Chapter 8
in which Pyotr Stolypin and Dmitriy Trepov suggest two different ways of reforming Russia
GETTING TO KNOW THE PEOPLE
April 26, 1906, is a day of celebration in Saint Petersburg—it is the first meeting of the State Duma of the Russian Empire. The newly appointed parliamentarians board small steamers and sail up the river from the Tauride Palace to the Winter Palace, where they are to be received by the tsar. The Duma members are in a combative mood. Many feel betrayed that the main laws have been adopted without their involvement, in violation of the manifesto of 17 October. They are determined to fight back.
A prayer service is held at the Winter Palace, after which Nicholas II greets the members of Duma. To the right of the emperor stand members of the imperial family, courtiers, and ministers in their gold-embroidered uniforms; to the left are the State Duma members. The two halves of the hall examine each other with curiosity.
The first visual contact is a shock for both sides. Most of the parliamentarians are peasants. For them, the opening of the Duma is their first public event in the capital. There is no dress code. No one prepared the parliamentarians for the meeting, and no one informed them of the proper protocol or court etiquette. All are dressed as if celebrating a holiday. “Very few were in tails and frock-coats. The overwhelming majority of those standing closest to the throne, as if purposely, were attired in workers’ clothes, while behind them were some peasants in national costumes. There were also many Duma members from the clergy,” recalls Finance Minister Kokovtsov.
It is a meeting of two worlds: the Duma members gaze upon Nicholas II in the flesh, not the “tsar-father” that they have been told about and imagined since childhood; he and the courtiers look back at the people, whom they have never bothered to imagine at all.
Metropolitan high society discusses the meeting at the Winter Palace as if it were some kind of monstrous scandal, although nothing unseemly happens. The mere appearance of the members of Duma seems so disrespectful that the Petersburg elite concludes that nothing good will come of the Duma, since, in their view, it is full of die-hard revolutionaries. After the ceremony Kokovtsov tells the Empress Dowager Maria Feodorovna that the Duma should be dissolved and the electoral law amended so as to prevent the election of such riff-raff in the future.
During the ceremony, one member of the government eyes the parliamentarians even more suspiciously than most. He is on the lookout for potential terrorists among them: “I cannot help thinking that one of them may be concealing a bomb,” he says out loud. “However, perhaps there is nothing to fear. The response to such an incident would be too unfavorable for these gentlemen.”
The man is Pyotr Stolypin, who a week ago was the governor of Saratov. Now he is the newly appointed interior minister.
“WITHOUT THE TSAR, YOU WOULD ALL BE BEGGARS”
Stolypin is a new face in Saint Petersburg, and his appointment took many by surprise. In dismissing Witte’s government, Nicholas II’s intention was to replace it with its antithesis. Boris Stürmer, the archconservative, was earmarked for the post of interior minister, but Prime Minister Ivan Goremykin preferred to go for an outsider, so the choice was made in favor of Saratov Governor Pyotr Stolypin.
Saratov province is problematic: peasant unrest has been ongoing since 1905, and landowners’ estates are burning. Stolypin copes as best he can (not very well), but things get even worse when help arrives in the form of General Sakharov, who is murdered by terrorists at Stolypin’s own home just one week after arriving in Saratov. Strangely enough, the tragedy bolsters Stolypin’s reputation, if only because he has been in charge of such an explosive region for three years and has managed to remain alive.
Stolypin is far from being a liberal. In all his speeches, he repeats: “Without the tsar, you would all be beggars, and we would all have no rights!” Unsurprisingly, the new interior minister and the new prime minister see eye to eye.
Goremykin is not thrilled by the prospect of running the country at such a turbulent time. However, he does not actually believe that he needs to. In his view, the tsar, as the anointed one, should rule the country. Besides, he knows that Nicholas II gets very jumpy when any of his top officials try to usurp his power. Moreover, Goremykin is the type of official that we now describe as a technocrat: he has no long-term program of any sort, but understands clearly what is—and what is not—required of him. He knows how to react to external stimuli, believing that in most cases no reaction is preferable. Things will sort themselves out.*
That is precisely his view of the newly elected Duma. He has no intention of engaging with it in any way: “Let them stew in their own juice. The Duma will discredit itself in the public eye,” he reckons.
But if anyone is stewing in his or her own juice, it is Prime Minister Goremykin. Russian newspapers print daily reports from the State Duma, which are themselves something of a revolution, so to speak. Henceforth, no topic is off limits for discussion, even ones that previously incurred stiff penalties, up to and including exile. The State Duma cannot change anything yet, but is already becoming a “forum for discussion.”*
After all the ceremonies and prayers, the first meeting of the State Duma commences at 5 p.m. on 26 April. The first elected chairman is the fifty-six-year-old Sergei Muromtsev, a member of the Kadet Party and a professor of Moscow University. He immediately gives the floor to the oldest liberal in the hall, Ivan Petrunkevich, who makes a short speech demanding a political amnesty. Then Muromtsev follows with the words: “While maintaining due respect for the prerogatives of the constitutional monarch, we are called upon to use the full force and scope of the rights of the people who elected us,” he says.
The government has prepared only two bills for consideration by the Duma: on setting up a public launderette and repairing the orangery at Tartu University. The bills cause a storm of indignation among the parliamentarians. They want to discuss serious matters. During the first week of meetings, they draft their first appeal to the tsar, which is adopted by majority vote. It consists of two parts. Part one outlines the Duma’s intentions and wishes, while part two proposes that the government be dismissed and replaced with one that is answerable to the Duma. Moreover, it calls to abolish the State Council, carry out land reforms, alter the system of zemstvos and city institutions, transform the tax system, introduce free and universal primary education, change the electoral law, introduce universal suffrage, and declare an amnesty for political prisoners.
These are the very slogans that the Kadets had been preaching before they entered the Duma. Moreover, many of the points were included in the manifesto of 17 October, but have not been put in practice since then. The parliamentarians intend to submit their long list of demands to the emperor.
On 8 May Nicholas II informs Duma Chairman Muromtsev that he will not receive the delegation of Duma members, and that they can convey their message to Prime Minister Goremykin (whose resignation the Duma also demands in the appeal). Goremykin appears in the Duma and reads out a long, tedious, barely audible official response from the government. The general import is that some demands have been rejected; other will be considered.
Hardly has Goremykin finished when Vladimir Nabokov runs up to the rostrum and shouts: “Executive power, you must submit to the legislature!” The Duma gives him a standing ovation.
Even before the meetings of the First Duma, things are moving in a vicious circle. From the start, the parliamentarians are offended that their powers, as outlined in the manifesto, have been curtailed. They have nothing but contempt for the authorities, and the antipathy is mutual. The government seeks to make sure that nothing will come of the Duma (although Pyotr Stolypin still hopes to use it for his own purposes). Each side is convinced of its own rectitude and appalled by the unacceptable behavior of its opponents.
EVERY REVOLUTIONARY’S NIGHTMARE
Throughout spring, Russia’s professional revolutionaries continue to hide. Very few leave the Russian Empire, but they do move to Finland. The local authorities there usually turn a blind eye to the suspects on the run from the Russian government—many Finns even help the fighters in their struggle against the tsarist regime. Finland is home to the leading Marxists Vladimir Lenin, Julius Martov, Boris Savinkov, Yevgeny Azef, and Viktor Chernov.
The SRs, having decided to boycott legal politics and the elections to the State Duma, are expecting a forceful peasant uprising to shake the country at any moment, for which preparations must be made. Plans are drawn up to detonate railways and bridges and interfere with telegraph communications. They decide to return to terror tactics in anticipation of the uprising, but fail to carry out a single successful assassination. The police are on their trail (tipped off by the double agent Azef), and periodic arrests are made of members of the militant organization. Only Savinkov escapes harassment. His accomplice Dora Brilliant ends up in the Peter and Paul Fortress, goes mad, and dies a year later.
The remaining SRs are demoralized. Pinhas Rutenberg tells Savinkov that he has nightmares about Gapon: “He appears in my dreams. I saved him on Bloody Sunday and now he’s hanging there.” Even Azef is feeling the psychological strain of being the head of the militant organization of the Socialist-Revolutionaries and a police informer at the same time. He declares to Savinkov that he is tired and wants a break. But Savinkov replies that it is totally out of the question.
Azef takes over the leadership of the main operation—an attempt on the life of Interior Minister Stolypin, while Savinkov is sent to Crimea to assassinate the admiral who suppressed the October uprising in Sevastopol.
Savinkov has barely arrived in Crimea when an unrelated incident occurs. A sixteen-year-old boy throws a bomb at the commandant of Sevastopol Fortress. It does not explode, but another bomb being carried by his accomplice is accidentally detonated, killing the terrorist himself and six innocent passers-by. The police begin to arrest all suspicious types, including Savinkov this time.
They await trial. A “sympathetic” prison guard says that they will all be executed.
A DEMOCRATIC GENERAL
On 6 May 1906 Nicholas II celebrates his thirty-eighth birthday. All the ministers are invited to the palace. Trepov openly discusses which Duma members could make up a government of national confidence. Finance Minister Kokovtsov is uncomfortable about discussing such a delicate topic in front of everyone. But Trepov continues: Does Kokovtsov think that a government answerable to the Duma is the “equivalent of a coup against the monarch, reducing him to a decorative role?” It might be even worse, replies Kokovtsov.
Not all state officials believe that the Duma should be dissolved. General Trepov still considers it his duty to prevent a new insurrection, and is therefore nervous about disbanding the Duma. But the issue cannot be swept under the carpet. On 13 May, the Duma almost unanimously passes a vote of no confidence in the government—only seven parliamentarians abstain.
On 16 May Goremykin summons his ministers to discuss their response. Only Foreign Minister Izvolsky opposes the dissolution of the Duma, saying that it would complicate relations with Europe. All the rest, most vociferously Interior Minister Stolypin, say that the Duma should be broken up.
The newly democratic Dmitry Trepov visits the tsar with a proposed list of cabinet members in the event that the Duma’s demand for a new government is satisfied. Inter alia, he proposes Duma Chairman Muromtsev as prime minister, Milyukov as interior or foreign minister, and Mikhail Herzenstein, a Moscow representative and the architect of the agrarian reforms, as finance minister. Trepov assures Nicholas II that this is the only way out of the impasse.
Moreover, Trepov says that he has already done the groundwork: he has held secret talks with the two potential ministers Muromtsev and Milyukov to learn about their agendas.
Nicholas is interested, but does not fail to consult with the ardent supporters of the dissolution of the Duma. He summons Finance Minister Kokovtsov, who, horrified by Trepov’s proposal, explains that the appointment of a government of people’s representatives would deprive the tsar of all influence over state policy—he would not even be able to dismiss the government. “We are not grown-up enough for a constitutional monarchy,” warns Kokovtsov.
Trepov, the court commandant, gives an interview to the news agency Reuters. In it, he openly declares that it is necessary to form a new government “made up of Kadet parliamentarians because they are the strongest party in the Duma,” adding that a government formed without Duma representation “will not bring peace to the country.” He admits that it is a great risk, but necessary: “If it does not work, we shall have to resort to more extreme remedies.”
Trepov’s opponents decide that “extreme remedies” means Trepov’s own personal dictatorship. They say that it is a ruse to form a Kadet government, which will put forward unacceptable conditions, allowing Trepov to dissolve it and seize power for himself.
The interview is an all-or-nothing gamble, and it fails. The idea of a government responsible to the Duma is opposed by Empress Alexandra, and the emperor himself has always believed in the inalienability of his power. “My mind is made up,” he assures his finance minister at the end of June. “There was never any real doubt, for I have no right to forgo what was bequeathed to Me by my ancestors and what must be passed on to My son.”
Nicholas II is ready to dissolve the Duma, but wants the initiative to come from the government. But Goremykin is afraid to take the initiative. He is waiting for the tsar to order him to dissolve the Duma.
The resolute Stolypin comes to the aid of the indecisive tsar and prime minister. According to Stolypin’s plan, everything will go smoothly if the Duma is dissolved at the same time as the government is dismissed, with the appointment of a popular compromise figure as the new prime minister instead of Goremykin. This idea appeals to the tsar, who orders Stolypin to look for candidates.
He summons Milyukov for talks and asks the leader of the Kadets how much he and his fellow party members are prepared to compromise, which members of the current cabinet they are happy to cooperate with, and whether the liberal Kadets realize that they will have to get their hands dirty—for instance, they will be in charge of the gendarmes.
According to colleagues, Milyukov is sure that the prime minister’s office is his. He believes that the meeting with Stolypin is a mere formality.
But Stolypin has another scheme. He summons Dmitry Shipov, a former zemstvo and opposition leader who suffered at the hands of Plehve, and offers him the post of prime minister in the new government. More than that, he tries to present him with a fait accompli. The dissolution of the Duma is a done deal; Shipov’s candidacy has already been approved by the tsar, and tomorrow, 28 June, Nicholas II expects to receive him at the palace.
Shipov is a rare breed. As a sincere Tolstoyan, political intrigues are alien to him. He is honest and scrupulous in all matters. A year earlier, he refused to join the Witte government, citing the fact that he was a minority among Moscow liberals. Now he brusquely rejects Stolypin’s proposal, saying that he considers the dissolution of the Duma to be not only unconstitutional but also criminal.
Stolypin tries to persuade Shipov to accept. Will Shipov agree to head a coalition government if the Duma is not dissolved, he asks. Shipov replies that the Duma majority belongs to the Kadets, which means that Stolypin should offer the post of prime minister to Milyukov. The interior minister acknowledges that he has spoken to Milyukov, but does not fancy the prospect of having him as prime minister. In the end, the only thing that Stolypin achieves is a promise that Shipov will meet the tsar the next day for talks.
Immediately afterwards, Shipov goes to see Duma Chairman Muromtsev and tells him everything. He says that he will refuse the post of prime minister, but will suggest Muromtsev instead. Muromtsev also refuses: for one thing, he is not certain that the new government will last long (the position of Duma chairman seems to him to be more stable), and for another, he cannot circumvent Milyukov, because the latter “already feels like the prime minister.”
After talking with Muromtsev, Shipov, as promised, pays a visit to Nicholas. Shipov tries to persuade the tsar to form a government from the Duma majority (i.e., the Kadets). They will soften their tactics on assuming power, he promises. The tsar wants to talk about specific individuals: Who should he appoint as prime minister? Despite the earlier conversation, Shipov recommends Muromtsev, adding that Milyukov could be the new interior minister. He leaves the palace in high spirits, thinking that the tsar has agreed to everything.
“They say Shipov’s a smart man, but he revealed his hand to me and I didn’t reveal mine,” Nicholas says to his wife after the meeting.
Muromtsev is livid when he learns that Shipov has recommended him as prime minister, and Milyukov as interior minister: “What right have you to meddle in an internal party issue?” Shipov starts to talk about the good of the country, but Muromtsev says that he will not be able to work with Milyukov: “Two bears cannot live in one den.”
However, Muromtsev is starting to think that he cannot avoid becoming a minister. The next day, during the Duma session, he summons Milyukov (who is not a parliamentarian, but goes to the Duma every day to observe the proceedings from the press gallery). “Which of us will be the next prime minister?” Muromtsev asks by way of greeting. Milyukov replies: “In my opinion, neither of us.” But seeing Muromtsev’s persistence, he continues: “As for me, I am happy to offer the premiership to you.”
The party starts preparing to form a government. On 3 July Milyukov gathers together the various factions and informs his comrades about his negotiations with Trepov and Stolypin. Many are shocked by the admission, believing that the secret meetings with Trepov and Stolypin are a disgrace and that the Kadets should not agree to the tsar’s proposal. However, most still agree that their primary duty is to their country, so they set about discussing the government’s future program.
The Duma, meanwhile, continues to function. The situation is slightly schizophrenic: the government is demanding the resignation of the Duma members, yet the latter continue to draft unadoptable laws. The key issue is land reform, championed by the Moscow representative and economics professor Mikhail Herzenstein. He is developing a bill on the alienation of landowners’ land for the purpose of transferring it to the peasants. Although it does not recognize the Duma’s right to make such laws, the government is involved in the debate. The discussion is very lively. Herzenstein says that if land reform is postponed, the peasants will rise up and start burning the aristocrats’ estates.
A baptized Jew, Herzenstein is fast becoming a hero among the peasant members of Duma. During speeches by right-wing opponents of the reforms, the peasants usually chant, “Herzenstein! Herzenstein!” The right-wingers hate him. He becomes a prime target for the Black Hundred press attacks and begins to receive threatening letters. He claims not to take the anonymous letters seriously, but insures his life for 50,000 roubles*.
The Union of the Russian People is also full of zealots. They bombard the government with telegrams demanding the dissolution of the Duma, writing that they can “barely contain the righteous indignation of the tsar’s loyal subjects who want mob law applied to the enemies of the Orthodox Church, the Tsar and the Russian people.”
In late June, the government issues an address to the public, stating that land reforms will not be imminent. In response, the Duma parliamentarians draft their own address to the people, outlining the reforms that they have prepared. On 8 July Goremykin and Stolypin pay a joint visit to the tsar at Peterhof. Stolypin persuades Nicholas that there is no time to lose: the Duma is calling on the peasants to revolt, so it should be pre-empted and dissolved immediately. Both Nicholas and Goremykin are pleased that someone else is taking the responsibility for this momentous decision. Moreover, Goremykin resigns as premier. The tsar appoints Stolypin as his successor.
Stolypin tries to refuse, citing inexperience, but Nicholas insists and blesses him with an icon. As if expecting such a turn of events, Stolypin pulls out a ready-made plan to suppress the unrest, which can be put into practice after the dissolution of the Duma.
On leaving the tsar’s office, Goremykin and Stolypin bump into Trepov: “It’s terrible! The whole of Saint Petersburg will be up in arms,” says Trepov, and hurries off to try to change the emperor’s mind.
Prime Minister Goremykin holds one last government meeting. He says that he feels that he has broken free and wants only one thing—peace.
A TRIP TO VYBORG
On Sunday morning, 9 July, Milyukov receives a call from the printing house that is typesetting the manifesto to dissolve the Duma. He jumps on his bicycle and rides around to the homes of all members of the Central Committee, summoning them to the house of Petrunkevich. The party lawyer, Fyodor Kokoshkin, convinces the Kadets that the manifesto is unconstitutional because it does not provide for new elections. The alarmed liberals ask Milyukov to write an appeal to the people to boycott the government (i.e., through non-payment of taxes and draft avoidance). They decide to convene a Duma meeting, but preferably outside the city to avoid being arrested.
Struve is sent to round up all fellow party members. He runs to the “Kadet club,” where everyone usually gathers, stands on a chair in the middle of the hall, and makes a speech. He says that all the parliamentarians have to go to Vyborg, a small town in Finland, an hour’s train ride from the Russian capital, where they will be able to discuss what to do next. The Duma members are opposed, saying that running from the capital is tantamount to desertion and acceptance of the dissolution order. “If the Duma remains in Saint Petersburg, there will be blood and disarray,” Struve tries to outshout everyone.
A few hours later a crowd of people gathers at Finland Station to begin the exodus to Vyborg—the travelers include not only members of Duma, but also journalists, friends, relatives, and sympathizers.
During the short trip they talk about what will happen. Some believe that another revolution is inevitable; others are sure that the old order will be restored—politics will stop and autocracy will return as before. Many do not understand why they are fleeing to Vyborg. Stolypin, for one, is taken by surprise. He has instructed the police to arrest the Duma members if they try to assemble unlawfully and to expel them from Saint Petersburg. Yet instead, they seem to be expelling themselves.
When they arrive in Vyborg, many find that they have nowhere to stay. All the hotels are full. They have to spend the night on the station floor. The next morning a meeting is held at the Belvedere Hotel. Petrunkevich presides at the first session; Muromtsev arrives later.
For two days the parliamentarians argue over the text of their appeal to the Russian people, blaming each other for being too soft or too revolutionary. In the end, they reach a compromise text, which becomes known as the Vyborg Manifesto. When the members of Duma leave Vyborg, a crowd gathers at the station to see them off. At every station they are welcomed and waved at. The parliamentarians throw leaflets with the text of the appeal out of the train windows. Arriving in Saint Petersburg, the Duma members are surprised to find that no one is there to arrest them. The capital is a picture of calm.
Following the dissolution of the Duma, many Kadets rent out summer villas on the coast of the Gulf of Finland. There, the former parliamentarians continue their meetings to discuss further the party’s plan of action. The forty-six-year-old Mikhail Herzenstein is incensed by the gathering in Vyborg: “What foolishness. You made this bed, now you’ll have to lie in it. In any case, you’re incapable of doing anything intelligent,” he grumbles.
He and his family spend the summer nearby at Terioki (now Zelenogorsk in Russia, not Finland). Herzenstein plans to run for the post of head of the Moscow Duma, since he is still very popular in the city. On 18 July, he is strolling along the beach with his wife and seventeen-year-old daughter. They are accosted by a man with a gun. He shoots twice, climbs over a fence, and runs away. The gunman’s name is Alexander Kazantsev.
The former Duma member is killed, and his daughter is wounded. The authorities forbid a funeral in Moscow, fearing unrest, and insist that he should be buried in Finland. Suspiciously, a whole hour before the shooting the reactionary newspaper Lighthouse had carried the front-page headline: “Herzenstein is assassinated!”
Since the killing took place in Finland (a grand duchy of the Russian Empire) it is investigated by the Finnish police. Had it taken place in the Russian heartland, there would have been no investigation at all, for the head of the Saint Petersburg Police Department knows full well that the assassination was committed by the militant wing of the Union of the Russian People, created by Dubrovin under the aegis of head of city police von der Launitz.
The murder provokes a major scandal inside the union itself. The fact is that von der Launitz paid 25,000 roubles* to the head of the militant wing for Herzenstein’s head, but only 300 roubles† apiece to the foot soldiers. They are displeased.
The chief of the Petersburg secret police, Gerasimov, hears about it and reports what has happened to now Prime Minister Stolypin. The latter frowns in disgust: “I will tell Launitz to wash his hands of this affair,” he says.
The investigation continues for nearly three years, but Dubrovin is never tried or even questioned as a witness. All the accused are pardoned by the tsar at the request of Stolypin. Herzenstein’s assassination is the first of many operations carried out by the military wing of the Union of the Russian People.‡
AN EXPLOSION ON APTEKARSKY ISLAND
On Saturday, 12 August 1906, Prime Minister Stolypin is at his residence on Aptekarsky Island in the Neva River in Saint Petersburg, receiving visitors. On the upper balcony, directly above the entrance to the house, sits his three-year-old son, Arkady, known in the family as Adya, with his nanny. The boy scrutinizes the arriving visitors. A carriage pulls up with two gendarmes inside, holding briefcases. They stride into the house, pushing the porter out of the way, but are stopped by General Zamyatin, the prime minister’s assistant. He is suspicious. Something about their uniforms is not right. Faced with the general, they throw their briefcases onto the floor. An explosion rings out.
Stolypin’s daughter Maria says that she was just about to open the door to her bedroom when there was a sudden roar. In a split second, her door turned into a gaping hole in the wall, offering a view of the river.
The terrorists, the porter, and General Zamyatin are “ripped to pieces,” says Maria Stolypina. Another thirty people are also killed by the blast. The explosion is so powerful that the windows of a factory on the other side of the river are shattered.
The only room in the house that is not damaged is the prime minister’s office, the farthest from the entrance. At the time of the explosion, Stolypin is at his desk. The shock wave causes a bronze inkwell to empty its contents over the prime minister. But otherwise he is unharmed.
He runs out into the street to look for his wife. “Olga, where are you?” yells Stolypin. She runs out onto the balcony. “Are the kids with you?” “I can’t find Natasha and Adya.”
Stolypin has six children: five elder girls and one youngest son. The fourteen-year-old Natasha and the three-year-old Adya are eventually found alive under the rubble: he has a broken leg, while both her legs are splintered in several places. Adya’s seventeen-year-old nanny, who was with the boy on the balcony, has had her legs blown off.
The explosion is heard from afar. At the neighboring dacha, Deputy Interior Minister Kryzhanovsky is receiving Dr. Dubrovin, the head of the Union of the Russian People. According to hearsay, he rushes to the scene and starts administering first aid. He is said to be the first person to talk to the ink-stained, plaster-covered prime minister in the immediate aftermath. “Go and have a wash,” he says to the victim, and only then does he recognize Stolypin. When the latter realizes that it is Dubrovin, he allegedly says to him: “Do what you like, the reforms will not be stopped!” The story is improbable, but very popular among the reactionaries.
After the assassination attempt, Stolypin continues as if nothing has happened. “We were amazed by his serenity and composure,” says Finance Minister Kokovtsov. Stolypin seemed to come of age and take charge. He was not afraid to speak his mind to anyone.”
The next day the tsar offers Stolypin compensation, which he turns down: “Your Majesty, I do not sell the blood of my children.” Soon, the Stolypin family relocates to the Winter Palace, since the tsar still prefers to reside at Tsarskoye Selo.
The terrorist group led by Azef spent several months preparing for the attempt on Stolypin’s life. Azef informs his supervisor Gerasimov about the operation in June, before the dissolution of the Duma. The two-faced head of the militant organization says that it would be a mistake to arrest all his subordinates and threatens to quit if they are. Gerasimov promises not to arrest all the terrorists.
But Gerasimov wants to know about all the movements of the militants, so that the police can carry out surveillance and, in some cases, let them know that they are being watched. Typically, on noticing a tail, the terrorists abandon their safe houses and lie low for a few weeks from Saint Petersburg. That way, the militant organization is paralyzed. In any case, arresting only the foot soldiers inside a safe house would be a short-term solution.
But Gerasimov forgets about a group of young radicals who split from the SRs when the party declared the terror was over—the so-called “maximalists.” They have lost contact with the SRs and are not subordinate to Azef. The leader of the maximalists is Sokolov, nicknamed “Bear”—it is he who coordinated the operation against Stolypin on Aptekarsky Island.
Savinkov, meanwhile, who has been arrested in Sevastopol, avoids the death penalty and escapes with the help of a sympathetic guard. He makes his way to Heidelberg, where the seriously ill Mikhail Gotz lives. The latter is not happy about the explosion on Aptekarsky Island.
Gotz believes that the preparations were shoddy. Stolypin is usually hosting a cabinet meeting at his dacha on the island, but the terrorists chose a time when not a single minister was there. Moreover, the large number of civilian casualties was deplorable. However, he does agree with the idea to assassinate Stolypin as the right response to the dissolution of the Duma, so the maximalists deserve some credit, especially since the SRs’ militant organization is making no progress whatsoever. “Don’t you see that the militant organization is paralyzed?” says the equally paralyzed Mikhail Gotz.
He suggests that Savinkov should refrain from terrorism until a new approach is devised. Savinkov moves to France, and Gotz dies a few weeks later after an unsuccessful operation on his spinal cord.
Despite Gotz and Savinkov’s despondency, their cause is more popular than ever. The SRs’ militant organization no longer enjoys a monopoly on terror. A couple of years earlier, all the high-profile attacks in the Russian Empire were the work of Azef and associates, but now there is no centralized organization for political assassinations—rather it is a popular ideology, spreading like a virus. Terrorist attacks against state officials are carried out across the country by young people who have never seen Gotz or Azef. The explosion on Aptekarsky Island is followed by several copycat attacks.
In Peterhof, a terrorist shoots Major-General Kozlov in full public view. During his interrogation, it becomes clear that he thought his target was Trepov. A day after the assassination attempt on Stolypin, Colonel Min, the commander of the Semenov Regiment, who distinguished himself during the suppression of the December uprising in Moscow, is assassinated at Peterhof train station. On the same day, again in Peterhof, General Staal survives an attack, again having been mistaken for Trepov. By June 1906, thirty-seven attacks have been made on major government officials, and the number continues to climb. Later in the year, even the curator of the Union of the Russian People, Petersburg Governor Vladimir von der Launitz, is shot and killed. The assassin commits suicide on the spot—and his head is gruesomely preserved in alcohol and put on public display. It does not help to identify the anonymous terrorist.
Trepov is shaken by the crime spree. In early 1905, he survived a fairly inept attempt on his life, but the assassinations of officials mistaken for him are a cause for alarm. He also fears for the life of the emperor. Moreover, he seems to have lost the ear of Nicholas II, who now listens more to Stolypin. The latter has not only replaced him at the Winter Palace, but is also outperforming him as an “effective manager”* of a hopeless situation.
The general public calm following the dissolution of the Duma is proof for Nicholas II that Stolypin was right and that Trepov was being alarmist. But the latter considers the growing number of terrorist attacks to be evidence of rising discontent that will soon erupt. Trepov believes that by not forming a government from the parliamentary majority and by returning to autocracy, Nicholas II is exposing himself to a fatal peril.
In September the tsar and his family go on a yacht trip to the Finnish fjords, leaving the fifty-year-old court commandant Trepov behind. It is an open snub. During the cruise, Nicholas II is informed of his sudden death. The tsar instructs his chancellor Mosolov, Trepov’s brother-in-law, whom the latter recommended to Count Fredericks six months ago, to find out what has happened.
Petersburg society believes that Trepov has committed suicide, but Mosolov states that the autopsy showed signs of a heart attack. The question on everyone’s lips is whether or not the tsar will interrupt his cruise to attend the funeral. He does not. Mosolov goes through Trepov’s papers and documents and takes all the most important to Nicholas II. “I am greatly saddened by this sudden death,” says Nicholas in a businesslike tone. “The Emperor certainly appreciated Trepov, but did not feel any personal liking for him,” Mosolov writes in his memoirs.
Others close to Nicholas II remember Trepov as a brave man devoted to the tsar, but one who showed weakness by trying to persuade the emperor to become a constitutional monarch. However, it soon becomes apparent that Trepov, not Stolypin, was right. The dissolution of the Duma and the subsequent crackdown do not create lasting stability, and the sword of Damocles continues to hang over the tsar. Stolypin survives Trepov by just five years, Nicholas II by twelve.
STOLYPIN’S NECKTIE
A week after the assassination attempt on Stolypin, the Council of Ministers declares a “war on terror” and introduces military courts. For the Russian Empire, which has operated a trial-by-jury system for over half a century, it is a game changer. According to the new system, if a crime is so clear-cut that “there is no need for an investigation,” the criminal should be tried by martial law. Such courts are set up by regional governors-general. Court verdicts are to be delivered within twenty-four hours of the crime; the usual sentence is, of course, the death penalty.
Russia at this time has a very special relationship with the death penalty. In 1741, Elizabeth, the daughter of Peter the Great, when preparing to mount a palace coup, vowed before an icon to repeal the death penalty if she became empress. Thereafter, the death penalty in Russia is more the exception than the rule—after Empress Elizabeth any death sentence must be approved personally by the monarch, which happens only in extreme cases. Catherine II, for instance, authorizes the execution of the ringleaders of the Pugachev uprising. In 1825, thirty-one Decembrists are sentenced to death, but only five are hanged in the end; the others have their sentences commuted to hard labor.
The death penalty is applied more frequently in wartime by military courts. Execution by firing squad is the usual penalty for military crimes, while serious political offenses are punishable by hanging. On average, the death penalty is handed down only a dozen times a year. It is not applied to persons under the age of twenty-one or older than seventy. Women can be sentenced to death only for an assassination attempt on the tsar, his family, or his government.
But with the onset of the twentieth century, the situation changes for the worse. Military courts spring up during the suppression of the December 1905 uprising—that month alone 376 people are executed. In the second half of 1906, 574 are sentenced to death, and the numbers climb even further: 1,139 people are hanged in 1907, 1,340 in 1908, and 717 in 1909. The gallows—the government’s preferred tool to crush the revolution—will be nicknamed “Stolypin’s necktie.”
The purges have no obvious effect. Even the head of the secret police, Gerasimov, says that the military courts do more harm than good: they often deliver arbitrary verdicts and swell the ranks of enemies of the regime. Not only terrorists are tried by them, and often the judges are ordinary officers who are not legal experts, so the sentences end up being based on gut feelings and personal enmities. “By introducing military courts, the government seemed to be taking revenge, which was undignified,” says Gerasimov.
The ordinariness of the death penalty is a sign of the times; it even becomes a common motif in Russian literature. The main opponent of the death penalty is still the ageing Tolstoy. Two years later, in May 1908, he writes an article entitled, “I Cannot Remain Silent.” In it, he asserts that the authorities are worse than the revolutionaries: “You, government people, describe revolutionary deeds as villainous, but there is nothing that they have done that you yourselves have not done to a far greater extent.”
AGRARIAN REFORM
Prime Minister Stolypin uses the dissolution of the Duma to launch his most ambitious reform—agricultural. His proposal is completely unlike Herzenstein’s and does not foresee alienating land from the landowners and handing it over to the peasant cooperatives or communes.
In early twentieth-century Russia there is no individual land ownership for farmers—every peasant is inseparable from the commune. The land is tilled jointly according to strict rules within the commune. Stolypin’s revolutionary idea is to encourage the breakup of the communes by selling land to individual peasants, making them private owners. Peasants can leave the commune and receive a slice of land; also, they get an opportunity to buy plots of land on credit through the new Peasant Bank. Land sold to the peasants is to be redeemed from the landowners by the bank at market prices. Under the scheme, the bank also receives land belonging to the tsar and his family.
Stolypin’s project is very unpopular with imperial family members. It takes Stolypin a long time to bring him round to the idea.
Nevertheless, Stolypin manages to adopt a land reform law on 9 November, less than six months after he took charge of the government. He is following the advice of his predecessor, Sergei Witte, who once said that any reform in Russia needs to be done quickly or not at all.
The reform, which is adopted without the approval of the dissolved Duma, provokes a hostile reaction from both opponents and supporters of the regime. The socialists believe that the landowners’ land should be confiscated, not redeemed, and distributed, not sold, to the peasants. The Union of the Russian People is equally critical, but from a different angle. Dubrovin considers the peasant commune to be a pillar of the autocratic regime. Stolypin’s project, writes the right-wing press, only benefits the Jewish Freemasons, who seek to undermine the autocratic system. But Stolypin’s influence over the tsar is firm, and the law is signed into force.
A BARREL OF CABBAGE
Most appalled of all by Stolypin’s reforms are the SRs, the heirs of the populist Narodniks. Like the Black Hundreds, they too idealize the peasant commune, but believe that the communes should receive all land—both state-owned and belonging to the landowning class.
However, when Stolypin is busy persuading the grand dukes to accept his reforms, the attention of the SRs is focused elsewhere. They are trying to arrange the escape of their leader, Gregory Gershuni, from prison. It is now three years since Gershuni created the SRs’ militant organization, in which time Russia has undergone radical change. It was after Gershuni’s arrest that the SRs went on to commit their most high-profile terrorist attacks. Gershuni was not included in the amnesty of October 1905, and by autumn 1906 he is at Akatuysky prison in eastern Siberia.*
The inmates’ work involves packing sauerkraut and pickles in barrels and delivering them to the neighboring villages. One morning, Gregory Gershuni climbs into a barrel—he is small in stature, so manages to squeeze in, albeit with difficulty. He immerses himself fully in the mushy contents, using a tube sticking out as an inconspicuous breathing apparatus. The barrel with Gershuni inside is carried out of the prison. He starts to choke and the sour liquid is stinging his eyes, but he manages to remain quiet. Finally, several hours later in the evening, some accomplices in the village help him out of the barrel, give him a horse, and show him to the railway station. A couple of days later, he boards a ship in Vladivostok bound for San Francisco.
In the United States, Gershuni is greeted by those in the know as a superhero returned from the dead. Russian émigrés welcome him with open arms, and the SRs beg him to do what Gorky could not—travel around America raising funds for the revolution. He holds a number of events for the Jewish community, at which the donations flow in. Still, he is eager to return to Europe. Before departing, Gershuni narrowly avoids a scandal when the Russian embassy sparks a rumor that the fugitive terrorist has spoken disrespectfully of President Theodore Roosevelt. The latter writes a letter to the New York Times (which the newspaper prints) to say that Gershuni has nothing but respect for the American president.
In February 1907 Gershuni gets back to Russia—or rather the part of the empire where he is relatively safe, Finland. It is expected that he will breathe new life into the weakened militant organization, but Gershuni shocks his fellow party members by appealing for a more peaceable solution. He argues against attacks on other oppositionists (even the Kadets), calls for the creation of a unified socialist party, and condemns the new generation of terrorists for killing too many passers-by.
Leon Trotsky, meanwhile, is inside the Peter and Paul Fortress, reading French novels. “Lying on my prison bunk, reading these books, I became intoxicated with the same sense of physical pleasure that connoisseurs get from sipping a fine wine or puffing on a fragrant cigar,” he recalls. He even expresses some regret when his solitary confinement comes to an end in order to face trial.
The trial of the Petersburg Soviet begins on 19 September. In the words of Trotsky, the authorities want to discredit Witte’s liberalism and his “soft spot” for the revolution. The trial turns into a major show with more than two hundred witnesses testifying in court. Trotsky transforms it into a piece of theatre. His frail parents are there in the courtroom, and his mother likes her son’s speeches so much that she thinks he should be rewarded, not punished.
But the main (absent) protagonist is neither a defendant, nor a lawyer. It is Alexei Lopukhin, the former director of the police department, appointed by Plehve and fired by Trepov in February 1905 after the assassination of Grand Duke Sergei. During the trial, Lopukhin decides to go public with all the facts known to him: for instance, the provincial gendarmerie is printing leaflets calling for pogroms, and the police themselves are responsible for organizing the Black Hundred gangs. According to Lopukhin, the capital escaped mass unrest and pogroms only thanks to the Petersburg Soviet.
All this is read out in a letter on 13 October by a lawyer for the defense. Lopukhin states that he was ready to appear in court as a witness, but was turned down by the judge. On hearing this, the defendants protest and refuse to take any further part in the court proceedings. The trial ends without the defendants in the courtroom. They are sentenced to perpetual exile in Obdorsk (now Salekhard, in northern Siberia). Despite the severity, it is a let-off, for everyone was expecting hard labor. Lopukhin’s letter apparently softened the verdict.
Trotsky and the other convicted members of the Petersburg Soviet are transported to northern Siberia in February 1907. The weather is ferocious. Along the way, in the settlement of Berezovo, Trotsky simulates an attack of sciatica and is allowed to remain there. The other exiles go on. Some local residents help Trotsky find a guide to take him seven hundred kilometers west to the Urals on board a reindeer sled. The sled driver is blind drunk for most of the journey and on several occasions nearly kills both himself and his passenger. Having made it to the Urals, Trotsky covers the distance back to Saint Petersburg in record time—just eleven days. His comrades take him for a ghost, believing him to be in northern Siberia—news of his escape has not yet had time to reach the capital.
Taking his wife with him, Trotsky heads for Finland to see his closest comrades, Lenin and Martov. In Finland he writes a book about his escape and uses the fee from the publisher to move to Stockholm.
BOMB IN THE CHIMNEY
One reason Trotsky’s escape goes unremarked for a while is that Saint Petersburg is not short of other news. In late January 1907 Dr. Dubrovin asks his private secretary, Prusakov, to provide him with a plan of Witte’s residence on Kamennoostrovsky Avenue in Saint Petersburg. He says that the tsar suspects Witte of being a secret revolutionary and wants the police to look for incriminating documents inside the house. Dubrovin promises Prusakov a thousand roubles* and the title of honorary citizen.
A few days later, rummaging through some papers on his boss’s desk, Prusakov discovers a draft article written in Dubrovin’s own hand, blaming the “assassination of Count Witte” on the socialists. Prusakov is surprised. He has not heard about any assassination attempt on Witte, successful or otherwise.
That same day, two peasants called Stepanov and Fedorov approach Witte’s house via the backyard, climb onto the roof, and lower two time bombs (known in Russia back then as “infernal machines”) down the twin chimneys. They think that they are carrying out an assignment on behalf of the “party of anarchists” (i.e., the socialists). Having descended from the roof, they approach Alexander Kazantsev, a member of the militant wing of the Union of the Russian People. This is the same Kazantsev who six months ago murdered Herzenstein. Posing as an anarchist, he hired the peasants and gave them the bombs. The three of them head for a tavern, where Kazantsev gives them two roubles† apiece for their work.
Come evening, Kazantsev is in a bad mood. No explosions have occurred. The bombs were discovered by a stoker while cleaning the chimneys. Noticing a rope hanging down from one of the chimneys, he pulls it. The “infernal machine” tumbles to the floor, but, fortunately for him, does not go off, since the device is amateurish. During a search of the house, the former Prime Minister Count Witte asks the head of the secret police Gerasimov who could have planned the assassination. “I don’t know, but they were not revolutionaries,” he answers.
Gerasimov delivers a report to Stolypin, pointing the finger at the Union of the Russian People. “It’s a disgrace,” says Stolypin, horrified. “These people do not understand what difficulties they are creating for me and the whole government. Drastic measures are called for.”
Meanwhile, the peasants Fedorov and Stepanov are again approached by Kazantsev. Both are in need of work and accept the offer to go to Moscow. There, Kazantsev puts them up at his own apartment and explains that the new target is a “dangerous man, a member of the Black Hundreds.” Fedorov is the more able shooter, so he is the one to track down and kill the “enemy.”
The next day, Stepanov and Fedorov learn from the newspapers that they have killed the former State Duma member Gregory Yollos. He was a Jew, a Kadet, and a close friend of the late Herzenstein. Only then do they realize that they are working for the Black Hundreds. They decide to kill Kazantsev. At their next meeting, Fedorov severs his carotid artery. Dubrovin, meanwhile, is drawing up a list of enemies of the Russian people. The next targets are Vladimir Nabokov and Pavel Milyukov.
Stolypin cannot take any drastic measures against the Union of the Russian People, for it has too many influential patrons. Von der Launitz is dead, but the new court commandant, Dedyulin is also an admirer of the Black Hundreds; he holds receptions between union members and the tsar. But the union’s real power lies in the fact that Nicholas and Alexandra are adherents. They love the flattery heaped upon them by Dubrovin and his associates.
In December Stolypin presents the tsar with a decree to abolish a number of restrictions on the Jews. Nicholas promises to sign, but soon returns the document without his signature: “Despite the very strong arguments in favor, My inner voice tells me not to sign. My conscience has never lied to Me. Therefore, I intend to obey it,” explains Nicholas II. “The heart of the Tsar lies in God’s hands.”
Shortly before that, in 1906, the so-called All-Russian Congress of the Russian People takes place in Kiev, involving members of the Union of the Russian People and other organizations. “Each of us suffers for himself, but there is one who suffers for all of us, for the whole of Russia,” says Dubrovin in his eulogy to the tsar. The audience agrees. Nicholas II, Alexandra, and Father John of Kronstadt send congratulatory telegrams. It is the largest ever official gathering of the Black Hundreds, with more than five hundred people from across the country.
The monarchists have long discussed the question of unifying all the right-wing organizations, but the Union of the Russian People has no desire to integrate with other groups. But the right-wingers do have a common rallying point: the upcoming elections to the proposed Second Duma. Although Dubrovin himself still does not recognize the Russian parliament, many of his fellows run as candidates. Stolypin, though ostensibly unhappy with the Union of the Russian People, allocates money for its election campaign. At the prime minister’s request, the right-wing activist and former police officer Vladimir Purishkevich is invited from Chisinau to enter the Duma.
The campaign starts in December and turns into a real election race. Whereas the First Duma elections were ignored by most parties, both right and left, now everyone is taking them seriously. Moreover, the government this time decides not to leave things to chance. In the elections to the First Duma, Witte interfered in neither the campaign nor the vote-counting process, and ended up with a disloyal Duma as a result. Stolypin does not intend to repeat his predecessor’s mistakes.
This time around, only legally registered parties are allowed to campaign. The legal parties include, for instance, the Union of 17 October and the Union of the Russian People, but not the Kadets. Members of the latter can stand as independents, but are not allowed to even mention their party in pre-election events.
The Kadets’ main election tactics are to scare voters with the threat of the Black Hundreds and to position themselves as the only real opposition. A vote for the radical left, they say, is a vote wasted, for they will not enter the Duma, leaving the way clear for the monarchists.
The winners of the previous Duma election, the Kadets, face huge obstacles. Not only are all the former Duma members who signed the Vyborg Manifesto forbidden from running, but others are, too, including the party leader Milyukov, who once again does not qualify under the property rules—he has owned an apartment for less than a year, which means he cannot be elected to the Duma.
At the same time, the other oppositionists accuse the Kadets of being in league with the authorities. Milyukov is constantly reminded of his secret talks with Stolypin, and there are rumors that they have met during the current election campaign—Milyukov is supposedly trying to get his party legalized in return for promising not to enter into an alliance with the left.
For the first time in recorded Russian history, the authorities use “administrative resources.”* Rural leaders are encouraged to support the right-wing parties. Meanwhile, the Holy Synod enjoins all priests to vote (albeit without specifying for whom).
The left is also in full campaign mode, although with different objectives. The Bolsheviks believe that the Duma can be used as a platform from which to agitate for another revolution, while the Mensheviks see the Duma potentially as an independent decision-making body capable of turning Russia into a normal parliamentary democracy. Lenin, of course, considers this view a betrayal, and so contrives to derail the Mensheviks at every opportunity, even when the two faces of Marxism are campaigning jointly as part of the so-called “left bloc.”
The results are staggering for the government. As Finance Minister Kokovtsov recalls, Stolypin’s own staff assured the prime minister that the right-wingers would secure the largest faction. Instead, it goes once again to the independent-running Kadets (again without Milyukov, but this time Peter Struve is elected to the Duma). Another, even worse surprise is the success of the left parties: they get a third of the seats in the new Duma, far more than the right.
The Second Duma opens on 20 February at the Tauride Palace—this time without the tsar. During the opening ceremony, confusion reigns when all the right-wing Duma members insist on standing up whenever the tsar’s name is mentioned, while their left-wing adversaries remain firmly seated—with one exception. A tall, red-bearded man rises alone from among the leftist faction. His comrades chide him: “Sit down, will you!” He obeys at first, but then gets to his feet again. It is Peter Struve.
A YOUNG MAN FROM KUTAISI
On 6 March members of the government visit the Duma. Their families sit in the visitors’ gallery. From the podium, Stolypin reads out the government’s program. The members of Duma sit quietly, which surprises the ministers. Whenever Goremykin addressed the previous Duma, he was greeted with loud cries of “Resign!” Now the government dares to believe that the Duma wants to engage constructively.
In fact, the members of Duma have a different motivation. They regard the government members as enemies. The dissolution of the First Duma, the military courts, the executions, the exile of political prisoners, and the omnipotence of the Black Hundreds are all symbols of authoritarianism. To most members of the Duma, Stolypin and his ministers seem like bloodthirsty tyrants. The Kadets decide to greet them with “proud silence.” But the Social Democrats believe that silence might be interpreted as capitulation.
Stolypin’s speech is very different to Goremykin’s the previous year. The former prime minister was convinced that the Duma was unruly and not interested in cooperation. Stolypin, on the other hand, proposes a detailed list of draft laws. They include the government’s nascent land reforms, laws to guarantee individual inviolability, amendments to the Criminal Code, school reforms, and others. It is a striking contrast to last year’s launderette and orangery.
Curiously, in describing the situation in the country, Stolypin uses the word perestroika, meaning “restructuring”: “The country is going through a period of perestroika and unrest,” says the prime minister. For him, every detail of every new law is important for the country’s future.
When Stolypin finishes speaking, the twenty-five-year-old Menshevik Irakli Tsereteli, a Duma member from the Georgian city of Kutaisi, takes the floor. He is the leader of the Social Democratic faction and is responsible for delivering the Duma’s response to the forty-five-year-old Stolypin’s opening address.
Tsereteli belongs to one of the oldest noble families in Georgia. In 1900 he entered the law faculty of Moscow University—in the midst of the student unrest. When the seventy-two-year-old Leo Tolstoy was excommunicated, the eighteen-year-old fresher Tsereteli was convicted for taking part in the resultant protests and exiled to Siberia, where he spent almost three years. In 1903 Tsereteli returned to Georgia, before moving to Berlin, where he enrolled at Humboldt University. In short, the young Tsereteli has already amassed a great deal of political experience.
He is not at all impressed by Stolypin’s conciliatory speech, saying that the prime minister is untrustworthy because his government has already “trampled over the existing laws, filled Russia’s prisons with freedom fighters, and introduced ‘medieval’ torture.” Tsereteli says that during the election campaign the authorities made every effort to hinder the Duma opposition, but the people’s “hatred for the government overcame the thousands of obstacles.” Stolypin cannot be trusted, Tsereteli sums up.
The right-wing parliamentarians, in particular the representatives from Chisinau Purishkevich and Krushevan, shout out “Lies!” and “Away!” The Duma chairman calls for quiet. In his opinion, Tsereteli’s words are not a breach of etiquette.
Tsereteli recalls that a year earlier, after the speech of the former Prime Minister Goremykin, Vladimir Nabokov approached the podium, demanding that the executive branch submit to the legislature. It is now clear, Tsereteli says, that the executive branch has no intention of submitting to the Duma. Moreover, it is highly likely that the new Duma, like its predecessor, will be dissolved “within perhaps a week.” But the people, argues Tsereteli, will get their way with or without the Duma—the government should obey the will of the people before it is too late.
The right-wing Duma members protest, and the chairman asks Tsereteli to refrain from calling for an armed uprising. He replies that he is not calling for an armed uprising: on the contrary, it is the government’s repressive measures that are provoking a surge in violence.
The left applauds, the right hisses. Stolypin mounts the podium again for an impromptu response. The forty-five-year-old prime minister wants to put the twenty-five-year-old parliamentarian in his place. He declares that, at the behest of the tsar, the State Duma is not permitted to express disapproval or censure of the government. However, as the head of the government, he will be glad to cooperate with all members of the Duma who are prepared to work constructively. He is happy to listen to constructive criticism and would welcome the exposure of official abuse of power in Russia. But, warns Stolypin, he will not tolerate Duma members seeking to “paralyze the will” of the government by causing it to surrender. The government will not be bullied, he says, before departing from the Tauride Palace.
Stolypin and Tsereteli are talking at cross-purposes. Neither wants a revolution, yet each considers the other to be provoking one. For Tsereteli, the real revolutionary is Stolypin, since his repressive measures are radicalizing the population; for Stolypin, it is the non-systemic oppositionist Tsereteli who is rocking the boat.
“Both of us shall answer to history,” says Stolypin. History, for its part, seems to justify Tsereteli. Despite his efforts, Stolypin failed to prevent another revolution. And it played out exactly as described by the twenty-five-year-old member of Duma from Kutaisi.
THE TRIAL OF LENIN
“The government has again declared war on the people,” writes the Bolshevik leader after the opening of the State Duma, signing his article “Nikolai Lenin.” He lives in Kuokkala in Finland, an hour’s ride from Saint Petersburg. Every day he writes long articles about the political situation in the capital, never missing an opportunity to pick a fight or humiliate his opponents. He rails deliriously at the Kadets, the Socialist-Revolutionaries, and the Duma faction which consists of Socialist Revolutionaries. But his favorite targets are his “comrade” Mensheviks and the Social Democratic faction inside the Duma headed by Tsereteli.
Lenin accuses Tsereteli and the Mensheviks of betrayal. In his opinion, the only reason for partaking in the Duma is to “explain to the masses the illusory nature of hoping for a peaceful outcome to the power struggle”—the Duma members should not swerve from the original revolutionary creed of the Russian Social Democratic Labor Party (RSDLP). There can be no peaceful outcome—only war, revolution, and the dictatorship of the proletariat. In his view, any activity that is not aimed at bringing about a bloody denouement is betrayal and sabotage. The Menshevik parliamentarians are “raising hopes for a peaceful outcome among the masses,” which Lenin finds outrageous. “They are disrupting the ‘revolutionary forces’ inside the Duma,” he opines.
Lenin’s insults and claims that the Mensheviks are toadying up to the Kadets test the patience of fellow party members. They decide to hold a “party trial” of Lenin to punish him for his mocking comments.
Lenin is “tried” internally by nine judges: three from the Mensheviks, three of Lenin’s own choice, and one each from the Latvian and Polish Social Democrats and the Bund. The “defendant” Lenin immediately goes on the attack, arguing that it was not he, but Tsereteli and other Mensheviks from the Duma, who split the party. If the party is indeed split, then it is dead and no longer exists. He believes himself to be free from any moral obligation in respect of party members, whom he considers traitors. Since the Social Democrats are trying to negotiate with the liberals (“political enemies”), he will continue to preach hatred among the masses and lead the fight to destroy them.
This blunt statement marks the end of the trial. The judges have nothing to say in response. It is almost a carbon copy of Lenin’s “trial by comrades” in exile in Siberia, at which he said that he did not give a damn about the opinion of his fellows.
ARMY FOR FIGHTING OPPOSITIONISTS
Emperor Nicholas II closely follows the sessions of the Second Duma. He is fed regular transcripts of the liveliest exchanges. At the same time, right-wing parliamentarians deliver excerpts from the Duma speeches to Empress Alexandra.
In early April the right-wingers put forward a resolution condemning the spate of political killings. The SR Duma members cannot bring themselves to vote for it, and even the Kadets feel that the left-wing press will label them stooges of the regime if they back the resolution. As a result, the Duma majority votes against the condemnation of political terror.
Another crucial day is 17 April. The Duma is paid a visit by War Minister Rediger to submit a bill introducing regular army conscription. The bill is opposed by the Menshevik member of Duma Arshak Zurabov from Tbilisi. In his speech, he accuses the army of being only capable of fighting oppositionists, but not of waging a real war.
The right is in uproar, and the Duma chairman tries to calm them down to no effect: they demand that Zurabov issue an apology. The chairman says that he has heard nothing to warrant an apology. War Minister Rediger goes up to the podium and states that he considers it beneath his dignity to respond to such a remark, and leaves. The chairman announces a recess. During the break, he rereads a transcript of Zurabov’s speech and changes his mind. He asks for an apology, but it is not enough.*
Zurabov’s remark is reported to Stolypin, who demands that Zurabov be expelled from the Duma. If not, no minister shall ever again cross the threshold of the Russian parliament. When extracts from Zurabov’s speech are shown to the emperor, he reacts even more firmly, asking why the Duma cannot be dissolved forthwith. Stolypin replies that the Second Duma cannot be dissolved before the drafting of a new electoral law—if the next Duma is elected under the current rules, things will only get worse. Stolypin believes that the Duma cannot be dissolved without a proper reason and without taking precautions—every effort must be made to blame the dissolution of the Duma on the left. Nicholas reluctantly agrees.
Members of the Union of the Russian People and his wife Alexandra persistently ask the tsar when the Duma will be dissolved. He is becoming increasingly irritated by Stolypin’s perceived tardiness.
A SOCIALIST CONSPIRACY
On 29 April 1907, a student hostel at the Polytechnic Institute in Saint Petersburg hosts a meeting of local socialists. It is attended by soldiers and students, among them the young activist Ekaterina Shornikova. She brings with her a petition in the name of the capital city’s soldiers addressed to members of the State Duma. The petition calls for an armed uprising and the overthrow of the existing order.
The petition was not, however, written by Saint Petersburg’s soldiers, but by the secret police on the orders of Colonel Gerasimov. Shornikova, a police agent, has rewritten the text in her own hand to make it look authentic.
Gerasimov, instructed by Stolypin to find incriminating evidence against Tsereteli and his fellow Social Democrats, shows the petition to the prime minister. The latter believes that the document can be considered proof of a conspiracy and authorizes arrests to be made as soon as the soldiers hand the petition to the Duma members.
At 7:30 p.m. on 5 May, police officers arrive at the head office of the Social Democratic faction on Nevsky Prospekt. They conduct a search of the room—a violation of parliamentary immunity—but find no trace of any petition. However, the case still goes ahead, based solely on the testimony of Shornikova, who states that she was there when the document was handed over.
According to the official version, there exists an underground military organization led by Tsereteli and the Social Democrats. On 5 May a group of soldiers came to the Social Democrats’ office with a petition asking for assistance to start an armed uprising, but it, along with other evidence, was destroyed by the Duma members before the police had time to carry out a search.
The next session of the Duma on 7 May is a tempestuous affair. The right-wing parliamentarians demand to know if the attackers planned to assassinate the tsar. Stolypin arrives at the Duma to deliver a report. He begins by saying that the government is not obliged to disclose such confidential information, but, given the exceptional circumstances, he feels able to reveal some details: yes, there was indeed a conspiracy—a hitherto unknown terrorist group, now neutralized, planned to murder Emperor Nicholas II and Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich. The general import of Stolypin’s words is that the “war on terror” is going well.
After that, the Social Democrats inquire as to the lawfulness of the search of their premises, to which Stolypin replies that the uncovering of a major conspiracy involving members of the State Duma is sufficient justification and constitutes grounds to dissolve the Duma.
The threat of dissolution (once again) is a nightmare for many parliamentarians. The Duma’s main advocate, Peter Struve, wants parliament to become a proper institution able to fight for the gradual reform of the Russian political system and to work constructively with the government. The slogan of the Kadets and Struve is: “Save the Duma.” He argues incessantly with the right, which insists that the Duma is behaving unacceptably and trying to “take power by storm.” “Gentlemen, we have assembled here to lay siege to the old order for the benefit of Russian statehood,” asserts Struve.
The influence of the one-time leader of public opinion is on the wane, and not only because he is a constant target of Trotsky, Lenin, and the leftist press. The publicist Struve, who has fought so hard for Russia to have an open forum for debate, is totally inept at speaking from the parliamentary rostrum, says Ariadna Tyrkova, the press secretary of the Kadets in the Second Duma. In March the Kadet faction asks him to make a speech on economic issues. He runs to the podium with an armful of papers, and arranges them in front of him on the stand. He starts to speak, at times too loudly, at times too softly, all the while adjusting his pince-nez and rummaging through his notes.
His papers get mixed up. Frantically trying to sort them, he ends up strewing them all over the floor. His fellow Duma members help to pick them up. The chairman is trying not to laugh, but the journalists and opposition parliamentarians are roaring out loud.
Despite his eccentric professor image, Struve begins secret talks with Stolypin in order to rescue the Duma. He visits the prime minister at night, together with his Duma colleague Mikhail Chelnokov. They describe their visits as “scientific expeditions.” The talks are held without the knowledge of other members of the Kadet party. Stolypin, meanwhile, is also in negotiations with the liberals, which he hides from the right for fear of being attacked. They have been ongoing for several months and address the question of how to form a stable majority in the Duma and what laws it should be allowed to pass.
In late May, after the start of an investigation into the “conspiracy,” the Duma starts to discuss the agrarian law—not Stolypin’s version, but its own. The Kadets intend to propose that land belonging to the landowners, the church, and the tsar should be distributed to the peasants for long-term use.
The parliamentary discussion of the Kadets’ draft land reform effectively means the end of Struve’s attempt to find common ground with the government. It is at this meeting that Stolypin delivers a famous speech culminating with the phrase: “You desire great upheaval. But we desire a great Russia.”
On 1 June Stolypin again visits the Duma and demands that fifty-five members of the Social Democratic faction be stripped of their parliamentary immunity and taken into custody. He accuses them of having created a criminal organization bent on the violent overthrow of the state by means of a popular uprising and the establishment of a democratic republic. The Duma offers to set up a twenty-two-man commission that will deliver a response to Stolypin’s demand.
That same night Struve and three other Kadet members of Duma go to see Stolypin in one final attempt to persuade him not to dissolve the Duma, asking why he seeks to aggravate the improving relations between the government and the Duma. Stolypin replies that he sees no such improvement, but suggests a compromise: “Rid the Duma from them [the Social Democrats], and you really will see an improvement.” The four Kadets answer that the Duma will not dismiss its own members. “In that case, the Duma will be dissolved and the responsibility shall be yours,” says Stolypin.
The parliamentarians leave the prime minister’s residence at 12:30 a.m. and head for the nearby park on Yelagin Island to drink champagne and devise a solution.
The next day a new session of the Duma opens, and Tsereteli proposes an immediate discussion of the agrarian law. The chairman objects, saying that it is not on the agenda. “When we are on the verge of a coup d’état, formalities should be discarded,” objects Tsereteli. “The government has bayoneted the agenda.”
But his proposal is rejected, and the session continues as planned. In the evening the Second Duma disbands, never to meet again. That night, the city is plastered with posters announcing the decree to dissolve the Duma. The round-up of its members commences, starting with Tsereteli.
Information about the secret talks between Stolypin and the Kadets leaks to the press. Soon Saint Petersburg’s newspapers are printing cartoons of Struve bowing obsequiously in front of Stolypin with the caption: “Taking power by storm.” Struve’s party members are incensed, and his political career is effectively over.
A “SHAMELESS” LAW
By the time the Duma is dissolved, a new electoral law has not only been written, but also adopted by the government and the State Council. The text of the new law is penned by the civil servant Kryzhanovsky. To avoid any leaks to the press, Stolypin bans even ministers from having a hard copy. It is simply read out orally at a government meeting. There are no objections.
Two versions of the law are initially drafted. The more radical of them is nicknamed the “shameless law,” which Nicholas II prefers.
“The State Duma must be Russian in spirit,” states the text, which is published on 3 June. This means that other peoples and nationalities “should not be the arbiters of questions that are purely Russian.” This primarily concerns the Caucasus and Poland, whose representatives in the Duma are sharply reduced. Other regions “where the population is not sufficiently developed in terms of civil society” have no representatives in Duma at all (for example, Central Asia and Yakutia).
Most important of all are the changes to the proportions of representation. Henceforth, one Duma member is elected from two million peasants or sixteen thousand landowners. This means that, by default, two-thirds of the Duma is elected by the nobility and the wealthiest subjects.
For some sections of society, the date 3 June remains a symbol of state repression and disregard for the law for a long time to come. The opposition-minded part of society is one of them. The conservatives also are unhappy, but for a different reason. Whereas Stolypin wants to replace the disobedient Second Duma with a more servile one, the Union of the Russian People believes that the Duma should be abolished and the old order (before the manifesto of 17 October) restored. Dubrovin boasts that if the Union of the Russian People were to take part in the Duma elections, it would win every seat. However, it does not do so because it considers the Duma to be an unlawful institution: “I have no right to justify with my presence the existence of this assemblage that encroaches on the unlimited power of the Sovereign,” he explains.
To prove to Nicholas II that the Duma is unnecessary, Dubrovin arranges regular “pilgrimages” by ordinary Russian folk to see the tsar. One of these delegations, from Tsaritsyn (today’s Volgograd), is headed by the monk Iliodor, who is recommended by both the Union of the Russian People and Grigory Rasputin. Iliodor is invited to the Interior Ministry for an interview, where he preaches that the State Duma is dangerous and must be destroyed (in the case of the socialist Duma members, he means physically) and that the old dogma about the divine origin of imperial power must be adhered to. Even the tsar, says Iliodor, has no right to change this fundamental law. To Interior Ministry staff, Iliodor seems like an overzealous ragamuffin, and it is decided not to grant him an audience with Nicholas II. Stolypin orders him and his associates to leave the capital. However, Iliodor does not go away. He is given lodging by Rasputin’s mentor, Archimandrite Theofan.
This episode is one of many manifestations of the conflict between Dubrovin and Stolypin. The Union of the Russian People starts campaigning vigorously against the election of a new State Duma, which gradually turns into a campaign against the prime minister, despite the fact that the government is the main source of funding for the union.
Stolypin orders that the funds be distributed not to Dubrovin, but to his deputy Vladimir Purishkevich, a former State Duma member from Chisinau. This produces a schism inside the Union of the Russian People: Dubrovin and Purishkevich accuse each other of embezzling party funds. As a result, the latter withdraws from the organization, taking most of the government funding with him, and sets up his own right-wing party called the Union of Archangel Michael.
BEST FRIEND
On 30 April 1907 Empress Alexandra’s twenty-two-year-old maid of honor, Anna Taneyeva, gets married. Her fiancé is the naval officer Aleksander Vyrubov. Although no beauty, she is a good catch, for her father is in charge of the Imperial Chancellery and she herself is very close to the empress. Marriage means that Anna will have to quit her palace employment, which upsets her. She loves the empress and the emperor, but does not like her husband at all.
A week before the wedding, Empress Alexandra asks her closest friend at that time, the Montenegrin Grand Duchess Milica, to introduce Anna to Grigory Rasputin. The Siberian mystic makes a powerful impression on the young woman.
The wedding, held at Tsarskoye Selo, is attended by the entire imperial family: Nicholas and Alexandra, their daughters, and even the tsar’s sixteen-year-old cousin, Grand Duke Dmitry, who will take part in Rasputin’s murder a decade later.
The Vyrubovs’ matrimonial bliss does not get off to a good start. Rumors spread that on their wedding night the groom gets blind drunk and becomes abusive. His wife is so frightened that she does everything possible to avoid the bedroom. After their unsuccessful wedding night, the newlyweds effectively stop talking to each other. According to Anna, her husband is psychologically damaged and still going through a nervous breakdown after the debacle at Tsushima. He spends whole days lying in bed, refusing to see anyone. Sometimes he beats her, Anna tells her friends.
During one of her husband’s fits, she calls the empress and asks for help. Alexandra immediately drapes a coat over her diamond-encrusted dress and walks out of the palace to the Vyrubovs’ house (they live nearby at Tsarskoye Selo). Anna’s husband is sent to Switzerland for treatment, and a year later she asks for a divorce.
This unhappy family saga will have a huge impact on Russian history. The twenty-three-year-old Anna becomes the closest friend of the thirty-six-year-old empress, and her most trusted adviser. Anna really does love Alexandra and cannot tolerate any criticism of her. Over the next ten years she will carefully and accurately recount to the empress all the rumors and gossip going around the city, and inform her of any potential adversaries, sometimes based on the look in their eyes. For the unsociable and cloistered Alexandra, Anna Vyrubova becomes the main source of information about the outside world.
Even after her divorce, Anna continues to live at the small house in Tsarskoye Selo that she and her husband rented. This innocent-looking building turns into the nerve center of government decision-making. Vyrubova, incidentally, never regains her official position as maid of honor—she is simply a friend of the empress, an unemployed friend.
“THANK GOD, NO PARLIAMENT SO FAR”
Elections to the Third Duma get underway in September. Whereas the authorities did not intervene at all in the first election, and employed “administrative resources” in the second, now they do whatever they can to ensure a compliant Duma. “The new law handed the government a powerful and flexible tool with which to influence the elections,” says the author of the “shameless” electoral law, the civil servant Kryzhanovsky.
Sergei Kryzhanovsky, previously mainly a copywriter, now becomes a full-fledged political consultant and Stolypin’s right-hand man. Inside the imperial administration, he is responsible for the smooth conduct of the elections.* He summons the regional governors, instructs them to pick the “right” candidates to the State Duma, and gives them money for the election campaign. Moscow Governor Dzhunkovsky, for instance, recalls that Kryzhanovsky “opened his iron cabinet,” took out some tightly packed bundles of money, and invited him to take 15,000 roubles,† saying “I hope that is sufficient.” The Moscow governor replied that he did not need such a large sum (“It never occurred to me that it was a bribe,” says Dzhunkovsky). In the end, Kryzhanovsky gives him 5,000 roubles‡ with the parting words: “More is available if required.” Other regional governors walk away with far larger sums in their pockets.
As a result, the overwhelming majority of the parties are loyal to Stolypin, including the Union of 17 October, led by Alexander Guchkov, and various right-wing parties. There are no supporters of Dubrovin in the new Duma, but Vladimir Purishkevich wins a seat. And, for the first time, Pavel Milyukov, the leader of the Kadet faction, crosses the threshold.
The new Duma assembles on 20 November and immediately demonstrates that it is unlike its predecessors. In his opening speech, Stolypin accuses the left of “open robbery” and of “corrupting the younger generation,” saying that it will be countered by force. The members applaud.
A priority issue for the Third Duma is the unprofitability of Russia’s railways. Milyukov, donning the mantle of the Duma’s main, albeit cautious, opponent of the government, tells Finance Minister Kokovtsov that he should set up a parliamentary commission to look into the matter. The minister dismisses the suggestion out of hand: “We don’t have a parliament so far, thank God.” The left boos and whistles, while the right, recalls Kokovtsov, greets his words with “thunderous applause.”
But it is not the finance minister but Duma Chairman Khomyakov who provokes Stolypin’s ire. Calling for order, Khomyakov says: “I had no way of preventing the finance minister from uttering such an unfortunate expression.” Stolypin believes that Duma members have no right to denigrate ministerial remarks. The chairman is forced to apologize for his “incorrect” tone in respect of the minister.
At the same time, the trial of the fifty-five arrested socialist members of the previous Duma begins. It is held behind closed doors to “maintain public order.” As a sign of protest, the defendants walk out of the courtroom. They are found guilty in absentia and sent to prison. One of the prosecution’s main arguments is the RSDLP’s calls for revolution in Russia made at their congresses abroad.
The signatories of the Vyborg Manifesto, all of them members of the First Duma, are also tried. They are sentenced to three months in prison. When the former Duma Chairman Muromtsev leaves the courtroom, he is showered with flowers by well-wishers.
* Goremykin’s method will be very popular among Russian state officials a hundred years later as well. Many high-ranking government and Presidential Administration employees will be making a huge effort not to make any enemies—and the best way to achieve that is through doing nothing. During Mikhail Fradkov’s term as prime minister (2004-2007) this principle was phrased “People don’t get fired for bad work performance, they get fired for not being loyal.” The same logic applied when Dmitry Medvedev became prime minister.
* In the early twenty-first century Boris Gryzlov, chairman of the fourth and fifth Duma, is rumored to have said “Duma is no place for discussions.” However, according to the official verbatim, he put it a bit differently in 2003: “The State Duma is not an arena for political battles.”
* About $659,167 in 2017.
* About $329,583 in 2017.
† About $3,955 in 2017.
‡ The actions of military wings of the Union of the Russian people are strikingly similar to the affair of the military wing of Russian Nationalists in the early twenty-first century. Activists of this organisation have killed a judge Eduard Chuvashov in 2010, a lawyer Stanislav Markelov, and a journalist Anastasia Baburova in 2009, and several leaders of anti-fascist movements. During the trial the accused stated that the military wing of Russian Nationalists is supervised and funded directly by the Presidential Administration.
* A term applied later to Stalin and Putin among others, and considered a great compliment in Russia.
* The Akatuy prison (nowadays non-existent), where Gregory Gershuni served his time in 1905-1906, is located about 100 kilometres away from the Krasnokamensk prison, where Mikhail Khodorkovsky served his first time (2005-2006).
* About $13,183 in 2017.
† About $26.40 in 2017.
* A common term in modern Russia to describe state tools to influence elections.
* In the early twenty-first century public officials will also often feel offended and use such cases against their political opponents. Moreover, in most cases officials would feel offended not for themselves personally, but for the religious or for the veterans of World War II. Article 282 of the criminal code carries punishment for “dishonoring a social group” (for instance, the group of “public officials”).
* Kryzhanovsky can be considered a pioneer in organizing Russian elections—in the early twenty-first century Russia it will be done almost the same way. The Presidential Administration knows the desired outcome in advance and is strictly regulating the process. There is nothing that can stop public officials from achieving their target result. Compared to the results of Vladislav Surkov and Vyacheslav Volodin the achievements of Kryzhanovsky, who combined moderate bribes and slight rigging, seem to be quite small.
† About $197,750 in 2017.
‡ About $65,917 in 2017.
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