Appointment of Stalin as General Secretary
For the Information of Organizations and Members of the RKP. April 3, 1922
This brief Pravda notice announced what later looked like a hinge of Soviet history: Stalin’s appointment as General Secretary of the party’s Central Committee. The post was created to rationalize administration, supervise cadre work, and enforce decisions through a growing network of secretaries. Stalin, valued as a tough and efficient organizer, seemed a natural pick for this managerial role. Yet the office quickly became a power base. Control over appointments, information flows, and discipline could be turned into political dominance. What read as routine bureaucratic news became, in hindsight, the seed of Stalin’s supremacy.
Original Source: Pravda, 4 April 1922.
The Central Committee elected by the XI congress of the RKP has confirmed a secretariat of the TsK RKP consisting of: Comrade Stalin (general secretary), Comrade Molotov and Comrade Kuibyshev.
The secretariat of the TsK has established the following schedule of reception hours at the TsK, daily from 12:00 to 3:00 p.m.: Monday-Molotov and Kuibyshev, Tuesday-Stalin and Molotov, Wednesday-Kuibyshev and Molotov, Thursday-Kuibyshev, Friday-Stalin and Molotov, Saturday-Stalin and Kuibyshev.
Address TsK: Vozdvizhenka, 5.
Secretary of the TsK RKP, Stalin.