The land decree of 1917 was adopted the day after the Great October Socialist Revolution (November 8 of the above year). According to its introduction, the property of landowners on land was abolished without any ransom.
The prerequisites for the adoption of this document arose a long time ago relative to the date of its release. The fact is that the Bolshevik program was opposed to the programs of other parties that existed at that time, which wanted to make partial concessions without changing the entire capitalist system as a whole, including without changing land rights.
April abstracts as the basis for future decrees
The land decree of 1917 grew out of the April theses of Lenin, which he announced on April 4. In his speech, Vladimir Ilyich then declared that it was necessary to confiscate all the landlords' lands and transfer them to the newly created Soviets of peasant and farm laborers, which should include representatives of the poorest farms. From each large landowner estate, which could include from 100 to 300 peasant farmsteads, it was supposed to create an exemplary farm under the control of farm laborers' deputies. I must say that Lenin did not find support for such ideas among the first listeners of the theses, and some (AA Bogdanov, a scientist, future head of the world's first blood transfusion institute) considered them crazy nonsense. However, they were approved by the Sixth Congress of the Bolshevik Party, which was held on August 8-16, 1917.
The ideas of the leader of the revolution - to the masses!
In his April theses, V.I. Lenin pointed out that the Bolsheviks were in the weak minority in the Council of Workers' Deputies, therefore, party ideas needed to be actively disseminated to the masses, which was done, and quite successfully. There are known cases in September-October 1917, when peasants rioted in a particular village, accompanied by pogroms, arson of estates and the demand for the landowners to "cut their fellow countrymen" under threat of life. Therefore, the Decree on Land (1917) simply fixed partly the ongoing historical processes of that time.
The land issue has been brewing for a long time
The peasant land problem acquired relevance, of course, not in 1917, but much earlier, and was due to the fact that the rural population, with the active export of the same grains, led a semi-miserable existence in many areas of tsarist Russia, selling the best of the produce and eating the worst, sick and dying. Zemstvo statistics have been preserved (for the Rybinsk and Yaroslavl provinces), according to which already in 1902 35% of peasant farms in this region did not have a horse, and 7.3% had their own land.
The huge difference in taxation before the revolution
The peasants, who enthusiastically adopted the Land Decree of 1917, rented allotments and horses for many years before paying them, paying both the owners of the means of production (up to half the crop) and the state (taxes). The latter were more than significant, since for a tithe of land it was required to deposit 1 ruble into the treasury. 97 kopecks, and the yield of the same tithing (under favorable weather conditions) was only about 4 rubles. It is also necessary to take into account the fact that noble taxes were levied in the amount of two kopecks (!) For the same tithe, despite the fact that the estates were equal in size to 200-300 peasant plots.
The decree on land in 1917 gave the peasants the opportunity to seize not only the landlords, but also the specific, church and monastery lands with all the property on them. Those who could leave the village to the city could return to these land plots from earnings. For example, in Yaroslavl province in 1902, about 202,000 passports were issued. This meant that so many men (mostly) left their households. The lands of ordinary Cossacks and peasants were not subject to seizure.
Letters from peasants - an important factor
It is believed that the decree on land in 1917 was drawn up on the basis of about 240 "peasant orders" by the editorial board of the newspaper Izvestia of the All-Russian Council of Peasant Deputies. It was intended that this document should have been a guide for land operations prior to the decision of the Constituent Assembly.
Prohibition of private ownership of land
What land reforms followed in 1917? The land decree reflected the point of view of the peasants that the most fair would be the order in which land cannot be privately owned. It becomes a public property and goes to the people working on it. At the same time, it was stipulated that persons affected by the “property coup” have the right to temporary public support to adapt to new living conditions.
In its second paragraph, the Land Decree (1917) indicated that subsoil and large bodies of water became state-owned, while small rivers and lakes were transferred to communities that have local governments. The document further stated that “highly cultivated plantations,” that is, gardens, greenhouses, are transferred to the state or to communities (depending on size), while home gardens and vegetable gardens remain their owners, but the size of the plots and the level of taxes on them are established by law.
Non-land issues
The land decree of 1917 addressed not only land issues. It mentions that horse factories, poultry breeding and cattle breeding also become a national property and become state property, in favor of the community or can be redeemed (the issue remained for the decision of the Constituent Assembly).
Household equipment from confiscated land passed to the new owners without redemption, but theoretically it was not allowed to leave the landless peasants without it.
When the Land Decree was adopted, it was assumed that allotments could be used by anyone who was able to process them on their own, family or in partnerships without hired labor. In the event of a person's incapacity, the rural community helped to cultivate its land until the restoration of working capacity, but not more than two years. And when the farmer grew old and could not personally work on the land, he lost the right to use it in exchange for a pension from the state.
To each according to his needs.
It is worth noting such conditions as the distribution of land according to needs depending on climatic conditions, the formation of a nationwide fund managed by local communities and central institutions (in the region). The land fund could be redistributed if the population changed or the allotment productivity. If the user left the earth, then she went back to the fund and could be received by other persons, primarily relatives of the retired community member. In this case, fundamental improvements (reclamation, fertilizers, etc.) should have been paid.
If the land fund was not enough to feed the peasants living on it, then at the expense of the state, resettlement of people should be organized with the supply of their equipment. The peasants had to move to new areas in the following order: willing, then “vicious” community members, then deserters, the rest by lot or by agreement with each other.
Based on the foregoing, we can say that the Land Decree was adopted by the II All-Russian Congress of Soviets, based on the current economic and political situation. Most likely, he simply consolidated the processes that were already taking place in society and were inevitable.