific knowledge and culture."

Opposed, though not too openly, to the policies of the Soviet's "Man of Steel," Josef Vissarionovich Stalin, subtle Comrade Rykov also hopes soon to give Russian citizens the right of private trading under conditions similar to those already granted foreign concessionaires.