to convoke a Party Commission headed by Ion Popescu-Puțuri, charged with investigating both Stalinist legacy and Gheorghiu-Dej's purges: resulting in the rehabilitation of a large number of Communist officials (including, among others, Ștefan Foriș, Lucrețiu Pătrășcanu, Miron Constantinescu, Vasile Luca, and Romanian victims of the Soviet Great Purge). This measure was instrumental in consolidating the new leadership while further increasing its distance from Gheorghiu-Dej's political legacy. In 1965, Ceaușescu declared that Romania was no longer a People's Democracy but a Socialist Republic and changed the name of the party back to the Romanian Communist Party'''—steps which were meant to indicate that Romania was following strict Marxist policies while remaining independent. He continued Romanianization and de-Sovietization efforts by stressing notions such as sovereignty and self-determination. At the time, Ceauşescu made references to Gheorghiu-Dej's own personality cult, while implying that his was to be a new style of leadership. In its official discourse, the PCR introduced the dogmas of "socialist democracy" and direct communication with the masses. From ca. 1965 to 1975, there was a noted rise in the standard of living for the Romanian population as a whole, which was similar to developments in most other Eastern bloc countries. Political scientist Daniel Barbu, who noted that this social improvement trend began ca. 1950 and benefited 45% of the population, concluded that one of its main effects was to increase the citizens' dependency on the state. A seminal event occurred in August 1968, when Ceaușescu highlighted his anti-Soviet discourse by vocally opposing the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia; a highly popular measure with the Romanian public, it led to sizable enrollments in the PCR and the newly created paramilitary Patriotic Guards (created with the goal of meeting a possible Soviet intervention in Romania). From 1965 to 1976, the PCR rose from approximately 1.4 million members to 2.6 million. In the contingency of an anti-Soviet war, the PCR even sought an alliance with the maverick Yugoslav leader Josip Broz Tito—negotiations did not yield a clear result. Although military intervention in Romania was reportedly taken into consideration by the Soviets, there is indication that Leonid Brezhnev had himself ruled out Romanian participation in Warsaw Pact maneuvers, and that he continued to rely on Ceaușescu's support for other common goals. While it appears that Romanian leaders genuinely approved of the Prague Spring reforms undertaken by Alexander Dubček, Ceaușescu's gesture also served to consolidate his image