Different federation

A number of presidents of the North Caucasus republics consisted of the Russian Federation, with the simultaneous initiative to "cease to be called presidents"! The first on Thursday, August 12, the President of the Republic Ramzan Kadyrov entered the parliament of Chechnya with a similar proposal. He stated that the country should stop the "parade of regional presidents." “ I begin from the fact that only one president should be in a single state ,” Kadyrov said. - And in subjects, first persons should be called the heads of the republics, heads of administrations, governors, etc. ". At the same time, the President of Chechnya did not specify what new name of his position he would prefer. “ I am ready to accept any term denoting the position of the head of the subject, except for the name“ President ” ,” said Ramzan Kadyrov.

Immediately after Kadyrov, the President of Ingushetia Yunus-Bek Yevkurov introduced a legislative initiative to the parliament of the republic that he would continue to be titled not by the president, but by the “head of Ingushetia, the head of the republic”. At the same time, he recalled that a year ago he first raised this topic in an interview with the media.

The President of Kabardino-Balkaria Arsen Kanokov supported the initiative of his colleagues-neighboring. In an interview with the Kommersant newspaper, he said that " there should be one president in a single country, and we, the leaders of the subjects, should be called differently ." The press service of the President of Karachay-Cherkessia Boris Ebzeev spread his statement that he had long been insisting on the principle of “a single state-one president” and resolutely supports Kadyrov’s initiative.

Of the leaders of the republics of the North Caucasus, the heads of Adygea and Dagestan have not yet spoke out on this subject. As for the Republic of North Ossetia - Alania, its president has long been renamed the “chapter”.

A friendly demonstration of the North Caucasian leaders clearly gives the impression of a planned action agreed with someone in the Kremlin and supported by him . We will not guess on the coffee grounds, what “intra-elite movements” (as fashionable to express) this phenomenon testifies to. We will move from the general to the particular, and then, perhaps, it will become clearer for us, to whom the proposed change can be beneficial.

At first glance, the proposals of Kadyrov and his colleagues are dictated by exclusively sound state meaning and concern of the unity of Russia, the desire to emphasize the special status of the first person of the Russian state. Indeed, not in any state of the world, even federal, there is no such thing that the position of the head of the subject of the Federation has the same name as the position of head of state .

However, we begin with the fact that no federal state of the world consists of republics. After all, the republic in essence of its name is nothing more than a sovereign state. And in the Constitution of the Russian Federation, in paragraph 2 of Article 5, it costs: “Republic (state) ...” Therefore, the Basic Law of the Russian Federation recognizes that the state Russia also includes other states. It turns out that the sovereignty of the Russian Federation is not one.

So, if we carry out the reform of state terms in the Russian Federation with the aim of more centralization, then it is necessary to start with the names of the constituent entities of the Federation - republics. There can be no republics in a single state. Russia itself, according to the Constitution, is a republic, its sovereignty should be unreasonable, and not crush in republics of a smaller order .

But it is obvious that the heads of the North Caucasian national regions are not at all going to abandon the naming of their constitutional estates to the republics. What can the renaming of their posts be the renaming of the former names of the constituent entities of the Federation?

Let's see what the names are offered in return for the presidents of the republics. True, Ramzan Kadyrov humbly waits for the decision of the parliament. Some of his colleagues are more frank. So, the president of Ingushetia Yevkurov wants to be called, as we saw, at the same time as the “head and leader”. In North Ossetia - Alania, Kalmykia and Karelia (!) There are already “heads of republics”. It is possible that thanks to the current North Caucasian initiative, this name will soon become common for the first persons of all republics in the Russian Federation.

But paragraph 1 of the same Article 5 of the Constitution of Russia suggests that all subjects of the Russian Federation are equal. The question is, and the leaders of the regions and regions, the worse than their colleagues from the republics? Why should they be called some governors or “heads of administration”, and not just the heads or at least the leaders of their regions? After all, the governor or head of the administration still means some degree of dependence, subordination. And the “head of the region” or “head of the region” is already something more significant.

Kadyrov assures that the “parade of regional presidents” is time to stop? It is easy to imagine what will begin if his proposal passes. Instead of the “Presidents Parade”, the “parade of chapters”, “parade of leaders” or “parade of leaders” will begin. A sort of diverse federation. Perhaps there is nothing wrong with that? What is the difference how exactly the first persons of the regions will be called? The main thing is that the names of their posts do not duplicate the names of the first post in the state.

But the fact of the matter is that it doesn’t matter. In Russia, a word has always been given important. “I will die for a single az,” the Old Believers repeated after their leader Avvakum. How will the semantics of the borrowed foreign word “president” become combined with perception at the level of the archetype level of purely Russian words “chapter” or “leader”, and then, what kind of good, and “ruler of the region”?

The word "president", generally speaking, is translated into Russian from French means nothing more than "chairman." In the old days there were no presidents of states. Only some bodies, corporations, meetings, and Soviets had presidents. In medieval France, there was a Parisian parliament - the most authoritative (after the king) judicial authority, and in it was the president of the parliament. During the revolution in France, there were presidents of the National Assembly, then the Legislative Assembly. The names of their posts did not at all indicate a large volume of power, concentrated in their hands. They only chaired (in turn - therefore there were several presidents at once) in the highest legislative body. The word "president" did not say anything else.

In modern political culture , the word “president” is associated primarily with the post of US President thanks to more than two -century influence of overseas democracy on the rest of the world . In the United States itself, the origin of this position was such. During the War of Independence, almost all states renamed their heads of executive power from presidential governors. This was caused by the rejection of the political terms from the times of the dominance of the English crown. And after alternative terminology, American patriots did not go far. They borrowed her from their ally in the war for independence - France. The president of this meeting was also in the convened Continental Congress of the States. The president, by his very meaning, meant that he did not possess, unlike the monarch, unlimited power. The naming of the highest position in the state “chairman” was supposed to emphasize the republican nature of the state structure and collegiality of the highest authorities. After all, the United States was originally a confederation of independent states.

During the preparation and adoption of the US Constitution, the rooted name “President” was left only behind the head of the federal executive branch (the heads of state again became governors). Contrary to the initial meaning of the name of his position, he was endowed with very great powers and became, as it were, the “chairman of the state” as a whole, and not some body at the head of state. And in this capacity, the president began to be perceived in the rest of the world. However, far from immediately, but after many decades.

Even during the Great French Revolution, the word “president”, as we have seen, was applied only to the chairman of the legislative body, and not to the first persons of the state. During the period of Termidorian stabilization of 1795-1799, executive leaders were named for directors-rulers in our opinion. When, after the coup of Napoleon Bonaparte, the question arose of what to call the head of state, there was a proposal to give him the title of electorate-in our opinion the chosen one. By the way, in relation to the first person of the state elected by the entire population, this name is best suited. But Bonaparte preferred the ancient Roman title of consul. And when in 1848 the second republic was proclaimed in France, by this time the practice of North American democracy had such an influence on the political culture of the West that they did not even remember the bizarre terms of the time of the first republic.

So what will mean for Russian reality the renaming of the governors, the “heads of administration” and the presidents (that is, the chairmen) of the Russian regions in just “chapters” , “leaders” or “rulers” while maintaining the title “president” for the first person of the Russian Federation? Most likely, a real increase in charisma of the heads of the constituent entities of the Federation when diminishing the authority of the federal vertical of power. The head of the republic - and next to him is the president of the Federation. It is clear to anyone who, in this pair, is more important in the republic by one name.

The word "leader" in this situation will also indicate a higher real status of the first person of the subject of the Federation compared to the President of the Russian Federation. After all, the leader in an adequate translation into Russian is a leader. And the leaders in the latest history of our Fatherland called only two people.

Therefore, the outwardly loyal proposal of the North Caucasian presidents can actually be used (and will certainly be used, if it passes) to legitimize the regional sovereignty parade in the public consciousness of the population of the regions. And the explosive expansion of real sovereignty of the constituent entities of the Federation will become much more dangerous for the unity of Russia than the current “Presidential Parade” .

Moreover, the most dangerous in the situation arising is to give a question about the name of state posts in the regions at the regional regions themselves. The names of the heads of the constituent entities of the Russian Federation should be clearly written in the Federal Law. Therefore, all the more, the statements of the chairman of the State Duma Committee on the constitutional legislation of Alexander Moskalts are alarming. He, according to the newspaper Kommersant, “ does not see the need to adopt special amendments to federal legislation. According to him, such a name is already contained in the current law “On the general principles of the organization of legislative and executive bodies of state power of the constituent entities of the Russian Federation”, it states “the highest official of the subject of the Federation ”. At the same time, he noted that “Russia is a federal state”, in which the main thing is that the authorities and officials of all regions should have equal powers and bear equal responsibility. And the names, according to him, are “this is a wishes and taste” of the regions themselves . ” So a logical question arises, who in the center can be beneficial to creeping confederalization of Russia?

If we talk about the conformity of the names for your status in the state structure of Russia, then, firstly, the same name should be given to all subjects of the Russian Federation. And it certainly should not be a “republic”! And secondly, to highlight the head of the Russian Federation with the name of his post, without canceling the right of the heads of regions to be called presidents. On the contrary, it was the first person of the Russian Federation that would be more suitable for the name of the “Head of State”. Or "supreme ruler." Then you can start at least “presidents of the regions” - where they, like the “presidents of the republics”, to the supreme ruler of all of Russia.

But the trend, alas, is the opposite ...