The Successor

In a theatre in Moscow, draped in mourning for Lenin, the Congress of Soviets of the Union of Soviet Socialistic Republics met to elect a successor to Nikolai Lenin, late Chief Executive.

During the discussions the announcement that Britain had recognized Russia brought forth cheers and a resolution of greeting to the British Government.

Later it was announced that Alexis Ivanovitch Rykov, a Russian, had been elected President of the Council of Commissars (Premier) in Lenin's place.

War Lord Trotsky was also reflected as Commissar for War, but since he left for the Caucasus (extreme south-west Russia) he has not been heard from.

Another significant appointment was that of M. Dzerzhinsky, creator and chief of the Cheka, who became head of the Supreme Council of National Economy in the place of M. Rykov.

President Rykov, aged 53, is a former Vice Chairman of the Council of Commissars and head of the S. C. N. E. Born at Nijni Novgorod of peasant parents, he early forsook the land and managed to give himself a university education. Unlike most Bolsheviki, he has not been much abroad; like most Bolsheviki, he has served terms of imprisonment, has been an exile in Siberia. In 1899 he joined the Social Democrat Party, before it split into Bolshevik and Menshevik factions, actively plotted against the Tsar.

Since the Bolsheviki came into power, he has been mainly interested in economics and was largely responsible for the framing of the New Economic Policy, which marked the abandonment of some of the Communistic tenets.

A tall, slim, dark man, his hair is streaked with gray. His pale face is adorned with a jet black goatee.