Soviet Form of Government—
Basis of Union

p In the history of the human race there have been many states that were conglomerations of peoples, such as the vast empires of Antiquity, Napoleon’s empire, the Austro-Hungarian monarchy, the British and Russian empires. All of these states had been created, as a general rule, by conquests and the subjugation of many peoples by the ruling circles of some one people. To maintain its domination this ruling minority followed a policy which the Romans defined by the motto "Divide and Rule”, that is, it set such conquered peoples against one another, prevented their association, and so kept them from joining forces to fight their common enemy. Such was the case with the Russian empire of the bourgeoisie and the landed gentry. And it made it easier for the Russian monarchy to maintain its domination over the numerous non-Russian peoples, and also the Russian workers and peasants.

The Soviet form of government, that is government of and by the people, is profoundly international in its essence. The Soviet Government is vitally interested in the unification of all peoples, of the working people of all nationalities, since that is the basis of its existence. "We do not rule by dividing, as ancient Rome’s harsh maxim required, but by uniting all the working people with the unbreakable bonds of living interests and a sense of class,"  [61•1  wrote Lenin. The Soviet form of government has united 62 a multitude of peoples to create the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics, a voluntary union of sovereign Soviet Republics enjoying equal rights, including the right of secession And if none has elected to date to exercise that right the reason is that membership in the Union is to the advantage of ea<h and every republic.

Unification Movement Among
Soviet Republics

p The Soviet Union was formed late in 1922, after the various Soviet Republics had existed for five years as separate independent states. The experience of those five years and the pattern of mutual relations that had developed among these republics convinced them of the necessity of unification and led them to take that step. This is the way it came about.

p On the basis of the Declaration of Rights of the Peoples of Russia published by the Soviet Government on November 15, 1917, many peoples of the former Russian empire proclaimed themselves independent Soviet Republics. These were: the Ukrainian, Byelorussian, Estonian, Latvian, Lithuanian, Azerbaijan, Armenian and Georgian Republics. They were accorded solemn recognition by the Government of the Russian Soviet Republic headed by Lenin. In January 1918, the Russian Republic proclaimed itself a Federative Republic, within which in the early years of its existence there emerged a number of autonomous republics and regions, such as the Tatar, Bashkir, Turkestan and Karelian republics, each with its legislative and executive bodies. Autonomous regions emerged likewise in the Azerbaijan and Georgian Republics.

p Thus the numerous peoples who lived under tsarist oppression came to acquire national statehood only with the establishment of the Soviet system of government.

p As soon as they acquired the status of national Soviet Republics these republics found themselves in mortal danger due to the intervention and the Civil War launched jointly by the foreign imperialists and the counter-revolutionaries. Salvation lay in a military alliance of the republics, and such an alliance was duly formed in the summer of 1919. It came to play an important role in maintaining the independence of a majority of the Soviet Republics, with the exception of Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania, where the Soviet administration was overthrown by the local counter-revolutionary forces, with the aid of foreign armed forces, which proved decisive. The lessons of the Civil War showed the Soviet Republics the necessity of maintaining their military 63 alliance even in times of peace as a guarantee against any new foreign invasion attempt.

p When the country turned to the work of peaceful construction economic relations, economic mutual aid among the independent Soviet Republics came increasingly to the fore. This aid was needed above all by the economically backward republics and those that had been particularly hard-hit during the foreign incursions and the Civil War as situated in the outlying areas. They obtained this aid from the Russian Soviet Republic, to which they turned as being the biggest and economically most developed. At the close of 1920 and during the first few months of 1921 treaties with the Russian Republic were concluded by all of the Soviet Republics, providing for both a military alliance and an economic union. These treaties served to develop economic co-operation among them in scope and volume, this co-operation being based on the division of labour and a common network of means of communication which had taken shape before the Revolution, when the republics were integral elements of the Russian empire.

p Joint action by the Soviet Republics in the sphere of diplomacy had been taken on several occasions while the Civil War was still in progress, but the necessity of a united diplomatic front became particularly felt when it was over, when diplomatic and economic contacts were initiated with the capitalist countries and when the governments of the leading capitalist powers shifted their main effort in their struggle against the Soviet Government into the diplomatic and economic spheres.

The convention of a general European financial arid economic conference at Genoa in 1922 prompted the Soviet Republics to conclude a diplomatic alliance with Russia, authorising the Russian delegation to represent and protect their interests at the conference. This diplomatic alliance operated at the Lausanne Conference (1922-23) as well, where the Russian delegation took care of the interests of all the Soviet Republics.

Formation of the USSR

p There existed, thus, among the Soviet Republics a military alliance, an economic union, and a diplomatic union, based on treaties. Yet their insufficiency and lack of precision were becoming increasingly apparent. Regulations governing the relations between supreme government bodies lacked explicitness and there was insufficient co-ordination in the work of the planning and financial bodies, which impeded economic development. This was chiefly a matter of concern to the smaller, backward 64 republies, who were the first, accordingly, to raise the question of a closer union of the Soviet Republics.

p The formula for a union that would be in the best interests of all the members was not discovered right away. Some people in the Party and Government suggested bringing all the independent Soviet Republics into the Russian Federation as autonomous Republics. The defect of that scheme lay in the fact that it could infringe upon the sovereign rights of the republics.

p Having revealed the fallacy of the above-mentioned scheme, Lenin urged the creation of a new union state founded on the principle of complete equality. The republics entering into the union would transfer to the union state some of their sovereign rights, primarily in the sphere of foreign affairs, national defence, finance, and national economic planning. They would retain full and equal sovereignty in the sphere of education, public health, social security, domestic affairs, etc. Ail-Union affairs would be put in the charge of all-Union legislative and executive bodies. Every republic that entered the Union would retain the right of secession.

p Lenin’s proposal evoked an enthusiastic response among the masses of all nationalities. For several months the issue was discussed at congresses of Soviets, Party congresses, and working people’s meetings. A special commission including representatives 65 from all of the republics drafted the texts of a Declaration and a Treaty on the unification of all the Soviet Republics in a Union of Soviet Socialist Republics.

p On December 30, 1922, there was convened in Moscow a congress of Soviets attended by delegations from the Russian, Ukrainian and Byelorussian Republics and from the Transcaucasian Federation, which had been formed earlier that year by the Azerbaijan, Armenian and Georgian Republics. The congress adopted an historic resolution creating the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics and approved the relative Declaration and Treaty. These documents became the basis of the Constitution of the Soviet Union, which was later drafted by a special commission, carefully studied in the various republics and finally adopted in January 1924, by the Second USSR Congress of Soviets.

The Constitution fully protected the rights of the Union and the interests of the member republics. A special Soviet of Nationalities within the supreme legislative organ of the Union was called upon to represent the special interests of the member republics. The Constitution reserved to every republic the right freely to secede from the Union and proclaimed unrestricted admission into the Union of all Soviet Republics, both now existing and any that may subsequently emerge. Many Soviet Republics which came into existence at later dates availed themselves of this right.

New Republics
Form and Adhere to the USSR

p There existed in Soviet Central Asia at the time the USSR was being formed, besides the Turkestan Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, the People’s Soviet Republics of Bukhara and Khoresm. They did not, at the time, adhere to the Soviet Union, because they were not then socialist republics. Both subsequently elected to follow the socialist way of development, Khoresm in the autumn of 1923 and Bukhara a year later.

p It was now both possible and necessary to create national Soviet states in Central Asia. Hitherto the Uzbek, Turkmen and Tajik peoples were divided between three states, namely the Turkestan ASSR, the Bukhara SSR and the Khoresm SSR. That was a vestige of the old tsarist colonial policy. In the autumn of 1924 territorial adjustments were made, on the initiative of the peoples of Central Asia, based on a national criterion, which resulted in the emergence of the following republics: the Uzbek SSR, comprising the vast majority of the Uzbek people; the 66 Turkmen SSR, comprising practically all of the Turkmen people; the Tajik Autonomous Republic within the framework of the Uzbek SSR; and several separate autonomous regions. The Bukhara SSR, Khoresm SSR and Turkestan ASSR were dissolved.

p In February 1925, the congresses of Soviets of the Uzbek and Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republics adopted resolutions on their entry into the USSR, and their appeals were met on May 13, 1925, by the Third Ail-Union Congress of Soviets. In 1929 the Tajik ASSR, which had by then achieved notable success in the field of economic and cultural construction, proclaimed itself an independent Soviet Socialist Republic and gained admission into the Union as a Union Republic. In 1936, the Kazakh and Kirghiz Republics, hitherto autonomous republics within the Russian Federation, and also Azerbaijan, Armenia and Georgia, till then members of the Transcaucasian Federation, proclaimed themselves independent republics and entered the USSR as Union Republics. The Moldavian, Latvian, Lithuanian and Estonian Soviet Socialist Republics gained admission into the USSR in 1940.

Broad prospects of all-round development now opened up before the peoples that had joined to form a union state. The formation of the USSR strengthened the ties of friendship and brotherhood among these peoples and made available to them additional sources of strength and means to be used to reconstruct the country’s economy and build socialism.