The party had dominated the Fatherland Front, a coalition that took power in 1944, late in World War II, after it led a coup against Bulgaria's tsarist regime in conjunction with the Red Army's crossing of the border.

The BCP was committed to Marxism-Leninism, an ideology based on the writings of the German philosopher Karl Marx and of Lenin (from 1922 to 1953 as formulated by Soviet leader Joseph Stalin).

After Soviet Premier Mikhail Gorbachev took power in 1985, the BCP underwent political and economic liberalization, which promptly liquidated the party and dissolved the People's Republic of Bulgaria completely.

In 1948 the Bulgarian Social Democratic Workers Party (Broad Socialists) was forced to merge into the BKP, thus liquidating any left-wing alternative to the communists.

[citation needed] From 1954 until 1989 the party was led by Todor Zhivkov, who was very supportive of the Soviet Union and remained close to its leadership after Nikita Khrushchev was deposed by Leonid Brezhnev.

For all intents and purposes, this was the end of Communist rule in Bulgaria, though it would be another month before the provision in the constitution enshrining the party's "leading role" was deleted.

[5] Congresses and national conferences adopt the program and statutes of the party, approve the accounts of the past periods, develop directives and decisions for further activity.