Extraordinary Seventeenth All-Russian Congress of Soviets

a congress held in Moscow from Jan. 15 to Jan. 21,1937. The congress was attended by 1,338 delegates and represented 43 nationalities. Industrial workers made up 47.6 percent of the delegates, peasants, 16 percent, and nonindustrial workers, 36.4 percent.

The congress was convened to consider and ratify the new constitution of the RSFSR; the draft of the constitution had been drawn up in accordance with the Constitution of the USSR, which had been ratified by the Extraordinary Eighth Congress of Soviets of the USSR. The need for the RSFSR to adopt a new constitution stemmed from the economic and social changes that had taken place in the republic and in the Soviet Union as a whole. Such changes included the elimination of the exploiting classes, the enhancement of the moral and political unity of Soviet society, and the strengthening of friendship and cooperation among the peoples of the USSR.

M. I. Kalinin delivered a report on the draft of the new constitution. Under his chairmanship an editorial commission of 164 members examined amendments and additions to the draft and worked out a final text, which was ratified as the new constitution on Jan. 21,1937. The congress adopted a resolution enjoining the All-Russian Central Executive Committee, elected at the Sixteenth All-Russian Congress of Soviets, to draft and ratify an election statute based on the new constitution and to establish a timetable for elections to the Supreme Soviet of the RSFSR.