USSR CONSTITUTIONAL OVERSIGHT COMMITTEE: HISTORY, LEGAL STATUS, ACTIVITY

Abstract

This article considers the history of the creation and legal status of USSR Constitutional Oversight Committee, a specialized body established to ensure legal protection of the Constitution of the USSR. It is noted that the formation of this institution should be viewed with respect to the tasks set in the Soviet state in the late 1980s and early 1990s: democratization of state administration, overcoming separatist tendencies, implementation of radical economic reform, and formation of a socialist legal state. In the study, the author used analytical, formal-legal methods, the method of abstraction, which allowed formulating main conclusions. Analyzing the legal status of the USSR Constitutional Oversight Committee, the author comes to the conclusion that its powers were of a limited nature: in the conditions of denying the principle of separation of powers, they did not dispute the supremacy of USSR Congress of People’s Deputies in the system of state power bodies. In those years, the activities of the Committee were considered not so much as jurisdictional, but as political and legal. The article categorizes the powers of the USSR Constitutional Oversight Committee, some of which were of control nature, but most of them were of supervisory or expert-consultative nature. Investigating the practice of the the USSR Constitutional Oversight Committee, the author concludes that the legal positions contained in its decisions significantly influenced the further development of domestic legislation and constitutional justice in Russia.