Legal Status of Special Settlers after 8 January 1945

The Stalin regime classified the deported Russian-Germans as special settlers and imposed a number of legal restrictions upon them. Later these restrictions also applied to other deported nationalities such as the Karachais, Kalmyks, Chechens, Ingush, Balkars, Crimean Tatars and Meskhetian Turks. Up until 8 January 1945, the restrictions on the special settlers were ad hoc, mostly in the form of NKVD decrees. On this day, the SNK (Council of Peoples Commissariats) issued a succinct five point resolution listing the specific limitations imposed upon the rights of special settlers. This document became one of the most important pieces of legislation governing the lives of the special settlers.

Council of Peoples Commissariats Union of SSRs

Resolution No. 35

From 8 January 1945 Moscow, Kremlin

On the legal status of special settlers

Council of Peoples Commissariats Union of SSRs RESOLVES:

1. Special settlers enjoy all rights of citizens of the USSR, with the exception of restrictions, provided for in the present Resolution.

2. All able bodied special settlers are obliged to be engaged in socially useful labor. Towards this goal local Soviets of workers deputies in coordination with organs of the NKVD are to organize labor arrangements of the special settlers in agriculture, industrial enterprises, construction, and economic cooperative organizations and institutions.

The violation of labor discipline by special settlers is subject to punishment according to existing laws.

3. Special settlers do not have the right without the authorization of the NKVD special commandant to be absent from the boundaries of the region of settlement served by their special commandant.

Voluntary absence from the boundaries of the region of settlement, served by the special commandant, will be viewed as flight and treated as a criminal matter.

4. Special settlers – heads of families or people substituting for them are required within a three day period to report to the special commandant of the NKVD all events that change the composition of the family (birth of a child, death of a family member, flight, etc.).

5. Special settlers are obliged to strictly observe the established regime and social order of the places of settlement and obey all orders of the special commandant of the NKVD.

The violation of the regime and social order in the places of settlement by special settlers is subject to administrative sanction in the form of a fine up to 100 rubles or arrest up to five days.

Deputy Chairman

Council of Peoples Commissariats Union of SSRs

V. Molotov

Administrative Affairs

Council of Peoples Commissariats Union of SSRs

Ia. Chadaev

Document reproduced in V.N. Zemskov, Spetsposlentsy v SSSR 1930-1960, Moscow, 2005, pp. 120-121. Translated from Russian into English by J. Otto Pohl.