Sfatul Țării

''Sfatul Țării'' ("Council of the Country"; ) was a council that united political, public, cultural, and professional organizations in the greater part of the territory of the Governorate of Bessarabia in the disintegrating Russian Empire, which was transformed into a Legislative body and proclaimed the Moldavian Democratic Republic as part of the Russian Federative Republic in December 1917, and then union with Romania in .

Prelude and organization

Russian participation in World War I

In August 1914, the First World War started, and 300,000 Bessarabians were mobilized and enrolled in the army of the Russian Empire, the majority in the immediate wake of Russian defeat. By March 1917, the military actions on the Eastern Front came to a stalemate. Conferences of soldiers in the rear of the front line dominated. Many called for a Republic; the Tsar had abdicated in March 1917, but the Russian Provisional Government that took his place had not proclaimed the Empire a Republic until September 1917. They wanted social and economic changes, such as annulment of the privileges of the nobility, and an agrarian reform that would give the peasants the land they worked on.

Despite the bad situation, the Army of the Russian Empire did not disband. Soldiers continued to form units, but often officers were replaced by new, elected ones. Units continued to be stationed as before and would not move without the consent of the general command. The soldiers also started making political claims, such as land reform, permission to use the national language in administration and courts, as well as education and church services in the national language. Some Bessarabian soldiers had numerous occasions to interact with soldiers of the Kingdom of Romania, and with ethnic Romanians from Transylvania and Bukovina, many of the latter taken prisoners from the Austrian army, and organized in regiments now fighting on the Entente side.

Contacts between Romanian intelligentsia in Austria-Hungary and in Russia were quite strong already before 1914, as many saw a common goal: building a national homeland for all Romanians. There were many divergent visions on how this could be achieved: some wanted all lands inhabited by Romanians to be reunited under the Austrian crown, others wanted an independent Romanian state, which might be closer either to the Central powers or to the Entente. At the time, less than half of all Romanians lived within the borders of what was then the Kingdom of Romania, and due to its small size, it had almost no influence over the two big neighboring empires. As a result, the Romanian intelligentsia in Transylvania, Bukovina and Bessarabia had to seek political empowerment by itself, exchanging methods and tactics with each other. Transylvanian newspapers in Romanian, such as ''Ardealul'' of Onisifor Ghibu were widespread in Bessarabia before World War I, where local newspapers such as '' Cuvânt moldovenesc'' and ''Viața Basarabiei'', although not completely outlawed, were targets of Russian authorities. With the overall recruitment for World War I, many representatives of Romanian intelligentsia found themselves as low-rank officers in Austrian and Russian armies.

In 1917, after the February Revolution in Petrograd, "Moldavian Revolutionary Committees of Soldiers" were organized in the major Russian cities where recruits from Bessarabia were concentrated: Odessa, Kiev, Sevastopol, Kherson, Novogeorgievsk, Moroski ( Minsk gubernia) in Russia, as well as in Iași, Roman, and Bârlad on the Romanian Front, plus smaller ones. Among the main calls on their banners were "Land and liberty", "Down with the war", and "Peoples's right to self-determination". April 1917 was the month with most such gatherings in the Russian Empire. On , a huge meeting was held in Odessa, where more than 10,000 Bessarabian soldiers participated. The resolution adopted by the meeting demanded (a) political autonomy for Bessarabia, (b) organization in Bessarabia of Moldavian military units (''cohorts'') in order to stop the violence to the population produced by the deserting irregulars of the partially disintegrating Russian Army, news of which had reached the soldiers, making them feel very worried for the fate of their families. This "congress" was also attended by a number of Bessarabian students, who obtained from the Russian authorities the permission to hold for those interested Romanian history and literature courses at the University of Odessa, as well as a number of Bessarabian intellectuals, such as Emanoil Catelli, Baluță, and others, who were most probably the authors of the resolution passed.

Local congresses

Following the February Revolution and the cessation of World War I hostilities, various meetings and congresses were organized throughout Bessarabia, discussing the future of the country. Led by teachers and intellectuals, meetings were held and committees were set up in virtually every village, after which county-wide and Bessarabia-wide congresses of professional corporations – peasants, teachers, cooperators, clergy – were held. On –, a congress of the representatives of the village cooperatives ("The First Congress of Cooperatives of Bessarabia") was held in Chișinău and voted a motion demanding political, administrative, educational, religious, and economic autonomy for Bessarabia and the formation of a legislative assembly "Sfatul Țării" (literally ''The Council of the Country'').

This was followed by other congresses, including those of soldiers, priests, students and teachers, all demanding self-rule. On –, 1917, a Congress of Clergy and representatives of parish committees was held in Chişinău, demanding a Moldavian archbishop to head the Church in Bessarabia, political autonomy of Bessarabia, and the setting of a High Council as a national legislative and executive body. Similar motions were passed in all nine counties of Bessarabia.

A "General Congress of Bessarabian Teachers" was held in Chișinău, and passed a motion to switch the primary language used in teaching from Russian to Romanian, to use the Latin alphabet, and supporting the demands of the other three congresses. On –, the Congress of Moldavian Teachers decided to switch to the Latin alphabet. Among the notable speeches at that congress were the ones given by Alexei Mateevici, who asked that Bessarabians identify as "Romanians" rather than " Moldavians", and of Iulie Frățiman, who asked that the areas beyond the Dniester inhabited by Romanians be administered by Bessarabia. These opinions weren't unanimous, as several protested being called "Romanians", affirming they were "not Romanian", but "Moldavian".

During April, May and June 1917, a series of Peasant Congresses are held at local levels, demanding land, administrative, and social reform, and the autonomy of Bessarabia. On –, the First General Congress of Peasants of All Bessarabia takes place in Chișinău. The Congress claimed that from the report of all the regions of Bessarabia, the land was taken over by an anarchic and public disorder current, to which the administration of Kerenski can not attend. Therefore, the Congress decided to found a Provisional Council of 100 members, 70 of which should be Moldavians and 30 should by representatives of minority groups. To this end, the Congress made up an organization commission. However, all this remained talk, and this organization commission has never done anything.

Legal situation

When the February Revolution took place in Petrograd in 1917, the governor of Bessarabia stepped down and passed his legal powers to Constantin Mimi, the President of the Gubernial Zemstvo, who was named ''the Commissar of the Provisional Government in Bessarabia'', with Vladimir Criste his deputy. Similar procedures took place in all regions of the Russian Empire; the chiefs of the Tsarist administrations passed their legal powers to the chiefs of the County and Governorate Zemstvos, which were then called ''County/Governorate Commissars''.Ion Nistor