p In the period of communist construction the political organisation is inseparably linked up with the Communist Party of the Soviet Union, which leads and directs Soviet society.

p The C.P.S.U., the Party Rules declare, is the militant, tested vanguard of the Soviet people, which, on a voluntary basis, unites the advanced and most politically conscious section of the working class, collective farmers and intellectuals. In the period since it was founded by Lenin, the Communist Party has travelled a glorious road of struggle and victory. It led the Russian proletariat and working peasants to the triumph of the Great October Socialist Revolution and the establishment of the proletarian dictatorship, and ensured the complete and final victory of 184 socialism. The social, political and ideological unity of the Soviet people was moulded and grew strong under the Party’s tested leadership. This brought the Party prestige and the unbounded trust of the people.

p Today the Party has nearly 12,500,000 members. Most of them are workers or collective farmers. In the Party’s social composition the working class occupies and shall continue to occupy the leading position. With practically all the peoples inhabiting the Soviet Union represented in its ranks, the Party is an internationalist political organisation embodying the deep friendship and fraternity among the peoples of the U.S.S.R.

p The Party’s entire policy and all its activities at home and abroad are subordinated to the interests of the people, to their most cherished thoughts and aspirations. “The Party," states the Programme of the C.P.S.U., “exists for the people, and it is in serving the people that it sees the purpose of its activity." That is why its ideals have become the ideals of the whole nation—of workers, collective farmers and intellectuals, of people of different ages, professions and nationalities. The Party is the brain, and conscience of our epoch, and of the Soviet people.

While leading society and directing the great creative work of the people, the Party vigilantly surveys the future, shows the people the road forward and stimulates their creative initiative. The socialist system draws its unconquerable strength from the unity between the Party and the people, from the leadership and organisation provided by the Party.