Vladimir Lenin gained the attention of Tsarist police in the 1890s. His goal was to establish a communist revolutionary government. The monarchy had to be deposed for the revolution to happen. At the time Czar Nicholas II was firmly in control. The repression in the Russian Empire pushed some to seek revolution as a political alternative. Lenin’s anger with the government was more than disagreement over ideology. His eldest brother Aleksandr was executed in 1887. He was charged with working with a revolutionary group conspiring to murder Czar Alexander III. This also resulted in Lenin and his family being harassed by the authorities. Lenin was expelled from the University of Kazan for being active in a student assembly deemed too radical . He was able to complete his education and became a lawyer. Lenin continued to be active in Marxist revolutionary circles. He was arrested in 1895 and then sent to Siberia to serve out his prison term. When his term of Siberian exile was finished, Lenin left Russia. Lenin would return to Russia in 1905 when a revolution broke out. This ended in failure and it would not be until October of 1917 did the Bolsheviks come to power.
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