Ussr Constitutions

President Mikhail S. Gorbachev said Saturday that the Soviet Union's constitution could be revised to remove a clause proclaiming the Communist Party as the leading force in society as the country proceeds with the overall restructuring of its political system. But Gorbachev, speaking to an important, daylong meeting of the party's policy-making Central Committee, said that a campaign under way to force such a change immediately is aimed at "demoralizing Communists" and must be opposed.

The red flags had been stuck on the facades of buildings, making bright splashes in the usual dreariness of the Moscow autumn. Most people stayed home from work. As if caught in a collective time warp, the Soviet Union marked Constitution Day on Monday--even though the document that inspired the holiday, like the country itself, has effectively ceased to exist. "We used to celebrate this day as one of our socialist holidays. But no more," Nikolai S.

Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev met serious resistance Wednesday in his bid for greater powers as liberal lawmakers criticized his plan for a Western-style, executive presidency and forced a postponement of the parliamentary session that would consider the required constitutional amendments.

When President Bush coldly rejected the attempted ouster of Mikhail S. Gorbachev as an "illegal coup" that violated the Soviet constitution, he was not simply imposing an irrelevant Western notion of government onto the Soviet situation. A key component of the reforms set in motion during Gorbachev's presidency was a series of amendments to the Soviet constitution that prescribe, for the first time in the nation's history, a procedure for the popular election of his successor.

Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev, wanting greater authority to promote his reforms, Tuesday pushed through the Supreme Soviet a proposed constitutional amendment providing for a new, U.S.-style presidency over objections by liberals that the position would be far too powerful.

Pro-reform candidates, including radical populist Boris N. Yeltsin and several former political prisoners, won strong backing from voters in the Soviet Union's regional and local elections, according to preliminary results released Monday.

Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev on Friday gave Lithuania three days to comply voluntarily with a resolution by the Soviet Union's highest legislative body invalidating its declaration of independence. The Soviet news agency Tass said the deadline was communicated in a telegram sent by Gorbachev to Vytautas Landsbergis, Lithuania's new president and leader of the Sajudis independence movement.

In a non-confrontational but precedent-setting decision, the Constitutional Compliance Committee on Friday invalidated a decree issued by President Mikhail S. Gorbachev, demonstrating that the Soviet leader's actions are now subject to legal limits. "We are trying to affirm the sanctity of the constitution," the quasi-judicial panel's chairman, jurist Sergei S. Alexeyev, said as he made public the committee's first decision voiding a presidential act.

Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev on Thursday won nearly unanimous approval from the Supreme Soviet, the national Parliament, for the new political structure that he is confident will turn the Soviet Union into a modern, socialist democracy.

The Parliament of Soviet Latvia on Tuesday stepped back from a constitutional clash with the Kremlin and turned down proposals to give itself the right to veto Moscow's decisions. However, the 320 Latvian deputies did decide to pursue efforts to convince the Soviet leadership that proposed changes in the country's federal constitution could violate the rights of individual republics, according to reporters in Riga, the Latvian capital.

The Soviet Committee on Constitutional Compliance, in a landmark but controversial ruling, on Friday declared invalid military regulations that have required army and navy officers to carry out Communist Party policy and to follow the orders of party officials. The committee held that the longstanding regulations, which ensured party control over the 5 million in the armed forces, violate the constitutional amendments that ended the Communist Party's monopoly on political power.

Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev, disclosing the highlights of an emergency plan to get his shortage-plagued country through the winter, said Tuesday that more than $1 billion in food must be purchased abroad in the next four months to make up for shortfalls in domestic production.

Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev, fighting to keep his continent-sized country intact, unveiled his blueprint Saturday for a new and voluntary union of "sovereign" Soviet republics, but his brand of federalism concentrates so much power in Moscow that some republics have already rejected it. In the meantime, Boris N.

In a non-confrontational but precedent-setting decision, the Constitutional Compliance Committee on Friday invalidated a decree issued by President Mikhail S. Gorbachev, demonstrating that the Soviet leader's actions are now subject to legal limits. "We are trying to affirm the sanctity of the constitution," the quasi-judicial panel's chairman, jurist Sergei S. Alexeyev, said as he made public the committee's first decision voiding a presidential act.

The Russian republic, led by the radical populist Boris N. Yeltsin, approved a draft proclamation Friday that would give its constitution and laws legal precedence over those of the Soviet Union, but that in doing so could plunge the nation into a profound political crisis. In a move that challenges the political authority of President Mikhail S.

The Lithuanian Parliament, in a conciliatory message to Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev, declared its readiness on Thursday to discuss its decision to secede from the Soviet Union within the context of the Soviet constitution.

Soviet lawmakers intent on accelerating the pace of reform elected Kremlin maverick Boris N. Yeltsin, human rights campaigner Andrei D. Sakharov and three other prominent activists Sunday to collectively head the first formal opposition group within this country's national political system in nearly 70 years.

Soviet lawmakers, rebelling against the Kremlin leadership, voted Tuesday to eliminate the Communist Party's reserved seats in the country's national assembly and other legislative bodies. The move, a dramatic reflection of the rapid evolution of a new political system here, would force party leaders, including President Mikhail S. Gorbachev, to run in open, competitive elections.

The Kremlin's woes in the Baltic suddenly doubled Friday when Estonian lawmakers decreed that Soviet law no longer applies in their republic and announced a step-by-step return to the independence snuffed out by the Red Army 50 years ago. "The restoration of the Republic of Estonia has begun," the Parliament of the Switzerland-sized republic proclaimed, its resolution immediately confronting President Mikhail S. Gorbachev with another fissure in the new "Soviet federation" he is trying to build.

Soviet President Mikhail S. Gorbachev on Friday gave Lithuania three days to comply voluntarily with a resolution by the Soviet Union's highest legislative body invalidating its declaration of independence. The Soviet news agency Tass said the deadline was communicated in a telegram sent by Gorbachev to Vytautas Landsbergis, Lithuania's new president and leader of the Sajudis independence movement.