Set of 5 gramophone double-side records in a folder - "Speech Delivered by comrade J. Stalin at the Meeting of Voters of the Stalin Electoral District, Moscow on December 11, 1937, in the Bolshoy Theatre"  

Language: Russian.

Publisher: "Gramplasttrest Moscow Factory"

Place of Publication: Moscow,

Year of Publication: 1937

CONDITION:

ALBUM: VG+

RECORDS: VG+

Audio- Part 1 (Russian) Description At a meeting of the voters of the Stalin Electoral District (December 11, 1937), in Moscow, Comrade Stalin made a speech about the importance of the electors in the new Soviet Constitution! This is an extremely rare, highly collectable, original set of 5 records of that speech. The set comes in its original vintage red color folder/bag with Stalin's head and the title of the records on the front. This is one of a kind find- a piece of early Soviet history. Text (Bigining of the speech) The Chairman : I call upon our candidate Comrade Stalin to speak. (The voters greet Comrade Stalin's appearance in the rostrum with a loud ovation lasting for several minutes. All those in the hall of the Bolshoi Theatre rise and greet Comrade Stalin. Continuous cries from the hall: "Long live great Stalin, Hurrah!" "Hurrah for Comrade Stalin, the creator of the Soviet Constitution, the most democratic in the world!" "Long live Comrade Stalin, leader of the oppressed throughout the world, Hurrah!" ) Stalin : Comrades, to tell you the truth, I had no intention of making a speech. But our respected Nikita Sergeyevich dragged me to this meeting by sheer force, so to speak. "Make a good speech," he said. What shall I talk about, exactly what sort of speech? Everything that had to be said before the elections has already been said and said again in the speeches of our leading comrades, Kalinin, Molotov, Voroshilov, Kaganovich and many other responsible comrades. What can be added to these speeches? What is needed, they say, are explanations of certain questions connected with the election campaign. What explanations, on what questions? Everything that had to be explained has been explained and explained again in the well-known Addresses of the Bolshevik Party, the Young Communist League, the All-Union Central Council of Trade Unions, the Aviation and Chemical Defence Society and the Committee of Physical Culture. What can be added to these explanations? Of course, one can make a light sort of speech about everything and nothing. (Laughter.) Perhaps such a speech would amuse the audience. They say there are some great hands at such speeches not only over there, in the capitalist countries, but here too, in the Soviet country. (Laughter and applause.) But, firstly, I am no great hand at such speeches. Secondly, is it worth while indulging in amusing things just now when all of us Bolsheviks are, as they say, "up to our necks" in, work? I think not. Clearly, you cannot make a good speech under such circumstances. However, since I have taken the floor, I will have, of course, to say at least something one way or another. (Loud applause.) First of all, I would like to express my thanks (applause ) to the electors for the confidence they have shown me. (Applause.) ADDITIONAL INDO Speech Delivered by Comrade J. Stalin at a Meeting of Voters of the Stalin Electoral Area, Moscow Notes on this document It may come as a surprise to many that Soviet Communist Party leader Iosif Stalin ran campaigns for electoral political office in the USSR — not once but twice. Not surprisingly, Stalin won both times. The document here is the text of Stalin's one and only "stump speech" from his first electoral "race." The institution to which Stalin aspired was the Supreme Soviet, a large bicameral parliament created by the so-called "Stalin Constitution" of 1936. From the early 1930s the Soviet Union's calculated and systematic leadership cult was in full swing. Official ideology proclaimed the achievement of socialism to be at hand and a modification of the political superstructure in the form of expanded socialist democracy was deemed by the party officialdom to be the order of the day. Competetive races were strongly hinted at. Even the Great Stalin would run for office, it was declared. This is not to say that Stalin's race would be anything other than a formulaic pre-ordained vote of confidence, a plan made readily apparent when it was announced that Stalin had been nominated by each of the 3,346 electoral districts as their desired deputy. As Stalin could stand for election in only one precinct, the central Moscow district, already deemed to be the "Stalin Electoral District," was chosen, for reasons which seem apparent. During the first part of December, the top leaders of the Soviet state had each made their own public speeches in the nation's capital as part of the electoral festivities. On Saturday night, December 11, 1937, it was at last the supreme leader's turn. A "special meeting" was held in the ornate Bolshoi Theater with Nikita Sergeivich Khrushchev, head of the Moscow party organization, serving as chairman. Preliminary speeches of nomination were made by two factory workers, a doctor, a teacher, and a housewife while top party leaders sat in the audience and applauded these modest oratorical efforts by these chosen representatives of the masses.1 Called to the rostrum to speak by Khrushchev, Stalin was met by an extended ovation punctuated by what seems to have been premeditated shouts of adulation. Clad in his trademarked khaki tunic, Stalin delivered a rather sedate and at times folksy 25 minute address to the carefully selected throng of "electors," a speech interrupted some 30 times by applause. The speech was almost certainly broadcast by radio and was recorded and reproduced as a set of five 78 rpm records. The text of this "Speech Delivered at a Meeting of Voters of the Stalin Electoral Area" was quickly published in Moscow in pamphlet form. An English translation soon followed, produced by the main state publishing house under the imprint of the "Co-operative Publishing Society of Foreign Workers in the USSR." Strangely, this speech was never published in pamphlet form by the Communist Party of the United States, nor by the CPGB in the UK. This situation was doubly peculiar given that this was one of only a tiny handful of speeches delivered by Stalin after 1936. Lest conspiracy theory creep in, scholars should be advised that the speech was in no way "secret" from CPUSA and CPGB members, as it appeared in the daily party press and as the lead article in the January 1938 issue of the Comintern's widely circulated theoretical magazine, The Communist International. Yet, further publication of the 1937 Election Speech remained extremely sporadic. The speech was not included in any edition of Stalin's selected works, nor in Stalin's collected works.2 Indeed, Stalin's 1937 election speech was only officially published in English by either the Soviet government or the Anglo-American communist movement one other time, as the second part of a Moscow-issued booklet headed by Stalin's 1946 electoral speech. The text of this later edition was expurgated to conveniently omit Stalin's tip of the hat to Nikolai Ezhov, former head of the secret police who was shot as an "enemy of the people" on Feb. 4, 1940, after 300 days of investigative incarceration. Scholars should be advised that it does it necessarily follow that this "misstep" in Stalin's 1937 oration was the cause of the omission of this speech from the definitive 11th Russian Edition of Stalin's selected works in 1939.