People's Commissar Nadezhda Alliluyeva Decree on Nationality Helsingfors Finnish Social Democrats granting Finland's request for independence in December federalism imperialist Pravda Bolshevik Bolsheviks
Having dropped his editorship of Pravda, Stalin was appointed the People's Commissar for Nationalities. He took Nadezhda Alliluyeva as his secretary and at some point married her, although the wedding date is unknown. In November 1917, he signed the Decree on Nationality, according ethnic and national minorities living in Russia the right of secession and self-determination. The decree's purpose was primarily strategic; the Bolsheviks wanted to gain favour among ethnic minorities but hoped that the latter would not actually desire independence. That month, he travelled to Helsingfors to talk with the Finnish Social Democrats, granting Finland's request for independence in December. His department allocated funds for establishment of presses and schools in the languages of various ethnic minorities. Socialist revolutionaries accused Stalin's talk of federalism and national self-determination as a front for Sovnarkom's centralising and imperialist policies.
