RSFSR stamps




The RSFSR and the Establishment of the USSR



In November 1917, the Bolzheviks and their Social Revolutionary allies took over the government. When the Social Revolutionaries left the coalition, the opposition parties being less than likely to cooperate with the Bolzhevik government, the Duma was abolished. Now the COMMUNIST PARTY, and within her the CENTRAL COMMITTEE was the decision-making political body.
Because of the political situation, Petrograd was exposed to attacks by the whites and the foreign interventionist troops, the capital was moved to MOSCOW. The RSFSR was established. A RED ARMY was organized, and the political police, the CHEKA, under FELIZ DZERZHINSKY. When the Red Army "liberated" an area outside of Russia proper, a Soviet Republic was founded there (Belarus, Ukraine etc.).
In 1921 the KRONSTADT REBELLION broke out; it was mercilessly suppressed.

Technically the various Soviet Republics were independent entities. As an expression of this independence, Russia, Belarus and Ukraine joined the League of Nations separately (and Belarus as well as Ukraine kept seats in the United Nations when Russia's seat was occupied by the USSR). In 1923 the Soviet Union was founded, the successor to the Russian Empire - emphatically stressing that it was not imperialist by structure, but would grant self-administration to its various ethnicities, in for,m of soviet republics or autonomous circles within soviet republics.
Within the Communist Party (the only legitimate political party in the nation) the CENTRAL COMMITTEE decided on actual political matters; more principal political decisions were to be taken by PARTY CONGRESSES to be held every couple of years. Then there was the PARLIAMENT of the USSR, members of which were DELEGATES rather than elected representatives. Numerous groups of society regarded relevant were represented by delegates (among whom was the Russian Philatelic Society, i.e. the nation's organized stamp collectors, sending one delegate).





EXTERNAL
FILES 		Lenin and the First Communist Revolutions : "War Communism", the Red Terror, and Lenin's Famine, from Museum of Communism
War Communism, by G. Rempel
The Russian Revolution and Civil War, telegram style notes
The Development of the Soviet Union, from lenin.org
DOCUMENTS The 1918 constitution of the RSFSR, from Bucknell Univ. and from marxists.org
RSFSR Flags, from Victor Lomantsov
Demands of the Kronstadt Insurgents, Expressed in the Resolution of the General Meeting of the Crews of the Ships of the Line, Feb. 28th 1921, posted by J.V. O'Brien, CUNY
REFERENCE The Revolution defends itself, in : Melvin C. Wren, The Course of Russian History pp.396-398


This page is part of World History at KMLA
First posted in 2000, last revised on November 8th 2004

Click here to go Home
Click here to go to Information about KMLA, WHKMLA, the author and webmaster
Click here to go to Statistics