Ivan Skvortsov-Stepanov

Who was Ivan Skvortsov-Stepanov?

Ivan Ivanovich Skvortsov-Stepanov was a prominent Russian Bolshevik.

Skvortsov-Stepanov was one of the oldest participants in the Russian revolutionary movement, a Marxist writer.

Ivan was the son of Moscow factory clerical worker based in Bogorodsk He joined the revolutionary movement in 1892 and became a Bolshevik in the winter of 1904. When Bor'ba was publiished in November 1905, Skvortsov-Stepanov was a member of the editorial board. In 1906 he was a delegate to the Fourth Congress of the Russian Social Democratic Labour Party, where he supported Lenin. During the period 1907–10, he favoured the Mezhraiontsy faction, but later fell again under the influence of Lenin. He was repeatedly arrested and exiled for his revolutionary activities.

Following the Revolution of 1917 he became the People's Commissar for Finance of the RSFSR.

Upon his death in October 1928, Stepanov was commemorated by Stalin as a "staunch and steadfast Leninist". This contrasts greatly with the treatment of the majority of members of the original Council of the People's Commissars, most of whom were executed during Stalin's purges.