Page:EB1922 - Volume 32.djvu/327

Rh Russell succeeded Sir Horace Plunkett as vice-president of the Irish Department of Agriculture and Technical Instruction. In 1910 he withdrew from the representation of S. Tyrone, but in the following year was elected for N. Tyrone as a Liberal and Home Ruler. He received a baronetcy in 1917 and retired from public life in 1918. He died at Terenure, co. Dublin, May 3 1920. RUSSELL, WILLIAM CLARK (1844-1911), English author (see 23.865), died at Bath Nov. 8 1911. RUSSIA (see 23.869). The history of Russia in the years 1910-21 was dominated by the revolution. The connexion between the World War of 1914-8 and that crisis is evident, but even the years preceding the outbreak of the war, both at home and abroad, must be considered chiefly as leading up to the catastrophe. The decay of the bureaucratic system of govern- ment, the entanglements of the foreign policy of the empire, the spread of extreme theories among the educated classes, the misery and discontent of the common people, were manifested by striking symptoms both on great occasions and in everyday life.

The Last Years of Tsardom. The transition from an auto- cratic to a constitutional regime is a difficult problem to solve under any circumstances, and it was rendered especially difficult in Russia by the lack of political education among the people, the doctrinaire fanaticism of the intellectual leaders and the short- sighted egotism of the Government. Instead of realizing the necessity of working together and supporting one another in order to avoid a revolutionary catastrophe, the traditional rulers and the reformers were intent on destroying each other. The First Duma had ended its days in a vain attempt to appeal to the country against the Imperial Government. In the face of terroristic attacks bureaucratic circles invited the support of enlightened public opinion, but they did it in a characteristic fashion. General Trepov conducted negotiations with a view to forming a Cadet Ministry, but competent observers were con- vinced that his ultimate object in applying to the advanced doctrinaires was to effect an unworkable coalition which would have to be given up after a short interval in favour of a military dictatorship (Isvolsky, Memoirs, 2oiF).

The Stolypin Ministry, which was actually formed in 1906, started also with a programme of cooperation between the Gov- ernment and " leaders of public opinion," and it sought an agree- ment with the more moderate sections of Liberals, especially with the Octobrists, the supporters of a policy aiming at putting into practice the Manifesto of Oct. 30. The failure of this attempt is a fact of historical importance in so far as it showed conclusively how irreconcilable the tendencies of the Imperial bureaucracy were with the programme of Moderate Liberalism. Our survey of the period must start with a brief account of Stolypin's policy, as its failure led directly to the events of the revolution which put an end to the monarchy of the Romanovs.

Stolypin's Policy. The protagonist of the drama in 1906-10, P. A. Stolypin, was as fine a representative of Old Russia as the governing class of the time could muster not a great statesman nor an original thinker, but a high-minded, patriotic country gentleman endowed with the traditional courage of his class, with practical experience in Zemstvo work and provincial ad- ministration, accessible to ideas of reform, but constitutionally adverse to radical theories. When Minister of the Interior in Goremykin's Ministry he had taken part in negotiations with the " leaders of public opinion," even with Cadets like Murom- tsev and Milyukov; on assuming the premiership he tried to introduce into his Cabinet Liberals like Count Heyden, A. Guch- kov, N. Lvov, but he did not insist on this combination and eventually formed his Ministry on bureaucratic lines, while relying on the support of the Moderates in the Duma.

The sanguinary repression of revolutionary attempts and of agrarian revolts was taken in hand with ruthless energy, and it succeeded in driving discontent underground and in reestab- lishing external order, but it cast its shadow on the constructive work of Stolypin's statesmanship. After the clash with the intractable Second Duma the electoral system was altered by the Manifesto of June 3 1907.

This coup d'etat secured to the Government a numerical majority in the Third and in the Fourth Dumas, while at the same time it weakened the moral authority of these Assemblies and made the Moderates more susceptible to the appeals of the Lefts.

Some of the points of the complicated electoral system introduced by the Manifesto of June 3 1907 may be mentioned. The deputies were chosen by provincial electoral colleges, only the principal landowners and capitalists had the right to vote personally in these colleges, while other citizens had to exercise their right through representatives chosen at preliminary meetings. The direct fran- chise was conceded to persons holding land in varying quantities in the different provinces, roughly from 150 dessiatines (about 400 ac.) to 600 dess. (about 1,600 ac.), or town property of the value of 15,000 rubles (about 1,500). The preliminary assemblies were constituted separately for smaller landowners, smaller householders in the towns, the clergy, factory and workshop workmen and peasants. Electors belonging to different nationalities could be divided into separate electoral groups by ministerial decree. The elections in Petrograd, Moscow, Kiev and Odessa were to be carried out by direct suffrage.

Stolypin's counter-offensive against the revolutionary move- ment could not be restricted to measures of police and emergency legislation: it made itself felt in the intellectual domain.

In spite of the outward pacification of the country there was no real settlement, and the flames of political passion burst out occasionally with ominous violence. The close of 1910 was marked by an increased agitation among the students the most sensitive and audacious element of Russian society. Har- rowing tales of flogging and tortures practised on political con- victs in the prisons of the North and of Siberia had reached the educational centres, and a series of strikes and indignation meetings began in all the various high schools of the empire. The professors and academic authorities did all they could to put an end to these disturbances and to ensure the continuation of teaching, and the majority of the undergraduates supported them in this respect. The reactionary bureaucrats, however, with M. Kasso, the Minister of Public Instruction, at their head, decided to use these sad occurrences in order to overthrow the self-government of the universities, conceded to these institu- tions by the Imperial ukaz of Aug. 27 1905, and to curb the rebellious spirit of the students by stern centralization. Towards the end of the Christmas vacation M. Kasso and the Council of Ministers issued decrees ordering the establishment of a strict regime of official inspection, the closing of students' unions and societies with the exception of the scientific ones, and, eventually, the direct interference of the police for the maintenance of order within the universities and high schools. As a protest against these measures, strikes and obstructions broke out again in all the establishments for higher education; lectures had to be delivered in the presence of police officers, armed constables occupied the halls and corridors of academic buildings, and wholesale arrests and deportations of under- graduates took place. In Moscow the Rector (Prof. Maniulov) and his assistants declared that they could not assume responsi- bility for the carrying into effect of the ministerial measures, and resigned their offices, when thereupon they were deprived of their chairs; 63 professors and lecturers tendered their resig- nations as a mark of sympathy with their dismissed comrades. This did not disturb the minister in the least, and he promptly accepted most of the resignations, although this involved the intellectual ruin of the oldest and most famous university of Rus- sia. The " Pride's Purge " in Moscow was followed by a number of dismissals in other educational establishments ; it was obvious that some of these repressive measures had been prompted by feelings of jealousy and revenge on the part of the minister.

The unsparing scourging of the academic corporations pro- duced the desired effect of outward submission, but it brought the feelings of hatred and humiliation among the intellectuals to the highest pitch, and the outcasts and convicts of the univer- sity " Stories " afterwards formed the principal contingent among the embittered intellectual leaders of the revolution.

Another sign of the times may be discerned in Stolypin's legislation in respect of the Zemstvos of the western provinces (Kiev, Volhynia, Podolia, Mogilev, Minsk and Vitebsk). The introduction of a measure of local self-government would have