The 15th Congress of the Russian Communist Party (Bolsheviks) was held during 2-19 December 1927 in Moscow. It was attended by 898 delegates with a casting vote and 771 with a consultative vote.
In October 1927, the last Left Opposition members were expelled from the 14th Central Committee, and in November 1927 Leon Trotsky and Grigory Zinoviev were expelled from the Party itself.
Oppositionists Christian Rakovsky and Lev Kamenev held brief speeches in front of the Congress. Rakovsky's speech was interrupted fifty-seven times by his opponentsâ€"Nikolai Bukharin, Martemyan Ryutin, and Lazar Kaganovich. Although, unlike Rakovsky, Kamenev used the occasion to appeal for reconciliation, he was interrupted twenty-four times by the same group.
In this triumphant Congress, Stalin's power was consolidated, with the Trotskyists and all other leading oppositionists (like Rakovsky, Kamenev and Timofei Sapronov) expelled from the Party. The congress elected the 15th Central Committee.
References
External links
- Fifteenth Congress of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolshevik) at the The Great Soviet Encyclopedia (1979)
- THE FIFTEENTH CONGRESS OF THE C.P.S.U.(B.)December 2-19, 1927, Transcripts of the speeches by J. V. Stalin From J. V. Stalin, Works; Foreign Languages Publishing House, Moscow, 1954, Vol. 10, pp. 275-382.