In 1765, by decree of her imperial majesty Catherine II, the oldest public organization was formed - the Free Economic Society. It was independent of the Government, which is why it was called Free. The special position and rights of the organization were confirmed by each successor of Catherine II during his accession to the throne. And even more than that, quite often the Free Economic Society received impressive sums from the treasury to implement their ideas.

Purpose of the Free Economic Society

At the origin of the formation of the organization was a whole group of courtiers, representing the interests of liberal-minded nobles and scientists, headed by M.V. Lomonosov. At that time, these people put forward very revolutionary ideas:

1. Development of the monetary economy.
2. The growth of industrial production.
3. Abolition of serfdom.

The truth that ruled then did not support them. And only Catherine II allowed the project to begin and encouraged it in every possible way. Free Economic declared the primacy of the interests of the state, which should develop based on effective economic activity.

Beginning of work

And back in 1765, finally, the Free Economic Society was adopted. The first step was to hold a competition among 160 specialists representing various states. The main topic was the distribution of the right to land owners to bring maximum benefit to their country.

The main merits of IVEO before the Empire

The creation of the Free Economic Society was of great importance for the state. Among the merits of the organization both to the reigning dynasty and to the people of the country, it should be noted:

1. Initiation of the abolition of serfdom.
2. Universal Primary Education.
3. Beginning of work of statistical committees.
4. The laying of the first cheese factories.
5. Distribution and popularization of new species and varieties of various cultivated plants (in particular, potatoes and others).

Publishing and educational activities

Members of the organization tried to convey their work on the intensification of agricultural production, increasing the industrial power of the state and many other topics to the widest possible masses of the population. The Free Economic Society of Russia published both monographs and periodicals. The library of the organization consisted of almost two hundred thousand monographs, and in the collection of Zemstvo publications there were more than forty thousand copies of brochures and books. At various times, such major thinkers of the Russian Empire as A. M. Butlerov, G. R. Derzhavin, D. I. Mendeleev, N. V. Vereshchagin, P. P. Semenov-Tyan-Shansky, V. V. Dokuchaev , A. and L. Euler, A. S. Stroganov, V. G. Korolenko, L. N. Tolstoy, A. A. Nartov, A. N. Senyavin and many others.

Contribution to the defense of the country

The First World War forced to mobilize everything that the Russian Empire had. The Free Economic Society did not stand aside either. In its structure in Moscow, a special unit was created for the needs of the troops - Voentorg. His tasks included providing officers who were directly involved in hostilities with various goods at reduced prices.

Fall and rebirth

The activities of the IEVO structures were severely undermined by the world war and subsequent revolutions. And after the events of 1917, the organization of Russian economists ceased to exist. Work resumed only after many years. In the seventies of the last century, the restoration of the public association of leading economists began. At this time, the need arose again to improve the economic activity of the state. It was then that economists organized their own organization - the NEO. The newly formed Community carried out work throughout the country. Already at the end of the eighties, the transformation of the NEO took place. It became known as the "All-Union Economic Community".

Modern activities of VEO

In the early 1990s, a significant event took place. The Organization of Russian Economists again regained its former historical name. Now it has become known as the Free Economic Society of Russia. A great contribution to the restoration of the work of the organization was made by Professor Popov. Today VEO operates in every region of Russia. This organization employs thousands of scientists and various specialists. The VEO seeks to use historical experience to play a major role in understanding the problems facing the national economy of the country. The organization pursues the goal of raising Russian entrepreneurship. This large army of economists and administrative workers must find a new approach to solving the pressing economic problems of the country's development.

Research

The organization is engaged in major scientific programs. The most famous of them:

Modern VEO Editions

In Russia, the organization again began to publish "Scientific Works". During the first three years of activity, 4 volumes were printed, which are devoted to the most pressing problems of the domestic economy. In the "Scientific Works" articles are printed most of Russia. VEO also released:

1. Analytical and information publications.
2. "Economic Bulletin of Russia".
3. Monthly magazine "The Past: History and Management Experience".

Revival of reviews

With the help of the active work of the VEO, the tradition of holding various national competitions was restored. At the end of the 1990s, the Moscow government and the VEO held reviews in which young scientists, many students and pupils took part. Two topics were considered: "Russia and the beginning of the 21st century" and "Moscow - the basis of the country's economic development." Being a part of the International Union, which united the workers of the economic sector, the VEO performs work to improve the country's integration ties in the existing system.

VEO developments

Among the numerous works, a few stand out:

1. Employment of the population, problems of unemployment.
2. Investments, finances and the possibility of cash investments.
3. Further improvement of the banking system.
4. Caspian Sea: problems, choice of directions and priority solutions.
5. Ecological problems.
6. Increasing economic growth.

All proposed works of the VEO are supported and approved by the President and the Government of the Russian Federation.

Semevsky V.I. (1848 / 49-1916) - Russian historian of the liberal populist direction. Professor. Editor of the magazine "Voice of the Past". He studied the history of the Russian peasantry of the 18th century, the working class, the liberation movement in Russia (Decembrists, Petrashevists). Nobleman. Brother of the editor-publisher of the historical magazine "Russian Starina" Semevsky Mikhail Ivanovich and zemstvo figure Semevsky Alexander Ivanovich (Velikiye Luki). - Polotsk Cadet Corps and Noble Regiment (since 1855 - Konstantinovsky Cadet Corps) in St. Petersburg.

Semevsky lost his parents early, his elder brother Mikhail was engaged in his upbringing and education. After graduating from the 1st St. Petersburg Gymnasium in 1866, Semevsky, considering it necessary to receive a versatile education, entered the Medico-Surgical Academy (St. Petersburg) to study the natural sciences, and after two courses he moved to the Faculty of History and Philology of St. Petersburg University. The first scientific work - the article "Serfs under Catherine II" - in 1876 was baked at the insistence of his brother in the journal "Russian Antiquity". Even in his student years, Semevsky became interested in studying the peasant question, believing that writing the history of Russian peasants is “the duty of our science to the people.” In 1881 he published his master's thesis "Peasants under Catherine II". The head of the department of Russian history K.N. Bestuzhev-Ryumin did not share the views of his young colleague and did not allow a defense in St. Petersburg. The dissertation was defended at Moscow University, where the department of Russian history was headed by V.O. Klyuchevsky.

In 1982-86 - Semevsky lectured on Russian history as a private assistant professor at St. Petersburg University and was suspended from teaching for a "harmful direction." He continued teaching at home, raising numerous students, so M.N. Pokorvsky called Semevsky "the general dean of all historians who do not belong to any faculty." In 1889, Semevsky defended his thesis for the degree of Doctor of Science - "The Peasant Question in the 18th and the first half of the 19th century", which the Academy of Sciences awarded the Uvarov Prize, and the Free Economic Society - the Big Gold Medal. Semevsky's works on the peasant question, due to the abundance of material collected in them, still retain an important place in the historiography of the issue.

Peasant question in a free economic society in 1803-1822.

It is known that under Empress Catherine II, the Free Economic Society took a very important part in the discussion of the peasant question: the problem of peasant property aroused the attention of all of Europe, and even Voltaire, the coryphaeus of European literature of that time, did not disdain to solve it. True, society did not show any particular courage in this matter, and the only Russian work (by Polenov), crowned with an award of the second degree, remained unpublished for a whole hundred years; but, be that as it may, the announcement of the problem of the property of the peasants and the award of a prize for the submitted essays is one of the most interesting pages in the history of the peasant question (See about this in our articles: "The Peasant Question under Catherine II" in Fatherland. Notes 1879, Nos. 10 and 11.). The position of the serfs and the attitude of the landowners towards them was also touched upon in some other tasks of society, for example, about the "mandate to the steward." In the reign of Emperor Alexander I, the free economic society took not only no less, but even more constant participation in the feasible solution of the issue, which then occupied all intelligent people, starting with the Sovereign himself. We will see below that several tasks of the society dealt more or less closely with this question, but, undoubtedly, the most important of them, both in its content and in the answers received, was the task for 1812 - about the comparative advantage for the owner of the serf and freelance labor. By this task, a new idea was thrown into our society of the nobility: would it not be beneficial for the landowners themselves to abolish serfdom? At first, this idea found its strongest defenders in the faces of two well-known Germans, to whom, incidentally, some Russian voices joined, but later it undoubtedly had no less important influence on the course of our peasant reform. This task was obviously inspired by the classic work of Adam Smith, which first appeared in Russian in 1802-1806. in the translation of Politkovsky, made by order of the Minister of Finance, c. Vasiliev. There were two passages in this work that dealt directly with the question posed by the task of 1812. "The means necessary to replace and, so to speak, to restore the damage caused by time and work in slavery, usually lie in the care of a careless owner and a negligent manager; the means intended for the same purpose with respect to a free person are in the hands of the most thrifty The economy of the first is naturally carried on in the disorder so common in the affairs of every rich man, but the strict temperance and petty thrift characteristic of a poor man naturally govern the economy of the second. economy. Therefore, I believe that the experience of all times and sun3;x country proves obviously, that, in fact, free labor is cheaper than slave labor". In another place, the author again insistently returns to this thought ("Studies on the nature and causes of the wealth of peoples." Book I, ch. VIII, and book III, ch. II; in Bibikov's edition. St. Petersburg, 1866, vol. 1, pp. 223-224, vol. II, pp. 177-178; cf. in Politkovsky's translation, vol. I, pp. 170--171, nt, II, pp. 276.). We find these ideas both in the very formulation of the problem of 1812, and in Jacob's answer to it crowned with the main award, and partly in some other answers. for the owner. It is clear that when proposing various measures for the reform of the landowner economy, very many authors gave little thought to the fact that they would be useful for the peasants as well. Starting to study the history of the peasant question in a free economic society in the era of Emperor Alexander I, we must note one important feature in comparison with the attempt to solve the peasant question in the very first years of the existence of society. Then the task was set by Empress Catherine II wider and more correct (It was asked, "what is more useful for society that a peasant should own land, or only movable property, and how far should his rights to this or that property extend?"); but, due to the fact that the task was made public throughout Europe, and also due to the poor preparedness of the Russian people to written solution of such questions, the vast majority of the answers sent belonged to foreigners (out of all 162 essays, only seven were delivered in Russian).On the contrary, in the reign of Emperor Alexander I, the tasks of a free economic society, which affected the peasant question, caused for the most part Russian answers and only an insignificant some of these Russian writings are below all criticism, but still a big step forward was the fact that the question of changing the way of life of the peasants was discussed not only in the capitals, but also in some Great Russian and Ukrainian wilderness.We will see how slowly the process of development and spread liberation ideas in society and how difficult it was to learn to understand them from the point of view of more than one landowner's benefit.

I.
Dzhunkovsky's article. - Task for 1804 - on the causes of high cost. - The question of quitrent and corvée system.

For 1803, the society announced the following task: "What measures should be taken so that the spirit of activity, zeal and diligence for work for the greatest benefit in the lower states of people, and especially peasant wives and children, can be aroused so that it becomes finally necessary for them habit?" - A medal of 50 chervonets, with funds given by D.P. Troshchinsky, was divided in half between Dzhunkovsky and Professor Gard from Berlin. Dzhunkovsky, in his work, published the following year in the "Proceedings" of the society, concerns, among other things, the relationship of serfs to landowners. Pointing out that one of the main motives for industriousness is confidence in the calm use of the results of their labor, the author notes that the landowners often increase the amount of dues from the peasants, considering not the increase in their wealth, but their own needs and needs; this compels the serfs to "hide their gains" and to acquire nothing but the essentials of life. As for the size of the duty of the peasants, then, according to the author, they usually work for the master from two to four days a week; many go to corvée and pay dues; finally, "there are occasionally those who all the time they work for the master and receive food from him. "To this we must also add yard servants, who "have no lower type of property, and moreover, often either by sale or in another way pass from one owner to another." The author rightly asserts that the position of quitrent peasants is much better than corvee: the former have more incentives to work zealously, and in order to to some extent guarantee the peasants from an unexpected increase in dues, Dzhunkovsky proposes to determine its size in advance for a certain number of years, not less than ten. speaks out against the production system: corvee, in his opinion, is harmful to both the peasants and the landowner. Forced labor is unproductive, and therefore. , for his profit, he can work out, 3) how much of the worked out can pay for land and for patronage, 4) how much a worker, forcibly for another, will work out or spoil and, finally, 5) how much is the maintenance and correction of a ruined worker worth. "In these questions we already see the embryo of the problem announced by society in 1812, about what kind of work is more profitable - serf or freelance. As for the development of industriousness, special task of the author, he believes that the habit of it develops only when a person sees the benefits of labor for himself, and not for another, no matter what people say about the delights of patriarchal relations between landlords and peasants. also the abolition of extortions in kind, or, at least, their conversion into money. In conclusion, he points out the enormous damage from the maintenance of numerous households, sometimes absorbing a third and even half of the income from the name. Among the tasks announced by the free economic society for 1804, there was, by the way, one - about the reasons for the increase in the high cost of food, which caused 44 answers. we will dwell on the work of the corrector of the printing house of the military collegium, Shvitkov, crowned with a medal, since the author does not touch on the peasant question at all, and we will touch on two answers, although they did not deserve approval and therefore were not published, but are more interesting for us. The author of one of them, among other things, says: "The high cost has increased and is increasing from burdening the landlord peasants with work." Despite the fact that, according to the decree of 1797, the peasants must work for the master three days a week, some of them in the summer, and especially during the harvest, do not work for themselves even one day. It is curious that in the area of ​​Russia to which the author's observations refer, namely, in the Yekaterinoslav province and Little Russia, the well-known decree of Emperor Paul even had a harmful effect: before him, the peasants worked here for the landowner only two days a week, sometimes less, and after In addition, the owners raised the size of the product service. Having less time to work for their own benefit, the peasants not only cannot sell bread, but sometimes they do not collect enough of it for their livelihood. Forced to pay taxes to sell sometimes the last bread, they then buy it again, and this increases the high cost. To avert it, the author proposes: if it is impossible to reduce taxes, then at least let the peasants work for their own benefit more than three days a week. The author of another unpublished answer to the problem of 1804 "reads that the main reason for the high cost of bread is the high cost of people, and the latter, in his opinion, is caused by the trade in recruits. During the second war with Turkey, under Empress Catherine II, when they demanded a set of 500 souls for 5 people, the price for people rose to the point that in some provinces they took 800 and 900 rubles for each. Such enormous prices induce the purchase of villages for the purpose of speculation: having bought a village, the new owner sells almost all the people fit for recruiting, and thus bails out the sum he has spent. As a result of this, entire villages are ruined, the lands are poorly cultivated and, consequently, there cannot be a good harvest. Trade in recruits is prohibited, but there are many means to circumvent this law, so the author proposes to take new restrictive measures. In response to the aforementioned topics, the position of the serfs was only partly touched upon: on the contrary, the task for 1809 was devoted entirely to him. It was formulated as follows: "For the benefit of the state, as well as private, of any owner and peasant, it would be desirable to determine by accurate calculations and indisputable evidence, based on our own experience and on well-known examples: corvée or quitrent farming, for landowners and peasants together, more useful and advantageous, or would there not be an equal or greater benefit from the combination of both of these methods. Of the four answers received for this task, two were awarded gold medals of 25 chervonets each, for the amount donated by the famous favorite of Emperor Paul, Alexander Borisovich Kurakin, a silver medal was awarded for the third essay, and the fourth was recognized as unsatisfactory. Gold medals were given to the Oryol landowner Pogodin and the well-known proofreader Shvitkov, and a large silver medal was awarded to the Ukrainian landowner Iv. unit Bogdanovich. The work of Shvitkov, who, according to the general conclusion of the Free Economic Society, presented "satisfactory arguments that could be very useful, although he did not set out detailed calculations," is written in the highest degree unsatisfactory, extremely drawn out, overflowing with the most elementary arguments and shows that the author does not possessed neither a good scientific education, nor a particularly close acquaintance with the life of the peasants, but was guided simply by his common sense, which, presumably, was not particularly strong. The question, as we have already said, was: what system of economy is more useful for the state, landlords and peasants - corvée or quitrent. In contrast to Dzhunkovsky, Shvitkov speaks in favor of the first, by the way, because with it it is easier to prevent the accumulation of arrears; outdoor activities should be limited, and street pedlars, sellers of "whimsical and caressing supplies"; quite "out of the ordinary." Outdoor trades are already harmful because they have a bad effect on the morality of the peasants, who are accustomed in the cities to luxury, freethinking and arrogance. But the author still does not dare to demand a ban on outdoor activities and thinks that peasants living on land of poor quality can be released to work at any time of the year, and those settled on good - only in winter. Speaking in favor of the corvee system, the author considers it even more useful to combine the product with dues. With the bad quality of the land on his estate, the owner, instead of dismissing the peasants for outside work, is most advantageous to start factories or handicrafts; the landowner may even give them a wage for their work, of course, more similar to that which he would pay outsiders, since, according to the author's frank statement, the landowner needs money more than the peasant. In all this opinion, not only are there no proposals for improving the life of the peasants, but Shvitkov even finds it completely natural and useful to sell people without land ("My drone," he says, "another gentleman can be a good bee, and for that - then with my common and his benefit I can sell it to another.") completely forgetting that, according to the conditions of the task, it was necessary to pay attention to the benefit not only of the landowner, but also of the peasants; this was also forgotten by the members of the economic society who crowned it, among whom were many owners of inhabited estates. Orlovsky landowner Pogodin, who received another gold medal, according to the opinion of the society, "submitted the required calculations, detailed and thorough." He thinks just as little as Shvitkov about the conveniences and benefits of the peasants, and therefore speaks out in favor of the corvée system. Peasants should be on products in those estates, where there is a lot of land convenient for arable farming; but, as we shall see, even in small-land estates he projects corvee labor, only in a different form. Looking closely at the life of the peasants during the last century of the existence of serfdom, we notice that while in an educated society the idea of ​​the need to free the serfs was gradually strengthened, as the government began to take measures to ensure their position, the material reality everything got worse; the amount of land that was in their use decreased, on the contrary, the duties in favor of the landowner increased. This is evident, by the way, from a comparison of the agronomic works of the 18th and early 19th centuries, V.N. according to the famous farmer of the second half of the 18th century, Rychkov, "a philanthropic gentleman and directly loving his fatherland never orders his stewards and clerks to plow more than one tax for each tax," and of course, no more than one and a half tithes "in the field, although they are people are cruel, requiring the processing of two or even more tithes for tax. What seems burdensome to Rychkov, Pogodin already presents as an easily fulfillable demand. He says that each tax can "without any burden" sow one and a half tithes per master, and if there is enough convenient land, then two tithes in the field. For their own food, the peasants can plow two acres in the field for tax, which will amount to about three acres of arable land per capita in all fields; such was the average peasant plowing in manufactured estates in the second half of the 18th century (Compare the table of 20 provinces in our book: "Peasants under Catherine II", S.-Pb. 1881, vol. I, pp. 492-493.) . According to Pogodin's calculations, with corvee duty, the landowner, if he has comfortable arable land and good hay meadows in his name, can receive from each tax from the sale of winter and spring bread, hemp, hemp and hay - 106 rubles. (Recall that Pogodin was a landowner in the black-earth Oryol province (In addition, Pogodin recommends the collection of table supplies in a significant amount, meanwhile, as Dzhunkovsky considered it no small oppression of the peasants.). about 15 rubles per soul, since Pogodin considers two souls per tax; if, however, we accept 2 1/2 souls for the black earth belt, then 12 rubles each); many landowners, according to him, take 12 and 10 rubles each (Here again we see a significant increase in dues, since the average amount of dues at the end of the 18th century was five rubles. However, it is necessary to take into account the increase in the price of bread.). decides to assert that it is undesirable for the peasants, but, in his opinion, it has a harmful effect on their morality, and then on their economic life. op contradicts the testimony of many impartial observers who assert that quitrent peasants were usually more prosperous than corvée ones. Perhaps, however, he did not have enough occasions to observe the influence of the quitrent system, which prevailed in the non-chernozem zone and, on the contrary, was significantly inferior to the corvee in prevalence in the black earth part of Great Russia. It should be noted that Pogodin finds the combination of both economic systems proposed by Shvitkov inconvenient. When land is scarce, the author recommends the construction of factories, plants and the development of crafts, and advises the use of factories and children from 10-15 years old, who can be paid from one to two rubles a month "for entertaining". Thus, this work is directed exclusively to the benefit of the landlords, and not the peasants; for the benefit of the latter, the author has invented nothing but a fruitless advice to landowners not to burden their serfs with "excessive work and taxes" - advice that sounds ironic after he has established a very difficult norm for the master's plowing. The author of the third answer, the Ukrainian landowner Bogdanovich, was awarded a large silver medal "in respect for useful thoughts, although not containing the necessary details." Pointing to the variety of economic conditions in the estates, he examines one after another the various categories of landed estates. Villages rich in land are more profitable to keep on corvee, just like treeless estates. Names, in which all the land accounts for eight acres per worker, are more profitable to leave on quitrent, but at the same time, the author appoints the highest amount indicated by Pogodin, i.e., 30 rubles per husband and wife. Where an adult worker accounts for no more than four acres of arable land and haymaking, it is unfair to demand from the peasant more than a third of his free time, but you need to use it to work in factories and plants that can not only replace arable farming, but even lead the landlord economy to flourishing. position. In multi-land estates with timbering, lying near navigable rivers, corvée should be established so that in the fall and winter half of the workers on the appointed days would be engaged in the construction of baroques and ships, and the other - in the preparation of bread for sale; of the money received from the barges, a third should be given to the workers. Finally, in some estates, the author designs a mixed system - a combination of corvée with dues. In conclusion, he notes that although the power of the landowner over the peasants is limited in two respects: he does not have the right to judge them in serious criminal offenses and cannot demand more time for corvee, determined by law, - "but, it seems, this is not enough when the will of the landowner is not controlled by his own prudence and compassion. Therefore, he does not expect improvement from the adoption of new legislative measures, but "only from enlightenment." The fourth and last answer to the problem of 1809 was found by society to be unsatisfactory; he, indeed, is not written quite sensibly, but at least the author, obviously a native of Little Russia, treats the peasants more humanely. Thus, he vigorously insists that the landlords should plow no more land than can be cultivated with a three-day corvée, otherwise they must take civilian employees so that their own peasants have the opportunity to harvest their grain at a convenient time, otherwise the landowners sometimes demanded from the peasants permanent job at the worst time. With excess plowing, the master can also give the peasants a third of all grain for harvesting bread on their own grubs in good years, a quarter in lean years, and one-fifth to those working on the master's grubs; in the intervals between the ripening of different grains, the peasants can also clean up their fields. Such a proposal, even if it did not contradict the interests of the peasants, did not correspond in any case to the law on three-day corvee and could lead to many abuses. Under the quitrent system, the author finds it possible to take 12 1/2 from each worker, and not more than 3 rubles from a woman (and spin two skeins of wool), - therefore, with a tax of about 16 rubles, - while the authors approved by the economic society responses, they wished to exact twice as much dues - 30 rubles each. With tax, however, he admits that the size of the quitrent of various peasants is commensurate with their prosperity.

II.
Professor Jacob's indication of the need to mitigate serfdom.--The problem of 1812 on the comparative profitability of serf and free labor.--Works of Jacob, Merkel and Komarov.-- Unpublished opinions for and against serf labor.

At the time when the learned members of the free economic society were awarding prizes for the very bad inventions of various persons on the question of the comparative usefulness of the corvee and quitrent systems of economy, in one of our provincial cities, namely Kharkov, which had just acquired a university, a completely scientific work appeared, in which the question of the usefulness of the very existence of serfdom and the need to limit it as long as it exists was decisively raised. This essay, written by a local scholar, Professor Jakob, called to the university from Germany in 1807 to the Department of Diplomacy and Political Economy in the Ethico-Political Faculty - we consider it more necessary to consider here that Jacob was the author of the best answer to the problem of an economic society about serf and civilian labor, which we will talk about below. Jacob graduated from the course at the University of Galle, where he received a doctorate, was a professor and rector, and only after the closing of the university by Napoleon decided to move to Kharkov. In his writings on philosophy, Jacob, a strict Kantian, showed very little originality, much more important than his economic and financial writings. In 1805 he published "Fundamentals of Political Economy", in 1807 - a translation of the work of J. B. Say, and in 1809 in Kharkov appeared his own two-volume work: "Grundsätze der Рolicеygesetzgebung und der Policeyanstalten". In a special section devoted to the consideration of the issue of ensuring the freedom of members of the state, the author first of all points to the unfavorable consequences of an unfree state. People who are not free will never be calm, faithful servants of the state; "as long as such unnatural relations exist and are supported by law, there will be constantly ready elements in the state for unrest and rebellion"; there will always be bitter enmity between the workers and the masters. Slavery is also harmful because slaves work poorly and multiply little. Considering it necessary to abolish slavery and other forms of unfreedom, Jacob nevertheless demands that this be done only with the remuneration of the owners. Where, unfortunately, slavery or serfdom still exists, it must be weakened and limited gradually, since its sudden abolition would be harmful both to the slave owners and to the emancipated. In existence slavery, the government must protect the slaves from the arbitrariness of the owners and place them under the protection of state laws, prohibit their purchase after a certain, previously announced period, determine by law the amount of work and maintenance of slaves, determine the size of the ransom, which should for each of them decrease but increasing the number of years of their service. With the existence of serfdom, which, according to Jakob, in many countries is "not much softer than slavery", the state must take the following measures: accurately and with moderation determine the amount of work of serfs in favor of the owner, prohibit resettlement, sale without land and renting a serf against his wishes, to forbid the forced separation of families, to introduce within certain limits the right of owners to punish peasants, to strictly protect serfs from any moral abuse on the part of the owner, to give serfs full ownership of what they earn during the time given to them for their work, and to what they save or acquire in some other legal way. Finally, the serfs should be given the right to bring complaints against their masters to impartial judges, and in the event of the guilt of the landowners, the peasants should receive freedom. It should also be determined by law with what amount of money a serf can be redeemed for freedom. It is curious that all these demands were expressed during the reign of Empress Catherine II, in the opinions of various Russian people on the peasant question. Like the authors of some of these opinions, Yakob also believes that the state should, by an example on state lands, prove to the landlords that if there are free hereditary or fixed-term tenants, the income of the landowner will be greater, labor. The best way to free the peasants, according to Jakob, is that the most diligent families should be transferred to hereditary lease or sold plots of land with the necessary buildings. Since, with the development of culture, wages will rise, it is as if ordinary serf batmen, during the time provided for their own work, will have the opportunity to earn enough to buy themselves free. Thus, a class of good artisans and factory workers is gradually formed, and as long as serfdom exists, industry cannot develop. In general, Jacob has a firm conviction that the government can find a way to gradually give personal freedom for all serfs without prejudice to the owners, all the more so as the belief in the unprofitability of forced labor spreads more and more. At the same time, it should be forbidden to sell oneself, oneself, and members of one's family into slavery, serfdom, or even become a lifelong servant. But even as long as serfdom exists, the police must carefully observe that the owners in the domestic court and the reprisals against their serfs do not fall into tyranny and cruelty. The abolition of serfdom, in the opinion of the author, will have very beneficial consequences: workers will become more expensive, but for that labor will be more productive; extra hands, not needed in agriculture, will go to the factories; among the free workers, the consumption of manufactured goods will develop, and consequently a strong impetus will be given to the development of industry; only with the flourishing state of the peasant class will the cities flourish. We see, therefore, that Jacob's dreams go no further than granting the peasants personal freedom, and he believes that the landowners will then find it advantageous for themselves to lend their lands to the emancipated on hereditary lease. His ideals are purely Western: he exaggerates the significance of landless liberation, saying that "a beggar in a free country is a king compared to a serf." He considers communal land ownership harmful, since it delays, in his opinion, the development of agricultural culture; he demands complete freedom in the alienation of land, etc. But if one cannot agree with his plans for the final organization of the peasant Conditions, then, in any case, one cannot but recognize as a great merit the clear formulation in a country where serfdom existed in full development, a detailed program measure to limit this evil. At the beginning of 1809, the named work of Jacob appeared in Kharkov, and in August an order was already received at the university - to dismiss him for a while in St. Petersburg; In June of the following year, the university council received the news that the Sovereign had appointed him to the service of the Department of Finance. Immediately, upon his arrival in St. Petersburg, Speransky formed a special committee to draw up a financial plan, which included, in addition to Yakob, Professor Balugyansky and official Wirst, but their total work did not satisfy Speransky. In 1810, Jacob's short essay on Russian paper money appeared, and then we meet him among the competitors for a prize for solving the problem of a free economic society. For 1812, the economic society announced the task of the comparative profitability of serf and free-lance labor ("Assuming as a rule, firstly, that any work is improved better and more successfully when workers have the right remuneration for it, and, secondly, that any work , judging by the time and effort used, has its price, and entering into detailed calculations, how much the work of serfs would cost if they at the same time worked for hire from others on voluntary conditions, and how much their own workers work worse and slower than hired, and therefore more expensive, it is proposed for permission to determine, according to the exact calculations of kindness and the price of work, what is more profitable for the owner: whether to cultivate the land by private (later replaced by the word: "civilian") people, where they can be found, or by their own peasants? ). It was proposed at the request of Count N. P. Rumyantsev, at whose expense a medal of 30 chervonets was promised for its successful resolution. In January 1812, an announcement appeared about this - in Petersburg Gazette together with another task: about separating the farmers from the factory workers in the landowner's estates. A month later, the society received a message on this subject from the Minister of the Interior, Kozodavlev (who held liberal opinions on the peasant question), in which it was said that since both these tasks "can contribute to the success not only of private, but also of the state economy", then he reported to the Sovereign on the increase in rewards for them in order to attract more experienced and knowledgeable people to a careful study of the tasks set, and the Sovereign ordered that two medals, one hundred chervonets each, be determined specially, at the expense of the cabinet, leaving the awards appointed by society for other good works on the same subject. Society hastened to announce this in the newspapers. By the annual meeting of the society, 9 answers were received to the problem of serf and civilian labor; but since the troubled circumstances of 1812 might have prevented many from delivering their essays, the society extended the proposed task for another year and decided to consider the answers already received along with those that would be delivered by October 1813. By this time, only 14 answers had been received for the above problem. At the solemn meeting of the society on January 17, 1814, it was announced that a large medal of 100 chervonets was awarded to collegiate adviser Ludwig Jakob, a scientist already familiar to us, and two small ones, 15 chervonets each, to the doctor of philosophy Mr. Merkel, the famous fighter for the liberation of Latvians from serfdom , and Major General Komarov. All three works appeared in the "Proceedings" of the society for 1814, and the works of Jakob and Merkel were also published in German. A separate edition of Jacob's work is somewhat more complete than the translation sent by him to the free economic society: it contains, firstly, a preface, which is absent in the Russian edition; secondly, for the example of the Russian owners, in the appendix there is a detailed story about the conversion of serfs in one foreign estate into free farmers. Significant differences could be expected between the Russian and German texts, since, when four sheets had already been printed in Russian, Jacob sent a note to the economic society, in which, pointing out the dissimilarity of the German text with the Russian original, he asked that the society send to him one of his members to compare his work with the German original. The society, on the contrary, asked Jacob to send the German original of his work, with which they promised to compare the translation and, where necessary, correct it. Comparing both texts, we noticed some inaccuracies in the translation, but we will only mention that the place where the author speaks of the harmful influence of the corvée system on the serfs is softened in the Russian text, obviously for censorship reasons. In the preface to the German edition, the author says that the task of society, if taken literally, requires only an investigation of how it is more profitable for the landowner to cultivate his land: by free wage laborers (where they can be found), or with the help of serfs settled on the land of the master . "With such a formulation of the question," says the author, "it seems impossible to arrive at any definite result, since, with certain relations, one or the other may be more advantageous." Therefore, he found it necessary to set the task somewhat broader and to investigate what kind of agricultural labor is generally more productive and beneficial for the landowner - free or forced. The approval of the society proved that he understood the task correctly. In order to make his work more persuasive for the farmers, the author found it necessary not to confine himself to a theoretical study, but to illustrate it with examples from real life; for this, he was supplied with material both from personal observations in Germany and Russia, and information about agriculture, collected orally and in writing. Detailed data on Russian names that have gained fame and related to the years 1806-1808, in addition to personal research on the spot, are based on many official documents. As for the information about the names of the Moscow province, they are borrowed for the most part from the English manuscript of Jung (the son of the famous English agronomist), who, at the invitation of the Russian government and at public expense, made a trip to this area, for the authenticity of the information collected, vouch for the Young both his personal agronomic experience and the obligatory assistance of the government and many large landowners in the study of our agriculture; Jung greatly facilitated the fulfillment of the assignment given to him and the fact that in many names of the Moscow province he found the rulers of his compatriots - the English. Jung's report, presented to the government in 1809, remained unpublished. “The main goal of my work,” says the author, “is to show in practice the possibility for the Russian landowner to put the peasants in such a position that they will willingly and voluntarily engage in agriculture, and the owners will receive even more income than in forced labor." In such a case, the continued existence of serfdom would only be an extra burden for the landowner, "since he would have to feed bad, lazy, weak and sick people." Jacob's work is divided into three main parts: 1) on the cultivation of the land by serfs, 2) on the cultivation of it by civilians, and 3) on the application of the above rules to Russia. The first part, in turn, is divided into two main sections: a) on the corvee and b) on the quitrent system of the economy. The reasons for the unproductivity of corvée labor are as follows: in the stubbornness of people working under compulsion, in the poor economic situation of the serfs, as a result of which their cattle and agricultural tools are extremely poor, in the distance of the fields from the dwellings of the workers, and, finally, in the fact that the landowners themselves are unproductive they squander the labor of their serfs by over-increasing the household or using the peasants for little useful work. Under the corvée system in Russia, the peasants are usually given at least half the working time, but some landowners also require a four-day corvee. There are also such gentlemen who force the peasants to work "for food alone" (that is, they turn them into so-called monthlys); but such a system, - says Jacob, - is feasible only in very small estates, and therefore it hardly deserves special attention, especially since such laborers work so badly, require such careful supervision, and often cause such harm that they cost much more. freelance workers. In his research, the author has in mind the most common form of corvée economy among us, when a certain amount of land is allotted to the peasants and at least half of the working time is left at their disposal. The author calculates what it costs the master to cultivate the fields with this size of corvée, and what it would cost the same for free labor; the task is decided in favor of the latter, but at the same time he looks at the matter from a completely abstract point of view, not taking into account the historical conditions of ownership in Russia of inhabited names. In his calculations, he points out that the landowner loses income for the land that is allocated to the peasants for their own feeding, his forest is spent on the construction and heating of peasant estates, he provides assistance to the peasants during crop failures and other disasters, suffers losses from recruitment. But the point is that he had to do all this according to the law. The landowners never owned the peasants in Russia in full, civil rights; their possession was conditioned by certain obligations to the state. That is why, when discussing the question of the profitability or unprofitability of serf labor in Russia, it was impossible to count among the losses of the landowners, the allocation of a certain amount of land to the peasants, supplying them with timber, taking care of their food; without these losses there would be no landowners' right to their names. So, according to Jacob's calculation, the corvée system is less profitable than cultivating the land by free hired labor (“True,” he continues, “by unjust oppression of the peasants, the owner can multiply his income for some time, and especially the new (landlord), who bought wealthy peasants, because he can steal from them the name acquired with difficulty and, by excessive burden of work, bring them to extreme poverty; however, this is a kind of robbery, (which) only benefits the owner for a short time and thus cannot serve as the basis for improving agriculture and constantly increasing income his".). In confirmation of his opinion, he refers to an article published in the publications of the Free Economic Society, the author of which says that in his name incomes increased only when he managed to bring the formerly impoverished peasants to a certain degree of prosperity. “But how much donations and labors cost him,” exclaims Jacob, “and how much time he should have spent on this! On the contrary, cultivating the land ... by freemen would never have cost so much.” Such an idea, perhaps, did not have a harmful effect in Russia proper, due to the fact that the government had not yet begun to reform the life of serf peasants in it, but this idea should have been well understood and assimilated by the Baltic barons; and if the local legislation on peasants, published in 1816-1819, put the peasants in an immeasurably worse position than what would have developed under the Livland code of 1804, then a considerable share of the blame for this falls on the free economic society, which propagandized without reservations of an idea similar to the above: the landless liberation of the peasants could, of course, be more profitable for the landlords than the large expenditure of money and labor for a lasting improvement in the life of the serfs. Turning to a consideration of the quitrent system, the author, contrary to the opinion of the majority of our agronomists, believes that the landowner, who let his peasants go to quitrent, receives no less, and sometimes even more income than the one who supports corvée ploughing; the peasant also becomes more independent. position and works much more diligently, since the fruits of his labor belong exclusively to himself. Jacob does not deny that agriculture among quitrent peasants is very often, even usually, in a worse position than among corvées (In the current state of agriculture in Russia, according to Jacob, it generally brings the peasants less income than other industries, and that's why they Od rightly says: "The great indiscretion (in the German original: "Eine grosse Thorheit") of those writers who, dealing with this subject, were looking for reasons for such a propensity for urban life, which has spread among the Russian people, in laziness, in inclinations in depravity, indecent life, etc. They rebel against dues and, apart from compulsory measures, do not know any other means for tying the peasants to the land. What a sad means to enrich the state and what harmful consequences should be expected from this. "); however, he thinks that the harmful effects of quitrent in Russia lie more "in a bad way to give land for rent, than in the resulting independence of the peasants." Comparing completely immeasurable values, namely, our quitrent system with English rent, forgetting again that our landowner is not such an unconditional landowner as an English lord, the author points out that in England the rent is much higher than the quitrent paid by the peasants. for your allotments. The disadvantages of the quitrent system, according to the author, are, firstly, that the landowner does not have the means to arrange peasant estates with strong cattle, good agricultural tools. Even the peasant has no means; and even if he had the money needed for this, he would not want to spend it without using the right of ownership of the land and the estate: a quitrent peasant can be resettled, deprived of land, his quitrent can be increased, and so on. In this respect, according to Jacob, the position of the English tenant is much more favorable, since there the lease term is 7-20 years and during this time he is secured by a contract. Meanwhile, in quitrent estates, more prosperous peasants have to pay for the poor when paying state duties, and often even when collecting quitrent to the master. Then the quitrent peasants, according to Jacob - - however, erroneous - usually have little land, as if no more than 5-6 acres, with the inclusion of forests and wastelands. Finally, the scattered arable plots of each peasant and the obligatory three-field system are also very harmful to the success of agriculture. For the cultivation of the land by free people there are two ways: the first is through day laborers. Where there is no shortage of them, their labor will cost less than a serf. The author confirms the general considerations on this subject by comparative calculations of the cost of cultivating the land in England and Russia, but at the same time he again introduces into the calculation the loss of income by the landowner from the land given to the peasant. However, it is inconvenient to conduct an extensive farm with the help of day laborers, as due to the need large capital, and because of the difficulty of supervising a large number of workers. It is more convenient to allocate to the farmers a certain part of the land with the fact that they work a certain amount of time for the landowner. Such relations are beneficial for the peasant, since in this case the size of his duty is precisely determined by the contract and after the expiration of the term, he may demand a change in certain conditions, they are also convenient for the landowner, who gets rid of the obligation to take care of his workers and, after the expiration of the agreed period, can remove lazy and unprofitable owners. loviyah Landlords with peasants, translated into Russian in 1809, proposed to assign a certain amount of land to each yard and accurately establish the amount of duties; but Jacob thinks that general rules should not be legitimized here—in other words, he presents the free landless peasant as a victim of competition, since he considers any restrictions on landowners to be harmful in disposing of their land. Any peasant household, in his opinion, should be of such size that one team constantly worked on the master's, and the other on the peasant's field. If the peasants become more prosperous, they can be given more extensive estates so that they pay for the excess land compared to the former land no longer with work, but with money or bread. A landowner who has vast lands can make up large, medium and small plots of them for distributing them on temporary or perpetual lease. This is the best system for the use of a large estate, but it presupposes two necessary conditions: firstly, that the owner himself is rich enough to set up many such peasant farms and supply them with the necessary working equipment, and, secondly, that there are a sufficient number of prosperous farmers in the state who could be accepted as tenants. With the increase in the well-being of the farmers, it is very convenient to give land on perpetual hereditary lease with payment not in money, but in a certain amount of bread. According to the author, freelance labor is not yet possible in Russia on a large scale, since there are very few free farmers in it. This name can be called one-palaces and colonists, but they are so busy cultivating their own land that they can hardly be hired for master's work - the same has to be said about state-owned peasants close to them in position. There remains, therefore, one means, to put the serf peasants in a position in which they would have reasons to diligently engage in agriculture. Some Russian landlords have made an attempt to change the usual position of the peasants, but these new institutions lack "legitimate firmness", and therefore they do not have the good consequences that one might expect from them. In conclusion, the author proposes his own plan for changing the life of the peasants in accordance with the size of the estate. He divides the landowners into three categories: small, having no more than 100 acres of plowed land, medium - from 100 to 1,000 and large - more than 1,000. tithes. The small landowners must manage their own economy, basing it on free wage labor. Jacob advises them to do it in this way: take over all the peasant land and start an improved economy on it, make the peasants quitrent and issue passports to everyone who wants to look for work on the side, and keep only those who are suitable for their economy, or, even better, with a good reward to induce them to prefer working with him to all other occupations. Peasant families left with the master turn into simple laborers. The author is silent about the fate of those released to all four sides, but he loses sight of the fact that, according to our laws, the landowner is responsible for the accurate payment of taxes by his peasants and that he is obliged to feed them in case of a shortage of their own bread, so that if the families released by him for quitrent If they didn’t find a job, went in peace, then they would be sent to their former landowner, and then the cost of their maintenance would greatly change the author’s calculations, so convincingly, apparently, proving the profitability of such an operation for the landowners. To the average landowners, i.e., those who have from 100 to 1,000 acres of arable land, Jacob advises to leave 200-300 acres for processing in their favor, and from the rest of the land to arrange plots of various sizes for distribution in hereditary lease both to their peasants and to everyone . A certain number of day laborers should live in such an estate, some of whom should be settled in the master's yard, and the rest among the peasants, so that the latter can hire them. In the same way, the author proposes to arrange larger estates. With this change in the life of the peasants, he finds it necessary to observe the following rules: 1) neither the owner nor the local authorities, except for the duties determined by the contract or the law, should burden the peasants with arbitrary taxes, somehow: carts, supplies, etc. Their time and property must be wholly their own. 2) You must never arbitrarily drive them from the plots allotted to them, change their lands, or interfere in any way in their economy. 3) Taxes and rent money should not be determined by the number of souls, but by the number of tithes. 4) Every owner should have the right to sell his plot at his discretion, and free people can buy them, without becoming serfs (This last condition is omitted in the Russian translation.). Day laborers and children of peasants should have the right to be hired from whomever they want (In the original German, this is added: "as far as within the known district".). 6) Serfdom would be limited only to the payment to the master of an annual quitrent, amounting to interest on the capital spent on acquiring serfs. It is obvious that the implementation of the plan proposed by Jacob would have had the most detrimental effect on the well-being of the peasants: at the same time, they were deprived of all their lands, which they could then take on lease terms, but they were not even given complete personal freedom, since they would be obliged, in addition to the rent for the land, pay another quitrent. Meanwhile, Jacob promises all sorts of benefits for society from such a device: the development of industry, an increase in state revenues, an improvement in morality, etc. Of course, the spread of many ideas expressed by the author in his work was useful, since he proved the disadvantage of serfdom for themselves owners and thus undermined the consciousness of its necessity. But his liberation plans, unfortunately, are connected with the landlessness of the peasants, and this propaganda of landlessness could act all the more harmful that the work of Jacob was crowned with an award established at the wish of the Sovereign, thus the views of the author, who had earned the approval of the learned society, could seem to be the views of the government. This circumstance may have had a harmful effect on the peasant reform in the Ostsee region; As for Russia, although we do not see the immediate bad fruits of such propaganda, these ideas could be planted in the soul of many landowners, and a free economic society can bear no small share of the responsibility for those attempts at "improvements" combined with the breaking of all primordial life. Russian peasant, samples of which we meet in some landlord households during the reign of Emperors Alexander I and Nicholas. It would have been much more useful for the development and dissemination of liberation ideas in Russia if Jacob, not setting out to create a complete plan for the peasant reform, - work beyond his strength, with a very insufficient knowledge of Russian life and unfamiliarity with its history - would again enumerate in his in response to the task of a free economic society, the measures necessary to mitigate serfdom, which he named in his work published in Kharkov. Jakob's work, whatever its shortcomings, is at any rate, in scientific processing, superior to all other answers delivered to economic society, and therefore the awarding of the main award to him is quite natural. As for the work of the famous author of the book "Latvians in Livonia at the End of a Philosophical Century", Dr. Garlib Merkel, his work, which deserved the second award, is far inferior to the work of Jakob both in volume and in thoroughness. We will not dwell on it, but only mention that the calculations made by the author lead him to the conclusion that free labor is cheaper than serf labor (It is curious that in the German edition of Merkel's book, which appeared in Riga in t, he same year, one place in the Russian text, where the author speaks of the conversion of all the peasants of the two Livonian estates into bobyls, "or better to say slaves", was probably excluded by the Riga censorship. However, this mitigation did not save Merkel's writings in Livonia and it, but, in the words of Mr. Samarin , beat there soon selected.). Merkel's essay evoked sharp and not without truth remarks in a pamphlet published in the same year in Dorpat von Bock. The author points out that the estate, put by Merkel as the basis of his calculations, is too in a favorable position, due to its proximity to the city, regarding the hiring of workers and other economic amenities. Noting the inaccuracies in his calculations, von Bock also points out to Merkel, who talks exclusively about the work of day laborers, how sad their situation is, and at the same time refers to factory workers in general and the life of day laborers in England. According to von Bock, the happiest of all is the free peasant who, for the land given to him for use, pays rent in money or himself works it out to his master ( H. A. von Bock:"Einige Bemerkungen veranlasst durch zwei aufgestellte Preisfragen der kaiserlichen, fr eien ökonomischen Gesellschaft in, S.-Petersburg". Dorpat, 1814, S. 4--9.) . General Komarov received the third award of the economic society for his essay; but so, contrary to Jacob and Merkel, he speaks out. in favor of serf labor, then we will first get acquainted with some of the works that have not been approved and therefore not published, the authors of which are also in favor of free labor. All the answers to the task of the society were sent 14 (including 3 German ones); of these, the authors of seven opinions spoke in favor of free wage labor (with the inclusion of Jacob and Merkel) and seven in favor of serf labor (including Komarov). Among the authors who considered freelance labor more profitable was the proofreader Shvitkov, already familiar to us, whose work was found by the economic society "good, but not satisfying the task" and therefore was not published. Free labor, according to the author, is better than serf labor because free laborers require less supervision, in case of need they can be found in a much greater number, freemen can be charged with remuneration for the loss caused by them, any conditions can be concluded with them (At the same time, the author relies, among other things, on the authority of Adam Smith.). However, Shvitkov does not draw any special practical conclusions from these general views, except for advising landlords to use freelance labor in their households. As for the serfs, he does not advise, in the first place, to give them monetary rewards or any extraordinary benefits for their work, as this may spoil them; secondly, he finds it possible to completely free the peasants from corvee, imposing on them a “double tax” (since “on the side they can always provide twice, three times and more than how much they could give taxes to their master.”); thirdly, he recommends allowing those capable of agriculture to be hired to work for other masters, and the rest to be released on passports for various trades. We often do not decide on the most useful enterprises only because they have not become commonplace. " For a long time it seemed strange - Shvitkov says - give their slaves in the service of foreign masters, but now it is almost already in the habit. And what are the consequences of that? ... Slaves, having experienced ... that it is not always good to serve on the side, many Shikuyu have become committed to their masters, that ... and forever do not want to be set free. Thus, the author does not find anything reprehensible in the letting of landlords of their serfs for hire to other persons, although this often gave rise to terrible abuses.From this example it is clear how the recognition of the greater productivity of free labor sometimes coexisted next to the most serf views, and therefore we will not be surprised if, on the contrary, we find sympathetic sides in the opinions of some of his opponents.The author of another unpublished work, which, upon initial reading in society, was recognized as "very good until consideration with other essays in response to this task", but then had to give way to other works, among other things, he says: "Own people, if they live on the master's support, do not have the need to be diligent in work: if the master has bread, they will still be full and clothed, even if their master is ruined in the end. Having no property, no hope of acquiring it by their unceasing labors, can they be industrious? The work that he who works in faith, in the hope of gain, considers a source of abundance, is for them only torment, which will end no sooner than with their complete decrepitude or death. For this reason they must hate her, and can they, without extreme injustice, be accused of this aversion? They are more worthy of pity than reproach, and the name of a worker is less appropriate for them than the name of a slave. "Therefore, the author finds that hired workers are much more profitable than serfs, but only with a "per-hour" pay. If the landowner wants the serfs to work diligently for him, he must win them over with an attentive attitude to their needs, demand them for his work only at a certain time, etc. Answer with the motto: "Freedom is the first right and the first well-being of man" (unpublished) - was recognized as free an unsatisfactory economic society. freedom and their brothers dared to be their slaves. ). Further asserting that free labor is better than serf labor, he bases his opinion on completely arbitrary assumptions. Here is an example: “A free man,” he says, “receiving a reward for his work, in twenty seconds will make such a movement, which a negligent and involuntary peasant can hardly make in a minute, we will add another 10 seconds for the first one in order to satisfy him. who consider freedom, but their love of luxury, to be idle, then even then the hired worker earns twice as much as his peasant. The author resorts to similar "mathematical" proofs further on. It is clear that anything can be proved in this way. In conclusion, he says: “So, it is much better to work the land with hired people than with your own ... The Russian nobility is a brilliant decoration, the most reliable support, or, rather, a magnificent colonnade of the greatest kingdom. It has always and everywhere contributed to the general welfare, it will dissolve chains of slavery in silent silence, under a meek scepter, and in the history of Russia, in the history of even the universe, will be a model and an object of surprise and difficult imitation in the most brilliant generosity and wise insight. No matter how naive these phrases are, they are nevertheless interesting, as a sign of a certain awakening in society of emancipatory ideas. At the head of the opinion, the authors of which speak in favor of serf labor, is the answer of General Komarov (with the motto: "Hurry slowly and see the end"), awarded by the economic society with a small medal. He did not raise, like Jacob, the question in its entirety, about the superiority of free or serf labor, but to cultivate the land of the owner by free employees and at the same time let his own people work for others - he finds it completely inconvenient. Since there are very few farmers in Russia, relative to its territory, then, if the land is cultivated by civilian workers, the prices of labor would rise unreasonably and only a fruitless movement of the people would occur. The author considers work on the spot to be much more useful than seasonal trades, according to the proverb: "a homemade hryvnia is better than a foreign ruble", although he admits that these trades are necessary in Moscow, Yaroslavl, Kostroma and Tver provinces, which are distinguished by either a lack of land or poor soil quality. He is not tempted by the example of Italy and France, where the people, "being for the most part distracted from rural economics, roam the cities and residences after others, alien and unusual prey, are deprived of their" prosperity, and the state - its fundamental support. There, the people willy-nilly have to wander, because they do not have land, while our peasants are endowed with it in sufficient quantities. A serf in Russia is not deprived of remuneration for his work with the landowner: in return for a monetary payment, he receives a plot of land, has time to cultivate it, and enjoys other benefits. Volunteer labor among us is inconvenient both because it does not relieve the need for supervision of workers, and because the landowner has nowhere to get money to pay the hired workers. If agriculture in Russia has lagged behind that of Western Europe, this is largely due to the severity of our climate. The author does not deny that we have bad landowners who "neglect about the order of employment of peasants and their well-being", but, in his opinion, there are few of them. Changes are not desirable, because the best order for the people is the one to which they are accustomed. Komarov's article ends with a calculation proving that serf labor is more profitable for a landowner than a free worker. Whatever the shortcomings of this work, the author is right in that he considers the economic situation of our serfs more favorable than the landless workers in Western Europe, and the free economic society, having awarded the medal and printed Komarov's article, as if introduced some correction to the one-sided opinion of the professor Jacob. The author of another answer, not published, likewise prefers serf labor to free hire, because it is cheaper and more convenient; he admits, however, that "an oppressed man is not so eager to work," and that the strictest supervision will not force him to work hard. In order to improve existing relations, the author finds it necessary to more closely connect the interests of the peasants and landlords (although he had previously argued that they were in complete solidarity) and proposes the following plan. Since by law the peasant is obliged to work for the landowner three days a week, that is, half the time in the year, the landowner could sow the common field with common seeds, i.e., give as many seeds for sowing as all the peasants who this new device must be at work every day. After threshing, the bread is divided in half: one part is taken by the landowner, the other is divided equally among the peasants according to taxes; until the division, you can set aside seeds for next year, as well as a certain number of them in a spare store. On a common account, some necessary machines can also be arranged: a threshing machine and others. Such relations have very many benefits: no one will complain that he got the land of the worst quality; all work will be done in a timely and friendly manner; everyone will look after each other. Who, due to illness, could not work, he will receive his part in full; and whoever deliberately mutilates himself, he should be betrayed "to the full severity of the laws." No one will evade the tax in order to have the right to participate in the sharing of food, and the world can give livelihood to the rootless old people from the general cash desk. Spare magazines will always be in good condition. None of the peasants can impoverish, and in case of fire and loss of livestock, a worldly fund should be established, from which the victims will receive assistance according to their losses. It is known that at present the peasants arrange some work in this way, but one cannot but see a great difference between what is accepted voluntarily, by common consent, and what is imposed by the landowner, even if with good intentions. In order for this landlord socialism to bear good fruit, it is necessary that the landowner should not begin to abuse his power, which, under the proposed arrangement, is much easier than in the case when each peasant works for his own benefit; the author of the project understands this too: “Of course,” he says, “that all of the above can have a real price or benefit when the landowner is a well-meaning and just person, and for the inhuman or lawless ... whatever you want, invent well-intentioned inventions, he always turn them into evil." The possibility of a decisive means of stopping this evil, that is, the emancipation of the peasants, does not even occur to the author. An unpublished work by an unknown author (with the motto: "Abraham and Isaac had bought slaves and used them in agriculture"), upon initial reading, was recognized by the economic society as "worthy of respect and consideration with other answers to this problem," but then it was not awarded any reward. It is recognized by all, - says the author (according to various signs, a native of the Poltava province), - that the work is done the better and more successfully, than the reward for it; however, it also happens that people, without any remuneration, take on hard work; these were: "many soldiers who entered the battlefield during the people's militia, some of the regular overseers of schools, who were entitled to a salary, but they refused it, officials of the Little Russian provinces, elected by the nobility; I do not mention here the heroes of unselfishness, whom I saved us a story: about Aristides, Cincinates, Minin". So in the lower classes we find pious hearts, meekly fulfilling what is entrusted to them, expecting retribution in the future life. It happens, however, and vice versa, that those who receive a certain reward work badly; one need only recall our free artels of carpenters and masons. So, the most important thing in any work is good supervision: "don't buy a village - buy a clerk," says the proverb. Peasants working for the master are not deprived of remuneration for this: a good landowner pays all taxes for them from his income, takes care of the execution of official duties, takes care of their safety, protects strong people from abuses, “like an active censor and police chief observes their morals; like a child-loving father builds houses for them, helps in needs, keeps servants and heals the sick. The peasants feel all this and work for the master more successfully and better than the hired ones. In Little Russia, day laborers from the landlord peasants are always hired more willingly and paid more dearly, since they are more accustomed to work and obedience than the inhabitants of state-owned villages. "And how pitiful is the owner who cultivates his fields with hirelings! He is like the head of a certain democratic republic or the Lukian Gonfalonier; the workers elect him for one or several days and these subordinates are not afraid of him, because they can leave him when they want. On the contrary, the landowner who has his own peasants is like a monarch in a well-ordered state." The profitability of serf labor is also seen from the fact that all owners, having acquired a sufficient amount of land, try to buy their own people as soon as possible; the same is done with us by breeders and manufacturers. This is also confirmed by history: the Europeans sought to acquire slaves on the Guinean shores to cultivate their plantations. Moses tells us that our forefathers, Abraham and Isaac, had their slaves bought; ancient Russian laws also mention slaves. "It seems that the experience of all ages has assured me that a hired hand is always a hired hand, and that his own worker is more trustworthy and works in comparison with a hired worker, with the same supervision, no worse and no slower" If it is objected that in England and in other foreign countries where people work free, the work has been brought to the highest degree of perfection, then, in the opinion of the author, this is due to the vigilance of the police, the greater education of the workers and the greater density of the population, and who knows, maybe with the help of the serfs they would have reached their goal sooner! It is extremely difficult to let your peasants go to rent, to be hired from others, and to hire free ones yourself, since we have never had vagrant artels of farmers, as in modern times. True, day laborers come from other districts and provinces for hire, but in Little Russia it is sometimes impossible to find workers for any money, and this happens at the most difficult time. The peasants "with their rural simplicity" will also be in difficulty where to turn with the offer of their labor, and they may turn out to be unreliable payers of the treasury and landowners. It is also more profitable for a peasant to work for three days for a good master than, being on quitrent, to be a day laborer (the author assumes "that, when peasants are released for quitrent to work with others, the owner will take away their land). Finally, serf labor is more profitable and convenient for the state : more profitable because when processed by civilians, bread will be more expensive; more convenient because the state in which the landowners cultivate the land with their own peasants is "more active, richer and, consequently, more powerful: in a vast, autocratic empire, all the small estates that make up part of it must have monarchical government(This is reminiscent of the thought of the author’s contemporary, V.N. Karazin: “In a monarchical state, all its divisions must be monarchical; some principles must be poured into all branches of this great body, so that they have a strong connection with each other, and, consequently, landowners, for the well-being of agricultural villages, as many are needed as monarchs are for subjects in general.") Is it not on this power of these petty monarchs that the active power and glory of Russia rests unshakably? We are surprised at foreigners and agree that they have achieved perfection in agriculture, but since the time of Godunov have they fed us with their bread? And we, with all our simplicity, with the greatest expenditure of it on distillation and domestic use, not only never need it, but, like ancient Sicily, we supply the whole world with it. "This comes from the fact that" we have the most extensive fields , which we cultivate with the simplest, almost worthless implements ", and more importantly -" with our own hardworking peasants, without undue trouble and expense. " No matter how naive some of the author's opinions, but he, like Komarov, is right about that attitude that it does not recognize the usefulness of landless liberation for the people. Such voices rebuffed the supporters of liberal ideas, understood from the point of view of exclusively the interests of the landowners, and, pointing out the difficulties of the peasant reform, forced the society to more maturely consider the necessary measures. Thanks to such voices, our peasants were not comprehended the fate of liberation in the Baltic style, and at the time in question they were quite seriously threatened by blatant danger.

III.
Unpublished opinions on the subject of the separation of factory workers from farmers.

We have already mentioned above that, together with the task of serf and civilian labor, the economic society promulgated another for 1812 - on separating the landowners from the factory workers in the landed estates; it was also mentioned that, at the wish of the Sovereign, a medal of 100 chervonets was promised for a successful solution of this problem as well (Here is how it was formulated in an announcement from the society: "The vastness and success in factories depend on knowledge and long-term business; peasants, engaged in arable farming and together in manufactories, they can never have such success in the quality of products as those artisans who are accustomed to one job from childhood. benefits for both, so that through this it is always possible to have such a kind of people who, without being engaged in agriculture at all, could make up only artisans and through that forever ensure the spread and improvement of manufactures, without hindering agriculture in the least. This task was also postponed for a year. By the solemn meeting of the society, on January 17, 1814, 10 answers were received, but all of them were considered unsatisfactory and the topic was continued for another year. For the next annual meeting, 15 answers were sent, but they suffered the same fate - the task was once again continued. Finally, by the meeting on March 8, 1816, 5 more answers were received, but also unsatisfactory. After that, the society decided not to propose this topic anymore, about which it informed the Minister of Internal Affairs, O.P. Kozodavlev, asking him to bring this to the attention of the Sovereign. The complete failure of the task, in spite of its persistent repetition, proves best of all that the question proposed by society is not mature enough in life itself, and we can only rejoice at this, since the development of the factory industry in the landowners' estates could only worsen the position of the serf peasants: and in meaning task, it was proposed to educate a special class of people exclusively engaged in factory labor, and with this [would, of course, their landlessness is connected. The possibility of the harmful influence of this topic was also understood by contemporaries, as can be seen from the pamphlet of von Bock, already known to us, published in Dorpat in 1814. Let us cite some passages from it. “I must confess,” says the author, “that while reading this problem, I was seized by a feeling of apprehension and sadness, since it could give rise to such measures that would cause indelible harm to our dear fatherland, especially in its present position. This question, unless it contains a contradiction in itself, can only be satisfactorily answered under one condition—if the country has a surplus of population; but in this case there would be no need to even raise the question, because there would be extra hands, and, consequently, factories would also be set up, otherwise emigration would begin. depends on local conditions and circumstances. Where there is no surplus of workers, their artificial diversion to factories will certainly cause, to the detriment of society, an increase in prices for items of the extractive industry. "The division of labor is impossible with a sparse population .... This is not why states populated and numerous nations that they have factories - on the contrary, the existence of factories is determined by the density of the population. economy, somehow: distilleries, potash and glass factories, saw mills and removal of coarse cloth and linen. “Let,” says the author, “in other countries that really or imaginary suffer from an excess of population, they lock the frail generations in factories or send them to colonies .... let them spin from wave, cotton, silk, and even flax such thin threads that they receive a certain value only after passing through the hands of hundreds of workers; in Russia, her healthy people can still freely plow their mother’s damp earth in order to extract from it the products needed for the whole world, remaining healthy mentally and physically! It may very well be that this pamphlet also influenced the decision of the society to stop further publication of such an unsuccessful task. Not finding it necessary to convey the content of all 25 unapproved and therefore unpublished answers on the question of the separation of factory people from farmers, we will dwell in detail on only one essay, presented in German in 1812, and then, for the second time, Russian, in an enlarged form in 1814, and only slightly touch on a few other answers. Even at the first presentation of the just mentioned essay about him, a member of the Free Economic Society, Academician Fus, gave a very favorable review. Having very sympathetically outlined the content of the answer, the author concludes by saying: “This memoir proves that its author is well acquainted with political economy, knows Russia and has deeply thought over the subject to which this task is devoted. In my opinion, this is the best of all the answers received by society on this topic. "One may be surprised that, after such a review, this work was not approved. No matter how we look at it, we cannot but admit, together with Academician Fus, that indeed this answer is immeasurably higher than all the others. The name of the author is unknown, but, comparing it with Professor Jakob's already familiar answer about serf and free-lance labor, we notice some similarity between them, both in the nature of the presentation, and partly in content. an undoubted fact, we believe that the work with which we will now become acquainted was written by Professor Jacob. At the beginning of the first edition of his answer (with a motto chosen very opportunely: "Festina lente" - hurry, slowly) the author says that Russia - the country is not at all industrial: it not only supplies abroad very few manufactured goods, but there are not enough of them even to satisfy domestic needs ty. Our factories cannot count on foreign sales, because with a much lower interest on capital in Western Europe, an entrepreneur can be content there with a more moderate profit. Besides, even in those Russian towns where the largest factories are located, the division of labor is far from being brought to such a degree as in foreign countries, and it is desirable only where there are many factories: there is nothing more harmful than to artificially accelerate the extreme differentiation of labor. What could be sadder than the situation of a man, accustomed to some simple operation, almost turned into a machine, if he suddenly loses his job and does not have the opportunity to enter one of the same factories! Meanwhile, the peasants will find themselves in such a position, whom the landowner will accustom at the factory to the most special work. As soon as it closes, the landowner will either have to feed the peasants himself, or let them go in peace. The author admits the usefulness of the device in Russia of factories that have a connection with agriculture and cattle breeding or are generally associated with the ownership of land (distilleries, breweries, iron smelters, tanneries, brick factories, linen, sailing, cloth factories, etc.), and also considers it desirable to increase the number of artisans - shoemakers, tailors, carpenters, etc. In all these industries and occupations there is no need at all, or only to a small extent, for a division of labour. Further, the author divides the workers into two classes: 1) independently working for sale and 2) working in the factory of the master or some other manufacturer, and speaks in detail about the separation of this or that category of workers from the farmers (The rest of the answer is also in the Russian edition presented to society in 1814 ; the beginning we have described is missing in it and replaced by a story (probably fictitious) of one landowner about how he made such a division in his name. This story is only a practical application of the general principles set forth in the second part of both editions of the answer, therefore we will confine ourselves to this last.). Since there are few such villages in which artisans could continuously find work, it is impossible to completely deprive them of the opportunity to engage in agriculture. The author advises to take the following measures: having figured out what and how many artisans are needed in a given place, he should build the same number of houses and cut to each of them 1/4 - 1/3 tithes (The author considers it necessary to provide artisans with small plots of land, assuming that their wives, or they themselves, in their free time, will grow bread or vegetables there, but the plots assigned to them are too insignificant. This land, together with the house, should be given to workers for a moderate dues and, moreover, they should be freed from all corvée "with the assurance that they will never be removed from the crafts they produce." The landowner must oblige these people to teach one or more boys from his villages, and reassure the latter that if, at the end of the training, they turn out to be unnecessary in their village, then "they will receive (In the German edition added:" free of charge. ") passports for what they need time to feed yourself by work in other places. Finally, artisans should not be constrained in setting prices for their products. However, the author also advises all peasants who wish to engage in some kind of craft, to give complete freedom to devote themselves to it, turning agriculture into an auxiliary trade. They need to cultivate a certain amount of land, firstly, because in the countryside it is difficult to buy all the supplies of life and, secondly, in the family there will always be a few extra people who can rather be used for field work than for manufacturing work. If a sufficient number of people engaged in one trade accumulate, then we can give them a shop device. The author then proceeds to the question of separation factory landlord workers from farmers. It is necessary that these people be engaged exclusively in factory work, since only in this case can they improve themselves in it. To achieve this goal, it is necessary to put them on an equal footing with civilians, "providing their condition so that they consider it a happiness to belong to this class of people." In this case, one must be guided by the following rules: 1) None of the peasants should be forced to work in factories, except for those who themselves wish it. 2) Promise them that they will never be forced to return to agriculture again, and in the event of the closure of the master's factory, or the need for them, they will be allowed to seek employment in other factories, "without charging them more dues for that, against the fact that how much it is necessary to pay for their dwelling or land; if their condition requires that they leave the village and look for work for themselves in remote places, then the master must issue them passports for this, without demanding any quitrent from them." 3) If the owner keeps them in his factories, then he must pay them the same that civilian employees receive in other similar establishments. 4) The landowner must form a fund partly from his own funds, partly from the contributions of factory workers to help the sick, the crippled and the elderly. 5) If there are many identical factories in a province, then it would be useful for the landlords to agree among themselves that their factory workers have the right to move from one factory to another within the same province. 6) Each of the factory workers should be given a house with garden land (about 1/3 ten). 7) In order to arouse competition between them, it is necessary to unite them into one workshop or guild, where those who have learned factory work are accepted not before, as after testing them by the main craftsmen. 8) Lazy workers are punished by the verdict of the guild court, which may even expel them from the guild, after which the expelled person does not receive a plot of land, but must earn his living as a day laborer. harmful to block the free transition from factory workers to farmers and vice versa. Believing that in cloth, linen, iron, steel and other factories, the implementation of the proposed measures will not meet with obstacles, the author adds: “It seems that in the discussion of these main factories it would not be difficult to take one more step towards improving the state of manufacturers, namely: let them go completely free for a certain payment as a reward, which they make little by little to the landowner, and, moreover, under the condition that they remain at the factories for some definite time. In this way, a completely free class of manufacturers will be formed "(as the factory workers were then called)," of whom even the children will remain in this rank, "there will never be a shortage of factory workers, and capitalists who do not have serfs will not encounter difficulties in setting up factories. Author thinks that this free class of factory workers could also provide for agriculture a significant number of free workers, in whom a severe shortage is felt. lands, and in this way skillful and prosperous owners capable of managing large estates would appear. statement, we believe that it was eno these scientists. The exemplary economy described at the beginning of the second edition of the opinion belongs to southern Russia, which could be familiar to Yakob from his service in Kharkov; here some places also vividly resemble his opinions (So, for example, the arrangement of peasant households by the landowner in fact not the same size.). When the essay under consideration was presented in 1814 in the second, Russian, edition, the society again did not approve it, because the author, describing how a practical attempt to solve a problem, an extensive economy, "takes this example from such provinces, whose laws and customs do not cannot be adapted to others; with all that, there is no certification of mutual benefits "(that is, factory and agricultural workers, as required by society): "and besides, mixing free artisans and industrialists with their people does not in the least correspond to the task". One must think that this is the main reason for the twofold disapproval of the stated opinion; the author's proposal to grant factory workers personal freedom, although furnished with certain conditions, may have seemed too liberal. The authors of other answers - about the separation of factory workers from the farmers - did not give such a detailed plan of the measures necessary for this: they indicated only some elements suitable for compiling a class of people engaged exclusively in factory labor. in human form. " According to another, at the owner's houses and estates "they push fruitlessly ... crowds of parasitic yard servants - lackeys, cooks, stables, theater and dog servants or with the servants of the servants ... The number of such idle parasites can not be mistakenly recognized in Moscow, also in the fields that have come down to chase hares and at large fairs in the southern provinces, where they gather with their owners not only squadrons, but whole hordes. "-" These people, - he says one of the authors, having no grandfather and accustomed to idleness, is engaged almost entirely in card games, drunkenness, debauchery, etc., which often leads them to theft, murder and other vices. "We will mention by the way that when, under the emperor Nicholas I, the government was especially concerned about the excessive abundance of servants, and on the issue of changing their way of life, two secret committees met, under the chairmanship of the Sovereign, in the journal Library for Reading in 1842, an article by Shelekhov appeared (the author of agricultural essays in many journals of that time), which expressed the same idea that we had just met in unpublished opinions of 1812-1814 - about the usefulness of turning courtyard people into factory workers. In addition to the servants, the authors of the answers to the problem of the economic society advised to recruit boys and girls from large peasant families, and especially orphans, for gradual accustoming to factory work. Finally, in land-poor estates, it was recommended that part of the peasants with their families should be turned into permanent factory workers and settled at factories, and the land taken from them should be distributed to the rest of the peasants. Let us also mention that one author advised to appoint a reward - for a particularly successful work of a factory worker - the gift of freedom. Fortunately, as we have already said, not one of the answers to the problem of separating factory workers from farmers was approved, and thus they could not have a harmful effect on the peasants on our landowners. However, it is impossible not to admit that even without it, the factory industry in the first half of the 19th century developed more and more in the noble estates, to the great regret of their serf population.

IV.
The task of destroying through the strip of land tenure among the peasants for 1821 - the Tver landowner Zubov and his article. - Deputy23; Durasov's influence on her.-- The protest of the serfs against these articles and the demand for their destruction.

In 1804, the free economic society announced the task of destroying through the strip ownership in general, for the solution of which he received a medal of 100 chervonets, appointed by the Sovereign, staff captain Kanitsky. Both in his work, published in the journal of the society, and in unpublished answers on this topic, one can find interesting data on peasant land ownership in various areas of Russia, but the authors of these works do not touch on the peasant question itself. In 1819, a task was announced for two years - about the destruction of the strip ownership already specially from the peasants ("Find means and ways for state-owned or landlord peasants, distribute plots of land belonging to them, so that each peasant has in one place all arable and haymaking land, due to its part, and so that through the strip between the peasants of one village there would be no possession either in arable land or in hayfields.), for the best theoretical solution of which a medal of twenty chervonets was assigned; but if one of the landowners "with visible success and common benefit" really makes such a division in the village, where there are at least 15 owners, and presents undoubted evidence, he should have received a medal of fifty chervonets, or 500 rubles. For the answer to it, the correspondent of the society, Lebedev, was awarded a medal of a smaller size, since he did not prove the practical implementation of the measures described by him. We will not dwell on this unpublished work, since it does not contain any data for the history of the question that interests us; but this task caused the sending to the society of another work, which gave rise to very stormy and interesting debates in a free economic society. In Kashinsky district, Tver province, lived at that time the landowner H. V. Zubov, a very elderly man, over 70 years old, and at the same time very rich 300.000 rub.). That this was a very humane person is evident from the following fact. When he was still 25 years old, he made a vow to set aside a twentieth part of his income for the benefit of the needy; for a long time he put off the fulfillment of this intention and, finally, in 1819, instead of the twentieth, he decided to set aside for this purpose an eighth part of the income, and after his death he bequeathed his well-acquired estate "in favor of private and public." Being engaged for 50 years in managing his own and other peasants, he came to the idea of ​​the harmful effect on agriculture of frequent redistribution of land, but he did not dare, however, to destroy them, until he read in 1820 the above task of an economic society. Then he sent to the society a little note on the subject, which, as we shall see, was printed; but he did not limit himself to this, but, in accordance with the instructions given in the task, he wished to actually carry out his projects. In the same year, he redistributed the spring field of three of his villages into separate plots, for each of 60 taxes, "not by strip pens, but by wide strips", and approved them "into the unshakable property of the peasants", and then drew up a written order on the same division rye, and then a steam field. According to the rules established by Zubov, if in any family the number of draft workers decreases, then it has the right to refuse the plot owned by the reduced tax (which is then given to those who wish) or sell it. The escheated peasant lands, which none of the fellow villagers wish to take, are transferred to the landowner. Newly profited taxes can receive plots from the remaining landed estates. In the autumn, Zubov planned to make a division of the hay land as well. He entered with a petition to the Tver provincial government that it ordered the county land surveyor to formally cut the land to the peasants, and at the same time sent his rules to the free economic society, asking him, if it recognizes the measures he had taken as useful, to intercede on them. assertion. Without waiting for an answer from society, on June 5, 1820, he drew up a petition to the State Council, in which he says that he had separated arable land and mowing "into a stable possession of the peasants", "moving himself away from his own benefit and power" and preferring to that "private and state benefit." For every tithe,” he says further, “I put in my income and my heirs a silver ruble of the present current time of kindness,” and, however, I left it to the discretion of the state council to reduce or increase this fee. But Zubov's petition to the State Council was not accepted by post, and he forwarded it to the economic society, with a request to forward it to its destination. Meanwhile, in a meeting on June 5, the society, having considered Zubov’s previous petition, decided to notify him that it could not take over the petition before the Sovereign and that in this case one should apply to the Ministry of Internal Affairs. In the archival materials known to us, there is no information about the further fate of Zubov's practical measures, but his article caused a lot of trouble for the economic society. When it was received, the society invited its members to report their opinion about it, to which Durasov and Bezobrazov agreed. A month later, Durasov presented his comments, with which the society decided to print it, and besides the president, the metropolitan of the Catholic Churches in Russia, Sestrentsevich-Bogush, and some members, 5 members of the internal committee were present: both indispensable secretaries (director of the state economy department in the ministry del Dzhunkovsky and Academician Fus), Senator Count Khvostov, Vice Admiral Sarychov and Adjutant General Prince Menshikov, who later became famous for his serf opinions. Zubov's article, together with Durasov's remarks, appeared in the Proceedings of the Free Economic Society for 1821. Zubov's note, which aroused great excitement in the economic community, occupies only four pages. Pointing to the redistribution of land according to taxes from the landlord peasants and according to the number of census souls from the state, the author notes that the peasants, "having no inviolable property in the land, do not cultivate it enough to produce a good harvest of bread and mowing." The author finds it inconvenient to separate plots for families in each field and proposes: state duties and dues in favor of the landowner "to receive from the land; arable land and mowing to divide the entire length of the fields from the peasant bean goose and thereby stop the need to redistribute the land; approve the land as the unshakable property of the peasants (It was this proposal that gave the main reason for many squabbles.); give them the right, with the payment of state duty and dues, to sell plots in their lands. "As a result of such a "statement of property", each farmer, "being a sovereign owner, will turn his care to fertilize the land for grain and mowing, having before him the assurance, that his labors and the outlay of money belong to him or his heirs." The author believes that the "stable division of field and hay lands" proposed by him can be carried out without the help of a land surveyor, by the peasants themselves, since they know how to do this very leveling, with the help of sazhens, arshins and even feet of feet.In the conclusion of his article, the author notes that "when separating the landowners' lands into eternal circulation, it seems enough for the peasants to put on each male soul of field and hay land from 4-5 acres, the rest of the land is kept in the full will of the landowner. Durasov, in his remarks on Zubov's article, first speaks of the precinct and communal use of land in general, then, turning to Zubov's proposals, he finds the land tax inconvenient: it would be unfair to establish it in the same size for provinces with different amounts of land per capita, and even if introduce and not the same fee, then it will be possible to implement it only after the production of a special land survey throughout Russia. It would be even more tricky to divide up the peasant land along the entire length of the fields, since in this case one would get comfortable, and the other bad land. As for granting the peasants the right to sell their plots, this is not only contrary to the laws existing in Russia, but, according to the author’s completely fair opinion, it would be extremely harmful for the peasants, as was proved by the example of single-palace residents in Great Russia, military inhabitants in Sloboda Ukraine and Cossacks in Little Russia, in which, as a result of the sale of the lands granted to them, most of them, less than a hundred years old, passed into the hands of wealthy owners. But to allocate "perpetual plots" to the peasants without, however, granting them the right to sell them, in other words, to destroy the communal use of land - the author considers it very useful, and in the end, the article presents a detailed draft of the measures necessary for this. Having become acquainted with the content of Zubov's note, it is difficult to understand how it could seem dangerous to some of the members of society: although we meet in it a proposal to approve the land as "unshakable property" to the peasants, it immediately speaks of laying out a quitrent on it, - therefore, it is not a matter of complete ownership of the land, but of its transfer to hereditary lease, with the right only to transfer one's plot to another for money. However, at the meetings of the society, on January 7 and 14, 1822, a member of it, the actual state councilor Golynsky, verbally stated that he and some other members found in the "Proceedings" of the society for the previous year, in article twelfth, consisting of the work of Zubov and Durasov’s remarks on it, “decrees tending to violate laws and deprive the nobility of property”, and that this article was allegedly printed without the permission of the society. At the meeting on January 14, Zubov's article was read, and it was explained that it was considered and appointed for publication by the meeting of the society and that there were no decisions in it, but only thoughts and reasonings of private people about the task promulgated by the society, about stopping the peasants from having stripes. On January 21, a package was brought to the meeting in the name of the members of the society, with a letter from the State Councilor Poshman, which, however, due to the "confusion" that occurred at the same time - probably too stormy debate - was not read, and a week later Golynsky delivered and your message; both of them were only a repetition of what Golynsky had said at the previous meetings of the society. “In the range of duties of a true member of a free economic society,” wrote Poshman, “the most important is: do not go beyond the limits of your appointment. Guided by this general rule for us, I cannot keep silent about what is directly different; disgusting. After reading the 72nd part of the "Works" of a free economic society, I found that Mr. Zubov, the court councilor, in his presentation of the best division of peasant fields, led away (sic) being zealous to deliver benefits to the peasants, lost sight of the limits by which such zeal , by appointment of a free economic society, is limited. To help the farmer with the true and proper means of our fatherland to fertilize the land and improve arable farming is the business of a free economic society in general and of every member of it in particular. But to dispose of the property of the landowners means to touch the sanctity of the right, only granted by God to our most merciful Sovereign. Mr. Zubov certainly did not know that already on July 10, 1820, in the circular order of the manager of the Ministry of Internal Affairs to the chief heads of the provinces, it was precisely said: “In the state, everyone must obey the order established by the laws, until the Supreme Power indicates otherwise; ask for His legitimate needs Majesty allows everyone, but He will never deign to allow that any class or person could of itself attempt to undertake anything contrary to the laws ... "In full assurance that our only private good may consist in the strictest obedience and In fulfillment of the Highest will of the most merciful Sovereign Emperor of ours, I conclude that none of us will wish to contradict this holy truth, and for this sole reason for the presentation of Mr. Zubov, who bows against the Highest will, it is not in our power to approve. While in fairness of my many, I am affected that the most respectable society of favor is to accept all the same, which correspond to the correctness of the elaborations of G. Zubov, for the Mr. Zubov can serve as evil people to be unreasonable for the disgusting of the disgusting, for the disgusting the gentlemen of the members and by common agreement to determine, so that this representation of Mr. Zubov from the "Works" of a free economic society was excluded ... "Golynsky wrote in his letter: G. Zubov lost sight of the fact that in all European states the land is the property of the landlord protected by laws, which is most secure in our fatherland by our most merciful Sovereigns for the loyalty and devotion of the nobility to the throne and the fatherland, and in particular is protected by the charter granted to the nobility. On. also proposes to destroy Zubov's article, and together with it Durasov's objection, which in such a case will turn out to be superfluous. At a meeting of the society on February 25, 1822, its member, Privy Councilor P.I. Sumarokov, announced to the president that the articles of Zubov and Durasov were “contrary to general state regulations,” and therefore he returned the book in which they were published (Three years after Sumarokov also distinguished himself by his obscurantism in the Senate during the trial of Popov, the translator of Gasner's book: he accused Popov of actions and intentions that tended to shake the faith and the government.). The President replied that these articles were published with the approval of him and the society; but since two written statements have been filed about them, he proposes to read both them and the articles themselves. When this was done, the indispensable secretary Dzhunkovsky began to read the explanatory note he had drawn up on behalf of the president. Having briefly outlined the course of this matter before the meeting on February 25, Dzhunkovsky proceeded to analyze the articles of Zubov and Durasov, and he tried to give the first of them a narrower meaning than it actually had. He explained Zubov’s words about granting “unshakable property” to peasants in such a way that they apply only to state-owned peasants, just like the proposal to allow peasants to sell their land plots “from one to another” and collect state duties and dues according to the amount of land, meanwhile both from Zubov's article itself, and from the documents delivered by him to society, it was clear that the author wanted to apply all these measures to the landlord peasants. Further, Dzhunkovsky explained that society cannot be held responsible for the perfect fidelity of the reports printed in his "Proceedings", that many articles cause refutation by other members of the society, as was the case in this case, and that, finally, in the "Proceedings" of the society "there is different theoretical opinions not only about the lands, but also about the condition of the farmers, who even the Highest have been awarded special awards and have never been the subject of any remarks or interpretations. However, if you read the articles of Zubov and Durasov, “although with some attention,” Dzhunkovsky continues, “there is not the slightest relation to depriving someone of property, or violating any laws But if someone wanted to tear out of them separately incomplete periods or from different places to collect words to compose new periods, then in this case there is no such book in the world, from which it would not be possible to produce various interpretations. Zubov's words about granting land to peasants as "unshakable property" are preceded by discussions about the distribution of land by them according to their souls or tractions. It is obvious that “immutable property simply means immutable use or possession of land. The author gives this advice not to the peasants, but to the chiefs or owners of the land, on whom such a device may depend ... As for the landlord peasants themselves, if anyone doubts the meaning of Zubov’s words, then such one will immediately find in the explanations of Mr. Durasov full on that interpretation? The article of the latter says very positively: "The lands of the landowners are their unlimited property, and the possession of them by the peasants depends solely on the arbitrariness of the landowners." From this it is clear that if a landowner allows his own peasant to own unshakably, that is, without change, some piece of his land, then is he really deprived of his property through this? For this he receives quitrent or the work of a peasant in kind, according to his own designation, just as in the case of an annual change of land. As long as the peasant belongs to the master, until then all peasant property is the master's: it often happens in Russia that the landlord peasants themselves buy land and even villages, but only in the name of the landowners, and these lands and estates are always considered landlords. G. Zubov also did not say that the peasants should be allowed to sell the land given to them by outsiders, but he specifically said that they could sell it from one to another, i.e. among themselves, consequently, the property of the landowner, both in the peasants themselves and in their land, remains in Zubov’s opinion completely inviolable. "Neither Zubov nor Durasov said anything particularly new: for many landowners, the land is really divided forever among the peasants, and the latter either pay dues, or serve a corvée. Then, in the law on the dismissal of peasants as free farmers, it is precisely prescribed that each peasant should be given a special piece of land. As for the sale of their plots by peasants, Zubova Durasov refutes this proposal in great detail. Golynsky and Poshman fear that Zubov’s article did not give rise to illegal interpretations, but, firstly, from this "no book, even holy books, are free," and secondly, against people who spread false rumors and misinterpret any institution, and that circular of the manager of the ministry was sent internal grandfather of July 10, 1820, about which they completely inappropriately mentioned. If the society agrees with their opinions and decides to destroy the articles of Zubov and Durasov, “then, really,” Dzhunkovsky continues, “the conclusion should be feared that this society itself interprets them in some worse direction and, instead of warning harmful interpretations, gives rise to to disperse them. For to exclude in such a public way and reprint the work would be nothing more than to give suspicion to the public and force them to look for in it such a meaning that it never had." After listening to all these documents, the society began to ballot the question - to keep or destroy the suspected articles. Of the members present (there were 21 in total at the meeting), 11, including the chairman, spoke in favor of leaving the articles (Sestrentsevich, Dzhunkovsky, Fus, Sarychov, Engelman, Krivtsov, Bunin, Kirilov, Kitaev, Etter, Kolyadin.), and 10 - - for their destruction (Pavel Sumarokov, Count Khvostov, priest O. Levitov, N. Mordvinov, Andrey Chebotarev, Martynov, Pustoshkin, Tomilov, Teryaev, Strukov.). It is noteworthy that the well-known Englishman H. S. Mordvinov, among other things, was a supporter of the destruction of the articles. It would seem that the question was completely settled, but the obscurantists could not calm down. At the opening of the meeting on March 4, a protest by Pavel Sumarokov was read. "The economic society," he wrote, "is called free by the exclusive right not to depend on censorship, to reason, to emboss one's discoveries, advice only about house-building, and not about changing the statutes of political affairs. This excellent power imposed on the estate and excellent caution, much more excellent than other subordinate writers. "Then, mentioning that Zubov proposes to cede the noble lands to the peasants, with the right to alienate them, and that his article represents "novelty in property without the knowledge of the government," Sumarokov complains that at the last meeting "the objections sent by the members were rejected and, without them, the majority of votes, incorrect without them, decided to keep the printed, as if precious creation. " Therefore, Sumarokov demanded either to convene a full meeting of the society to resolve this matter, or, writing down his opinion in a journal, forward it, together with the articles of Zubov and Durasov, for consideration by the manager of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, "as a member and person appointed to supervise the deanery, tranquility in the state." There were, however, opposite opinions. in the meeting, said in a letter but the following opinion: since the advice of a free economic society is not the essence of the law, therefore, they cannot be opposed to anything, and much stronger than this matter was printed, "besides, these books were presented to Their Imperial Majesties and received favor, then I believe in my opinion - - to remain this way, as it is. Vice-Admiral Sarychov proposed to make an explanatory note regarding Zubov's article in copies of the society that would go on sale. The society decided to postpone the decision of the case until the next meeting (It is curious that at the same meeting on March 4, the landowner Puzyrevky read, at the request of the society, a detailed description of the distribution of land among the peasants to special plots in his Vilna name, "according to the way he proposed Zubov, the landowner of the Tver province, will do the same." The minutes read: "The meeting, after listening to this, decided: an extract from it should be placed in the activities of the society," but these words are crossed out in pencil.). Finally, in a meeting on March 18, 1822, but at the suggestion of the chairman, the society decided to print on the page where Zubov’s article ends, the following note: “the above thoughts serve only to explain the task proposed by the society for 1820, so that there were lanes and each would have his own section separately. Why the expressions: to approve the land as an unshakable property or to separate it into eternal circulation for state or landowner peasants - only mean that instead of common ownership each one has his own special plot and the lands allotted to them would not be divided annually in strips, as it is explained in detail in the following article by Mr. Durasov, where the proposal to sell the plots is refuted. "We do not know how many copies managed to insert such a note: in the book that was in our hands, it is not. Be that as it may, the frightened feudal lords were reassured, and this whole sad episode came to an end. better time During the reign of Emperor Alexander I, society, at the wish of the Sovereign, crowned essays with large prizes in favor of free labor, and while some Golynsky and Sumarokov would not dare to elevate the most innocent article into a criminal offense.

V. Semevsky.

"Russian Thought", No 1, 1883.

Semevsky I Semevsky

Boris Nikolaevich [b.21.2 (6.3.) 1907, p. Verkhovye, now the Smolensk region], Soviet economic geographer, doctor of geographical sciences (since 1949). Member of the CPSU since 1942. Graduated from the Faculty of Economics of the Moscow Agricultural Academy. academy. K. A. Timiryazev (1931). Professor, Head of the Department of Economic Geography (since 1959), Dean (since 1970) of the Faculty of Geography of Leningrad University. The main works on the economic geography of foreign countries and on general theoretical issues of economic geography. Vice President of the Geographical Society of the USSR (since 1970).

Works: Agricultural development of deserts, L., 1937; USA. Economic and geographical essay, M., 1963; Questions of the theory of economic geography, L., 1964; Economic geography of foreign countries, parts 1-2, M., 1968-72 (co-author and editor); Economic geography of Cuba, L., 1970; Introduction to economic geography, L., 1972.

II Semevsky

Vasily Ivanovich, Russian historian. Graduated from St. Petersburg University (1872). In 1882-86 assistant professor at St. Petersburg University (suspended from teaching for a "harmful direction"); I have been teaching students at home for many years. In 1891 he made a trip to Siberia to work in the archives. S. actively participated in public life, in the protests of the St. Petersburg intelligentsia against the repressive measures of the autocracy. In January 1905 he was briefly arrested. In 1905, chairman of the Committee for Assistance to Liberated Prisoners of Shlisselburg, member of the Committee for Assistance to Political Exiles. Since 1906 he has been a member of the People's Socialist Party. Participated in 1913 in the creation of the magazine "Voice of the Past" and was one of its editors. S. was a historian of the liberal populist direction. Studied the history of the peasantry, the working class, the liberation movement in Russia. His works are written from a democratic position, with the involvement of a huge amount of factual material. S. did not make broad generalizations, believing that an objective presentation of the facts itself leads to the correct conclusions. The works retain their significance as collections of large and reliable factual material. Member of the Society of Russian Literature (since 1880), Free Economic Society (since 1895).

Op.: Peasants in the reign of Empress Catherine II, vol. 1-2, St. Petersburg, 1881-1901; The Peasant Question in Russia in the 18th and First Half of the 19th Centuries, vol. 1-2, St. Petersburg, 1888; Workers in the Siberian gold mines, vol. 1-2, St. Petersburg, 1898; Political and social ideas of the Decembrists, St. Petersburg, 1909; Cyril and Methodius Society. 1846-1847, [M., 1918]; M. V. Butashevich-Petrashevsky and the Petrashevites, part 1, M., 1922.

Lit.: Historiography of the history of the USSR from ancient times to the Great October Socialist Revolution, 2nd ed., M., 1971, p. 290-94; Volkov S. I., V. I. Semevsky. (TO scientific biography), "History of the USSR", 1959, No. 5; Kritsky Yu. M., V. I. Semevsky and censorship, "History of the USSR", 1970, No. 3; History of historical science in the USSR. pre-October period. Bibliography, M., 1965.

III Semevsky

Mikhail Ivanovich, Russian historian, journalist, public figure. Brother of V. I. Semevsky (See Semevsky). He graduated from the Konstantinovsky Cadet Corps (1855). He served in the military (until 1861) and state (until 1882) service, participated (since 1877) in the St. Petersburg city government. From 1856 he published articles on Russian history (mainly in the 18th and 1st half of the 19th centuries), and contributed to publications by the Free Russian Printing House in London. In 1870-92, the publisher of the historical journal Russkaya Starina, actively searched for documents for publication in the provincial and family archives, encouraged experienced people to write memoirs. His album Acquaintances (1888) contains autobiographical notes of 850 individuals. He published notes by A. T. Bolotov, Ya. P. Shakhovsky, E. Minich, memoirs and letters of the Decembrists.

Works: Essays and stories from Russian history of the 18th century, 2nd ed., vols. 1-3, St. Petersburg, 1883-84.

Lit.: Timoshchuk V. V., M. I. Semevsky, founder and editor of the historical journal Russkaya Starina. His life and work. 1837-1892, St. Petersburg, 1895 (list of works by S.).

Great Soviet Encyclopedia. - M.: Soviet Encyclopedia. 1969-1978 .

• Semeyko
• Semenenko

See what "Semevsky" is in other dictionaries:

Semevsky V. N.- Semevsky V.N. Vladimir Nikolayevich Sov. mountain scientist. sci., d p tech. Sciences (1955), prof. (1956). After graduating from Moscow bugle Academy (1927) worked as an engineer in the mines of the Moscow coal basin. (1927 29), supervised ... ... Geological Encyclopedia

SEMEVSKII- Vasily Ivanovich (1848 1916), Russian. populist historian. Graduated from Petersburg. unt (1872). Member Free economic. about va (since 1895). Exploring the history of the Russian peasantry in the 2nd half. 18th century, drew attention to a number of points related to ... ... Demographic Encyclopedic Dictionary

Semevsky- Semevsky is a Russian surname. Semevsky noble family: Semevsky, Mikhail Ivanovich (1837 1892) Russian historian, journalist, public figure Semevsky, Vasily Ivanovich (1848 1916) Russian historian of the peasantry, journalist, ... ... Wikipedia

SEMEVSKII- 1. SEMEVSKII Vasily Ivanovich (1848 1916), historian of populist orientation. Brother of M. I. Semevsky. In 1906, one of the founders of the People's Socialist Party and a member of its Central Committee. Founder (1913) and editor of the Voice of the Past magazine. Works on socially ... ... Russian history

SEMEVSKII- one . Vasily Ivanovich (December 25, 1848 – September 21, 1916) Russian. historian, populist directions in Russian historiography. From a noble family. In 1872 he graduated from the East. philological f t Petersburg. un ta. Considering the development of the history of the peasantry as a payment ... ... Soviet historical encyclopedia

Semevsky V.I.- SEMÉVSKY Vasily Ivanovich (1848-1916), historian of populist orientation. Brother of M. I. Semevsky. In 1906, one of the founders of the People's Party. socialists and members her CC. Founder (1913) and editor w. The voice of the past. Tr. in social economics. stories… … Biographical Dictionary

Semevsky M.I.- SEMÉVSKY Mikhail Ivanovich (1837–92), historian, journalist. Brother of V. I. Semevsky. In con. 1850s - early. 1860s corr. Free Russian. printing press in London. Founder (1870) and publisher editor ist. well. Russian antiquity. Published notes by A. T ... Biographical Dictionary

Semevsky Mikhail Ivanovich- Semevsky (Mikhail Ivanovich, 1837 1892), a public figure and writer, studied in the Polotsk cadet corps and a noble regiment; served as an officer in the Life Guards Pavlovsky Regiment; being in 1855 1856. in Moscow, revolved mainly in a circle ... Biographical Dictionary

Semevsky Vasily Ivanovich- Semevsky (Vasily Ivanovich), a famous scientist, was born in 1848. At the end of the course at the 1st St. Petersburg gymnasium, he entered the medical-surgical academy for two years, in order to study the natural sciences, and then switched to the historical ... ... Biographical Dictionary

Semevsky Vasily Ivanovich-, Russian historian. Graduated from St. Petersburg University (1872). In 1882‒86 assistant professor at St. Petersburg University (suspended from teaching for "harmful ... ... Great Soviet Encyclopedia

Books

• Workers in the Siberian gold mines. V. 2. The situation of workers after 1870, Semevsky VI. This book will be produced in accordance with your order using Print-on-Demand technology. The book is a reprint edition of 1898. Despite the fact that there was a serious…

Power and Society: Free Economic Society and the Liberal Movement in Russia at the End of the 19th Century.

N. F. Gritsenko

National Research University "MIET"

The place and role in the public life of Russia at the end of the 19th century is considered. The Free Economic Society, as one of the centers of the country's liberal opposition forces, determines its functions in developing the program and tactics of liberalism, shaping public opinion and creating conditions for the formation of civil society. The role of the Society in the formation of the program provisions of zemstvo liberalism is revealed (in particular, the introduction of an all-estate volost zemstvo and the expansion of rights local government) and in the opposition movement (as a means for contacts between liberals on legal grounds), as well as the Literacy Committee as one of the unifying centers of figures in the field of public education.

Keywords: liberalism; zemstvo liberal movement; program and tactics; power and society; public opinion; civil society.

At the end of the XIX century. in the course of the modernization of the economy in Russia, a civil society was gradually formed. This, in particular, was expressed in the emergence and activation of various kinds of opposition movements, attempts to consolidate and program them. Elements of civil society are gradually taking shape in the country - public organizations; thinking public; public opinion, with which the state power was forced to reckon; a freer press.

One of the centers of concentration of the liberal opposition forces in Russia at the end of the 19th century. becomes the Free Economic Society (VEO), established in 1765 and operating until 1917 (in 1982, the activities of the Society were resumed). VEO was one of the oldest in the world and the first domestic economic society. Representatives of many branches of science and practical knowledge, prominent scientists and public figures of various political trends took part in its work. The oppositionists were united around the VEO by the discussions on economic issues that took place there (in particular, on the most topical aspects of the government’s economic policy at the end of the 19th century, including the monetary reform of 1895-1897), the controversy between “legal Marxists” and populists, the discussion food issue, etc. In the early and mid-90s. 19th century Zemstvo liberals and civil servants, who had traditionally been part of it since the 1870s, played an important role in the activities of the VEO.

At the end of the XIX century. VEO aspired to become a body uniting the activities of zemstvos. By the time they began to be introduced, the VEO was already engaged in the discussion and consideration of issues that later became the competence of zemstvo local governments. In its work, the Society relied on local

© Gritsenko N. F.

economic forces, tried to support the local initiative in the field of cultural and economic development. This led to the mutual ties that have developed in the activities of the scientific society and zemstvo institutions. In 1876-1885. The society published the Zemsky Yearbook, which played a certain role in the unification of the zemstvos, and in 1885 a special department of zemstvo publications was created in the VEO library, numbering up to 50 thousand volumes of books and brochures. According to the well-known historian of Zemstvos B. B. Veselovsky, he was "the best and most complete collection of Zemstvo publications of all time."

The liberal members of the VEO, linking the fulfillment of their tasks by the zemstvos with the development of their greater independence and economic initiative, supported the introduction of a small zemstvo unit in the form of an all-estate volost zemstvo and the expansion of the rights of zemstvos in the field. In 1898, when discussing the food question, this problem occupied one of the central places.

In 1894, under the III branch of the VEO, under the leadership of the zemstvo statistician V.I. Pokrovsky, a Statistical Commission was created, designed to unite all the statistical work carried out in the country. The program developed by the commission provided assistance to zemstvo statistical bodies in their activities, the development of general schemes and programs for zemstvo statistical research, the solution of special issues of zemstvo statistics and the establishment of permanent contacts with all zemstvos in order to analyze their activities. The commission included well-known statisticians and zemstvo figures: V. I. Pokrovsky, D. I. Richter, V. E. Varzar, V. Yu. Skalon, P. A. Korsakov, as well as Professor L. V. Khodsky, lawyer and publicist D. D. Protopopov, professor V. I. Charnolusky, writer G. A. Falbork and social democrat A. N. Potresov.

In February 1900, at the request of zemstvo statisticians, the VEO held several meetings specifically devoted to questions of their activities. As a result of a survey of Zemstvo residents, a program of meetings was drawn up, in which more than 100 people from 26 provinces of Russia took part. Most of the statisticians came from the St. Petersburg province (10 people), from Vladimir - 9, Pskov - 8, Samara - 7, Ryazan - 6. From February 15 to February 22, 1900, 24 meetings were held.

The desire of the VEO to act as a center uniting liberal Zemstvo intensified in 1895, when the well-known Zemstvo figure P. A. Heiden became its head. In August 1896, at a meeting of the chairmen of the provincial zemstvo councils in Nizhny Novgorod, he proposed that the zemstvo leaders unite in a Zemstvo department specially created under the VEO, which, according to Heiden, should include all the chairmen of the provincial zemstvo councils, “which opened up the opportunity to carry out the same tasks that puts ... the present meeting ”(quoted from:). As a result, the Zemstvo department could become an all-Russian Zemstvo body, the creation of which the Zemstvo liberals dreamed of.

On September 15, 1898, Heiden addressed all zemstvo councils with a proposal to publish the “Zemsky Yearbook” and “Zemsky Collection” at the VEO. As shown by a survey conducted by the Moscow Zemstvo Council, the majority of Zemstvos (18 out of 29) spoke in favor of publishing such a body in Moscow. In December 1899 (after the prohibition of the Moscow Provincial Zemstvo Council to publish a journal), the VEO notified all councils that it was starting to publish Zemstvo journals and asked for Zemstvo funds to be allocated for this. However, the publication could not be carried out: on April 20, 1900, the activities of the VEO were suspended.

At the end of the XIX century. The VEO claimed to be one of the public centers for discussing economic policy pursued by Minister of Finance S. Yu. Witte. This manifested itself, in particular, when considering the issue of transforming the Proceedings of the VEO into a special economic journal. At the general meeting of the VEO on September 28

In 1895, a special Commission was created to transform the "Proceedings". It included the “legal Marxists” P. B. Struve, M. I. Tugan-Baranovsky, professors L. V. Khodsky and V. I. Semevsky, as well as statistician and publicist, populist N. F. Annensky, publicist A. P. Mertvago, politician K. K. Bauer and others. The commission prepared a project for the publication of a new economic journal, based on the great importance of economic issues and the need for their correct coverage and “the absence in Russia of a special economic journal, with the exception of Vestnik Finans”, which, for all the value of the factual information reported in it, cannot be ranked among scientific journals where critical analysis and free discussion of economic and financial issues would be allowed. The creation of such a journal could "satisfy one of the urgent needs of public self-awareness ...".

When developing the issue of the nature of the "Proceedings", disagreements emerged among the members of both the commission and the entire VEO. A number of members of the Society (Professor A.N. Beketov, P.A. Geyden, G.I. Tanfilyev, P.L. Chebyshev, D.N. Anuchin and others) proposed to give the “Proceedings” a purely scientific character, to limit the circle of covered they contain questions about the activities of the Society. Another group of members of the VEO, which included the "legal Marxists" P. B. Struve, M. I. Tugan-Baranovsky and K. K. Bauer close to them, liberal populists V. P. Vorontsov and G. P. Sazonov, professors L V. Khodsky and V. I. Semevsky, attorney at law A. A. Nikonov, publicist A. P. Mertvago, as well as M. A. Lozina-Lozinsky, G. A. Falbork, A. M. Kalmykova and others. , proposed to publish an economic journal of a broader focus, covering various aspects of the socio-economic life of Russia and foreign countries. Their views were reflected in the draft program of such a journal proposed by the Commission for the Transformation of Trudov. For

In 1896 and early 1897, at general meetings of the VEO, meetings of the Council and branches of the Society, there were disputes about the nature of the "Proceedings of the VEO", in which many members of the Society holding various political views were involved; in particular, an opinion was expressed about the transformation of "Proceedings" into a body that unites the activities of zemstvos. As a result of lengthy discussions on March 27, 1897, at the general meeting of the VEO, a compromise solution was reached - to expand the range of issues covered in the Proceedings, focusing on economic problems.

However, the desire of the VEO to become a legal body uniting zemstvos was not crowned with success. Apparently, Zemstvo liberals preferred to rally around the Moscow Provincial Zemstvo Council as a body of local self-government, and VEO was viewed primarily as a scientific society. However, by the 1990s 19th century at the meetings of the VEO, the demands of the zemstvo liberals began to be discussed: on the introduction of an all-estate volost zemstvo, the expansion of the rights of local governments, etc.

A certain role in the consolidation of the opposition elements around the VEO and in the development by them at its meetings of some program provisions of Zemstvo liberalism was played by the Literacy Committee, opened under the Society in 1861. Namely

Personality. Society. The state around it, as well as the III branch of the VEO and the Soil Commission from the mid-80s. 19th century zemstvo elements and some representatives of the bourgeois-liberal intelligentsia consolidated. A number of prominent Zemstvo residents (P. A. Geiden, F. I. Rodichev, K. K. Arseniev, Prince P. D. Dolgorukov, A. M. Kolyubakin, V. N. Lind, M. I. Petrunkevich, D I. Shakhovskaya and others) not only actively participate in the work of the Society, but also occupy leadership positions in it. For several years, the Committee of Literacy was headed by the chairmen of the St. Petersburg Provincial Zemstvo Council I. A. Gorchakov and the Moscow Zemstvo Council V. Yu. Skalon.

By this time, the connection between the Literacy Committee of the VEO and the Zemstvos had significantly increased. In its work, the Committee began to rely on them as “the main and only organization of the intelligent elements of Russian society” and turned into one of the unifying centers for zemstvo teachers and public education figures in general. In 1885-1886. it included active zemstvo figures, brothers S. F. and F. F. Oldenburg, D. I. Shakhovskoy and others, who set themselves the task of broad cultural work among the people. All of them were previously members of the circle of F. F. Oldenburg, created in the early 1880s. a group of students of St. Petersburg University. Its leaders, the Oldenburg brothers, were under the influence of D. I. Shakhovsky, whose “program” at that time was “refraining from political struggle in the name of accumulating strength and knowledge,” which corresponded to the aspirations of the members of the circle.

In the spring of 1882, the circle joined the scientific and literary society at St. Petersburg University. Being influenced by the philosophy of Leo Tolstoy (mainly his theory of the improvement of the personality) and his work for the people, the members of the circle in 1884 began to study and publish folk literature. Prince Shakhovskoy, the Oldenburg brothers, Doctor of Geography A.N. Krasnov and others actively worked in this direction. The circle established contact with the Posrednik publishing house, Kharkov teachers A. M. Kalmykova and Kh. On the basis of common interests, the members of the circle became close to the Committee itself, and in 1885-1886. became part of it, which significantly revived its activities.

By the beginning of the 90s. 19th century in the Literacy Committee, a group of radical Zemstvo and liberal intellectuals stood out, which the tsarist government drew attention to. In a note on the VEO, presented by the Minister of Internal Affairs I. L. Goremykin to Nicholas II on April 15, 1898, it was reported: zemstvo figures and teachers were supposed to oppose government measures on legal grounds ... this circle, which appropriated the name "zemstvo", was supposed, in the opinion of its founders, to rally all the dissatisfied. Such a circle was soon organized among a certain part of the members of the VEO and, mainly, among the members of the Literacy Committee attached to it. . Among the most active members of the "zemstvo circle" were A. M. Kalmykova, V. I. Charnolusky, G. A. Falbork, N. A. Rubakin, D. D. Protopopov, A. M. Tyutryumov. Literacy Committee activists (I. P. Sveshnikov, K. K. Arseniev, V. K. Vinberg, P. A. Korsakov, F. I. Rodichev, V. Yu. Skalon, M. A. Lozina-Lozinsky, A. I. Yarotsky, D. D. Protopopov and others)

previously they were part of the student scientific and literary society, closed in 1887, the circle of folk literature, and the "Zemsky circle", created on its basis and existed for two years. Council elections in 1893 and 1895. these people took leadership positions in it. So, in a letter intercepted by the police dated May 1, 1893, it was reported: “... We won the elections to the Literacy Committee, so now a young party is at the helm of the board.” . Zemstvo liberals and publicists K. K. Arsenyev, V. Yu. Skalon and A. M. Tyutryumov, Zemstvo vowel I. A. Gorchakov, mining engineer E. E. Anert, official of the I department of the Senate M. A. Lozina-Lozinsky, publicists and figures of public education D. D. Protopopov, G. A. Falbork, V. I. Charno-lusky, and also the teacher V. V. Devel. According to the St. Petersburg mayor, the Council consisted "mainly of persons of an anti-government direction."

The VEO Literacy Committee has become a kind of rallying point for heterogeneous liberal elements. The activities of his "young party" caused dissatisfaction with the conservative part of the Committee and sharp criticism in the government press. An article appeared in the Novoe Vremya newspaper condemning the work of the Committee, which noted that “its current (Committee of Literacy) activities under the leadership of Falbork and Charnolussky and the campaign are far from being flattered by those zemstvos who are hard at work in the field of public school” . However, already three days later the editors of the newspaper were forced to publish a refutation: “In fact, the vast majority of zemstvos reacted to the activities of the Committee with complete sympathy, and every day more and more new expressions of it come to the Committee. Over the past year, 200 zemstvos have turned to the Committee with a request for assistance in arranging public reading rooms ... ".

The close connection of the Committee with the Zemstvos was manifested in their joint work on the publication of popular books and their distribution to public libraries. The zemstvos often submitted projects on public education for the Committee's conclusion and gave it the right to select books for the libraries being created. This side of the work of the Committee, connected with the organization of public libraries and reading rooms, became the cause of dissatisfaction of the tsarist government. At the same time, the police were especially concerned about weak control over reading rooms and libraries, which “can hardly ensure normal development for these institutions in cases where the founders of reading rooms or their heads, imbued with an anti-government way of thinking, see in these institutions a legal means to carry out their theories in life and educate the people in a direction that is desirable for them, not always in accordance with the true conditions of our political system.

The Minister of Internal Affairs saw the only way out of this situation in the transfer of the Literacy Committee to the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Public Education, since “The Committee published mass editions of the works of L. N. Tolstoy, G. I. Uspensky, N. K. Mikhailovsky. These works of the press, appearing as an instrument of legal propaganda among the people, were one of the means of fighting the agitators against the government on legal grounds and began to be sent out by the Literacy Committee to public libraries and reading rooms, as well as to zemstvo teachers, paramedics, orderlies, etc. young people. . Undoubtedly, the Committee did not

Personality. Society. The state has the task of organizing revolutionary propaganda among the people, but such literature educated the masses in the spirit of protest and facilitated the perception of revolutionary ideas.

The Literacy Committee paid much attention to the problem of introducing universal education in Russia, since the illiteracy of the population had a detrimental effect on national economy and on the authority of Russia among European countries. This issue was discussed at a number of zemstvo congresses, on the pages of Vestnik Evropy, Russkiye Vedomosti, and other publications. Zemstvo institutions played an important role in the implementation of the program. The Literacy Committee sought to unite the educational activities of the zemstvos. So, in January 1895, a meeting was held there with representatives of zemstvos, dedicated to “clarifying the relationship in the field of public education between provincial and district zemstvos and the Literacy Committee”, with the participation of prominent zemstvos, scientists and literature. In the same year, the Committee compiled a major work "Research on Public Education in Russia".

Another issue of the zemstvo liberal program, the abolition of corporal punishment, was closely connected with the requirement of universal primary education, which was also discussed at meetings of the VEO and the Literacy Committee in September - December 1895. Professor V. I. Semevsky, a member of the VEO, noted in his report that corporal punishment is condemned by the whole of Russian society and is "a remnant of ignorance, contrary to the whole spirit of the reforms of Alexander II", connected the issue of its abolition with the general rise in the "economic life" of the peasants and drew a direct connection between the rise of agriculture and the liberated personality of the peasant. The text of the petition to the government to abolish corporal punishment caused a significant public outcry. In official reports, not without alarm, they pointed out "an enthusiastic manifestation of the student youth present at the meeting, who applauded the speakers who expressed sharp attacks on the existing state and social system" . However, one should not exaggerate the extent of the opposition activity of the Literacy Committee. He was mainly engaged in legal educational work. The government was afraid of any manifestation of opposition, public initiative, rallying the population around such committees and the rapprochement of the intelligentsia with the people.

On August 26, 1893, a program was developed in the Police Department to combat the "anti-government activities" of the Literacy Committee. “This is not an easy matter and requires endurance and tact,” it was noted in the plan of work presented to L. A. Rataev, “and one must always be clear about the goal: to eliminate people who adversely affect the activities of an institution that is very useful and respectable in its basic idea” . It was proposed to achieve this goal, firstly, to study the composition of the Literacy Committee and its “ramifications” in the provinces, and secondly, to establish strict control over the activities of its most active members, especially G. A. Falbork, V. I. Charnolusky, A M. Kalmykova and N. A. Rubakina. The personality of the latter was of particular interest to the police, since, as noted in a police report, “he is undoubtedly the center and, in addition to distributing school publications of the Literacy Committee, apparently also deals with cases that are not entirely legal.” It was supposed to conduct a search at his place to detect illegal publications, and besides, it was considered necessary

“prohibit residence in the capitals and university cities” of V. I. Charnolusky, G. A. Falbork and some other members of the Literacy Committee. This was only part of the measures to combat the Committee. Soon, on February 5, 1894, the Minister of the Interior I. N. Durnovo addressed the Minister of Public Education I. D. Delyanov with a confidential letter, in which he proposed that the Ministry of Public Education take over the St. Petersburg Literacy Committee; At the same time, since “at the head of the Pb. There are several people on the Literacy Committee, whose political reliability is more than doubtful, and that persons known for their liberal trend, such as Mikhailovsky, Zasodimsky, Goltsev, Uspensky, Rubakin and many others, take an ardent part in the publication and distribution of folk literature. ”, Durnovo considered it necessary put under strict control the publishing activities of the Committee. Thus, already at the beginning of 1894, in government circles, the question was raised of transferring the Literacy Committee to the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Public Education. The confidential letter of the Ministry of Internal Affairs was distributed and became known in the Committee itself, which caused a public outcry (this is evidenced, in particular, by the police intercepted letter of the student of the Institute of Communications A. M. Arkhangelsky dated February 27, 1895).

At the beginning of 1895, the government continued to develop the issue of withdrawing the Literacy Committee from the jurisdiction of the VEO, which caused discontent even among the moderate members of the Committee and prompted them to take more decisive action. However, the WEO participants disagreed on this issue. The liberal-minded members were clearly not satisfied with the activities of Count A. A. Bobrinsky, the former president of the Society. As early as the end of 1894, under the influence of rumors about a change in the subordination of the Literacy Committee at a general meeting, it was proposed to turn it from a temporary institution into a permanent IV department of the VEO for the promotion of literacy and agricultural education. In late December 1894 - early 1895, in the VEO, as well as in the apartment of K. K. Arsenyev, private meetings of active members of the Literacy Committee were held, where I. A. Gorchakov, D. D. Protopopov, M. A. Lozina-Lozinsky were present , A.N. Potresov, F.I. Rodichev, G.A. Falbork, V.I. Wishing to speed up the resolution of the issue, on January 12, 1895, a group of active members of the Committee, mainly persons known for their liberal views (L. V. Khodsky, B. E. Ketrits, A. M. Tyutryumov, D. D. Protopopov, M. A. Lozina-Lozinsky, V. I. Charnolusky, K. K. Arseniev and others, 23 people in total), addressed the President of the Society Bobrinsky with a letter, in which they asked for the earliest possible convening of the Council to “develop measures for the preservation and greater strengthening of the Committee literacy in the Society”, and then on the immediate convening of the General Meeting for the final discussion of the measures outlined by the Council to achieve the goal. However, Bobrinsky was clearly in no hurry to resolve the issues raised. Dissatisfaction with his activities prompted one of the most active members of the Literacy Committee, its secretary Protopopov, known for his "opposition views", to write harsh letters to him, as a result of which Bobrinsky was forced to resign as president of the VEO (soon a moderate liberal was elected instead of him Count P. A. Heiden).

Personality. Society. The state In the conflict that arose between Bobrinsky and Protopopov, the VEO Council, represented on the whole by persons of a conservative direction, came to the defense of the former president. Only two of its members protested against the Council's decision: I. A. Gorchakov, Chairman of the Literacy Committee, and V. I. Pokrovsky, Deputy Chairman of the VEO Division III. However, the activities of the Council did not find support among the members of the Society. special opinion about wrong actions A. M. Tyutryumov, V. I. Charnolusky, A. A. Nikonov, M. I. Tugan-Baranovsky, G. A. Falbork, A. N. Guriev, A. N. Po-tresov and others. In a letter from the St. Petersburg mayor to the Police Department, it was reported about the stormy meeting of the general meeting of the VEO, which took place on March 4, 1895: “... it turned out from the debate that Protopopov, along with some other members of the Society and the Committee, , allowed himself to write to Count Bobrinsky a number of letters, not restrained in tone and not relevant in content. During what was happening. meeting, a significant part of the meeting, headed by members of the Society Guryev, Lozinsky, Okunev, Nikonov, Sazonov, Charnolussky, Falbork and others, spoke in favor of Protopopov.

Thus, there was no unity both within the Literacy Committee and among the members of the WEO and its Council. Radical members of the Society, mainly representatives of the bourgeois-liberal intelligentsia, sought to intensify the activities of the Society. The members of the VEO themselves felt the difference in views. So, in a letter from the former secretary of the Society G. I. Tanfilyev to the newly elected secretary N. G. Kulyabko-Koretsky dated April 14, 1897, it was reported: into a rut, although you are probably very well aware that in our Society there are very different, sometimes diametrically opposed currents, so that there is also a struggle of parties.

In April 1895, at a general meeting of members of the Literacy Committee, which elected a new, radical composition of the Council, it was announced that it was impossible to continue its work for the benefit of public education if it fell under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Public Education. In November - December 1895, private meetings of the radical “party” of the Committee of Literacy were held, where the issue of “forms and methods of protest” against the provisions of the Committee of Ministers approved by Nicholas II on November 17, 1895 on the transfer of the Committee to the jurisdiction of the Ministry of Public Education was discussed. The first of them took place on November 27, 1895 at the apartment of A. A. Nikonov, member of the Committee, Assistant Attorney at Law, various groups liberal intelligentsia, including prominent liberal figures, as well as some more radical elements (G. A. Falbork, V. I. Charnolusky, N. A. Rubakin, K. K. Bauer, V. V. Carrick, A. M. Kalmykova, A. N. Potresov, M. A. Lozina-Lozinsky, S. F. Oldenburg, M. I. Tugan-Baranovsky), more than 25 people in total.

Members of the "commission of protest" on December 5 at the apartment of V. I. Pokrovsky held a joint meeting with representatives of the liberal and liberal-populist press, where they were present: from the editorial board of Vestnik Evropy - N. I. Kareev, from Novoye Slovo - V. P. Vorontsov and N. A. Rubakin and N. K. Mikhailovsky from the editors of Russian Wealth. The question of the timing of the public

protest over the transfer of the Committee. On December 7, at the apartment of M. Grigoriev, a joint meeting of the radical part of the Committee was held under the chairmanship of S. Oldenburg (G. Bartold, K. K. Bauer, M. Bulgakov, V. Voznesensky, M. Volkenstein, A. M. Kalmykova, V. W. Carrick, M. A. Lozina-Lozinsky, A. A. Nikonov, Prince V. Obolensky, A. N. Potresov, M. I. Tugan-Baranovsky, A. Stasov, G. A. Falbork, V. I. Charnolusky and others; after a lengthy debate, it was decided to protest against the transfer of the Literacy Committee in the general meeting of the Committee, and, according to A. A. Nikonov and K. K. Bauer, more than 200 people "have already expressed a desire to participate in the protest") . At the meeting of the Council of the Committee of Literacy on December 23, 1895, statements of all commissions and 265 members on their withdrawal from the Committee were heard. In the explanations presented by the Council to the Minister of Public Education, it was emphasized that the Literacy Committee, with the transfer to its state structure, had lost the character of an independent institution, "and therefore is not capable of fruitful work by private individuals."

The "protest" tactic ended in failure. On March 12, 1896, the charter of the St. Petersburg and Moscow Literacy Societies, developed by the Ministry of Public Education, was approved, according to which any actions of the Literacy Society could be carried out only with the permission of the Minister of Education, who also appointed officials. Previously, all positions in the Literacy Committee were elected. The new charter and the transfer of the VEO Literacy Committee to the Ministry of Public Education caused a protest in the country. Almost all members of the Committee refused to join the new society. The Society of Friends of Russian Freedom and its organ, the Free Russia magazine, published in London in English, publicly declared their disagreement with the government's decision; L. N. Tolstoy in his "Letter to the Liberals" advised to continue the struggle and not be afraid of repression.

Thus, the active members of the VEO Literacy Committee acted in full accordance with the tactical principles of zemstvo liberalism of that period, which manifested itself in the development of a protest petition for the “highest name”, in periodic irregular meetings of individual members of the Society. Under the influence of the revolutionary movement, tactics changed towards some left, which was expressed in the expansion of contacts between the left Zemstvo members of the VEO with the intelligentsia, in holding joint meetings with representatives of the liberal and liberal populist press.

The energetic work of the Committee of Literacy in 1891-1895, especially the activities of the VEO in the famine year of 1891, attracted the attention of broad sections of Russian society to the Society and contributed to the activation of public opinion.

By the beginning of the XX century. there is an urgent need to modernize the political system, which was one of the indispensable conditions for the formation of civil society. The constituent elements of this process were to be the inclusion of ever larger sections of the population in the political process, the establishment of democratic freedoms and a change in the ways of legitimizing power.

Sources

1. Veselovsky B. B. Imperial Free Economic Society and Zemstvo Institutions // Bulletin of Agriculture. 1915. No. 51-52.

Personality. Society. State

2. Verbatim record of the debate on the food issue in the General Meeting of the VEO // Proceedings of the VEO. 1898. T. 1. Book. 3. S. 29.

3. Minutes of the meeting of the Statistical Commission at the III branch of the VEO, May 24, 1894 // Proceedings of the VEO. 1895. T. 2. Book. 5.

4. Shipov D. N. Memories and thoughts about the experience. MM. and S. Sabashnikov], 1918. 592 p.

5. RGIA. F. 91. Op. 2. D. 114. L. 5v. D. 200.

6. Protopopov D. D. History of the St. Petersburg Literacy Committee. SPb.: Ed. Free Economics. ob-va, 1898. 370, XIV p.

7. Levandovsky A. A. Circle of F. F. Oldenburg: (from the history liberal movement 80s of the XIX century) // Problems of the history of the USSR. Issue. 6. M.: Publishing House of Moscow State University, 1977. S. 166-183.

8. Grevs I. M. Memories of the circle of F. F. Oldenburg // Past. 1921. No. 16. S. 137-166.

9. GARF. F. 102. DP-Sh. 1893. D. 635. L. 34. DPLU D. 133. T. 6. F. 601. Op. 1. D. 1025.

10. V. B- (Bartenev V. V.) Memoirs of a Petersburger about the second half of the 80s // Past Years. 1908. No. 10. S. 176-193.

11. GARF. F. 102. DP-Sh. D. 635.

14. RGIA. F. 1101. Op. 1. D. 889.

15. On the history of the Free Economic Society. SPb., 1907.

16. ValborkG. A. Universal education in Russia. M.: Type. t-va I. D. Sytin, 1908. 212 p.: tab.

17. GARF. F. 102. DP-G^ D. 133. T. 6.

18. RGALI. F. 40. Op. 1. D. 33.

19. RGIA. F. 91. Op. 1. D. 198.

20. GARF. F. 1732. Op. 1. D. 645.

21. GARF. F. 102. DP-Sh. 1890. D. 332. T. 4.

22. OR GPB im. M. E. Saltykov-Shchedrin. F. 163. D. 384.

Gritsenko Natalia Fedorovna - Doctor of Historical Sciences, Professor, Head of the Department of Russian History, State and Law (IRGiP) MIET. Email: [email protected]