The Presidential Library - about the history of the electoral system in Russia

One of the most important events of 2018 is the election of the President of the Russian Federation. Director General Alexander Vershinin told at a press conference in TASS about the work which was conducted by the Presidential Library in connection with this event.

"The Presidential Library belongs to the Office of the Presidential Administration of the Russian Federation and, having the status of the National Library of Russia, is a nationwide electronic repository with over 600,000 digital copies of various types of materials on the history, theory and practice of Russian statehood, language of the Russian Federation", - said Alexander Vershinin. - A significant place among them belongs to documents devoted to the institute of presidency, including the history of elections in Russia. All these materials are available to readers and researchers in any of the more than 500 remote access centers of the Presidential Library, which are opened in all 85 regions of the Russian Federation, and in 36 remote electronic reading rooms in 28 foreign countries".  

According to Director General, in 2016 the Presidential Library prepared a thematic collection "The Electoral System in Russia: the Past and the Present". The collection includes more than 200 items of storage and highlights not only the current state of the electoral law in our state, but also gives a holistic view of the history of its formation.

In the section of the collection that tells about the history of elections in Russia from the times of Ancient Rus’ to the period of the Soviet power, and from October 1917 to December 1991, one can get familiar with the documents on the institutions of the people's rights in Russia in the XI-XV centuries, the representative power of the people in Russia XVI- XVII centuries, the electoral system in the XVIII - early XX century, elections to the Constituent Assembly and the electoral system in Soviet Russia. The editions of the second section of the collection tell about the electoral system of modern Russia - the elections of the President of the Russian Federation, deputies of the State Duma, representative bodies of the subjects of the Federation and local self-government.

The third section of the collection contains educational and methodological products - video lectures, editions of textbooks for universities and educational and methodical complexes.

The State Public Historical Library of Russia, the Russian State Library, the Center for Information Technologies and Systems of Executive Authorities, the State Archives of the Russian Federation, the Federal Service for the Protection of Russia and others took part in the creation of the collection.

The Director General also described in detail the work of the Presidential Library over a large-scale project - the creation of the "Presidential Chronicle". Today, the chronicle exists in documents stored in the library's electronic fund, films of its own production, telling how the presidential power operates in the Russian Federation, about the most important attributes of the presidential power and much more. This project is implemented jointly with the Administration of the President. Within its framework films were prepared: "Symbols of Presidential Authority", "Personal library of the President of the Russian Federation", "I appeal to the President". To date, the films "Archives of the President of the Russian Federation", "The Moscow Kremlin - the residence of the President of the Russian Federation", "Working Residence. Senate", "Grand Kremlin Palace", "The President awards" are in service.