№ 3 - 2005
Alyushin A.L.
Breaches of Legal Continuity in 20th Century Russia’s History

In the article, the author undertakes analyzing the Russian legal tradition, and the legal foundations of today’s state arrangement of Russia. Retracing from this angle the Russian history in the 20th century, he demonstrates that our country’s every subsequent legal condition was preceded by a breach of legal gradualness (January 1918 — formal firm establishment of the status of Russia as Republic of Soviets and the formation of the RSFSR; December 1991 — the USSR being liquidated and the RF becoming a sovereign state; December 1993 — adoption of the Constitution which confirmed and consolidated Russia’s renovated state arrangement). In his estimation, notwithstanding the fact that the establishment of the new constitutional system in Russia in 1993 was of stabilizing and constructive significance, nevertheless, given the lack of a definite juridical appraisal of continuity between the legal systems that were replacing one another for the period from 1918 to 1993, and given the serious flaws in the legal mechanism through which the transition to the new legal condition was realized, the legal grounds of the said event are very contradictory. As the author concludes, today’s constitutional system of Russia, with all its outward legitimacy and firmness, rests upon rather shaky a foundation.