The process of theoretical preparation and practical experience of creating the first Soviet penal code - the RSFSR Criminal code 1922 is being explored. The Russian historical, legal and criminological community is celebrating this year the centenary of this great Codistics act. Its special significance, legal accessibility and partial continuity of certain provisions and structures are revealed. Historical review of the key provisions of the General and Special Parts of the Republican Criminal Code of 1922 is carried out, their acute political orientation, the class nature of the "descending ladder" of punishments, the development of the concept of crime from formal definition to material, the concept of "potential danger" of the individual and the application of the analogy of the law. The author was also able to identify the paradoxical humanization of the provisions of the Criminal code 1922 by fixing a system of measures of social protection and measures not related to deprivation of liberty, the introduction of new exclusionary circumstances, the juvenile system of punishments for minors, etc.