V. I. Lenin

“Dual” Subordination and Legality [1]

To Comrade Stalin for the Political Bureau

The question of the procuratorship has given rise to disagreement on the commission appointed by the Central Committee to direct
the proceedings of the All-Russia Central Executive Committee session. If
these disagreements do not cause this question to be brought before the
Political Bureau automatically, I propose, in view of its extreme
importance, that it be brought up in any case.

In substance, the point at issue is the following: On the question of the
procuratorship, the majority of the commission elected by the All-Russia
Central Executive Committee expressed opposition to the proposal that local
procurators should be appointed solely by the central authority and he
subordinate solely to the latter. The majority demands what is called
dual” subordination, the system that applies to all local officials,
i.e., subordination to the central authority in the shape of the respective
People’s Commissariat, and also to the Gubernia Executive
Committee.

The same majority of the commission of the All-Russia Central Executive
Committee denies the right of local procurators to challenge the legality of
decisions passed by gubernia executive committees, and by local authorities
generally.

I cannot imagine on what grounds this obviously fallacious decision of
the majority of the commission of the All Russia Central Executive Committee
can be justified. The only argument I have neard in support of it is that
defence of ’dual” subordination in this case means legitimate
opposition to bureaucratic centralism, defending the necessary independence
of the local authorities, and protecting the officials of the gubernia
executive committees from high-handed conduct by the central authorities. Is
there anything high-handed in the view that law cannot be Kaluga law or
Kazan law, but that it must be uniform all-Russia law, and even uniform for
the entire federation of Soviet Republics? The underlying fallacy of the
view which has prevailed among the majority of the commission of the
All-Russia Central Executive Committee is that they wrongly apply the
principle of “dual” subordination. ’Dual” subordination is needed where it is necessary to allow for a really
inevitable difference. Agriculture in Kaluga Guhernia differs from that in
Kazan Gubernia. The same thing can be said about industry; and it can be
said about administration, or management, as a whole. Failure to make
allowances for local differences in all these matters would mean slipping
into bureaucratic centralism, and so forth. It would mean preventing the
local authorities from giving proper consideration to specific local
features, which is the basis of all rational administration. Nevertheless,
the law must be uniform, and the root evil of our social life, and of our
lack of culture, is our pandering to the ancient Russian view and
semi-savage habit of mind, which wishes to preserve Kaluga law as distinct
from Kazan law. It must be borne in mind that, unlike the administration
authorities, the procurator has no administrative powers, and has no power
to decide any question of administration. His rights and duties are reduced
to one function, viz., to see that the law is really uniformly interpreted
throughout the Republic, notwithstanding differences in local conditions,
and in spite of all local influences. The only right and duty of the
procurator is to take the matter before the court. What sort of court? Our
courts are local courts. Our judges are elected by the local Soviets. Hence,
the authority to which the procurator submits a case of infringement of the
law is a local authority which, on the one hand, must strictly abide by the
laws uniformly established for the whole Federation and, on the other hand,
in determining the penalty, must take all local circumstances into
consideration. And it has the right to say that although there has been a
definite infringement of the law in a given case, nevertheless, certain
circumstances, with which local people are closely familiar, and which come
to light in the local court, compel the court to mitigate the penalty to
which the culprit is liable, or even acquit him. Unless we strictly adhere
to this most elementary condition for maintaining the uniformity of the law
for the whole Federation, it will be utterly impossible to protect the law,
or to develop any kind of culture.

Similarly, it is wrong in principle to argue that procurators should not
have the right to challenge the decisions of gubernia executive committees,
or of other local authorities; that legally the latter come under the
jurisdiction of the Workers’ and Peasants’ Inspection.

The Workers’ and Peasants’ Inspection judges not only from
the viewpoint of the law, but also from the viewpoint of expediency. The
procurator must see to it that not a single decision passed by any local
authority runs counter to the law, and only from this aspect is it his duty
to challenge every illegal decision. He has no right to suspend such a
decision; he must only take measures to secure that the interpretation of
the law is absolutely uniform throughout the Republic. Hence, the decision
of the majority of the commission of the All-Russia Central Executive
Committee is not only utterly wrong in principle, it not only applies the
principle of “dual” subordination in an utterly fallacious
manner, but it also hinders all efforts to establish uniformity of the law
and develop at least the minimum of culture.

Further, in deciding this question, it is necessary to take into account
the weight of local influence. Undoubtedly, we are living amidst an ocean of
illegality, and local influence is one of the greatest, if not the greatest
obstacle to the establishment of law and culture. There is scarcely anyone
who has not heard that the purging of the Party revealed the prevalence, in
the majority of local purging committees, of personal spite and local strife
in the process of purging the Party. This fact is incontrovertible, and
significant. Scarcely anyone will dare deny that it is easier for the Party
to find half a score of reliable Communists who possess an adequate legal
education and are capable of resisting all purely local influences than to
find hundreds of them. And this is precisely what the question boils down
to in discussing whether procurators should be subject to “dual”
subordination, or to subordination solely to the central authorities. At the
centre we must find about half a score of men to exercise the functions of
the central procurator authority represented by the Procurator General, the
Supreme Tribunal, and the Collegium of the People’s Commissariat of
Justice (1 leave aside the question as to whether the Procurator General
should he the sole authority, or whether he should share his authority with
the Supreme Tribunal and the Collegium of the People’s Commissariat of
Justice, for this is purely a secondary question, and can be settled, one
way or another, in accordance with whether the Party will delegate vast
authority to one person, or divide that authority among the three aforesaid
bodies). These ten should work at the centre, under the closest supervision
of and in closest contact with the three Party bodies which provide the most
reliable barrier against local and personal influences, viz., the Organising
Bureau of the Central Committee, the Political Bureau of the Central
Committee, and the Central Control Commission. The latter body, i.e., the
Central Control Commission, is responsible only to the Party Congress, and
is constructed in such a way that no member of it can hold a position in any
People’s Commissariat, government department, or any organ of the
Soviet government. It is clear that under these circumstances we have the
greatest guarantee so far devised that the Party will set up a small central
collegium that will be really capable of resisting local influences and
local, and all other, bureaucracy, and which will establish real uniformity
in the application of the laws throughout the Republic, and throughout the
Federation. Hence, any mistake that this central legal collegium may make
can be at once rectified on the spot by the Party bodies, which determine
all the fundamental concepts and lay down all the fundamental rules for all
our Party and Soviet activities throughout the Republic.

To depart from this would mean dragging in on the sly a view which nobody
can defend openly and frankly, viz., that culture and law, which is its
necessary concomitant, are so highly developed in our country that we can
guarantee to find hundreds of absolutely irreproachable procurators capable
of resisting all local influences, and of establishing uniformity of the law
throughout the Republic by their own efforts.

To sum up, I draw the conclusion that to defend the “dual”
subordination of procurators, and to deprive them of the right to
challenge any decision passed by the local authorities, is not only wrong
in principle, not only hinders our fundamental task of constantly
introducing respect for the law, but is also an expression of the
interests and prejudices of local bureaucrats and local influences, i.e.,
the most pernicious wall that stands between the working people and the
local and central Soviet authorities, as well as the central authority of
the Russian Communist Party.

I therefore propose that the Central Committee should reject “dual” subordination in this matter, establish the
subordination of local procurators solely to the central authority, and
allow the procurator to retain the right and duty to challenge the legality
of any decision or order passed by the local authorities with the proviso,
however, that he shall have no right to suspend such decisions; he shall
only have the right to bring them before the courts.

Lenin

Endnotes

[1] Lenin wrote
this letter in connection with the drawing up of the Rules of the
Procurator’s office. On May 24, 1922 the Political Bureau discussed
Lenin’s letter and accepted the recommendations in it. On May 26,
acting on the report of the special commission, the Third Session of the
Ninth All-Russia Central Executive Committee approved the Rules in
accordance with Lenin’s recommendations.