The legal and political foundations of the new state were not entirely clear. It had a parliament of sorts, the Congress of People’s Deputies, which had been elected in 1990, before Russia declared sovereignty. At its first session, in May 1990, 920 of its 1,068 members belonged to the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. A year later, only 767 Congress members remained in the Party. But even after Yeltsin banned the Communist Party’s activities, a majority—675 people—maintained their Party affiliation.
