Ukrainian Labor party

Ukrainian Labor party (Українська трудова партія; Ukrainska trudova partiia, or УТП; UTP; also Labor Party, Ukrainian People's Labor party). Formerly the National Democratic party, it was inaugurated as the UTP at a party congress on 28 March 1919 in Stanyslaviv. The UTP maintained its predecessor's basic profile and personnel. It was the strongest Galician party in the Ukrainian National Rada and the General Secretariat of the Western Ukrainian National Republic (ZUNR). Yevhen Petrushevych and members of his government belonged to the UTP. Its publications included the dailies Dilo, Ukraïns’ka dumka (Lviv) (1920), and Ukraïns’kyi vistnyk (1921) as well as the weekly Bat’kivshchyna. The People's Committee of the UTP protested against the Treaty of Warsaw (1920) between the Ukrainian National Republic government and Poland, which acknowledged Poland's claim to Galicia, as well as against the Peace Treaty of Riga (1921). The UTP protested Polish rule in Ukrainian lands on the ground that it was a foreign occupation, and recognized the Government-in-exile of the Western Ukrainian National Republic under Ye. Petrushevych. On 21 May 1923 the National Congress of the UTP protested against the 14 March ruling of the Conference of Ambassadors, which recognized Poland's control over Galicia. The reaction to that decision resulted in the UTP's split into three factions. The first, the so-called independent group (under Ye. Evyn, Rev Oleksander Stefanovych, and others), rejected any attempt to harmonize Ukrainian-Polish relations and continued its support of Petrushevych. It published the daily Nash prapor. The second, more influential group centered around the paper Dilo and stressed its independence from émigré government centers, particularly that of Petrushevych, who was moving politically to Sovietophilism. The third, nationalist faction, headed by Samiilo Pidhirsky, Dmytro Paliiv, and Volodymyr Kuzmovych, broke away altogether from the UTP and founded the Ukrainian Party of National Work. The split was not final. In 1924, talks took place between the groups regarding the consolidation of Ukrainian political forces, and the factions were reunited on 11 July 1925 as the Ukrainian National Democratic Alliance.

Volodymyr Kubijovyč

[This article originally appeared in the Encyclopedia of Ukraine, vol. 5 (1993).]