All-Russian Central Executive Committee

Organization

The 1918 Russian Constitution required that the All-Russian Central Executive Committee convene the All-Russian Congress of Soviets at least twice a year (Statute 26 of Article III). Additional sessions could be called by the All-Russian Central Executive Committee or on the request of local Soviets. The All-Russian Central Executive Committee was elected by a full Congress, with no more than 200 individuals. It was completely subordinate to the Congress. The functions of the Collegiate or the Presidium were not declared in the Constitution, but presumably they were supposed to be purely supervisory or revisionary bodies.

Provisions

The All-Russian Central Executive Committee gave a general direction for the policies of the Worker-Peasant government and all bodies of the Soviet power in the country. It united and coordinated activities for legislation and administration as well as supervised the endorsement of the Soviet Constitution, declarations of the All-Russian Congress of Soviets and central bodies of the Soviet power. The All-Russian Central Executive Committee reviewed and adopted the projects of decrees and other propositions introduced by the Council of People's Commissars and separate departments as well as issued its own decrees and instructions.

The All-Russian Central Executive Committee summoned the All-Russian Congress of Soviets to which it presented the reports on its activity, general policy, and other inquiries. The All-Russian Central Executive Committee formed the Council of People's Commissars for general administrative affairs of the republic and departments (called People's Commissariats) for the management of separate branches of administration. Deputies of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee worked in the departments or executed special assignments of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee.

State budgets (for the RSFSR as a whole and for each of the republic's administrative divisions) were decided jointly by the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and the All-Russian Congress of Soviets.

History

The first All-Russian Central Executive Committee was elected at the First All-Russian Congress of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies' Soviets, held in Petrograd, June 3–24, 1917. The first Central Executive Committee of the All-Russian Congress of Soviets was not a governing body, and its chairman Nikolai Chkheidze was not the head of the Russian state.

Menshevik period

The congress elected the All-Russian Central Executive Committee of 320 deputies. It included 123 Mensheviks, 119 Social Revolutionaries, 58 Bolsheviks, 13 United Social Democrats, 7 others, which roughly corresponded to the Social Revolutionary-Menshevik composition of the delegates to the First Congress of Soviets. The Menshevik Nikolay Chkheidze became the chairman of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee.

After the July events, representatives of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee took part in the work of the commission on the establishment of order in Petrograd, established by the Provisional Government. The All-Russian Central Executive Committee supported the actions of the Provisional Government, welcomed the appointment of Social Revolutionary Aleksandr Kerensky as minister-chairman of the government and decided to recognize unlimited powers for the government.

Until August 1917, All-Russian Central Executive Committee sat in the Tauride Palace, after which it moved to Smolny.

Bolshevik ascendency

In early September, after the liquidation of the Kornilov revolt, the All-Russian Central Executive Committee, jointly with the executive committee of the All-Russian Council of Peasant Deputies, initiated the convening of a Democratic Conference, as opposed to the August Moscow State Conference. In a telegram inviting representatives of parties and public organizations to take part in the meeting signed by the Chairmen of the Central Executive Committees Nikolay Chkheidze and Nikolay Avksentiev, it was said that "a congress of all organized Democracy of Russia in Petrograd would create a strong revolutionary government capable of uniting all revolutionary Russia to repel external to enemies and for the suppression of any attempts on conquered freedom".

The All-Russian Central Executive Committee tried to counteract the process of Bolshevization of Soviets, which began in August, which intensified in September–October 1917 and was accompanied by the ousting of moderate socialists that had previously dominated them, especially the Socialist Revolutionaries and Mensheviks, from these authorities.

By the beginning of November, the Bolsheviks occupied up to 90% of the seats in the Petrograd Soviet, up to 60% in Moscow, the majority of the seats in the 80 local Soviets of large industrial cities. In September, the Bolshevik Viktor Nogin became the chairman of the Presidium of the Moscow Council, Lev Trotsky – the chairman of the Petrograd Council. Soldiers' committees, primarily the Northern and Western fronts, the Petrograd garrison and Central Committee of the Baltic Fleet went over to the Bolsheviks. At the Second Congress of the Deputies of the Baltic Fleet, the Bolshevik-Left Socialist Revolutionary Central Committee of the Baltic Fleet was elected. "Bolshevization" of soldiers' committees, starting from the bottom, reached the committees of the regimental level. At the same time, the Army Committees until November 1917 remained Socialist Revolutionary–Menshevik.

Having received an absolute majority of seats in the Petrograd Council, the Bolsheviks began active work in winning the upcoming Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets, and, accordingly, its permanent body, the All-Russian Central Executive Committee. On the eve of the Second Congress, the Bolshevik Petrograd Soviet organized the First Congress of Soviets of the Northern Region, in which Petrograd was included, with the participation of representatives of the Baltic Fleet. The congress, which took place on October 24–26 in Petrograd, was characterized by a sharp predominance of radical socialists – the Bolsheviks and the Left Socialist Revolutionaries.

After the October Revolution

The congress opened on November 7 at 10:40 pm, at the height of the armed uprising that began in Petrograd. The peasant councils and all the soldier-level committees of the army refused to participate in the activities of the congress. The Mensheviks and Socialist Revolutionaries condemned the Bolshevik's actions as an "illegal coup". The old composition of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee also condemned the Bolsheviks, saying that

The Central Executive Committee considers the Second Congress failed and regards it as a private meeting of the Bolshevik delegates. The decisions of this congress, as illegal, are declared by the Central Executive Committee as optional for local Soviets and all army committees. The Central Executive Committee calls on the Soviets and army organizations to rally around him to defend the revolution. The Central Executive Committee will convene a new congress of Soviets as soon as the conditions are created for its proper convocation.

On November 8, at the evening session of the congress, Lenin proposed to dissolve the old composition of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee, choosing instead the new composition of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and forming a temporary workers' and peasants' government – the Council of People's Commissars.

Among the 101 members of the new All-Russian Central Executive Committee were 62 Bolsheviks and 29 Left Social Revolutionaries. Although the Bolsheviks and the Left Social Revolutionaries secured a majority in advance, the All-Russian Central Executive Committee also represented a fraction of the Menshevik Internationalists close to the Bolsheviks, Ukrainian socialists, there was one representative of the radical faction of the maximalist Socialist Revolutionaries. Representatives of moderate socialists did not join the All-Russian Central Executive Committee because of their boycott. Lev Kamenev became the chairman of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee. On November 9, the Congress issued an appeal to the local Soviets with a call to "rally around the new composition of the Central Executive Committee", the powers of the commissars of the former (Socialist Revolutionary-Menshevik) composition of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee in the army and on the ground were declared discontinued.

On November 14, 1917, the new All-Russian Central Executive Committee adopted a resolution "On the terms of an agreement with other parties", in which it explicitly indicated that it considers the "agreement of the socialist parties desirable". The terms of such an agreement were set forth as follows:

Chairmen of the Central Executive Committee of the RSFSR

Lev Kamenev (November 9–21, 1917)

Yakov Sverdlov (November 21, 1917 – March 16, 1919; died in office)

Mikhail Vladimirsky (acting; March 16–30, 1919)

Mikhail Kalinin (March 30, 1919 – July 15, 1938)

On December 30, 1922, the Soviet Union was formed. It comprised the Russian SFSR and other communist-controlled Soviet republics. Mikhail Kalinin retained his position as chairman of the Central Executive Committee of the All-Russian Congress of Soviets and became chairman of the newly formed Central Executive Committee of the All-Union Congress of Soviets as well. Both positions were mostly ceremonial, increasingly so in later years.