Pēteris Stučka

Pēteris Stučka, sometimes Russified to Pyotr Stuchka; ( – 25 January 1932), was a Latvian jurist and communist politician, leader of the pro-Bolshevik puppet government in Latvia during the 1918–1920 Latvian War of Independence, and later a statesman in the Soviet Union.

Biography Stučka was born in Latvia, in the Governorate of Livonia (then part of the Russian Empire). His father was a prosperous farmer, his mother was a teacher. He was educated in a German lyceum in Riga, and then St Petersburg University, where he studied law. After graduating in 1888, he returned to Latvia, where he practised as a lawyer, and was one of the leaders of the New Current movement in the late 19th century, a prolific writer and translator, and an editor of Latvian language newspapers and periodicals. He was arrested in 1897, and sentenced to five years exile in Vyatka province, where he was allowed to continue practising law.

The result, as Stučka noted in retrospect, was that "from November 1917 to 1922, law was formally lacking."

In February 1918, Stučka returned to Latvia, where he was chairman of the government of the short-lived Latvian Socialist Soviet Republic from December 1918 to August 1919. According to the writer, Victor Serge, Stučka,

After the collapse of the Latvian communist government in August 1919 after a counter-offensive by Latvian Army and allied troops, Stučka returned permanently to Russia. In 1920–32, he worked in Comintern, as a member, and was chairman of the International Control Commission in 1924–28.

In 1923, Stučka, was appointed the first Chief Justice of the Russian SFSR. He held this post until his death in 1932.

After his death on January 25, 1932, Stučka's remains were cremated and his ashes amongst those of other Communist dignitaries in the Kremlin Wall Necropolis, near Lenin's Mausoleum in Moscow's Red Square.

Family Stučka's wife, Dora Pliekšāne (1870–1950), was the sister of the Latvian poet Rainis (Jānis Pliekšāns), with whom Stučka shared a room during their law studies at St. Petersburg University. Rainis supported socialism, but stressed that national culture was also important. Although Rainis initially supported a free Latvia within a free Russia, he would later support an independent Latvian nation.

Places and organizations named in honour of Stučka

During the Soviet period, from 1958 to 1990, the University of Latvia was officially known as Pēteris Stučka Latvian State University . The town of Aizkraukle was named Stučka, after Pēteris Stučka, from the time when it was established in 1960s until the fall of Communism in 1991, when it was renamed Aizkraukle. In the GDR, Polytechnic Secondary School No. 55 in Rostock was named "Peter Stucka" in honour of the Latvian Communist.

Works

A comprehensive bibliography of the works by and about Stučka, with explanatory material in both Latvian and Russian, is: