Ukrainian Democratic Party

Ukrainian Democratic Party(UDP), was a Ukrainian party that existed inKievin since 1897 first as a clandestineGeneral Ukrainian nonpartisan democratic organizationthat grew into a political party just before the1905 Russian Revolution.The 1897 organization was formed out of the already existing wider community organization network known asHromada(Community) that existed since 1859 and theTaras Student Fraternity,a more direct student organization of 1891.

Name change

• General Ukrainian Unaffiliated Democratic Organization (1897 - 1904)
• Ukrainian Democratic Party (1904 - 1905)
  • Ukrainian Radical Party (1904 - 1905)
• Ukrainian Democratic Radical Party (1905 - 1908)
• Society of Ukrainian Progressionists (1908 - 1917)
• Ukrainian Party of Socialists-Federalists (1917 - 1923)
• Ukrainian Radical Democratic Party (1923 - 1939)

General Ukrainian Nonpartisan Democratic Organization

The party was formed out of the General Ukrainian Organization, also known as General Ukrainian Nonpartisan Democratic Organization. The organization was formed also in Kiev earlier in 1897 by the Ukrainized Polish political activistVolodymyr Antonovychand the UkrainianlexicographerOleksandr Konysky.

That organization united allHromadas from some 20 cities across the Ukrainian lands. The organization published the magazineVik,organized the Shevchenko's festivals, and provided politicalsanctuaryfor the politically persecuted national activists.

First years and Split

The UDP was seeking liquidation ofabsolutismin theRussian Empireand the introduction of a constitutional order (similarly to the RussianKadets). The party also was pursuing an autonomy for the Ukrainian lands with its own regional diet (sejm) and implementation of theUkrainian languagethroughout the territory. Among its early leaders wereSerhiy Yefremov,Borys Hrinchenko,Yevhen Chykalenko. At the end of 1904 a left-inclined group of its party members split into another political party, the Ukrainian Radical Party. Unlike the democrats, the Ukrainian radicals were for theconstitutional monarchy.Among the radicals were the above-mentioned Serhiy Yefremov, Borys Hrinchenko as well asModest Levytsky,Fedir Matushevsky,and others. The party published its periodicals inLvivandSaint Petersburg.It did not manage to create much of influence on the local population in Ukraine and in the autumn of 1905 reunited back with democrats into the Ukrainian Democratic Radical Party (UDRP).

UDRP

The fundamental principals of the party wereparliamentarismandfederalism:Ukraine had to acquire under the Constitution of Russia a wide degree of autonomy. UDRP also was seeking a compulsory purchase from private owners its land and industries that eventually would be nationalized. The party was represented in theState Duma of the Russian Empirein its first two convocations. The State Duma UDRP parliamentarians organized into theDuma's Ukrainian Hromada.During this period the party published its own press mediaHromada's Thoughtwhich was a predecessor of the newspaperRada.With early dissolution of the Second State Duma and the growing Russian nationalism on the Ukrainian territory (seePogroms), the party reorganized into theSociety of Ukrainian Progressionists(TUP) together with some members of theUkrainian Social Democratic Labour Party.

External links

• Society of Ukrainian Progressives.Encyclopedia of Ukraine