imperial russia, 1881 1914

The Russian Revolution1815-1924

Session IVImperial Russia, 1881-1914

Sunday, October 11, 2009

• Economic Conditions

• The Agrarian Problem

• Industry & Labor

• Foreign Trade

• Domestic Political Developments

• Full Reaction, 1881-1905

• Reformers & Revolutionaries

• The Revolution of 1905

• The Constitutional Experiment

• Foreign Policy

• Expansion

• The Train Wreck


Economic Conditions


Economic Conditions

Deryevnalit., the village

fig., thecountryside,rural Russia


Agriculture provided the economic and social basis of late-tsarist Russia. Approximately four-fifths of her population consisted of peasants who tilled the land and, in the northern provinces, also pursued industrial side occupations. A balloonist flying over Central Russia would have seen an endless landscape of cultivated fields, divided into narrow strips, interspersed with forests and meadows, scattered among which, every five to ten kilometers, lay villages of wooden huts. Cities were small and far between.

Richard Pipes, A Concise History of the Russian Revolution, p. 4


Imperative for Change


We are at least two hundred years behind, we have really gained nothing yet, we have no definite attitude to the past, we do nothing but theorize or complain of depression or drink vodka. It is clear that to begin to live in the present we must first expiate our past, we must break with it; and we can expiate it only by suffering, by extraordinary unceasing labor.

the “perpetual student” Trofimovin Anton Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard, 1904

Imperative for Change


19th Century Russian Inte!igentsia


19th Century Russian Inte!igentsia

WesternizersSlavophilsVladimir Solovyov

Aleksey Khomyakov

Aleksandr Herzen

Vissarion Belinsky


Advocates of Reform:Three Main Groups



1. economic and social change granted from above



1. economic and social change granted from aboveby imperial ukase or administrative action without alteration of the political or social system




examples--Alexander II, in his early years, bureaucrat reformers, Miliutin, Stolypin





2. emulate the liberal countries of western Europe





2. emulate the liberal countries of western Europegradual reforms by the progressive extension of political rights






Westernizers, university professors, civil servants, professionals, capitalists







3. revolutionaries of various types







3. revolutionaries of various typesleast homogeneous of the three groups








Narodniki, People’s Will, Land and Freedom, Social Democrats, Bolsheviks. SRs








Narodniki, People’s Will, Land and Freedom, Social Democrats, Bolsheviks. SRs

only agreed on the need for violence


Opponents of Reform


Opponents of Reform

most members of the governing classes


Opponents of Reform

most members of the governing classesat the court,


Opponents of Reform


in the higher civil service and the officers of the military,


Opponents of Reform



the church, the Slavophil intelligentsia


Opponents of Reform




the landed gentry, who opposed change for ideological or material reasons


Opponents of Reform




the landed gentry, who opposed change for ideological or material reasons

the Muzhiki, the peasantry “the inert mass of the population”


The Agrarian Problem


The Agrarian Problem

Deryevna in Tambov Gubernia, 1891-92

photo by Maxim Dimitreyev,father of Russian photo journalism


The Mir System

S. Korovin, “На Миру (Na Miru)On the Mir”


The Mir System

mir-Slavic term=village collective, world, & peace; cf., Mir Miru



The Mir System


1861-the emancipation edict took the mir out from under the local noble and made it a self- governing body, collectively responsible for paying the redemption dues



The Mir System



peasants couldn’t leave without the permission of the mir



The Mir System




land was alloted by the mir to each household



The Mir System




land was alloted by the mir to each household

the medieval “three field system” and similar backward practices kept yields low



Primitive Transportation Hindered Productivity

Ilya Repin. Barge Haulers on the Volga. 1870-1873. Oil on canvas. The Russian Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia


… the great mass of the peasantry continued to live in the communes [miri] in conditions of deepening poverty. It is not surprising that the memory of the exciting promise of the days of emancipation should gradually have been transformed into a legend that the tsar’s wishes … had been betrayed by evil forces, and that some day justice would be done….

Craig, p.383


Industry & Labor


Industry & Labor

THE PUTILOV COMPANY IN LATE IMPERIAL RUSSIA, 1868-1917


19th Century Russian Industry



in contrast to agriculture, there was decided growth and modernization here




the Putilov Locomotive Works of St. Petersburg was “the Russian Krupp”





the rapid railway building of the 1870s slowed in the next decade






but between 1892 and 1902 total rail mileage grew by 46%







1890-1900-Putilov’s work force quadrupled to 12,400








rail demand spurred the new coal and iron industry in the Donetz basin









Baku and the Caucasus oil fields were another new development at the turn of the century









Baku and the Caucasus oil fields were another new development at the turn of the century

Rostow’s Take-off Stage was 1885-1900, so Russia had begun the Drive to Maturity (Stage 4) well before the 1917 Revolution


The Admiralty Dockyard. Lithograph by C.P.Beggrow . 1820s.

Peter the Great’s Navy Shipyard, Skt-Peterburg


The first steamboat in Russia, Elizabeth, was built at the plant of K. N. Bird in 1815, and in 1834, the submarine of A. A. Schilder was built at Alexandrovsky Plant. It was the first solid-metal vessel constructed in Russia. To defend the sea approaches to the capital in 1854-55 a total of 89 propeller gunboats and corvettes were built; some battleships were equipped with propeller engines on the initiative of General-Admiral Grand Prince Konstantin Nikolaevich with participation of N. I. Putilov in St. Petersburg. From the middle of the 19th century and up to 1904, the New Admiralty alone built 36 military ships, and Borodino battleship is considered to be the best of those. Nevsky Plant established in 1857 specialized in construction of torpedo boats as did Metal Plant founded at the same time. In 1912, the joint-stock company of Putilov Plants created Putilov Ship Building Plant and purchased Nevsky Plant. In 1914-17 some 10,000 workers were employed at these enterprises, building destroyers. By the end of 1914, the Baltic Plant and the Admiralty Plant completed 4 dreadnought battleships (Sevastopol, Poltava, Petropavlovsk and Gangut), and the serial construction of turbine destroyers of Novik type started at Putilov Plant. All in all in 1908-17, Petrograd shipbuilders built 37 turbine ships for the Baltic Fleet.

Russia’s “Military-Industrial Complex”--80 years later


State Sponsorship of Industry

father, Dutch Lutheran; mother, Russian nobility

college in Odessa, mathematics degree

1870s & ‘80s-railroad administration

1889-1892-Director of Railway Affairs--began the Trans-Siberian Railway

1892-1903-Finance Minister

encouraged foreign investment, 1897-put Russia on the gold standard

1903-1905-Chairman, Council of Ministers

Sergei Yulevich Witte1849-1915


VOLZHSKO-KAMSKY BANK, a joint-stock commercial bank founded by a group of manufacturers and merchants. The share capital amounted to 6 million roubles and increased up to 18 million roubles by 1914. The bank developed a network of 60 branches that in 1914 covered commercial centers of the Volga Region and the Urals, as well as Kiev, Kharkov, and Ekaterinburg. The leader among Russian commercial banks in 1890s, the bank dealt with financing domestic production, as well as issuing and distributing bonds of Russian rail carriers from the late 1890s on. The bank also took part in establishing Produgol Syndicate [to develop oil resources-JBP] in 1906. The volume of transactions was high enough for the bank to rank 6th among all Russian banks by 1914. The building of Volzhsko-Kamsky Bank was built by architect L. N. Benois at 38 Nevsky Prospect in the first third of the 19th century and partly re-built in 1898.


(KRASNY) TREUGOLNIK (138 Obvodny Canal Embankment), an open joint-stock company, an enterprise making footwear from polymer materials. It was founded in 1860 by Hamburg merchant F. Krauskopf and his companions as the Russian-American Rubber Manufacture Association (since 1908 it was called Treugolnik). The main products of the plant were rubber overshoes (in the period from 1900 to 1912 its production increased from 10 million to 20 million pairs; up to 25% of the products were exported). The plant also produced machine belts, pipes for pipelines, discharge valves and faucets, isolation, medical instruments, etc. Up to the late 19th century the plant was country monopolist in this sector of the market, in the 20th century it was the largest enterprise of rubber goods production in Russia and Europe.


19th Century St. Petersburg Plants


19th Century St. Petersburg PlantsAfter the 1917 revolution the Putilov works were renamed “Red Putilov.” In 1934, Stalin secretly

had Sergei Kirov assassinated and named them for him


Development of a Proletariat


Development of a ProletariatWith the growth of industry in the 1890s...changes became noticeable: the number to take permanent empoyment in the fatories increased; thousands loosened their last ties with their villages; and many began to break away from old beliefs and to reject the restrictions imposed on their behavior by the Church and the patriarchal family. In addition, the fierce struggles in the factories had led at least a small core of the workers to see the relation between their economic problems and larger political problems; the fact that the state protected their employers--often foreign capitalists--impressed upon them the need for changing the political situation in order to improve the economic.

Sidney Harcave, Russia; A History, p. 381


The Human CostsThe Lena Goldfields Massacre


MEMORIAL AT THE PLACE OF THE WORKER MASSACRE 4/17 APRIL 1912 YEAR


SLUICE AT THE SITE OF THE ANNUNCIATION GOLD MINE

From material in the book “Harbinger of Revolutionary Events”


The Lena Miners OrganizePresident of the Central Strike Committee

Pavel Nikolaevich Batashev

From a Russian internet site


The Lena Miners Organize

Merciless exploitation of the workforce provided enormous profits for the British and Russian shareholders, such as A.I.Vyshnegradsky, Alexei Putilov (both on the board of directors), Count Sergei Witte, Empress Maria Fyodorovna, and others.

President of the Central Strike Committee Pavel Nikolaevich Batashev



http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United_Kingdom


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shareholder


http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Alexei_Putilov&action=edit&redlink=1


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Board_of_directors




http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Count


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sergei_Witte


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maria_Feodorovna_(Dagmar_of_Denmark)




The working conditions at the goldfields were extremely harsh. The miners had to work 15 to 16 hours a day. For every thousand workers, there were more than 700 traumatic accidents. One part of the low salary often had to be used to pay fines. The other part of it was given in the form of coupons to be used in stores at the mine itself.




















http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Physical_trauma





February 29 (March 13) 1912-All this led a spontaneous strike at the Andreyevsky goldfield. An immediate cause for the strike was distribution of rotten meat at one of the stores.






















http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/February_29


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strike_action






4 March-the workers established their demands: an 8-hour workday, 30% raise in wages, the elimination of fines, and the improvement of food delivery, among others. However, none of these demands were satisfied by the administration






























4 March-the workers established their demands: an 8-hour workday, 30% raise in wages, the elimination of fines, and the improvement of food delivery, among others. However, none of these demands were satisfied by the administration

mid-March- the strike had extended to all the goldfields, and included over 6000 workers


























the climax


the climax

4 April 1912 a thin line of Russian soldiers, confronted by a large crowd of gold miners on strike for several weeks, reacted with fear and anger. At their officers' orders, they opened fire, shooting five hundred unarmed protestors [150-270 killed, 100-250 wounded]. The event reverberated across Russia.


the climax


It has been suggested that Vladimir Ulyanov adopted his more popular alias after the river Lena — Lenin — after this event, although he had in fact started using it years earlier[1901]. He had served time in Shushenskoe (in Siberia, but not on the Lena River), 1897-1900


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vladimir_Ulyanov




http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lenin


the climax


It has been suggested that Vladimir Ulyanov adopted his more popular alias after the river Lena — Lenin — after this event, although he had in fact started using it years earlier[1901]. He had served time in Shushenskoe (in Siberia, but not on the Lena River), 1897-1900

22 April 1912 Pravda sold 60,000 copies of its first issue describing the massacre








Lena. 1912 year. Picture by the artist U.N. Tulin


ETERNAL MEMORIAL FOR THE LENA WORKERS SLAIN IN THE BEASTLY MASSACRE4/17 APRIL 1912 WITNESSING THE STRUGGLE OF THE WORKING CLASS

1912 - 1967


Foreign Trade


Foreign Trade

The grain ship 'L'Avenir' (1908) moored in the Millwall Docks, with McDougall's Wheatsheaf Mill in the background. A French ship carrying Russian grain to Britain


Russia’s Share of World Trade=4%

not markedly higher than in the first half of the century

most striking development--steady growth of grain exports

1860-1,120,000 tons to 1897-6,945,000 tons

1836-1840-grain = 15% of total value of Russian exports

after 1871-grain = about 50%

effects outside the purely economic sphere1902-under pressure from the junkers, Germany passed a tariff that severely hurt Russian grain exports

this pushed Russia even farther into the anti-German French alliance


Domestic Political Developments


Domestic Political Developments

Ilya Repin. The Revolutionary Meeting. 1883. Oil on canvas. The Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow, Russia.


Full Reaction, 1881-1905


Full Reaction, 1881-1905Первомартовцы

(Pyervomartovtsi

The First of Marchers)

(Those who did something

[assassinate Alexander II]

on the first of March) by

Nicolai Kibalchick


The Tsar Liberator


March 1, 1881--Both the thirty-five year old tsarevich, about to become tsar Alexander III and his twelve year old son, Nicolasha, one day to become the last tsar were present at the death bed of tsar Alexander II. As he lay there, both legs shattered by the assassin’s bomb, dying in great pain, beyond the physicians’ ability to save; is it too much to assume that the hope for further liberal reforms was dying as well?


Konstantin Petrovich Pobedonostsev (1827-1907)

son of a literature professor, becomes a law professor

1866-tutor to the future Alexander III

1880- Procurator of the Holy Synod (controls state church)

1881-becomes the “eminence grise,” bane of liberals

1894-less influence under Nicholas whom he also tutored, still Russification maintained


Pobiedonostsev’s Reaction

opposed the liberal Interior Minister, Count Loris-Melikov

said political reforms cause “drift toward constitutionalism”

“Russification” of Poles and Finns, pogroms against the Jews

replaced Zemstvo schools with parochial schools under his control

reversed liberal judicial reforms of Alexander IIValentin Serov. Portrait of K. Pobedonostsev. 1902.

Charcoal, color pencils on paper. The Russian Museum, St. Petersburg, Russia


Russia’s Jews

1791-the Pale of Settlement was begun by Catherine the Great

At its heyday, the Pale, which included the new Polish and Lithuanian territories, had a Jewish population of over 5 million, which represented the largest concentration (40 percent) of world Jewry at that time.

Jews who wouldn’t convert were expelled from cities to the Pale, unless they had special skills or economic qualifications

pogroms (pa•GROMs) were especially fierce 1881-1883 and 1903-1906

1881-1914-some 2 million emigrated, mostly to the United States


Tsar Alexander III

“unsophisticated, conscientious ruler with a firm will and unrelievedly conservative views”

1881-Education Minister Count Dimitry Tolstoy added Interior (MVD, i.e., police) to his portfolio

the secret, counter-terrorist police, the Okhrana, is created

famous for the technique of agents provocateurs and forging The Protocols of the Elders of Zion

1882-”temporary”laws further muzzled the universities and the press. “May Laws” tightened restrictions on the Jews 1845-1881-1894


The Okhrana Leadership at Fontanka 16

Photograph, 1905Sunday, October 11, 2009

a fateful execution?

Aleksandr Ulyanov1866-1887



• gold medalist at Simbirsk & Skt-Peterburg Universities (natural sciences, zoology)





• 1886-became a member of the terrorist wing of the Narodnaya Volya






• March 1, 1887-arrested as part of an assassination plot against Alexander III (hence called piervomartovtsi, like the earlier successful assassins of his father)







• 8 March-tried and hanged at Schisselburg








• legend has it that his younger brother, V.I. Ulyanov, was radicalized by this event








• legend has it that his younger brother, V.I. Ulyanov, was radicalized by this event

• this is doubtful, he had a cold response,”There is another way;” Lenin never favored “propaganda of the deed”



Soviet monument at Schisselburg commemorating thepolitical prisoners executed there


Reformers and Revolutionaries


Reformers and Revolutionaries

Арест пропагандистаArrest of a propagandistby Ilya Repin


Coronation of the last tsar; 26/14 May 1896Sunday, October 11, 2009

Valentin Serov. Anointing of the Emperor Nicholas II in The Uspensky Cathedral. 1896. Oil on canvas. The Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow, Russia.


An Ill Omen? the Khodynka Stampede

18 [O.S.] May 1896Sunday, October 11, 2009

An Ill Omen? the Khodynka Stampede

Of the approximate half million in attendance, it is estimated that 1,429 individuals died and another 9,000 to 20,000 were injured.

Very much like our Who Concert tragedy, the crowds trampled one another; here, to get to the free beer and trinkets celebrating the coronation

18 [O.S.] May 1896Sunday, October 11, 2009

Nicholas II 1868-1894-1917-1918


Nicholas II 1868-1894-1917-1918

“a political philosophy...not markedly different from that of his father…”


Nicholas II 1868-1894-1917-1918


but”not accompanied by [Alexander III’s]steadfastness and resolution…”


Nicholas II 1868-1894-1917-1918



always a tool in the hands of stronger individuals:


Nicholas II 1868-1894-1917-1918




for the first ten years, Pobiedenostsev and his military advisors


Nicholas II 1868-1894-1917-1918





later, his wife and her favorites, especially Rasputin


Nicholas II 1868-1894-1917-1918





later, his wife and her favorites, especially Rasputin

his best ministers, Witte & Stolypin, were done in by court intrigues


Still, Hopes for Reform

liberal reformers (type 2) had been relatively quiet since the death of Alexander II

now the zemstvo officials pressed for expanded powers in local government and a central institution that might develop into a national parliament

Nicholas turned a deaf ear

when they didn’t take the hint, police broke up their meetings


Ilya Repin, Russian State Council commemorating its 100th anniversary, May 5, 1901.

Nicholas


The Radical Alternative; The Russian Social Democratic Labor Party

founder of the SD movement in Russia and the first Russian Marxist

1876-organized the Kazan Cathedral demonstration, St Petersburg

1880-after two arrests in as many years, emigrated to Switzerland

1883-founded the RSDLP

“He introduced a generation of Russians to Marx”--Lenin

Georgi Plekhanov1856-1918


“...resembled a Protestant pastor…”


“...resembled a Protestant pastor…”[Plekhanov] had mastered the analytical instruments of Marxism and had learned to exploit its stinging wit at the same time that he had carried to chilling lengths the Marxist intellectual superciliousness. Gorky says that Plehkanov resembled a Protestant pastor, buttoned up tight in his frock-coat and ‘confident that his ideas were incontrovertible, every word and every pause of great value.’ When workers would come to see him from Russia, he would receive them with folded arms and lecture them so magisterially that they found that they were unable to talk to him about the things that were on their minds.

Edmund Wilson, To the Finland Station, p. 393


Plekhanov’s Greatest Discipleborn in Simbirsk on the Volga to a 4th rank (chin)civil service nobleman

1887-

father, a Westernizer school official, died

older brother, Alexander, hanged for conspiring to assassinate the tsar

entered Kazan University

expe!ed for dangerous political views

1892-law degree %om St Petersburg University

honors in Latin, Greek, English, French and GermanVladimir Illych Ulyanov

1870-1924 (photo, 1887)Sunday, October 11, 2009

"Lenin's Room in Simbirsk 1878 to 1887" by Wladimir Krikhatzkij (1877-1942)


Ulyanov to Lenin

joined one of 20 Marxist reading circles in St Petersburg

1895-arrested and confined 14 months before trial

1897-1900-Siberian exile,[not katorga]“graduate studies” in revolution with wife, Krupskaya

1900-1917-lived as an émigré throughout Europe, primarily in Geneva and Zurich

Police mug shot1895


2007 pic of one of Lenin’s rented houses Spiegelgasse 16, Zürich


Pictures from 1920 of same apartment


“Iskra” (The Spark)

Initial staff: Vladimir Lenin, Georgi Plekhanov, Vera Zasulich, Pavel Axelrod (Pinchas Borutsch), Julius Martov (Ilija Cederbaum), Aleksandr Potresov

Later: Leon Trotsky (Lev Davidovich Bronstein)

First issue, 1 December 1900, Stuttgart


“What is to be Done?” (Что Делатъ?)

1. saw the party as consisting mainly of “intellectuals,” on the basis of a theory according to which workers cannot t h e m s e l v e s d e v e l o p t o s o c i a l i s t consciousness; rather, the socialist idea is always and inevitably imported into the movement by bourgeois intellectuals

2. posited that the party is simply a band of “professional revolutionaries” as distinct from a broad working-class party

3. repudiated any element of spontaneity or spontaneous movement, in favor of engineered revolution only

4. required that the party be organized not democratically but as a bureaucratic or semi-military hierarchy


RSDLP (РСДРП) Congresses

1898-First Party Congress, Minsk. Since the party was illegal, all nine delegates were arrested. Hereafter the party met abroad

1903-Second Party Congress, Brussels/London.17 November-the famous irreconcilable split

Bolsheviks (Majoritists)-due to a temporary majority vote, Lenin seized the propaganda advantage of this name (also means “greater, stronger” in Russian)

Mensheviks (Minoritists)-Martov and the actual majority of the RSDLP were stuck with this less appealing label


The “Es•ers” (С•Р-SRs)- Socialist Revolutionaries

Lenin’s Bolsheviks’ day will come, but for now they are less significant than their rivals on the left, the SRs

differed from the RSDLP, both Bolshevik and Mensheviknot Marxist, believed in the peasantry, not the proletariat

emphasized “propaganda of the deed” terrorism, assassination

1904- SR Boris Savinkov kills Interior Minister von Plehve

1905-active in the revolution, represented in both St Petersburg and Moscow Soviets


The Revolution of 1905


The Revolution of 1905

Кровавое Воскресенье(krovavoye voskresen’ye)Bloody Sunday by Ivan Vladimirov


Economic and Diplomatic Causes

1899-1903-the last stage of the Long Depression produced a lagging slump of Russian industry

1902-the German tariff hit Russian grain exports

1904-Russia’s reckless Far Eastern policy triggered war with Japan

the military call up disrupted agricultural production and distribution-->serious food shortages

industrial production was also disrupted, strikes increased

a series of military setbacks contributed to popular frustration with the government


Bloody Sunday -- 22/9 January 1905December, 1904-strike at the Putilov plant led to others, some 80,000 out

Father Georgi Gapon, who had collaborated with the Okhrana, led a peaceful procession to the Winter Palace with a petition for the tsar

in a series of confrontations protesters were shot or trampled

tsarist estimate: 96 dead, 333 injuredanti-government: > 4,000 deadmoderate estimates ave. 1,000 KIA & WIA

disorder and looting spread across the city. Nicholas never recovered

Still from 1925 Soviet film“devyatoe yanvarya-9th of January”


January-June; disorders spread

following Bloody Sunday a general strike begins in St Petersburg and spreads rapidly to Moscow, Saratov, Ekaterinoslav, and the principal cities of Poland and the Baltics

17 February-the tsar’s uncle, Grand Duke Sergei is assassinated by Savinkov’s SR Combat Organization


I threw the bomb from less than four steps. I was taken by the explosions, I saw the carriage flew to pieces...My overcoat was strewn with splinters of wood all around, it was torn and burnt, there was blood on my face...

Ivan Kalayevmug shot just

after the assassination


January-June; disorders spread

a general strike begins in St Petersburg and spreads rapidly to Moscow, Saratov, Ekaterinoslav, and the principal cities of Poland and the Baltics

17 February-the tsar’s uncle, Grand Duke Sergei is assassinated by Savinkov’s SR Combat Organization

February-peasant uprisings in Kursk Gubernia and they spread rapidly to other provinces

June-a Peasant Union is formed

27/14 June-the Battleship Potyomkin mutinies


Soviet poster portraying the 1905 revolution. The caption reads "Glory to the People's Heroes of the Potëmkin!"


“...our demand: freedom for the whole nation.”

Soviet poster portraying the 1905 revolution. The caption reads "Glory to the People's Heroes of the Potëmkin!"


clips from Eisenstein’s Battleship Potyomkin, 1925

the Odessa steps sequence


Nicholas temporizes, the crisis mounts

after the mutiny, the tsar appears willing to make political concessions

August-he announces that the franchise would be a narrow one, “excluding most workers and intellectuals”

this leads to further demonstrations, strikes in universities and the railroads, and a second general strike in the capital

October-the first Soviet [council] of Workers Delegates is formed in St Petersburg. Leon Trotsky becomes its leader

the tsar considered using military force but is convinced by Witte to grant the so-called October Manifesto instead


The Revolution’s Last Gasp

with what appeared to be the granting of constitutional monarchy from above, the unity of the revolutionary movement dissolved

public opinion began to swing against the few remaining radical “dead enders”

the “black hundreds” (chyornie soti-черние соти), gangs of hooligans organized by reactionary elites, were supported by the public when they attacked critics of the government

December, 1905-the police dared break up the St Petersburg Soviet--the revolution was over


The Constitutional Experiment


The Constitutional Experiment

Манифестация 17 октября 1905 годаThe Manifesto of 17 October 1905by Ilya Repin


The Experiment’s Three Stages

1) 6 August 1905-the initial proclamation which proved insufficient to quell the revolution

2) 17 October 1905-the “October Manifesto” which took the wind out of the revolution’s sails

3) 23 April 1906-the “Fundamental Laws” decreed in the midst of the elections for the first Duma, Russia’s elected lower house. This was Imperial Russia’s first and last constitution.


Russian Constitution of 1906

Chapter I--declared and defined the autocracy of the Russian Empire, including the Emperor's supremacy over the Law, the Church, and the Duma

Article 4 states: "The supreme autocratic power is vested in the Emperor of all the Russias. It is God's command that his authority should be obeyed not only through fear but for conscience's sake."

Article 9 provides that: "The Sovereign Emperor approves the laws, and without his approval no law can come into existence."

Chapter II--defined the rights and the obligations of the citizens of the Russian Empire. It defined the scope and supremacy of the law over Russian subjects. It confirmed the basic human rights granted by the October Manifesto, but made them subordinate to the law.

Chapter III--is the regulation about laws.

Chapter IV--defined the composition and the scope of the activities of the State Council and the State Duma.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autocracy

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Autocracy

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empire

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Empire

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Law

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_Orthodox_Church

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russian_Orthodox_Church

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_the_Russias

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/All_the_Russias

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Human_rights

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/October_Manifesto

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/October_Manifesto

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/State_Council_of_Imperial_Russia




State Council--The Upper House

Marie PalaceSt Petersburg

Meeting Place ofthe State Council


State Council--The Upper House

Marie PalaceSt Petersburg

Meeting Place ofthe State Council

Unlike the House of Lords or the Herren Haus, the positions were not hereditary. Half were appointed by the tsar, half were elected by various groups; the zemstvos, the assemblies of nobility, the orthodox church, stock exchange committees & business organizations, the Russian Academy of Sciences, and the Finnish Parliament


State Duma--The Lower House

Tauride PalaceSt PetersburgMeeting place

ofthe Duma




ofthe Duma

• the franchise, although broad, was divided into three tiers, like Prussia’s, according to wealth




ofthe Duma

• the franchise, although broad, was divided into three tiers, like Prussia’s, according to wealth• ministers were not responsible to the Duma, appointed by and responsible to the tsar




ofthe Duma

• the franchise, although broad, was divided into three tiers, like Prussia’s, according to wealth• ministers were not responsible to the Duma, appointed by and responsible to the tsar• the tsar could dismiss the Duma at will and govern by emergency decree




ofthe Duma

• the franchise, although broad, was divided into three tiers, like Prussia’s, according to wealth• ministers were not responsible to the Duma, appointed by and responsible to the tsar• the tsar could dismiss the Duma at will and govern by emergency decree• laws passed by the Duma required both the approval of the State Council and the tsar


The Political Forces in 1906

Reformershopelessly divided between the Kadets (Constitutional Democrats) who wanted more progress and the Octobrists who were satisfied with “half a loaf

Revolutionariesthe SRs were convulsed over the Azef affair, the RSDLP divided or in exile

Reactionariesthe nobility, the landlords, the church, the bureaucrats, the officers, and the Pan-Slav patriots organized a “Union of the Russian People” to encourage the tsar to roll back the concessions of 1905


SR bloodbath--The Azef Affair

1890s-from a poor Jewish family, became a revolutionary

1892-fearing arrest, embezzled 800 rubles, fled to Germany, studied electrical engineering

recruited by Okhrana, returned and joined SRs

betrayed the head of the Combat Organization. After his capture, he replaced him!

masterminded von Plehve’s (1904) and Grand Duke Sergei’s (1905) assassination; had Gapon murdered

in spite of tips from sympathetic police, the SRs refused to believe he was a double agent

1909-on the verge of discovery, escaped once again to Germany 1869-1918


Increasing Impotence of the Duma

First Duma, April-June, 1906dissolved within 10 weeks. The tsar was “cruelly disappointed” that they had “strayed into spheres beyond their competence”

Second Duma, February-June, 1907actually arrested 16 members for revolutionary activity

franchise drastically (and illegally) reduced

Third Duma, full term, 1907-1912

Fourth Duma, 1912-1917


“Our Friend” Grigori Rasputin

born in Siberia, early evidence of mystical powers, pilgrim to Greece and Jerusalem

1903-arrived St Petersburg, developed reputation as staryets (holy healer and prophet)

1905-Alexandra sought him for Tsarevich Alexei’s haemophilia

his continuing ability to bring relief to the family

gave him inordinate influence over them

made him fierce enemies at court and countrywide

he began to pull a “Blagoevich” (sell offices) 1869-1916


Vladimir Sukhomlinov--War Minister

long held up as an example of poor leadership and blamed for Russia’s initial weak showing in 1914

currently enjoying a rehabilitation

1908-head of the General Staff

1909-1915-Minister of War

increased the army size and added some modern elements, i.e., military aircraft

involved in intrigues1848-1926


Unarguably Nicholas’ Ablest Minister

1905-as governor of Saratov, put down the peasant uprisings

1906-first Interior, then Prime Minister, hunted down revolutionaries, “Stolypin’s neckties”

agricultural reforms: from mir to individual family farms with government credit and modern techniques

encouraged Siberian homesteading

1911-inevitably he became the SR’s #1 priority and a police spy/assassin shot him in the Kiev Opera House Pyotr Arkadyevich Stolypin

1862-1911Sunday, October 11, 2009

Olga Tatiana Maria Anastasia


1910Sunday, October 11, 2009

The Imperial Family, 1911

Lt to Rt: Grand Duchess Olga, Maria, Nicholas, Alexandra, Anastasia, Tsarevich Alexei, Tatiana


Foreign Policy


Expansion


Expansion

Svobodna Bulgariya

LiberatedBulgaria


A Three-Pronged Policy

1.Russification towards non-Russian minorities within the Empire: Poles,Finns, Georgians,Armenians, the muslim peoples of Central Asia. Only the Jews were “spared” since they were scapegoated as pariahs

2.Panslavism towards the fellow slavs outside the Empire: the Balkan peoples, Rumanians, Bulgarians, and especially Serbs. Protecting the Orthodox Christian subjects of the Ottoman Empire

3.Traditional search for the warm water port This translated into pressuring Turkey over the Straits and China over the Liaotung Peninsula and Port Arthur


The Russo-Turkish War, 1877-78



Bulgaria



Bulgaria

“the sick man”



Bosnia &Herzegovina

Bulgaria

“the sick man”


Bulgaria


Bulgaria

Bosnia&

Herzegovina


Origins of the Russo-Turk War

the Tsar Liberator Alexander had to make the humiliating Peace of Paris, 1856, just after coming to the throne

Russia didn’t want to give up the role of protecting brother slavs the way they had been forced to give up “protector of Christians in the Holy Land”

August, 1875, BOS•ni•a & Her•ze•GO•vi•na began an insurrection against Turkish rule

To everyone’s surprise, Osman Pasha put down the revolt handily but with “Balkan atrocities”


The Congress of Berlin, 1878 by Anton von WernerIn the left foreground, Count Karolyi (Austria-Hungary), Prince Gorchakov, seated

(Russia), and the Earl of Beaconsfield (Disraeli). In the center foreground, Count Andrassy (A-H), Bismarck, and Count Shuvalov (Russia). In the right rear, with the

bald head, Lord Salisbury, (Great Britain)Sunday, October 11, 2009

Adjustmentsunder the

Berlin Treaty


1


Berlin Treaty


1

2


Berlin Treaty


1

2

3


Berlin Treaty


Bismarck offers to be “an honest broker”

Russia accepts:

exhausted by the unexpected rigors of the Turkish war

worried by the thought of war with Britain and Austria-Hungary

most distinguished diplomatic gathering between 1815 & 1919

Balkan peoples had unrealistic expectations--> disappointment

Serbs expected Bosnia & Herzegovina, instead A-H gets them

Romania has to surrender Bessarabia to Russia

Bulgaria greatly reduced in size

Greece furious that Britain gains Cyprus & Turkey keeps Crete & Epirus

seeds sown for future Balkan revisionism & wars


Russia and Turkey the most aggrieved

Turkey lost half its European territory and population

Russia’s Pan-Slavs had little to show for their country’s heavy expenditures in men and money

Bulgaria, the proposed springboard for future expansion, “a mere shadow of its former self”

Britain, without the loss of a man, gained Cyprus and strengthened its position over the Straits Question

Austria gained Bosnia and France was given a free hand in Tunis

Russia, mortified, blamed BismarckSunday, October 11, 2009

Turning East--Push to the Pacific

• 1889-Count Witte appointed Director of Railway Affairs. His #1 task-- the construction of the Trans-Siberian Railway (Transsib)

• 1881-1913-1.455 billion rubles, an expenditure record, surpassed only by the military budget of World War I, the last Imperial Budget item

• the push to connect Vladivostok and the Maritime Province led logically to Russian interest to participate in the dismemberment of China, already begun by the imperialist powers, especially Britain, Germany and Japan

• Russia clashed with the latter over Korea, Manchuria, and the Liaotung Peninsula and its warm water port, Port Arthur

• 1904-the Russo-Japanese War showed Russia’s military weakness and contributed to the Revolution of 1905


The Train Wreck, 1914


1914-1918 “The Butcher’s Bill”


The Alliance Systemspart public--part secret



• 1873-1887 Three Emperors’ League--Germany, Austria-Hungary, Russia




• 1882-1914Triple Alliance--Germany, Austria-Hungary, Italy





• 1884-1890 Reinsurance Treaty--Germany, Russia






• 1894-1914 Franco-Russian Alliance







• 1904-1914 Entente Cordiale France and Britain







• 1904-1914 Entente Cordiale France and Britain

• 1907-1914 Anglo-Russian Entente creates the Triple Entente


Feinde ringsum-ringed by enemies


Bismarck’s fear of encirclement



• after the Franco-Prussian War (1870-71) he knew France wanted revenge




• so the focus of his diplomacy was keeping Russia bound to neutrality





• Dreikaiserbund-1873-75, 1881-84, 1884-87





• Dreikaiserbund-1873-75, 1881-84, 1884-87

• Reinsurance Treaty-1887-90-secret but suspected





• Dreikaiserbund-1873-75, 1881-84, 1884-87


1. Germany and Russia both agreed to observe neutrality should the other be involved in a war with a third country. Neutrality would not apply should Germany attack France or Russia attack Austria





• Dreikaiserbund-1873-75, 1881-84, 1884-87


1. Germany and Russia both agreed to observe neutrality should the other be involved in a war with a third country. Neutrality would not apply should Germany attack France or Russia attack Austria

2. In the most secret completion protocol Germany declared herself neutral in the event of a Russian intervention in the Bosporus and the Dardane!es.


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bosporus

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bosporus

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dardanelles

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dardanelles

A fatal mistake


A fatal mistake

• 1890-the callow young kaiser put Bismarck aside


A fatal mistake


• the Foreign office refused Russia’s repeated requests to renew the Reinsurance Treaty


A fatal mistake



• this opened the door to the impossible--an alliance between republican France and autocratic Russia


A fatal mistake




• the first move of the diplomatic revolution, 1890-1907 was made possible


A fatal mistake




• the first move of the diplomatic revolution, 1890-1907 was made possible

• again, the initiative was taken by France, not Russia


View across the Pont Alexandre III down the Avenue Nicholas IItowards the Invalides during the 1900 Universal Exposition


Tsar Alexander III noted in 1892 that it was imperative for Russia to come to terms with France “and, in the event of a war between France and Germany, at once attack the Germans so as not to give them the time first to beat France and then to turn against us.”

Pipes, p.57


The “Irreconcilables” Reconcile -- 1891-1894

1891-both dread isolation, exchange notes to consult if peace is threatened1892-at French insistence, proposal of military talks to give positive shape to such “peacekeeping” measures

delayed for a year by the Panama Crisis which strengthened anti-French forces in Russia

1893-exchange of naval visits to Toulon and Kronstadt

4 January 1894-negotiations completed, Franco-Russian Alliance


A Permanent Realignment?



there were parties in both Russia and Germany who hoped not




later events hardened the Russo-German division:the anti-Russian grain tariffs which the Agrarian League and the Ha-Ka-Tisten demanded and got in 1902

German aggressive foreign policy in the Middle East

1909-v. Bülow’s ultimatum to Izvolsky during the Bosnian Crisis




later events hardened the Russo-German division:the anti-Russian grain tariffs which the Agrarian League and the Ha-Ka-Tisten demanded and got in 1902

German aggressive foreign policy in the Middle East

1909-v. Bülow’s ultimatum to Izvolsky during the Bosnian Crisis

1892-however, there was one part of the German government who took this “worst case” seriously--the Great General Staff

Count Alfred v. Schlieffen makes France the first object of Germany’s war plans


1907-The Circle around the Central Powers is Completed

Germany Austria-Hungary


1907-The Circle around the Central Powers is Completed

1894 1904

1907Germany Austria-Hungary


1907-Russia and Britain Agree to a Partition of Persia


1907-Russia and Britain Agree to a Partition of Persia

Russian

BufferZone

British


The Bosnian Crisis--1908-1909



• September, 1908-Russia’s Alexandr Izvolsky and Austria’s Alois Aerenthal meet in Buchlau Castle to seek mutual accommodation on foreign policy objectives




• Austria’s desire to annex Bosnia




• Austria’s desire to annex Bosnia• Russia’s desire to improve her access to the Straits at Turkey’s expense





• October, 1908-Aerenthal moved to collect his part of the bargain before Russia was ready






• war loomed until Russia’s allies counseled her to unilaterally give way






• war loomed until Russia’s allies counseled her to unilaterally give way

• Russia resolved never to back down over the Balkans again


Consolidation of the Alliances


Fruits of theBalkan Wars,

1912-1913

The bright colorsindicate gains by

Roumania,Bulgaria,Serbia,

Montenegro,and

Greece


The Final Crisis--28 June 1914


The Final Crisis--28 June 1914

Sarajevo
