In the younger ranks of the educated classes this state of things had produced much dissatisfaction, which soon found expression in revolutionary agitation. At first the agitation was of an academic character, and was dealt with by the press censure, but it gradually took the form of secret associations, and the police had to interfere. There were no great, well-organised secret societies, but there were many small groups, composed chiefly of male and female students of the universities and technical schools, which worked independently for a common purpose. That purpose was the overthrow of the existing regime and the reorganisation of society on collectivist principles. Finding that the walls of autocracy could not be overturned by blasts of revolutionary trumpets, the young enthusiasts determined to seek the support of the masses, or, as they termed it, " to go in among the people " (idti v narod). Under the guise of doctors, midwives, teachers, governesses, factory hands, or common labourers, they sought to make proselytes among the peasantry and the workmen in the industrial centres by revolutionary pamphlets and oral explanations.
For a time the propaganda had very little success, because the uneducated peasants and factory workers could not easily understand the phraseology and principles of scientific socialism; but when the propagandists descended to a lower platform and spread rumours that the czar had given all the land to the peasants, and that the proprietors were preventing his benevolent intentions from being carried into effect, there was a serious danger of agrarian disturbances, and energetic measures were adopted by the authorities. Wholesale arrests were made by the police, and many of the accused were imprisoned or exiled to distant provinces, some by the regular judicial procedure, and others by so-called "administrative procedure," without trial. The activity of the police and the sufferings of the victims naturally produced intense excitement and bitterness among those who escaped, and a secret body calling itself the executive committee announced in its clandestinely printed organs that those who distinguished themselves by endeavouring to suppress the propaganda would be removed. A number of officials had been condemned to death by this secret terrorist tribunal, and in some cases its sentences were carried out. As these terrorist measures had quite the opposite of the desired effect, repeated attempts had been made on the life of the emperor. At last, on the 13th of March, 1881, the carefully-laid plans of the conspirators, [as related in the last chapter], were successful.
THE REACTIONARY POLICY UNDER ALEXANDER III
Finding repressive police measures insufficient to suppress the revolutionary movement, Alexander II had entertained the idea of giving a certainsatisfaction to moderate liberal opinion without restricting his autocratic power. With this object in view he had appointed General Loris-Melikov, who was credited with liberal views, minister of the interior, and on the morning of his death he had signed a ukase creating several commissions, composed of high official personages and eminent private individuals, who should prepare reforms in various branches of the administration.
His son and successor Alexander III (1881-94), who had never shown much sympathy with liberalism in any form, entered frankly on a reactionary policy, which was pursued consistently during the whole of his reign. He could not, of course, undo the great reforms of his predecessor, but he amended them in such a way as to counteract what he considered the exaggerations of liberalism. Local self-government in the village communes, the
rural districts, and the towns was carefully restricted, and placed to a greater extent under the control of the regular officials.
The reformers of the previous reign had endeavoured to make the emancipated peasantry administratively and economically independent of the landed proprietors; the conservatives of this later era, proceeding on the assumption that the peasants did not know how to make a proper use of the liberty prematurely conferred upon them, endeavoured to re-establish the influence of the landed proprietors by appointing from amongst them " land-chiefs," who were to exercise over the peasants of their district a certain amount of patriarchal jurisdiction. The reformers of the previous reign had sought to make the new local administration (zemstvo) a system of genuine rural self-government and a basis for future parliamentary institutions; these later conservatives transformed it into a mere branch of the ordinary state administration, and took precautions against its ever assuming a political character. Even municipal institutions, which had never shown much vitality, were subjected to similar restrictions. In short, the various forms of local self-government, which were intended to raise the nation gradually to the higher political level of western Europe, were condemned as unsuited to the national character and traditions, and as productive of disorder and demoralisation. They were accordingly replaced in great measure by the old autocratic methods of administration, and much of the administrative corruption which had been cured, or at least repressed, by the reform enthusiasm again flourished luxuriantly.
Alexander III (1845-1894)
In a small but influential section of the educated classes there was a conviction that the revolutionary tendencies, which culminated in nihilism and anarchism, proceeded from the adoption of cosmopolitan rather than national principles in all spheres of educational and administrative activity, and that the best remedy for the evils from which the country was suffering was to be found in a return to the three great principles of nationality, orthodoxy, and autocracy. This doctrine, which had been invented by the Slavophilsof a previous generation, was early instilled into the mind of Alexander III by Pobiedonostsev, who was one of his teachers, and later his most trusted adviser, and its influence can be traced in all the more important acts of the government during that monarch's reign. His determination to maintain autocracy was officially proclaimed a few days after his accession. Nationality and eastern orthodoxy, which are so closely connected as to be almost blended together in the Russian mind, received not less attention.
THE RUSSIFICATION OF THE PROVINCES.
Even in European Russia the regions near the frontier contain a great variety of nationalities, languages, and religions. In Finland the population is composed of Finnish-speaking and Swedish-speaking Protestants; the Baltic provinces are inhabited by German-speaking, Lett-speaking, and Esth-speak- ing Lutherans; the inhabitants of the southwestern provinces are chiefly Polish-speaking Roman Catholics and Yiddish-speaking Jews; in the Crimea and on the middle Volga there are a considerable number of Tatar-speaking Mohammedans; and in the Caucasus there is a conglomeration of races and languages such as is to be found on no other portion of the earth's surface. Until recent times these various nationalities were allowed to retain unmolested the language, religion, and peculiar local administration of their ancestors, but when the new nationality doctrine came into fashion attempts were made to spread among them the language, religion, and administrative institutions of the dominant race. In the reigns of Nicholas I and Alexander II these attempts were merely occasional and intermittent; under Alexander III they were made systematically and with very little consideration for the feelings, wishes, and interests of the people concerned. The local institutions were assimilated to those of the purely Russian provinces; the use of the Russian language was made obligatory in the administration, in the tribunals, and to some extent in the schools; the spread of eastern orthodoxy was encouraged by the authorities, whilst the other confessions were placed under severe restrictions; foreigners were prohibited from possessing landed property, and in some provinces administrative measures were taken for making the land pass into the hands of orthodox Russians. In this process some of the local officials displayed probably an amount of zeal beyond the intentions of the government, but any attempt to oppose the movement was rigorously punished.