Temporary Totalitarian Constitution and Paraconstitution as Special Political-Legal Instruments of the XX Century

The aim of the article is to study the peculiarities of constitutional construction in the focus of political and legal processes of the XX century. The example of the Constitution of the RSFSR of 1918 shows the specifics of totalitarian temporary constitution, in particular, the legalization of a number of political and legal instruments aimed at preserving the power of the ruling group; the arrangement of power on the basis of social disunity, etc. Further on the materials of the Constitution of the Weimar Republic of 1919 the peculiarities of paraconstitution as a special type of temporary constitution are revealed. In conclusion, the author comes to the conclusion that the above-mentioned types of constitutions are characterized as temporary not only by formal features, but first of all because they are not the product of the primary constituent power, i.e. they are not created by the population, but are the result of the activity of the ruling group or the opposition, which actually gained control over the process of creating the constitution and the legal order. Accordingly, there is no need to observe any statutory requirements (special procedure) for the abolition of such a constitution by the population as a permanent constituent power, which, in turn, makes it possible to project this approach to the change of modern constitutions. The author employed various methods of scientific inquiry, including comparative legal analysis, historical analysis, and doctrinal analysis. In the preparation of the article, the scientific works of R.C. van Caenegem, V.I. Lenin, and E.B. Pashukanis were used.