page_title: Democratic Republic of Georgia
section_title: Background
hierarchical_section_title: Democratic Republic of Georgia / Background
caption_attribution_description: Nikolay ('Karlo') Chkheidze (1864-1926), Georgian Menshevik politician.
context_page_description: The Democratic Republic of Georgia existed from May 1918 to February 1921 and was the first modern establishment of a Republic of Georgia.
  The DRG was created after the collapse of the Russian Empire that began with the Russian Revolution of 1917. Its established borders were with the Kuban People's Republic and the Mountainous Republic of the Northern Caucasus in the north, the Ottoman Empire and the First Republic of Armenia in the south, and the Azerbaijan Democratic Republic in the southeast. It had a total land area of roughly 107,600 km², and a population of 2.5 million.
  The republic's capital was Tbilisi, and its state language was Georgian. Proclaimed on May 26, 1918, on the break-up of the Transcaucasian Federation, it was led by the Georgian Social Democratic Party. Facing permanent internal and external problems, the young state was unable to withstand invasion by Russia's Red Army and collapsed between February and March 1921, to become a Soviet republic.
context_section_description: After the February Revolution of 1917 and collapse of the tsarist administration in the Caucasus, most powers was held by the Special Transcaucasian Committee (Ozakom, short for Osobyi Zakavkazskii Komitet) of the Russian Provisional Government. All of the soviets in Georgia were firmly controlled by the Georgian Social Democratic Party, who followed the lead of the Petrograd Soviet and supported the Provisional Government. The Bolshevist October Revolution changed the situation drastically. The Caucasian Soviets refused to recognize Vladimir Lenin's regime. Threats from the increasingly Bolshevistic deserting soldiers of the former Caucasus army, ethnic clashes and anarchy in the region forced Georgian, Armenian and Azerbaijani politicians to create a unified regional authority known as the Transcaucasian Commissariat (November 14, 1917) and later a legislature, the Sejm (January 23, 1918). On April 22, 1918, the Sejm – Nikolay Chkheidze was the president – declared the Transcaucasus an independent democratic federation with an executive Transcaucasian government chaired by Evgeni Gegechkori and later by Akaki Chkhenkeli.
  Many Georgians, influenced by the ideas of Ilia Chavchavadze and other intellectuals from the late 19th century, insisted on national independence. A cultural national awakening was further strengthened by the restoration of the autocephaly of the Georgian Orthodox Church (March 12, 1917) and the establishment of a national university in Tbilisi (1918). In contrast, the Georgian Mensheviks regarded independence from Russia as a temporary step against the Bolshevik revolution and considered calls for Georgia's independence chauvinistic and separatist. The union of Transcaucasus was short-lived though. Undermined by increasing internal tensions and by pressure from the German and Ottoman empires, the federation collapsed on May 26, 1918, when Georgia declared independence. Two days later both Armenia and Azerbaijan declared their independence as well.
caption: Nikolay Chkheidze, president of the Georgian Provisional Assembly, later the Constituent Assembly
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