No More Learning

The
Soviet of Nationalities, a unique institution in the
history of parliamentary development at the time it was
set up, reflects the multi-national character of the Soviet
commonwealth and the particular interests of the various
national groups. The Constitution gives special recog-
nition throughout to the many different ethnic minorities
of the U. S. S. R. This theme is of great importance and
I shall devote the next chapter to it.
* In the national elections of 1946 and 1950 both Soviets added several
extra members, elected by military units serving outside of the country. In
1950 the number of additional Deputies chosen for each chamber was seven.
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? THE SOVIET COHSTITUTIOH
The term of office for each house in the Supreme
Soviet is four years. The Supreme Soviet meets twice
annually. It names the Supreme Court of the U. S. S. R.
for a term of five years. It likewise elects a Presidium or
Executive Committee of thirty-three members to carry
on its functions when it is not in session. Foreign corres-
pondents often refer to the Chairman of the Presidium,
at present Nikolai M. Shvernik, former head of the trade
union movement, as the Soviet "President. " He repre-
sents the Soviet Government at many official functions,
his duties and powers conforming in considerable degree
to those of the President of France.
The Supreme Soviet also chooses the Council of Min-
isters of the U. S. S. R. , which has about sixty members.
This Council corresponds to the Cabinet in America and
England and constitutes the Government of the U. S. S. R.
Its Chairman, at present Joseph Stalin, is Premier of the
Soviet Union, and it has more than twelve Deputy Chair-
men. The Council of Ministers is responsible and ac-
countable to the Presidium, which has the power to annul
its decisions and orders "in case they do not conform
to law" (Article 49f). And the Presidium is in its turn
accountable to the Supreme Soviet.
Thus the Soviet Constitution follows the British pat-
tern, in form at least, in setting up direct parliamentary
responsibility for the central government instead of giv-
ing a chief executive the power, as does the American
Constitution, to continue his administration even after
the highest legislative body has repudiated him. Like-
wise it resembles the British model in doing without a
popularly elected chief executive. Again, the Soviet sys-
tem is like the British rather than the American in that
the Supreme Court does not have the power to declare
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? SOVIET CIVILIZATION
legislation unconstitutional. The final court of authority
on legislation in Soviet Russia is the Supreme Soviet.
Many constitutional experts believe that placing ulti-
mate power in the legislature is, other things being
equal, a more democratic arrangement than the Ameri-
can system of checks and balances.
The immense scope of a socialist government under
which there is public ownership and operation of the
main means of production and distribution becomes
clear in viewing the functions of the Council of Ministers.
Whereas the American Cabinet administers only nine
separate departments, the Soviet is responsible for fifty-
six. The Council of Ministers (Cabinet) includes the
heads of fifty-one Ministries* and the chairmen of five
special bodies of ministerial rank, namely, the Committee
on Arts, the State Planning Committee, the State Com-
mittee for Construction, the State Committee for Food
and Industrial Commodity Supplies and the State Com-
mittee for Material and Technical Supplies to the Na-
tional Economy.
The Cabinet also has direct charge of more than
twenty Chief Administrations, Administrations, Bureaus,
Commissions, Councils or Committees which do not have
ministerial status, but whose chairmen sit in the Cabinet
in a consultative capacity. Examples of such bodies are
the Central Statistical Administration, the Chief Adminis-
tration of Protective Afforestation, the Academy of Sci-
ences of the U. S. S. R. , the Committee on the Affairs of
Physical Culture and Sport, the Council on Affairs of the
Orthodox Church and the State Arbitration Bureau,
which has the duty of ironing out disagreements and dif-
? Until 1946 the official title of Soviet Ministries was People's Commis-
sariats and of Ministers, People's Commissars.
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? THE SOVIET COHSTITUTIOH
Acuities between the various Ministries and sub-Min-
istries.
Twenty-nine of the Ministries under the Soviet Cab-
inet are in the Ail-Union category with nation-wide scope
and function. They are as follows (Article 77):
Agricultural Machine-Building Industry
Agricultural Stocks
Armaments
Automobile and Tractor Industry
Aviation Industry
Chemical Industry
Coal Industry
Communications
Communications Equipment Industry
Construction and Road-Building Machinery
Construction of Heavy Industry Enterprises
Construction of Machine-Building Enterprises
Electrical Industry
Electric Power Stations
Ferrous Metallurgy
Foreign Trade
Geology
Heavy Machine-Building Industry
Labor Reserves
Machine-Tool Building Industry
Machine-Building and Instrument-Building
Merchant Marine
Navy
Non-Ferrous Metallurgy
Oil Industry
Railroads
River Fleet
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? SOVIET CIVILIZATION
Ship-Building Industry
Transport Machine-Building Industry
The central Soviet Government also is in charge of
twenty-one Union-Republican Ministries which, "as a
rule, direct the branches of state administration entrusted
to them through the corresponding Ministries of the
Union Republics" (Article 76). These corresponding
Ministries of each of the sixteen constituent Republics
have a dual responsibility and accountability, being
"subordinate both to the Council of Ministers of the
Union Republic and to the corresponding Union-Repub-
lican Ministries of the U. S. S. R. " (Article 87). The
twenty-two Union-Republican Ministries are (Article
78):
Agriculture
Army
Building Materials Industry
Cinematography
Cotton Growing
Finance
Fishing Industry
Food Industry
Foreign Affairs
Forestry
Higher Education
Internal Affairs
Justice
Light Industry
Meat and Dairy Industry
Paper and Woodworking
Public Health
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? THE SOVIET CONSTITUTION
State Control
State Farms
State Security
Timber Industry-
Trade
The economic, cultural and political affairs assigned
to the Union-Republican Ministries are run jointly by
the federal and the Republican governments. The Union
Republics administer a few Republican Ministries which
are concerned with local affairs and have no opposite
numbers in the federal government. To summarize,
there are altogether four classes of Ministries in the
governments of the U. S. S. R. and the Union Repub-
lics: the exclusively Republican Ministries just men-
tioned, the Republics' Union-Republican Ministries, the
federal Union-Republican Ministries (bearing the same
names as the corresponding Republican departments),
and the All-Union Ministries which are the responsibility
of the federal administration alone.
The governmental structures of the Union Republics,
and of the subdivisions within them called Autonomous
Soviet Socialist Republics, are somewhat less complicated
than those of the federal state, the most important dif-
ference being that their Supreme Soviets are unicameral
instead of bicameral. This means, of course, that they
do not have a separate Chamber of Nationalities. Repre-
sentation in the Supreme Soviets of the Union Republics
varies, according to size of population, from one deputy
for every 5,000 inhabitants to one for every 150,000.
For the Supreme Soviets of the Autonomous Republics
the general rule is one representative for every 3,000 to
5,000 inhabitants.
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? SOVIET CIVILIZATION
GOVERNMENT STRUCTURE OF THE U. S. S. R.
SUPREME COURT
OF THE U. S. S. R.
PROCURATOR
OF THE U. S. S. R.
COUNCIL OF MINISTERS
OF THE U. S. S. R.
STALIN, CHAIRMAN (PREMIER)
COMMITTEES
STATE
PLANNING
COMMITTEE
OF THE U. S. S. R.
STATE COMMITTEE
FOR MATERIAL
AND TECHNICAL
SUPPLIES TO THE
NATIONAL
ECONOMY
and Others
ALL-UNION
MINISTRIES
Armsmentj
Automobile and
Tractor Industry
Coal Industry
Communications
Electric Power
Stations
Foreign Trade
Machine-Tool Build-
ing Industry
Merchant Marine
Oil Industry
Railroads
River Fleet
and Others
UNION-REPUBLICAN
MINISTRIES OF THE
U. S. S. R.
Agriculture
Army
Finance
Food Industry
Foreign Affairs
Higher Education
Justice
Light Industry
Public Health
State Security
Timber Industry
and Others
STATE BANK
SAVINGS
BANKS
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? THE SOVIET COHSTITUTIOJi
GOVERNMENT STRUCTURE OF A UNION REPUBLIC
STATE PLANNING
COMMITTEE
OF THE U. S. S. R.
SUPREME COURT
OF THE U. S. S. R.
PROCURATOR
OF THE U. S. S. R.
UNION-REPUBLICAN!
MINISTRIES
OF THE U. S. S. R.
SUPREME COURT
OF THE
UNION REPUBLIC
PROCURATOR
OF THE
lUNION REPUBLIC
COUNCIL OF MINISTERS
OF THE UNION REPUBLIC
STATE PLANNING
COMMITTEE
OF THE
UNION REPUBLIC
COMMITTEE
ON CULTURAL
AND EDUCATIONAL
INSTITUTIONS
and Other Committees
VARYING FROM
REPUBLIC TO
REPUBLIC
REPUBLICAN MINISTRIES
EDUCATION
LOCAL INDUSTRY
MUNICIPAL ECONOMY
SOCIAL MAINTENANCE
and OTHERS VARYING
FROM REPUBLIC TO
REPUBLIC
UNION-REPUBLICAN
MINISTRIES OF THE
U. S. S. R.
AGRICULTURE
ARMY
FINANCE
FOOD INDUSTRY
FOREIGN AFFAIRS
HIGHER EDUCATION
JUSTICE
LIGHT INDUSTRY
PUBLIC HEALTH
STATE SECURITY
TIMBER INDUSTRY
and OTHERS
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? SOVIET CIVILIZATION
In Chapter XI the 1936 Constitution outlines an
electoral system which contains five new provisions that
signify a real advance and that show, to my mind, a grad-
ual evolution toward full-fledged democracy in the Soviet
Union. In the first place, the Constitution renders the
ballot universal, giving the franchise to certain groups
and individuals formerly barred from voting because they
were considered too hostile to the Soviet state or too
unreliable. Article 135 reads: "Elections of deputies are
universal: all citizens of the U. S. S. R. who have reached
the age of eighteen, irrespective of race or nationality,
sex, religion, educational and residential qualifications,
social origin, property status or past activities, have the
right to vote in the election of deputies, with the excep-
tion of insane persons and persons who have been con-
victed by a court of law and whose sentences include
deprivation of electoral rights. "
In the second place, the 1936 Constitution asserts the
principle of equal suffrage for all and does not discrimi-
nate against any group or class. The 1924 Constitution
provided for unequal representation of workers and
peasants in the chief elective bodies, one deputy being
elected for every 25,000 city electors as compared with
one for every 125,000 people in the rural districts. The
reason for this disproportion was that the agricultural
population was at the time still predominantly illiterate
and wedded to individualistic methods of farming. Only
with the progress of education among the peasants and
the triumph of collective farming was it deemed wise for
the Socialist Republic to eliminate the weighting of the
ballot in favor of the progressive city workers. In the
United States today the ballot is still unequal in the
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? THE SOVIET COHSTITUTIOH
sense of being generally weighted against the urban
population.
In the third place, the 1936 Constitution establishes
secret voting in the election of all the different grades
of Soviet. Previously elections had been conducted by
a show of hands at open meetings, in the fashion of the
old New England town meeting. Again, in the earlier
years of the Soviet Republic there did not exist the cul-
tural prerequisites among the largely illiterate Soviet
people for carrying through efficiently the processes of
the secret ballot. The simple show of hands, however
subject to abuse, was the natural and intelligent pro-
cedure for a considerable period.
In the fourth place, the 1936 Constitution does away
with the old method of indirect voting for. members of
the upper Soviets and replaces it with the method of
direct popular vote.
Under the 1924 Constitution the
voters elected directly only the village and city govern-
ments, which sent representatives to the regional and
Union Republic Soviets, which in turn chose the deputies
to the federal All-Union Congress of Soviets. This
hierarchical system was similar to the election of United
States Senators by the State legislatures until 1913. Now
in the Soviet Union the electorate votes separately and
directly for the delegates to each Soviet.
In the fifth place, the direct ballot guaranteed by the
1936 Constitution makes possible the direct recall of
deputies to any Soviet during their term of office, where-
as previously such recall was limited to the lower Soviets.
Article 142 states: "It is the duty of every deputy to
report to his electors on his work and on the work of the
Soviet of Working People's Deputies, and he is liable
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? SOVIET CIVILIZATION
to be recalled at any time in the manner established by
law upon decision of a majority of the electors. " The
Soviet people hold their deputies up to rigorous stand-
ards of representation, frequently becoming dissatisfied
with them and using the power of recall. This method
of democratic vigilance is highly developed in Soviet
Russia.
Since there is only one legal political party in the
U. S. S. R. , the Communist Party, the regulations for nomi-
nation to the Soviets are of especial importance. Article
141 lays down the rules: "Candidates for election are
nominated according to electoral areas. The right to
nominate candidates is secured to public organizations
and societies of the working people: Communist Party
organizations, trade unions, cooperatives, youth organi-
zations and cultural societies. " The only other mention
of the Communist Party occurs in Article 126 of the Con-
stitution which declares that "the most active and polit-
ically most conscious citizens in the ranks of the working
class and other sections of the working people unite in
the Communist Party of the Soviet Union (Bolsheviks),
which is the vanguard of the working people in their
struggle to strengthen and develop the socialist system
and is the leading core of all organizations of the work-
ing people, both public and state. "
The Soviet Constitution has often been denounced
as "a mere fraudulent facade" on the grounds that it
does not adequately describe the pervasive and all-im-
portant role of the Communist Party in Soviet life. How-
ever, since the Constitution explicitly states that the
Communist Party "is the leading core of all organiza-
tions . . . both public and state," I think that it does
indicate the importance of the Communist Party. It is
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? THE SOVIET COHSTiTUTIOH
appropriate to recall that the American Constitution
makes no mention of any political party whatsoever and
does not even hint at a two-party system or at the part
that political parties have played in American democracy.
In fact, the Founding Fathers of the American Republic
did not envisage a two-party or multi-party system and
felt strongly that parties would be a menace to the new
democratic state. Two distinct and separate political
parties did not come into existence for fifteen years after
the Revolution of 1776; and no candidate was nominated
to oppose George Washington in the first two elections
for President.
A one-party system, then, in which the nominations
are the fundamental thing and in which a single slate
is ratified in elections, does not necessarily prevent true
democracy. In the United States today we have many
examples of democratic single-slate voting. Frequently
the Republican and Democratic Parties agree on the
same candidates for judgeships. In Leonia, New Jersey,
a community of 7,000 people, the Leonia Civic Confer-
ence, a non-partisan group, selects the best candidates
for local offices whom it can find, regardless of political
labels, and nominates them. Almost without exception
the single slate it recommends is elected. The Civic Con-
ference is composed of delegates from the local Demo-
cratic and Republican organizations, from the men's and
women's clubs, and from parents' and veterans' groups.
Any organization with fifty members can send a delegate
to the Conference, or any twenty-five citizens who sign
a petition. In America, too, there are a huge number of
non-governmental societies, associations, councils and
committees most of which elect their officers through the
uncontested single-slate method.
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? SOVIET CIVILIZATION
It is the Soviet and Marxist theory that different polit-
ical parties arise from conflicting property interests on
the part of different economic classes such as workers and
capitalists, landowners and farmers (or peasants), small
businessmen and monopolists; and that as long as such
groupings exist political freedom, in whatever degree it
can be attained under such circumstances, does demand
different political parties. The Marxist idea is that when
these classes have been eliminated, as in the Soviet Union,
then the need for a multiplicity of parties also disappears.
Whether or not this theory is sound, we cannot insist or
expect that the evolution of democracy in the U. S. S. R.
follow the institutional pattern of the decidedly imperfect
democracies with which the world is already acquainted.
The Communist Party of the Soviet Union, number-
ing in 1952 over 6,000,000 out of an adult population
of some 130,000,000, far from trying to keep all govern-
ment posts to itself, makes every effort to draw non-Party
people into elective and other offices. In the highest
legislative body in the land the percentage of non-Party
members has tended to grow larger since the early years
of the Soviet Republic. From 10 percent in 1924 this
ratio rose to 23. 9 percent in the Supreme Soviet elected
in 1937, although it fell to 17 percent in that chosen in
1950. The percentage of non-Party deputies noticeably
increases in the lower Soviets, rising in 1939 to 47. 4
percent in the city Soviets, to 53. 2 in the town Soviets
and to 76. 9 in the village Soviets. In the elections held
in 1947-48 for all Soviets, including regional and pro-
vincial, below the level of the Union Republic Soviets,
the figure for non-Party representatives was 62. 6 per-
cent.
In any of the Soviets, however, whatever the Com-
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? THE SOVIET COHSTITUTIOH
munist Party supports in the way of legislation practically
always goes through; and whatever it opposes is practic-
ally always lost. The Central Committee of the Party,
with its more than seventy members, meets every four
months. It elects an executive committee called the
Political Bureau (Politburo) ,* composed of ten members
and four alternates. The Politburo, on which Premier
Stalin, General Secretary of the Communist Party since
1922, and his closest associates sit, is far and away the
most powerful political unit in Soviet Russia at present,
overshadowing the Government itself. The power of the
Communist Party nationally and locally does not imply
that the governmental and administrative machinery out-
lined by the Constitution is a meaningless shell; for what-
ever the power of the Party, it is this constitutional
machinery which it and the people as a whole use to carry
on the political and economic affairs of the country.
And there is wide popular participation in government
through the Soviets, with the population maintaining
close contact with their deputies in the Soviets at all
levels.
Of democratic significance are the relatively large
number of elective positions in the U. S. S. R. "Ten times
as many Soviet citizens hold elective posts as are chosen
by the American people. . . . Moscow has 1,200 members
in its Council, whereas New York has twenty-seven. . . .
Each neighborhood of about a quarter of a million people
has its own governing council, with considerable author-
ity in local school, housing, police, retailing and civil serv-
* In August, 1952, the Central Committee announced that under a new
statute to be voted on at the Nineteenth Congress of the Soviet Communist
Party in October, 1952, a Presidium takes the place of the Politburo and is
"to guide the work of the Central Committee between plenary sessions. " For
the complete text of the statute see The New York Times, August 21, 1952.
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? SOVIET CIVILIZATION
ice affairs. Delegates are elected on the basis of one to
every thousand people, or about 250 families. In terms
of New York that means about one elected representative
for each side of each city block. Certainly, government
could hardly get closer to the people than that. "3
It seems to me that there is in the Soviet Union a
mixed governmental system in which dictatorship is con-
joined with strong and growing elements of democracy.
The function of the Communist Party, exercising what
Sidney and Beatrice Webb called its "vocation of leader-
ship," is to act as guide and educator of the people until
sthey are fully versed in the intricacies of self-government.
To this thought we must add the point that as long
as Soviet Russia feels threatened by "capitalistic encircle-
ment" and foreign aggression, Soviet democratic institu-
tions will be subject to ups and downs and the dictator-
ship will remain.
According to Marxist theory, not only the dictator-
ship but the state itself is destined to "wither away" in
the Communist society that is eventually established. I
believe that in the Soviet Union the dictatorship will
probably give way in due course to a truly democratic
government. But I have never been able to accept the
thesis that the U. S. S. R. or any other country would be
able to dispense entirely with the state as an administra-
tive apparatus and as the final authority in nation-wide
economic planning. The Soviet State, however, as the
guardian of the interests of a special class, will no doubt
disappear in time. And when that happens, there will
no longer be a need for the Communist Party, as Soviet
theoreticians predict.
It is regrettable that during the past few years the
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? THE SOVIET COHSTITUTIOH
Soviet dictatorship has manifestly become tighter instead
of relaxing. But this is not surprising in light of the
menacing international situation that has come into
being since World War II and the widespread discussion
of a Third World War directed against the Soviet Repub-
lic. The Soviet Government has operated on the prin-
ciple that it is better to preserve the new institutions of
socialism, even through the most rigorous and ruthless
measures, in order that those institutions may keep on
developing instead of being destroyed at the outset.
3. The New Rights of Man
The most striking and novel section of the Soviet
Constitution is Chapter X entitled "Fundamental Rights
and Duties of Citizens. " In this Chapter the Constitu-
tion advances far beyond any other such state document
in history and assures to all citizens certain basic eco-
nomic, social and cultural rights that had never before
been considered constitutional prerogatives of citizen-
ship as such. According to eye-witnesses, the Soviet dele-
gates to the constitutional convention cheered each Ar-
ticle of this Chapter, and only of this Chapter, in the
final reading and adoption of the Constitution.
In accordance with the priority of economics in Soviet
theory, Article 118, laying down the fundamental eco-
nomic foundation for the many different aspects of citizen-
ship, comes first in Chapter X. This Article reads:
"Citizens of the U. S. S. R. have the right to work, that is,
are guaranteed the right to employment and payment
for their work in accordance with its quantity and qual-
ity. The right to work is ensured by the socialist organi-
zation of the national economy, the steady growth of the
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? SOVIET CIVILIZATION
productive forces of Soviet society, the elimination of
the possibility of economic crises, and the abolition of
unemployment. "
Although we must keep a weather eye on future
developments, it does indeed seem true that Soviet social-
ism, without depending on the stimulus of armaments
or war, has been able to eliminate the general economic
crises and mass unemployment characteristic of the cap-
italist world. This is why the Constitution dares declare,
in effect, that unemployment is unconstitutional.
The next Article also deals with economic affairs:
"The right to rest and leisure is ensured by the establish-
ment of the eight-hour workday for office employees and
by reducing the workday to seven and six hours for a
number of arduous professions and to four hours in
factory shops with particularly arduous working condi-
tions; by establishing annual vacations with full pay for
workers and office employees; by providing a wide net-
work of sanitariums, rest homes and clubs to serve the
working people. "
Vacations with pay in Soviet Russia range from two
weeks to two months. There are of course a multitude
of opportunities for recreation. In every town and city --
and in most villages -- there is at least one public library.
Theatre and opera, concert and motion picture are avail-
able to everyone. The municipalities and the trade
unions provide ample facilities for sports. The "parks
of culture and rest," offering the most varied recreational
programs, are outstanding features in most Soviet cities.
Outdoor life, taking advantage of river, lake, beach,
mountain and forest, is encouraged throughout the
U. S. S. R.
Article 120 is concerned with various forms of social
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? THE SOVIET CONSTITUTION
security: "Citizens of the U. S. S. R. have the right to
maintenance in old age and also in case of sickness or
loss of capacity to work. This right is ensured by the
extensive development of social insurance of workers
and employees at state expense, free medical service for
the working people and the provision of a wide network
of health resorts for the use of the working people. "
It is to be noted that in this Article covering social
security there is no mention of unemployment insurance,
which had been guaranteed by the Soviet Labor Code
up till 1930 and which is of such vital importance in
capitalist countries. To repeat, involuntary unemploy-
ment has disappeared in the U. S. S. R. , and so unemploy-
ment insurance would be superfluous. Old age pensions
begin at the age of fifty-five for women and at sixty for
men. The free medical service includes dental care.
In the United States we are accustomed to hear viru-
lent criticism of socialized medicine, but this new system
of health instituted in the U. S. S. R. is, in my judgment,
one of the greatest of Soviet achievements. England
under the Labor Government successfully established a
similar system. I do not claim that every Soviet citizen
is obtaining the best medical care; for Soviet medicine
still lacks adequate supplies and a sufficient number of
well-trained physicians. I do claim, however, that no one
in Soviet Russia lacks proper medical service because he
cannot afford it.
The fact is that the health of the Soviet people has
made tremendous progress since 1917. The chief en-
demic diseases of Tsarist times, such as bubonic plague,
cholera, smallpox, typhus and venereal disease, are vir-
tually non-existent today. The number of typhoid cases
are more than 80 percent below the 1913 level and the
75
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