The Mensheviks were a faction of the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party formed in 1903 and disavowed around 1912. The Mensheviks split with the Bolsheviks over the issue of revolution against the oppressive Czar Nicholas II of Russia, with the Mensheviks arguing that a class alliance and assistance from the liberals would be key in the revolution; the Bolsheviks wanted a proletarian revolution by the people. The Mensheviks were moderates as opposed to the radical Bolsheviks, but by 1912 the Mensheviks were no longer a major opposition group to the Bolsheviks, with its leaders emigrating from Russia. Key leaders were Noe Zhordania, Julius Martov, Pavel Axelrod, and Alexander Martinov, and the Mensheviks would go into exile after the Bolsheviks' October Revolution of 1917.
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