The People's Council of Latvia (, LTP) was a temporary council which declared

Latvia Latvia, officially the Republic of Latvia, is a country in the Baltic region of Northern Europe. It is one of the three Baltic states, along with Estonia to the north and Lithuania to the south. It borders Russia to the east and Belarus to t ...

independence Independence is a condition of a nation, country, or state, in which residents and population, or some portion thereof, exercise self-government, and usually sovereignty, over its territory. The opposite of independence is the status of ...

on November 18, 1918 and then acted as the temporary

parliament In modern politics and history, a parliament is a legislative body of government. Generally, a modern parliament has three functions: Representation (politics), representing the Election#Suffrage, electorate, making laws, and overseeing ...

of the country until a

Constitutional Assembly A constituent assembly (also known as a constitutional convention, constitutional congress, or constitutional assembly) is a body assembled for the purpose of drafting or revising a constitution. Members of a constituent assembly may be elected b ...

was elected. The People's Council was formed on November 17, 1918 as a result of merging two councils of Latvian organizations: Latvian Provisional National Council ('','' LPNP) and the Democratic Bloc. Originally, the People's Council had 40 members representing all the major Latvian political organizations, except the far right and the far left (

communists Communism () is a sociopolitical, philosophical, and economic ideology within the socialist movement, whose goal is the creation of a communist society, a socioeconomic order centered on common ownership of the means of production, d ...

). It was later expanded to 245 representatives. On November 18, 1918, the People's Council declared Latvia an independent country at the now

National Theatre of Latvia National may refer to: Common uses * Nation or country ** Nationality – a ''national'' is a person who is subject to a nation, regardless of whether the person has full rights as a citizen Places in the United States * National, Maryland, ...

. It chose

Jānis Čakste Jānis Kristaps Čakste (; 14 September 1859 – 14 March 1927) was a Latvian politician and lawyer who served as the first head of an independent Latvian state as the Chairman of the Tautas Padome, People's Council (1918–1920), the Speaker o ...

as the President of the Council and

Kārlis Ulmanis Kārlis Augusts Vilhelms Ulmanis (; 4 September 1877 – 20 September 1942) was a Latvian politician and a dictator. He was one of the most prominent Latvian politicians of pre-World War II Latvia during the Interwar period of independence from N ...

as the

Prime Minister A prime minister or chief of cabinet is the head of the cabinet and the leader of the ministers in the executive branch of government, often in a parliamentary or semi-presidential system. A prime minister is not the head of state, but r ...

of the

Latvian Provisional Government The Latvian Provisional Government () was formed on November 18, 1918 by the People's Council of Latvia as the interim government of the newly-proclaimed Republic of Latvia during the Latvian War of Independence. The term encompasses three cabin ...

. The People's Council acted as a temporary parliament of Latvia until May 1, 1920 when the Constitutional Assembly was elected.

References

External links

Tautas padome
Political history of Latvia 1918 establishments in Latvia {{Latvia-hist-stub Independence of Latvia Democratization