ON THE PAINFULLY SLOW PATH FROM INFANCY TO maturity, Russian democracy last week encountered adolescence. During Day 3 of the Congress of People's Deputies, a dispute over procedure degenerated into a fistfight on the floor of the Grand Palace in the Kremlin, where members of the country's supreme legislature had gathered to decide the fate of political and economic reform. The melee erupted when conservative parliament speaker Ruslan Khasbulatov, tired of arguing with a group of liberal representatives, called on his supporters for help in silencing his critics. On cue, a swarm of his backers descended upon the hapless advocates of...
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