The 1991 presidential campaign of Boris Yeltsin, was the successful campaign by then-Chairman of the Supreme Soviet of Russia in Russia's first presidential election. Yeltsin ran as an independent candidate. His running mate was People's Deputy and former soldier Alexander Rutskoy.

Receiving more than 50% of the vote in the first round of the election, the Yeltsin-Rutskoy ticket won the election with an overwhelming margin over their closest competitors, the Ryzhkov-Gromov ticket. Thus Boris Yeltsin and Alexander Rutskoy were elected 1st President of Russia and 1st vice president of Russia respectively.

Background

On March 17, 1991, the all-Russian referendum on the introduction of the post of President of Russia was held. More than 70% of citizens voted for the introduction of the post of President, elected by direct vote. On 24 April 1991, the Supreme Council of Russia adopted the law "On the President of the RSFSR".

Boris Yeltsin served as Chairman of the Supreme Soviet and was the head of the Russian SFSR. He had had strong favorability. Heading into the election, he was the most popular candidate. He was widely viewed to be the only candidate with a real chance to become president.

The alliances which would form the Democratic Russia apparatus which supported Yeltsin's candidacy, had been forged prior to his presidential candidacy, originally working in support of Yeltsin's successful push to create an office of the presidency.

Campaign strategy The leader of the RSFSR, Yeltsin essentially campaigned as an incumbent. Having a vast lead, Yeltsin opted to avoid engaging his opponents.

Yeltsin's support came not only from a liberal democratic base, but also from a broad coalition of a variety of social groups. Nevertheless, his core support came from a base which favored radical reforms. His greatest support was found in Russia's cities. He also found strong support among those who were most disadvantaged under the Soviet system.

While the campaign period was very brief, both Yeltsin and Rutskoy still traveled to many regions of Russia and held meetings with voters.

Yeltsin's campaign and its backers decided to conduct a low-key campaign. Rather than heightening emotions of voters, they sought to instead calm them. A key reason behind the decision to opt for a low-key campaign was a desire to avoid fatigue among voters. For instance, when Democratic Russia held rallies attended by several hundred thousand supporters each on May 20 and June 10 in Moscow's Manezh Square, rather than riling voters up about key issues, those speaking at the rallies spoke lightheartedly and expressed their confidence in Yeltsin's chances of winning the election. Steering largely away from issues, only occasional criticisms of Yeltsin's opponents and of the communist order were delivered at these events.

Organizers of Yeltsin's campaign had decided that they will wait until June before fully ramping up their efforts. They did this in the belief that Russians had become tired of politics, and that it would be off-putting to overly-campaign. With Yeltsin having a strong lead, they deemed it unnecessary to conduct much beyond a "minimal campaign".

Yeltsin made an effort to avoid creating optics of a direct association with the more extremist elements of the democratic movement. He wanted to avoid repulsing voters. On May 23, Yeltsin told Izvestia that he desired for the democrats to be less combative in their attacks on the center.

Rather than employing the sorts of frenzied rhetoric that his opponents were using, Yeltsin instead opted to act the part of a measured statesman during the campaign period. This was intended to solidify the perception of Yeltsin as a capable leader and enhance the dynamic in which he was running as a de facto incumbent. The economic crisis and the serious antikomintern (the mood in society) influenced Yeltsin's decision to adopt a more serious tone of rhetoric. In his campaign rhetoric Yeltsin made a conscious effort to refer to his fellow citizens as rossiiany (a term referring to all the people living in Russian territory) as opposed to russkiy (which, more specifically, tends to refer to ethnic Russians).

As part of the democratic opposition to the communist Soviet establishment, Yeltsin benefited from the fever pitch which anti-communist tensions had reached in Russia.

Yeltsin's campaign apparatus had immense access to printing resources, and, come the election, was able to flood the nation with posters and leaflets. Opponents, such as Vladimir Zhirinovsky, lacked access to comparable resources.

Campaigning Yeltsin was the only candidate of the democratic forces. Among the organizations that supported him were the Democratic Russia movement, the Democratic Party and the Social Democratic Party.

On April 27, Democratic Russia nominated Yeltsin as their candidate. On May 3, the RSFSR Social Democratic Party nominated Yeltsin at their national conference. The Social Democratic Party also nominated Galina Starovoytova to be Yeltsin's running mate if he were to accept their nomination. Yeltsin refused both nominations. Rather of accepting any one party's nomination, Yeltsin instead opted to run as an independent. However, while refusing their nominations, Yeltsin received support from both parties.

On April 29, during a meeting in Novokuznetsk with approximately 600 miners and local officials, Yeltsin took the opportunity to issue a number of promises aimed at earning the votes of miners. On the same day, Democratic Russia organized an event in Moscow in which thousands of supporters rallied for Yeltsin and collected signatures for his registration. Democratic Russia had been hoping to also organize a Red Square rally with a Moscow trade union organization, however, these plans fell apart due to the trade union objecting to some of the more radical slogans which Democratic Russia used, which called for the resignation of Gorbachev.

On May 16, an explosion occurred in the room being used to store the signatures being gathered for Yeltsin's candidacy at the Democratic Russia headquarters in Moscow. The Baltimore Sun called it "the first political bombing in the capital for more than a decade". Sovetskaya Rossiya placed blame on the Libertarian (Radical) Party of the Soviet Union for perpetrating the attack, however, they denied involvement.

Yeltsin was officially registered as a presidential candidate on May 20. A week afterwards, he embarked on a ten-day campaign tour. He started his campaign travels with a trip to Murmansk, where he was reported to have been hounded by enthusiastic crowds waving the flag of pre-revolutionary Russia and shouting "We love you, Boris Nikolaevich!". As he had on previous trips he had made to the distant regions of the Russian Federation, Yeltsin promised the local residents that his administration would devolve enough powers to the regions to enable them to solve their problems themselves. On this tour, Yeltsin subsequently traveled to Petrozavodsk, Voronezh, Perm, Chelyabinsk, Orenberg, and Sverdlovsk (the latter being Yeltsin's hometown and a strong bastion of pro-Yeltsin support).

Although Yeltsin had earlier promised to participate in debates, during the campaign he opted against it.

Two days before the election more than 20,000 supporters attended an afternoon rally in Moscow's Manezh Square. At the rally, chess champion Garry Kasparov delivered a speech encouraging a large turnout in support of Yeltsin. Democratic Russia leader Nikolai Travkin confidently spoke of Yeltsin's prospects.

Eduard Shevardnadze spoke in support of Yeltsin's candidacy on the eve of the election, calling his likely election a "step in the right direction".

In hopes of garnering the support of religious voters, on the eve of the election Yeltsin was interviewed on RSFSR state radio by Orthodox priests Vyacheslav Polosin (who was also a deputy of the Supreme Soviet and the cofounder of the Russian Christian Democratic Movement).

On the day of the election Yeltsin's campaign deployed a vast number of poll watchers to observe voting stations across the country, in order to keep an eye out for any voter fraud that the Communist Party might conduct against him.

Running mate selection

In May 1991, speculation grew about who Yeltsin was going to pick as his running mate. Potential candidates were Vadim Bakatin, Gennady Burbulis, Dmitri Volkogonov, Gavriil Popov, Anatoly Sobchak, Galina Starovoytova, Sergey Shakhray, and Vladimir Bukovsky.

It was reported that Yeltsin had reached an agreement with Bakatin for him to serve as his running mate, but that Bakatin had backed out after being convinced by Mikhail Gorbachev to instead challenge Yeltsin for the presidency. According to Yeltsin, until the last minute he had intended to choose between his two closest associates at time, which were Ruslan Khasbulatov and Gennady Burbulis. However, he ultimately felt they lacked charisma and were too unpopular with voters. Despite their key role in his campaign effort, Yeltsin did not consult the leaders of Democratic Russia about his running mate selection.

On May 18, 1991 (the last day when it was still possible for him to choose a running mate), Yeltsin selected Alexander Rutskoy as his running mate. Rutskoy was a celebrated military veteran, a People's Deputy, and the leader of the newly-formed Communists for Democracy movement.

The choice of Rutskoy was unexpected to many. Most of the candidates that had been widely anticipated were from the same political camp as Yeltsin. Rutskoy had not previously been a political ally of Yeltsin's. A prominent figure in the Communist camp, Rutskoy was a former ally of Gorbachev. He was also considered to be more conservative than Gorbachev. However, he had also shown an openness to democratic reforms. Yeltsin selected Rutskoy after deciding that he wanted a runningmate that could broaden support for the ticket. He hoped that Rutskoy's inclusion on the ticket could attract some conservative (anti-reform) voters, such as moderate-leaning members of the Communist Party, members of the military, and nationalists.

While an unexpected choice, Rutskoy was not an extreme choice. He was a well-regarded Hero of the Soviet Union. He carried a strong military reputation, which was important to Yeltsin. Yeltsin's strongest opponent, Nikolai Ryzhkov, had selected Boris Gromov, a military hero, to serve as his running mate. Yeltsin hoped that Ryzhkov would help him to attract the many conservative Russian voters who desired stability in society.

Rutskoy hoped that his inclusion on the ticket would provide a ticket balance, and allow Yeltsin to attract votes from moderate communists. Yeltsin praised Rutskoy for his ability to understand the needs of military veterans and for his creation of the "Communists for Democracy" movement.

Rutskoy declared that he would continue to be a member of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Russia, but that he still disagreed with its leadership (particularly with Ivan Polizkov). He encouraged all who wished to see Russia's greatness restored to vote for him and Yeltsin.

Soon after his selection, Rutskoy came under fire amid allegations that he had been formerly supported by chauvinistic organizations such as Pamyat' and Otechestvo, and that he had been a strong opponent of the late academician Andrei Sakharov. Rutskoy defended himself by stating that while he had been one of the founders of Otechestvo (which he argued had been started as a patriotic association), he rejected the chauvinistic views which it had since adopted. Rutskoy also said that he only disagreed with Andrei Sakharov over Sakharov's claim that the Soviet air force had bombed its own soldiers in Afghanistan, but that he otherwise had great respect for Sakharov.

Election result