 Mikhail Ivanovich Kalinin, Chairman of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee of Soviets of the RSFSR, was born November 7, 1875, Verkhnyaya Troitsa, Korchev region, Tver province, Russia.
A revolutionary of peasant origin, Mikhail Kalinin joined the Russian Social-Democratic Workers' Party in 1898, and became one of the first supporters of Bolshevik faction. He played an active role in the party's revolutionary functions and participated in the Russian Revolution of 1905 in St. Petersburg. In 1912 he became a candidate member of the Bolsheviks' Central Committee, a member of their Russian bureau, and co-founder of their newspaper Pravda. In November of 1917 he served as mayor of Petrograd. In December 1917, Kalinin entered the board of the RSFSR People's Commissariat for Food Supplies. On March 30, 1919, he was elected chairman of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee of Soviets (March 30, 1919 - July 15, 1938). The party's Central Committee elected Kalinin candidate member of the Politburo (March 25, 1919 - Dec. 18, 1925) and full member (Nov. 29, 1919 - March 29, 1920) of the Orgburo in 1919, but he was not re-elected to this body after the 9th party congress. In 1921, he was made candidate member of the Orgburo (March 16, 1921 - June 2, 1924) and later was again promoted to full membership (June 2, 1924 - Dec. 18, 1925).
The first session of the Central Executive Committee of the USSR elected Kalinin, who represented the Russian Socialist Federated Soviet Republic, one of the four chairmen on December 30, 1922. He was re-elected chairman of the Central Executive Committee on six occasions until his term expired at the time of inaugurating the new Soviet parliament, Supreme Soviet, in 1938. On January 17, 1938, the joint meeting of two chambers of the Supreme Soviet elected Kalinin chairman, a post equal to that of head of the Soviet state.
Accession of Kalinin to the top leadership of the Communist party was made complete, when he was elected full member (Jan. 1, 1926 - June 3, 1946) of the Politburo after the 14th party congress. Despite the fact that he exposed some favor of right wing trend in the disputes within the party in the 1920s, Kalinin always supported Stalin and consequently survived the Stalinist purges. He retained his high government office until he tendered his resignation to the Supreme Soviet on March 19, 1946, shortly before his death.
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