Communist Party (Bolsheviks) of Ukraine
Encyclopedia
The Communist Party of Ukraine ( Komunistychna Partiya (bilshovykiv) Ukrayiny, КП(б)У, KP(b)U) was a sub-branch of the Bolshevik faction of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party (RSDLP)that in March 1918 renamed itself the Russian Communist Party (RCP). Central leaders in Moscow agreed in March 1918 to requests from Ukrainian party members to form a single "Ukrainian" branch encompassing the 8 Ukrainian provinces of the former Russian empire. This sub-branch was formally proclaimed at a conference in Moscow
, in July. This party was composed overwhelmingly of Russians in Ukraine who did not represent Ukrainians as "an oppressed peoples" and did not envisage an independent soviereign Ukrainian socialist national state. Their party was totally subordinated to and formally had a status of a oblast (provincial) committee within the RCP. A minority within the party's Ukrainian branch represented by men such as Mykola Skrypnyk did call for an independent Ukrainian party and a socialist Ukraine free of Russian domination but was overruled both by the RUssian majority and Lenin. Dissidents who refused to accept Russian domination called for the creation of an independent Ukrainian Communist Party that would lead a national-liberation struggle as a member of the Third International.
On August 26, 1991 the Communist Party was outlawed in Ukraine. Different sectors reconstituted themselves in different parties. One group led by moderate members under Oleksandr Moroz
formed the Socialist Party of Ukraine
(SPU) out of most of the former members, another group re-created in 1993 the Communist Party of Ukraine
in Donetsk
under the leadership of Petro Symonenko
when the ban was lifted, the rest members either changed their political "compass" or created their own parties of the left orientation such as the Vitrenko bloc, Social-Democratic (United) party, and others.
an interesting event took place on October 2, 1942 when there was created the Illegal Central Committee of the Party consisting of 17 members. The committee was dissolved on June 29, 1943. Among the members of the committee were such personalities as Sydir Kovpak
, Leonid Korniets, Oleksiy Fedorov, and others.
At first it consisted of five members and later another one was added. The first Politburo included Andriy Bubnov, Emanuel Kviring
, Volodymyr Mescheriakov, Heorhiy Pyatakov, Christian Rakovsky
, and later Stanislav Kosior
, all centrists.
From March 23 until April 15, 1920 there was elected a Provisional Bureau which the next day was ratified by the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks).
).
forces and Hetman
Pavlo Skoropadskyi’s dictatorship. There were only 15 members in the Central Committee and six candidates.It reversed the decision adopted that April by a preliminary council in Tahanroh to established an independent Ukrainian bolshevik party with a membership in the envisaged Third International apart from the Russian party.
was elected to the Central Committee.
was elected. This prompted the Eight Congress
of the Russian Communist Party to pass the following motion: ""It is necessary to have a unified communist party with a unified central committee ... All decisions of the RCP and its leading organs are absolutely binding for all parts of the party, independent of their national composition. The central committees of the Ukrainian, Lettish and Lithuanian communists are conferred the rights of regional committees of the party; they are to be unreservedly subordinate to the central committee of the RCP."
were forced to dissolve themselves and their erstwile members were permitted to join the CP(b)U. Vasyl Ellan-Blakytny and Shumsky drawn from the Borotbist leadership were elected to the Committee and the Borotbist Central Committee passed a resolution dissolving the Borotbist party and its central committee. All members were instructed to apply for CP(B)U membership. Nearly 4,000 out of approximately 5,000 Borotbists were admitted to the CP(B)U.
There were three major Committees and several Bureaus. Each committee had members and candidates to members each with certain degree of obligations. The members and candidates to the committees were elected at the Party Congress. The number of members varied from one gathering to the next usually in ascending sequence. During the Great Purge
the numbers remarkably declined as well as one of the committees, Central Control Committee, was disbanded. The first members were elected in 1918, 15 members of the Central Committee, six candidates as well as three members and two candidates of the Revision Committee. In 1920 the Central Control Committee was formed and by 1934 the Party accounted for some 191 members and 45 candidates in all committees. In 1937 there were only 71 members and 40 candidates in two committees. By 1990 the number of members grew just over 300 members.
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...
, in July. This party was composed overwhelmingly of Russians in Ukraine who did not represent Ukrainians as "an oppressed peoples" and did not envisage an independent soviereign Ukrainian socialist national state. Their party was totally subordinated to and formally had a status of a oblast (provincial) committee within the RCP. A minority within the party's Ukrainian branch represented by men such as Mykola Skrypnyk did call for an independent Ukrainian party and a socialist Ukraine free of Russian domination but was overruled both by the RUssian majority and Lenin. Dissidents who refused to accept Russian domination called for the creation of an independent Ukrainian Communist Party that would lead a national-liberation struggle as a member of the Third International.
Overview
On October 13, 1952 the party officially was renamed into the Communist Party of Ukraine.On August 26, 1991 the Communist Party was outlawed in Ukraine. Different sectors reconstituted themselves in different parties. One group led by moderate members under Oleksandr Moroz
Oleksandr Moroz
Oleksandr Oleksandrovych Moroz is a Ukrainian statesman and politician. He was the Speaker of Verkhovna Rada of Ukraine twice: July 2006 to September 2007, and previously in 1994 through 1998. Moroz is one of the founders and leader of the Socialist Party of Ukraine, which was an influential...
formed the Socialist Party of Ukraine
Socialist Party of Ukraine
The Socialist Party of Ukraine is a Socialist political party in Ukraine and part of the Verkhovna Rada from 1994 to 2007.It is one of the oldest parties and was created by the former members of the Communist Party of Ukraine in late 1991 when the Communist Party was banned...
(SPU) out of most of the former members, another group re-created in 1993 the Communist Party of Ukraine
Communist Party of Ukraine
The Communist Party of Ukraine is a political party in Ukraine, currently led by Petro Symonenko.The party fights the Ukrainian national self-determination by identifying any Ukrainian national parties as the National-Fascist ones The Communist Party of Ukraine is a political party in Ukraine,...
in Donetsk
Donetsk
Donetsk , is a large city in eastern Ukraine on the Kalmius river. Administratively, it is a center of Donetsk Oblast, while historically, it is the unofficial capital and largest city of the economic and cultural Donets Basin region...
under the leadership of Petro Symonenko
Petro Symonenko
Petro Mykolayovych Symonenko is a Ukrainian politician and the First Secretary of the Communist Party of Ukraine. Symonenko was the Communist Party's candidate in both the 1999 and 2004 presidential elections. During the Ukrainian presidential election, 2010 he was the candidate of the Election...
when the ban was lifted, the rest members either changed their political "compass" or created their own parties of the left orientation such as the Vitrenko bloc, Social-Democratic (United) party, and others.
Central Committees
During World War IIWorld War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
an interesting event took place on October 2, 1942 when there was created the Illegal Central Committee of the Party consisting of 17 members. The committee was dissolved on June 29, 1943. Among the members of the committee were such personalities as Sydir Kovpak
Sydir Kovpak
Sydir Artemovych Kovpak , June 7, 1887December 11, 1967) was a prominent Soviet partisan leader in Ukraine.-Biography:Kovpak was born to a poor peasant family in Ukrainian village near Poltava . For his military service in the World War I he was awarded two Crosses of St...
, Leonid Korniets, Oleksiy Fedorov, and others.
Politburo
The party had its own Politburo created on March 6, 1919. On September 25, 1952 the committee was renamed into the Bureau of the Central Committee (CC) of CP(b)U, and in October the same year as the Bureau of the CC CPU. On October 10, 1952 it became the Presidium of the CC CPU. On June 26, 1966 again the bureau was finally left with its original name as the Politburo of the CC CPU.At first it consisted of five members and later another one was added. The first Politburo included Andriy Bubnov, Emanuel Kviring
Emanuel Kviring
Emanuel Kwiring was a Soviet politician.Born into a German family in Friesenthal Emanuel Kwiring (Kviring) (13 September 1888, Friesenthal, Russian Empire - 26 November 1937, Moscow, Soviet Union) was a Soviet politician.Born into a German family in Friesenthal Emanuel Kwiring (Kviring) (13...
, Volodymyr Mescheriakov, Heorhiy Pyatakov, Christian Rakovsky
Christian Rakovsky
Christian Rakovsky was a Bulgarian socialist revolutionary, a Bolshevik politician and Soviet diplomat; he was also noted as a journalist, physician, and essayist...
, and later Stanislav Kosior
Stanislav Kosior
Stanislav Vikentyevich Kosior, sometimes spelled Kossior was one of three Kosior brothers, Polish-born Soviet politicians. He was General Secretary of the Ukrainian Communist Party, deputy prime minister of the USSR, and a member of the Politburo of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union...
, all centrists.
From March 23 until April 15, 1920 there was elected a Provisional Bureau which the next day was ratified by the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks).
Orgburo
Along with Politburo the party like its Russian counterpart had its own Orgburo that was created the same day as Politburo.Party leader
The party was headed by its secretary. The position was highly influential and often was considered to be more important than the head of state (see Ukrainian SSRUkrainian SSR
The Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic or in short, the Ukrainian SSR was a sovereign Soviet Socialist state and one of the fifteen constituent republics of the Soviet Union lasting from its inception in 1922 to the breakup in 1991...
).
Secretaries of the Central Committee of the Communist Party (Bolsheviks) of Ukraine
- Mykola SkrypnykMykola SkrypnykMykola Oleksiyovych Skrypnyk was a Ukrainian Bolshevik leader who was a proponent of the Ukrainian Republic's independence, and led the cultural Ukrainization effort in Soviet Ukraine. When the policy was reversed and he was removed from his position, he committed suicide rather than be forced to...
(20 April - 26 May 1918) (Secretary of the Organizational Bureau) - Yurii Pyatakov (12 July - 9 September 1918)
- Serafima HopnerSerafima HopnerSerafima Hopner was a Bolshevik politician.Since 1905, she was a member, and then a secretary of Bolshevik party in Yekaterinoslav. In 1910-1917, she lived in emigration....
(9 September - 23 October 1918) - Emanuel KviringEmanuel KviringEmanuel Kwiring was a Soviet politician.Born into a German family in Friesenthal Emanuel Kwiring (Kviring) (13 September 1888, Friesenthal, Russian Empire - 26 November 1937, Moscow, Soviet Union) was a Soviet politician.Born into a German family in Friesenthal Emanuel Kwiring (Kviring) (13...
(23 October 1918 - 30 May 1919) - Stanislav KosiorStanislav KosiorStanislav Vikentyevich Kosior, sometimes spelled Kossior was one of three Kosior brothers, Polish-born Soviet politicians. He was General Secretary of the Ukrainian Communist Party, deputy prime minister of the USSR, and a member of the Politburo of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union...
(30 May - 10 December 1919) (1st time) - Vacant (10 December 1919 - January 1920)
- Rafail Farbman (January - 23 March 1920) (acting)
- Nikolay Nikolayev (23–25 March 1920)
- Stanislav KosiorStanislav KosiorStanislav Vikentyevich Kosior, sometimes spelled Kossior was one of three Kosior brothers, Polish-born Soviet politicians. He was General Secretary of the Ukrainian Communist Party, deputy prime minister of the USSR, and a member of the Politburo of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union...
(25 March - 23 November 1920) (2nd time)
First Secretary of the Central Committee
- Vyacheslav MolotovVyacheslav MolotovVyacheslav Mikhailovich Molotov was a Soviet politician and diplomat, an Old Bolshevik and a leading figure in the Soviet government from the 1920s, when he rose to power as a protégé of Joseph Stalin, to 1957, when he was dismissed from the Presidium of the Central Committee by Nikita Khrushchev...
(23 November 1920 - 22 March 1921)
Executive Secretary of the Central Committee
- Feliks KonFeliks KonFeliks Yakovlevich Kon was a Polish communist activist.-Career:Born in Warsaw, Kon's mother was Georgian and was brought up in Russia. He was trained as a historian and a journalist, but was involved in politics...
(22 March - 15 December 1921) (acting)
First Secretaries of the Communist Party
- Dmitry ManuilskyDmitry ManuilskyDmitriy Manuilsky, or Dmytro Zakharovych Manuilsky was an important Bolshevik. He was the son of an Orthodox priest from a Ukrainian village. After secondary school he enrolled in the University of St...
(15 December 1921 - 10 April 1923) - Emanuil Kviring (10 April 1923 - 20 March 1925)
General Secretaries of the Central Committee
- Emanuil Kviring (20 March - 7 April 1925)
- Lazar KaganovichLazar KaganovichLazar Moiseyevich Kaganovich was a Soviet politician and administrator and one of the main associates of Joseph Stalin.-Early life:Kaganovich was born in 1893 to Jewish parents in the village of Kabany, Radomyshl uyezd, Kiev Governorate, Russian Empire...
(7 April 1925 - 14 July 1928) (1st time) - Stanislav KosiorStanislav KosiorStanislav Vikentyevich Kosior, sometimes spelled Kossior was one of three Kosior brothers, Polish-born Soviet politicians. He was General Secretary of the Ukrainian Communist Party, deputy prime minister of the USSR, and a member of the Politburo of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union...
(14 July 1928 - 23 January 1934) (3rd time)
First Secretaries of the Central Committee
- Stanislav KosiorStanislav KosiorStanislav Vikentyevich Kosior, sometimes spelled Kossior was one of three Kosior brothers, Polish-born Soviet politicians. He was General Secretary of the Ukrainian Communist Party, deputy prime minister of the USSR, and a member of the Politburo of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union...
(23 January 1934 - 27 January 1938) - Nikita KhrushchevNikita KhrushchevNikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev led the Soviet Union during part of the Cold War. He served as First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964, and as Chairman of the Council of Ministers, or Premier, from 1958 to 1964...
(27 January 1938 - 3 March 1947) (1st time) - Lazar KaganovichLazar KaganovichLazar Moiseyevich Kaganovich was a Soviet politician and administrator and one of the main associates of Joseph Stalin.-Early life:Kaganovich was born in 1893 to Jewish parents in the village of Kabany, Radomyshl uyezd, Kiev Governorate, Russian Empire...
(3 March - 26 December 1947) (2nd time) - Nikita KhrushchevNikita KhrushchevNikita Sergeyevich Khrushchev led the Soviet Union during part of the Cold War. He served as First Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union from 1953 to 1964, and as Chairman of the Council of Ministers, or Premier, from 1958 to 1964...
(26 December 1947 - 16 December 1949) (2nd time) - Leonid Melnikov (16 December 1949 - 4 June 1953)
- Aleksey Kirichenko (4 June 1953 - 26 December 1957)
- Nikolay Podgorny (26 December 1957 - 2 July 1963)
- Pyotr Shelest (2 July 1963 -25 May 1972)
- Vladimir Shcherbitsky (25 May 1972 - 28 September 1989)
- Vladimir IvashkoVladimir IvashkoVladimir Antonovich Ivashko , was briefly the acting General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union during the period from 24 August 1991 to 29 August 1991. On 24 August Mikhail Gorbachev resigned, and on 29 August the CPSU was suspended by the Supreme Soviet...
(28 September 1989 - 22 June 1990) - Stanislav Gurenko (22 June 1990 - 1 September 1991)
Party Congresses
There were 28 Congresses with the last one consisting out of two stages. There also were three consolidated conferences of the party from 1926 to 1932. At the second stage of the last Congress there were 273 members in the Central Committee.First Congress, July 1918
This took place in Moscow and decided to call for preparations for an armed uprising against the occupying Central PowersCentral Powers
The Central Powers were one of the two warring factions in World War I , composed of the German Empire, the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Ottoman Empire, and the Kingdom of Bulgaria...
forces and Hetman
Hetman
Hetman was the title of the second-highest military commander in 15th- to 18th-century Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, which together, from 1569 to 1795, comprised the Polish-Lithuanian Commonwealth, or Rzeczpospolita....
Pavlo Skoropadskyi’s dictatorship. There were only 15 members in the Central Committee and six candidates.It reversed the decision adopted that April by a preliminary council in Tahanroh to established an independent Ukrainian bolshevik party with a membership in the envisaged Third International apart from the Russian party.
Second Congress, October 1918
This also took place in Moscow. Joseph StalinJoseph Stalin
Joseph Vissarionovich Stalin was the Premier of the Soviet Union from 6 May 1941 to 5 March 1953. He was among the Bolshevik revolutionaries who brought about the October Revolution and had held the position of first General Secretary of the Communist Party of the Soviet Union's Central Committee...
was elected to the Central Committee.
Third Congress, March 1919
This congress took place in Kharkov. A new central committee with a majority of Left CommunistsLeft communism
Left communism is the range of communist viewpoints held by the communist left, which criticizes the political ideas of the Bolsheviks at certain periods, from a position that is asserted to be more authentically Marxist and proletarian than the views of Leninism held by the Communist International...
was elected. This prompted the Eight Congress
8th Congress of the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks)
The 8th Congress of the Russian Communist Party was held in Moscow 18 - 23 March, 1919.The Congress was attended by 301 voting delegates who represented 313,766 Party members...
of the Russian Communist Party to pass the following motion: ""It is necessary to have a unified communist party with a unified central committee ... All decisions of the RCP and its leading organs are absolutely binding for all parts of the party, independent of their national composition. The central committees of the Ukrainian, Lettish and Lithuanian communists are conferred the rights of regional committees of the party; they are to be unreservedly subordinate to the central committee of the RCP."
Fourth Congress, March 17–23, 1920
The BorotbistsBorotbists
The Borotba Party was a peasant based left-nationalist political party in Ukraine. It arose in May 1918 after the split in the Ukrainian Socialist-Revolutionary Party on the basis of supporting Soviet power in Ukraine. Similar to Russian Left-SR it got its name from the central organ of the...
were forced to dissolve themselves and their erstwile members were permitted to join the CP(b)U. Vasyl Ellan-Blakytny and Shumsky drawn from the Borotbist leadership were elected to the Committee and the Borotbist Central Committee passed a resolution dissolving the Borotbist party and its central committee. All members were instructed to apply for CP(B)U membership. Nearly 4,000 out of approximately 5,000 Borotbists were admitted to the CP(B)U.
Later congresses
From 1919 to 1934 all meetings were conducted in Kharkov.There were three major Committees and several Bureaus. Each committee had members and candidates to members each with certain degree of obligations. The members and candidates to the committees were elected at the Party Congress. The number of members varied from one gathering to the next usually in ascending sequence. During the Great Purge
Great Purge
The Great Purge was a series of campaigns of political repression and persecution in the Soviet Union orchestrated by Joseph Stalin from 1936 to 1938...
the numbers remarkably declined as well as one of the committees, Central Control Committee, was disbanded. The first members were elected in 1918, 15 members of the Central Committee, six candidates as well as three members and two candidates of the Revision Committee. In 1920 the Central Control Committee was formed and by 1934 the Party accounted for some 191 members and 45 candidates in all committees. In 1937 there were only 71 members and 40 candidates in two committees. By 1990 the number of members grew just over 300 members.