Russian Constituent Assembly in the context of "Decree on the system of government of Russia (1918)"

The Russian Republic, referred to as the Russian Democratic Federative Republic in the 1918 Constitution, was a short-lived state which controlled, de jure, the territory of the former Russian Empire after its proclamation by the Russian Provisional Government on 1 September (14 September, N.S.Tooltip New Style) 1917 in a decree signed by Alexander Kerensky as Minister-Chairman and Alexander Zarudny as Minister of Justice.

The government of the Russian Republic was dissolved after the Bolsheviks seized power by force on 7 November 1917. Nonetheless, a partially democratic election of the Constituent Assembly still took place later in November. On 18 January 1918, this assembly issued a decree, proclaiming Russia a democratic federal republic, but was also dissolved by the Bolsheviks on the next day after the proclamation.

The Russian Provisional Government was a provisional government of the Russian Empire and Russian Republic, announced two days before and established immediately after the abdication of Nicholas II on 2 March, O.S. [15 March 1917, N.S.], during the February Revolution. The intention of the provisional government was the organization of elections to the Russian Constituent Assembly and its convention. The provisional government, led first by Prince Georgy Lvov and then by Alexander Kerensky, lasted approximately eight months, and ceased to exist when the Bolsheviks gained power in the October Revolution in October [November, N.S.] 1917.

According to Harold Whitmore Williams, the history of the eight months during which Russia was ruled by the Provisional Government was the history of the steady and systematic disorganization of the army. The Provisional Government was a caretaker government, with its political system and the status of the monarchy remaining unresolved until the election of the Constituent Assembly. This was finally clarified on 1 September [14 September, N.S.], when the Russian Republic was proclaimed, in a decree signed by Kerensky as Minister-President and Zarudny as Minister of Justice.

Elections to the Russian Constituent Assembly were held on 25 November 1917. Organized as a result of events in the February Revolution, the elections took place two months after they had been originally meant to occur. They are generally recognised as the first free elections in Russian history, though they did not produce a democratically elected government, as the Bolsheviks subsequently disbanded the Constituent Assembly and proceeded to rule the country as a one-party state with all opposition parties banned.

Various academic studies have given alternative results. However, all indicate that the Bolsheviks were clear winners in the urban centres, and also took around two-thirds of the votes of soldiers on the Western Front. Nevertheless, the Socialist-Revolutionary party topped the polls, winning a plurality of seats (no party won a majority) on the strength of support from the country's rural peasantry, who were for the most part one-issue voters, that issue being land reform.

Emperor Nicholas II abdicated the throne of the Russian Empire on the 2nd of March (O.S.) / 15th of March (N.S.) 1917, in the Russian city of Pskov, in the midst of World War I and the February Revolution. The Emperor renounced the throne on behalf of himself and his son, Tsarevich Alexei Nikolaevich, in favor of his brother Grand Duke Michael Alexandrovich. The next day the Grand Duke refused to accept the imperial authority, stating that he would accept it only if that was the consensus of democratic action by the Russian Constituent Assembly, which shall define the form of government for Russia. With this decision, the rule of the 300-year-old House of Romanov ended. Power in Russia then passed to the Russian Provisional Government, signaling victory for the February Revolution.

Under the leadership of Russian communist Vladimir Lenin, the Bolshevik Party seized power in the Russian Republic during a coup known as the October Revolution. Overthrowing the pre-existing Provisional Government, the Bolsheviks established a new administration, the first Council of People's Commissars (see article "Lenin's First and Second Government"), with Lenin appointed as its governing chairman. Ruling by decree, Lenin’s Sovnarkom introduced widespread reforms, such as confiscating land for redistribution among the peasantry, permitting non-Russian nations to declare themselves independent, improving labour rights, and increasing access to education.

The Lenin party continued with the previously scheduled November 1917 election, but when it produced a Constituent Assembly dominated by the rival Socialist Revolutionary Party the Bolsheviks lambasted it as counter-revolutionary and shut it down. The Bolshevik government banned a number of centrist and right-wing parties, and restricted the activities of rival socialist groups, but entered into a governmental coalition with the Left Socialist Revolutionary Party. Lenin had inherited a country in the midst of the First World War, with war-weary Russian troops battling the Central Powers of Germany and Austria-Hungary on the Eastern Front. Deeming the ongoing conflict a threat to his own government, Lenin sought to withdraw Russia from the war, using his Decree on Peace to establish an armistice, after which negotiations took place resulting in the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk. This punitive treaty – highly unpopular within Russia – established a cessation of hostilities but granted considerable territorial concessions to Germany, who took control of large areas of the former Empire.