Jüri Uluots

Jüri Uluots

Jüri Uluots (January 13, 1890 - January 9, 1945) was an Estonian prime minister, journalist, and prominent attorney.

Uluots was born in the Kirbla municipality in 1890, and studied law at St. Petersburg University from 1910 - 1918. He subsequently taught Roman and Estonian law at the University of Tartu until 1944. Uluots was also an editor of the Kaja newspaper from 1919-1920, and editor-in-chief of Postimees from 1937-38.

Uluots was elected to the Riigikogu, the Estonian parliament, from 1920 - 1926, and from 1929 through 1932. He then served as prime minister from 1938 until June 1940 when Soviet troops entered Estonia and installed a new pro-Soviet government. This communist government was never recognized by the United States, whereas Uluots' "constitutional" government went underground.

In July 1940 the former Estonian President Konstantin Päts was arrested and deported to Russia. According to the theory of Estonian legal continuity, Uluots became prime minister acting in the duties of the president, as dictated by the Estonian constitution. When the Nazis invaded the Estonian SSR in 1941 the communist government was overthrown. As the Germans retreated in September, 1944, Uluots organized a new government, headed by Otto Tief.

Tief's government left Tallinn prior to the Soviet army's arrival and went into hiding. But most of the cabinet members were later arrested and suffered various repressions by the Soviet authorities, or were sent to labour camps in Siberia. The remainder of the government fled to Stockholm, Sweden, where it operated in exile from 1944 to 1992 when Heinrich Mark, who was prime minister acting in duties of the president, presented his credentials to incoming president Lennart Meri. Uluots died shortly after arriving in Sweden in 1945.

References

• Article about Otto Tief's government from the official site of the Estonian Embassy in Moscow