The Congress of Soviets was the supreme governing body of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic and several other Soviet republics from 1917 to 1936 and a somewhat similar Congress of People's Deputies from 1989 to 1991. After the creation of the Soviet Union, the Congress of Soviets of the Soviet Union functioned as its legislative branch until its dissolution in 1936. Its initial full name was the "Congress of Soviets of Workers', Soldiers' and Peasants' Deputies". It was also sometimes known as the "Congress of People's Deputies." A similar name also applied in communist-held China in the Republican era.
A People's Commissariat was a structure in the Soviet state from 1917–1946 which functioned as the central executive body in charge of managing a particular field of state activity or a separate sector of the national economy; analogue of the ministry. As a rule, a People's Commissariat was headed by a People's Commissar, which is part of the government – the Council of People's Commissars of the appropriate level.
The All-Russian Central Executive Committee was a permanent body formed by the First All-Russian Congress of Soviets of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies, then became the supreme governing body of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic in between sessions of the All-Russian Congress of Soviets from 1917 to 1937. In 1937, the All-Russian Central Executive Committee was replaced with the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the Russian SFSR.
The Council of Labor and Defense, first established as the Council of Workers' and Peasants' Defense in November 1918, was an agency responsible for the central management of the economy and production of military materiel in the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic and later in the Soviet Union. During the Russian Civil War of 1917-1922 the council served as an emergency "national economic cabinet", issuing emergency decrees in an effort to sustain industrial production for the Red Army amidst economic collapse. In 1920–23 it existed on the rights of the commission of the Russian Sovnarkom and after 1923 of the Soviet Council of People's Commissariats. The Central Executive Committee of the Soviet Union abolished the council on 28 April 1937. Its functions were split between the Economic Council of the Council of People's Commissars of the Soviet Union and the Defense Committee of the Council of People's Commissars of the Soviet Union.
The Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic, previously known as the Russian Soviet Republic and the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic, and unofficially as Soviet Russia, was an independent federal socialist state from 1917 to 1922, and afterwards the largest and most populous constituent republic of the Soviet Union (USSR) from 1922 to 1991, until becoming a sovereign part of the Soviet Union with priority of Russian laws over Union-level legislation in 1990 and 1991, the last two years of the existence of the USSR. The Russian SFSR was composed of sixteen smaller constituent units of autonomous republics, five autonomous oblasts, ten autonomous okrugs, six krais and forty oblasts. Russians formed the largest ethnic group. The capital of the Russian SFSR and the USSR as a whole was Moscow and the other major urban centers included Leningrad, Stalingrad, Novosibirsk, Sverdlovsk, Gorky and Kuybyshev. It was the first socialist state in history.
Following the October Revolution, Vladimir Lenin became the head of the new government of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic. It was known officially as the Council of People's Commissars, effectively his cabinet. Ten of the council's fourteen members would later be killed during Joseph Stalin's Great Purge.
The Council of People's Commissars of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic was the government of Soviet Russia between 1917 and 1946. It was established by the Second All-Russian Congress of Soviets of Workers', Soldiers', and Peasants' Deputies on November 9, 1917 "as an interim workers' and peasants' government" under the name of the Council of People's Commissars, which was used before the adoption of the Constitution of the Russian Socialist Federative Soviet Republic of 1918.
The first significant attempt to implement communism on a large scale occurred in Russia following the February Revolution of 1917, which resulted in the abdication of Tsar Nicholas II. The Bolshevik Party, led by Vladimir Lenin, capitalized on the discontent with the Provisional government and successfully seized power in the October Revolution of the same year. Lenin's government began to transform Russian society through policies such as land redistribution, nationalization of industry, and withdrawal from World War I. After Lenin's death in 1924, Joseph Stalin's rise to power brought about rapid industrialization, forced collectivization, and widespread political repression, which solidified the Soviet Union's status as a major world power but at a tremendous human cost.
The Ukrainian People's Republic of Soviets was a short-lived (1917–1918) Soviet republic of the Russian SFSR that was created by the declaration of the Kharkiv All-Ukrainian Congress of Soviets "About the self-determination of Ukraine" on 25 December [O.S. 12 December] 1917 in the Noble Assembly building in Kharkov. Headed by the Provisional Workers' and Peasants' Government of Ukraine formed earlier in Russian Kursk. The republic was later united into the Ukrainian Soviet Republic and, eventually, liquidated, because of a cessation of support from the government of the Russian SFSR when the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk was signed.
The All-Russian Congress of Soviets evolved from 1917 to become the supreme governing body of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic from 1918 until 1936, effectively. The 1918 Constitution of the Russian SFSR mandated that Congress shall convene at least twice a year, with the duties of defining the principles of the Soviet Constitution and ratifying peace treaties. The October Revolution ousted the provisional government of 1917, making the Congress of Soviets the sole, and supreme governing body. This Congress was not the same as the Congress of Soviets of the Soviet Union which governed the whole Soviet Union after its creation in 1922.
The Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic, part of the Soviet Union, had four successive constitutions during its existence. The first (1919) was in Russian and the final three were in Ukrainian.
The All Russian Constituent Assembly was a constituent assembly convened in Russia after the February Revolution of 1917. It met for 13 hours, from 4 p.m. to 5 a.m., 18–19 January [O.S. 5–6 January] 1918, whereupon it was dissolved by the Bolshevik-led All-Russian Central Executive Committee, proclaiming the Third All-Russian Congress of Soviets the new governing body of Russia.
First All-Ukrainian Congress of Soviets was a congress of Soviets (councils) of workers, peasants, Red-army-men deputies that took place in Kharkiv on December 24-25, 1917.
The Declaration and Treaty on the Formation of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics officially created the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR), commonly known as the Soviet Union. It de jure legalised a political union of several Soviet republics that had existed since 1919 and created a new federal government whose key functions were centralised in Moscow. Its legislative branch consisted of the Congress of Soviets of the Soviet Union and the Central Executive Committee of the Soviet Union (TsIK), while the Council of People's Commissars composed the executive.
The Emblem of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic was adopted on 10 July 1918 by the Government of the Soviet Union, and had been modified several times afterwards. It shows wheat as the symbol of agriculture, a rising sun to symbolize the republic's future, the red star as well as the hammer and sickle for the victory of communism and the "world-wide socialist community of states".
The Council of People's Commissars (CPC) (Russian: Совет народных комиссаров (СНК), romanized: Sovet narodnykh kommissarov (SNK)), commonly known as the Sovnarkom (Совнарком), were the highest executive authorities of the Russian Soviet Federative Socialist Republic (RSFSR), the Soviet Union (USSR), and the Soviet republics from 1917 to 1946.
Third All-Ukrainian Congress of Soviets was a congress of Soviets (councils) of workers, peasants, Red-army-men deputies that took place in Kharkiv on March 6–10, 1919. The congress followed the Third Congress of the Communist Party of Ukraine that took place on March 1–6, 1919.
The 1927 Constitution of the Azerbaijan Socialist Soviet Republic was adopted by the Central Executive Committee of the Azerbaijan SSR at the 5th All-Azerbaijani Congress of Soviets on March 26, 1927.
The Third All-Russian Congress of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies' Soviets took place on 23-31 January 1918 [O.S. 10-18 January 1918] in Tauride Palace, Petrograd. It was the successor to the Second All-Russian Congress of Workers' and Soldiers' Deputies' Soviets.
The Extraordinary 8th All-Union Congress of Soviets was held in Moscow from November 25 to December 5, 1936, on the last day of its work it approved the new constitution of the Soviet Union, according to which the supreme body of state power of the Soviet Union is a Supreme Soviet of the Soviet Union. Thus, this was the last Congress of Soviets.
