Article 6 of the Soviet Constitution, which makes the Communist Party the "leading and guiding force of Soviet society," is the key to the party's exclusive hold on political power.
It is part of the Constitution adopted Oct. 7, 1977, by a special session of the Supreme Soviet under the leadership of the late Leonid I. Brezhnev. It has been interpreted as ruling out the creation of competing political parties. The article says:"The leading and guiding force of Soviet society and the nucleus of its political system, of all state organizations and public organizations, is the Communist Party of the Soviet Union. The C.P.S.U. exists for the people and serves the people.
"The Communist Party, armed with Marxism-Leninism, determines the general perspectives of the development of society and the course of the home and foreign policy of the U.S.S.R., directs the great constructive work of the Soviet people, and imparts a planned, systematic and theoretically substantiated character to their struggle for the victory of communism.
"All party organizations shall function within the framework of the Constitution of the U.S.S.R."