TheNew Union Treaty (Russian:Новый союзный договор,romanized: Novyy soyuznyy dogovor) was a drafttreaty that would have replaced the 1922Treaty on the Creation of the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics (USSR) to salvage and reform theUSSR.
The preparation of this treaty was known as the Novo-Ogaryovo process (новоогаревский процесс), named afterNovo-Ogaryovo, a governmental estate where the work on the document was carried out and whereSoviet President andCPSU General SecretaryMikhail Gorbachev talked with leaders ofUnion republics.[1]
A ceremony of theRussian SFSR signing the treaty was scheduled for 20 August 1991, but was prevented by theAugust Coup.[2] In its aftermath, the Soviet Union ultimately dissolved by December of the same year, and theCommonwealth of Independent States was set up in its place.
A less centralized federal system was proposed by Gorbachev during theCommunist Party Congress of July 1990. A draft of the New Union Treaty was submitted to theSupreme Soviet of the Soviet Union on 23 November 1990. A drafting committee started work on the text on 1 January 1991. Six of the fifteen Soviet republics, however, did not participate in the drafting of the treaty:Armenia,Georgia,Moldova,Estonia,Latvia andLithuania. The proposal was approved by theSoviet of the Union on 6 March and sent to theSupreme Soviets of each republic for approval.[3]
Agreement could not be reached on the distribution of power between the Union and the Republics and the proposal was not approved. As an additional restrictive element, someautonomous republics expressed the desire to raise their status and to be a party to the new Soviet treaty. Gorbachev tried to gain popular support for the proposal. On 17 March 1991, the nine republics (Russia,Byelorussia,Ukraine,Azerbaijan,Kazakhstan,Kyrgyzstan,Tajikistan,Turkmenistan, andUzbekistan) which participated in the drafting of the treaty held apopular referendum. 76% of voters supported maintaining the federal system of the Soviet Union, including a majority in all of the nine republics. Opposition was greatest in large cities like Leningrad and Moscow. As the other six republics were already moving towards independence, citizens mostly boycotted the referendum. An agreement between the Soviet central government and the nine republics, known as the9 + 1 agreement, was finally signed in Novo-Ogaryovo on 23 April. The New Union Treaty would have converted the Soviet Union into a confederation of independent republics with a common president, foreign policy, and military.[4]
By August, eight of the nine republics, except Ukraine, had approved the draft of the new Treaty with some conditions. Ukraine did not agree on the terms of the Treaty. In the republican referendum on 17 March, the majority of residents of Ukraine supported joining the Union only if Ukraine declared itself a sovereign state,[5] one that would be free and independent but still confederated with Russia.[6]
In the August 1991 draft of the treaty, the proclaimed name for the new country was theUnion of Soviet Sovereign Republics (Russian:Союз Советских Суверенных Республик,romanized: Soyuz Sovetskikh Suverennykh Respublik). This would conserve the Russian "СССР" acronym, meaning "USSR" and "Soviet Union" in English and other languages.[3] By September 1991, support for continuing the Soviet system had transitioned into reforming the Soviet Union into a confederation of sovereign states. The final draft renamed the proposed state as theUnion of Sovereign States (Russian:Союз Суверенных Государств,romanized: Soyuz Suverennykh Gosudarstv).
Following the August coup, the New Union Treaty was further reformed into theCommonwealth of Independent States.[7]
With the new Treaty of the Union Gorbachev sought to keep the Union from splitting apart arguing that its dismantling would end only in bloodshed.[8] The text of the Treaty contains an introduction of basic principles followed by 26 Articles:[3]
Although the treaty was intended to save the union, hardliners feared that it would encourage some of the smaller republics to follow the lead ofLithuania and press for full independence. On 18 August,the hardliners took control of the government after confining Gorbachev in his Crimeandacha in order to stop him from returning to Moscow to sign the treaty. The August Coup collapsed in the face of overwhelming opposition not only from the smaller republics but from larger ones, especially Russia.
The treaty was ultimately not signed, and theBelovezha Accords signed on 8 December 1991 by Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus marked the official dissolution of the Soviet Union, converting the republics into independent states. The leaders of the republics organized theCommonwealth of Independent States, an organization of 12 newly independent states, created to replace the Soviet Union. TheBaltic states never joined the CIS.Georgia was not a member until 1993 and withdrew in 2008 following theRusso-Georgian War.[9]Ukraine, which never formally became a member, ended its participation in CIS statutory bodies in 2018 due to theRusso-Ukrainian War.[10]
'On November 26 (1990), the Supreme Soviet of the Checheno-Ingush Republic adopted the Declaration of State Sovereignty, dropping the Soviet Socialist Autonomous label and becoming a union republic. We took part in drafting the new (Novo-)Ogaryovo Treaty, scheduled for signing on August 21 (1991), but on August 19, the coup happened, orchestrated by the KGB when they realized many regions might leave entirely.'