Contents of the peasant reform of 1861 table
Peasant reform of 1861
Causes
In 1861, a reform was carried out in Russia that abolished serfdom and laid the foundation for the capitalist formation in the country. The main reason for this reform was: the crisis of the serfdom system, peasant unrest, which especially intensified during the Crimean War. In addition, serfdom hampered the development of the state and the formation of a new class - the bourgeoisie, which had limited rights and could not participate in government. Many landowners believed that the liberation of the peasants would give positive result in development Agriculture. The moral aspect played an equally significant role in the abolition of serfdom: in the middle of the 19th century, “slavery” existed in Russia.
Preparation of the reform
The government program was outlined in a rescript from Emperor Alexander II on November 20, 1857 to the Vilna Governor-General V. I. Nazimov. It provided:
- the destruction of the personal dependence of the peasants while maintaining all the land in the ownership of the landowners;
- providing peasants with a certain amount of land, for which they will be required to pay quitrents or serve corvee, and over time, the right to buy out peasant estates (a residential building and outbuildings).
In 1858, to prepare peasant reforms, provincial committees were formed, within which a struggle began for measures and forms of concessions between liberal and reactionary landowners. The fear of an all-Russian peasant revolt forced the government to change the government program of peasant reform, the projects of which were repeatedly changed in connection with the rise or decline of the peasant movement.
In December 1858, a new program of peasant reform was adopted: providing peasants with the opportunity to buy out land plots and the creation of peasant public administration bodies.
On February 19 (March 3, new style), 1861 in St. Petersburg, Alexander II signed the Manifesto on the abolition of serfdom and the Regulations on peasants emerging from serfdom, which consisted of 17 legislative acts.
The main provisions of the peasant reform
The main act “General provision on peasants emerging from serfdom” contained the main conditions of the peasant reform:
- peasants received personal freedom and the right to freely dispose of their property;
- The landowners retained ownership of all the lands that belonged to them, but were obliged to provide the peasants with “sedentary estates” and field allotment for use.
For the use of allotment land, peasants had to serve corvee or pay quitrent and did not have the right to refuse it for 9 years.
Peasants were given the right to buy out an estate and, by agreement with the landowner, a field allotment; until this was done, they were called temporarily obligated peasants.
Four “Local Regulations” determined the size of land plots and duties for their use in 44 provinces of European Russia. From the land that was in the use of peasants before February 19, 1861, sections could be made if the peasants' per capita allotments exceeded the highest size established for the given area, or if the landowners, while maintaining the existing peasant allotment, had less than 1/3 of the total land of the estate left.
Allotments could be reduced by special agreements between peasants and landowners, as well as upon receipt of a donation. If peasants had smaller plots of land for use, the landowner was obliged to either cut off the missing land or reduce duties. For the highest shower allotment, a quitrent was set from 8 to 12 rubles. per year or corvee 40 men's and 30 women's working days per year. If the allotment was less than the highest, then the duties were reduced, but not proportionally.
The features of the Peasant Reform for certain categories of peasants and specific areas were determined “ Additional rules» “On the arrangement of peasants settled on the estates of small-scale owners, and on benefits to these owners”, “On the people of the Ministry of Finance assigned to private mining factories.”
“Regulations on the employment of courtyard people”provided for their release without land, but for 2 years they remained completely dependent on the landowner.
"Redemption Clause"determined the procedure for the purchase of land by peasants from landowners, the organization of the redemption operation, the rights and obligations of peasant owners. The redemption of a field plot depended on an agreement with the landowner, who could oblige the peasants to buy the land at his request. The price of land was determined by quitrent, capitalized at 6% per annum. In case of redemption by voluntary agreement, the peasants had to make an additional payment to the landowner. The landowner received the main amount from the state, to which the peasants had to repay it annually for 49 years with redemption payments.
The "Manifesto" and "Regulations" were published from March 7 to April 2. Fearing the dissatisfaction of the peasants with the conditions of the reform, the government took a number of precautions (relocation of troops, sending members of the imperial retinue to places, appeal of the Synod, etc.). The peasantry, dissatisfied with the enslaving conditions of the reform, responded to it with mass unrest.
Reform of 1861 and its main stages.
The agrarian question in Russia in the second half of the 19th century.
Reform of 1861 and its main stages. Structure land ownership in post-reform times. Government policy on the agrarian-peasant issue. Peasant movement in the second half of the 19th century. The problem of the level of development of agrarian capitalism in domestic historiography.
Reform of 1861 and its main stages.
Alexander II ascended the throne in February 1855. already a middle-aged man - at 36 years old. The need to abolish serfdom has been long overdue, but after the Crimean War this problem became most acute. An economic crisis was brewing in the country, trade turnover sharply decreased, the economic interest of peasants in their work fell, over the 4 years from 1855 to 1859. There were more than 1.5 thousand peasant uprisings.
Serfdom was fraught with another threat. It showed no obvious signs of its imminent collapse and collapse. Depleting nature and humans, it could exist for an indefinitely long time. Serfdom dictated an extremely slow pace of development for the country. The Crimean War showed the growing backwardness of Russia. In the near future, it was supposed to move into the category of third-rate powers - with all the ensuing consequences.
Abolition of serfdom in Russia.
The abolition of serfdom affected the vital foundations of a huge country. To implement the reform, it was necessary to create a cumbersome system of central and local institutions specifically for the development of peasant reform. Soon after the conclusion of the Peace of Paris, Alexander II, speaking in Moscow to the leaders of the nobility, declared that “it is better to begin the destruction of serfdom from above, rather than wait for the time when it begins to destroy itself from below.” It was expected that the nobles would quickly respond to the king's call. With this in mind, the Ministry of Internal Affairs began developing the main principles of the reform. Projects by Speransky and Kiselev were extracted from the archives. They were accompanied by notes circulating from hand to hand, including Kavelin’s. As a result, officials agreed that the peasants freed from serfdom should be given small plots. For this, the peasants will have to perform strictly defined duties in favor of the landowner.
IN early 1857 was educated Unspoken (secret) committee to discuss the ministerial program. But his activities turned out to be unproductive. Meanwhile, the landowners did not respond to the tsar’s call. Vilna Governor-General V.I. Nazimov managed to persuade local nobles to come up with a proposal to abolish serfdom. But the Lithuanian landowners asked to free the peasants without land, and the ministerial project envisaged liberation with an allotment. Alexander II ordered a rescript to be drawn up addressed to Nazimov, based on the ministerial program. November 20, 1857 Nazimov’s rescript was approved by the king. Lithuanian landowners were asked to elect a provincial committee to develop reform on the terms proposed by the government. The rescript to Nazimov was published.
The secret committee was transformed into the Main Committee for Peasant Affairs. The reform began to be developed in an atmosphere of glasnost. By the summer of 1858, almost everywhere, provincial noble committees. At the end of that year, their feedback began to arrive. To consider these reviews and draw up a detailed draft reform, the editorial commissions. By the will of the king, he led them ME AND. Rostovtsev.
Obolensky advised to allocate land to the peasants in the same amount as they owned under serfdom. Only a government-guaranteed ransom can successfully resolve the issue.
Rostovtsev did a lot to direct the work of editorial commissions in a liberal direction. All current affairs related to the preparation of the reform were concentrated in the hands of Comrade Minister of Internal Affairs N.A. Milyutin. Milyutin was close to Kavelin and tried to implement the main provisions of his note. The Slavophile Yu.F. provided him with great help. Samarin, member of editorial commissions.
The landowners were distrustful of the editorial commissions, and Alexander promised that representatives of the nobility would be summoned to St. Petersburg, familiarize themselves with the documents and be able to express their opinions. By August 1859, the project was prepared and the question arose about the arrival of noble representatives. The government decided to summon the nobles to the capital in two stages (first from the non-black earth provinces, and then from the black earth provinces). They were invited 3-4 people each to the editorial commissions and asked to answer the questions asked. The nobles were very unhappy with this turn of events. The landowners of non-black earth provinces did not object to the allocation of land to the peasants, but they demanded a ransom for it that was disproportionate to its value. Thus, they tried to include compensation for the quitrent in the ransom amount. They also insisted that the government guarantee the buyout operation.
In addition, the landowners feared that the power of the government bureaucracy would become too strong if it took into its own hands the entire matter of managing the peasants. To neutralize this danger, noble deputies demanded freedom of the press, openness, an independent court and local self-government. In response, the government banned discussions of the issue of reforms at noble meetings. This ban caused strong unrest among the nobility, especially in non-black earth provinces.
At the beginning of 1860, noble representatives from the black earth provinces gathered in St. Petersburg. Their criticism of the government project was even harsher. They saw in the activities of the editorial commissions a manifestation of democratic, republican and even socialist tendencies.
At this time Rostovtsev died. The Minister of Justice, Count V.N. Panin, a well-known conservative. At each subsequent stage of discussion, certain amendments were made to the draft by the serf owners. The reformers felt that the project was increasingly moving away from the “golden mean” towards the infringement of peasant interests. Nevertheless, the discussion of reform in provincial committees and the call of noble representatives did not remain without benefit. Milyutin and Samarin (the main developers of the reform) realized that it could not be carried out on the same basis throughout the country, that local characteristics must be taken into account. IN black earth provinces home value is Earth , V non-chernozem - peasant labor , embodied in quitrent. They also realized that it was impossible to hand over landowners and peasant farms to the power of market relations without preparation: a transition period was required. They became convinced that the peasants should be freed with their land, and the landowners should be given a government-guaranteed ransom. These ideas formed the basis of the laws on peasant reform.
The cherished dream of the serf owners was to bury the reform one way or another. But Alexander II showed extraordinary persistence. At the most crucial moment, he appointed his brother Konstantin Nikolaevich, a supporter of liberal measures, as chairman of the Main Committee for Peasant Affairs. At the last meeting of the Committee and in the State Council, the reform was defended by the tsar himself. February 19, 1861 Alexander II signed all the laws on reform and manifesto on the abolition of serfdom.
Laws of February 19, 1861: landowner peasants ceased to be considered property - from now on they could not be sold, bought, given, or resettled at the discretion of the owners. The government declared the former serfs “free rural inhabitants” and granted them civil rights - freedom to marry, independently enter into contracts and conduct court cases, acquire real estate in their own name, etc.
The peasants of each landowner's estate united into rural societies. They discussed and resolved their general economic issues at village meetings. The village headman, elected for three years, had to carry out the decisions of the assemblies. Several adjacent rural communities made up the volost. Village elders and elected officials from rural societies participated in the volost assembly. At this meeting, the volost foreman was elected. He performed police and administrative duties. The activities of rural and volost administrations, as well as the relationships between peasants and landowners, were controlled by global intermediaries. They were appointed by the Senate from among the local noble landowners. Peace mediators had broad powers. But the administration could not use peace mediators for its own purposes. They were not subordinate to either the governor or the minister and did not have to follow their instructions. They had to follow only the instructions of the law. All land on the estate was recognized as the property of the landowner, including that which was in the use of the peasants. For the use of their plots, free peasants personally had to serve corvee or pay quitrent. The law recognized this condition as temporary. Therefore, personally free peasants bearing duties in favor of the landowner were called “ temporarily obliged" The size of the peasant allotment and duties for each estate should have been determined once and for all by agreement between the peasants and the landowner and fixed in the charter. The introduction of these charters was the main activity of the peace mediators.
The permissible scope of agreements between peasants and landowners was outlined in the law. The law drew a line between non-chernozem and chernozem provinces. Non-black soil peasants still had almost the same amount of land in use as before. In the black soil, under pressure from the serf owners, a greatly reduced per capita allotment was introduced. When converting to such an allotment, “extra” land was cut off from peasant societies. For additional duties, the peasants were forced to rent these lands from the landowners.
Sooner or later, the government believed, the “temporarily obligated” relationship would end and the peasants and landowners would conclude a buyout deal - for each estate. According to the law, peasants had to pay the landowner a lump sum for their allotment about a fifth of the stipulated amount. The rest was paid by the state. But the peasants had to return this amount to him (with interest) in annual payments for 49 years. Based on the amount ransom the profitability of the purchased lands should have been lower. This is approximately what was done in relation to the black earth provinces. But the landowners of non-black earth provinces considered such a principle ruinous for themselves. They lived mainly not from the income from their lands, but from quitrents, which peasants paid from their outside earnings. Therefore, in non-black earth provinces, land was subject to redemption payments higher than its profitability. Redemption payments took away all the savings in the peasant farm and interfered with| him to rebuild and adapt to the market economy, kept the Russian village in a state of poverty. Fearing that the peasants would want to pay a lot of money for bad plots and run away, the government introduced a number of strict restrictions. While redemption payments were being made, the peasant could not refuse the plot and leave his village forever without the consent of the village assembly. And the gathering was reluctant to give such consent, because the annual payments fell on the entire society. Peasants mutual guarantee and attached to their allotment.
The feudal landowners managed to introduce another amendment to the law. By agreement with the peasants, the landowner could refuse the ransom, “give” the peasants a quarter of their legal allotment, and take the rest of the land for himself.
This was not the kind of reform the peasants expected. Having heard enough about the approaching “freedom,” they received the news with surprise and indignation that they had to continue serving corvee labor and paying quitrent. Suspicions crept into their minds as to whether they had read the real manifesto, or whether the landowners, in agreement with the priests, had hidden the “real will.” Reports of peasant riots came from all the provinces of European Russia. Troops were sent to suppress. The events in the villages of Bezdne, Kazan province, and Kandeevka, Penza province, were particularly dramatic. These and other similar news made a grave impression on the public, especially since it was forbidden to criticize the peasant reform in the press. But by June 1861 the peasant movement began to decline.
The reform did not turn out the way Kavelin, Herzen and Chernyshevsky saw it. Built on difficult compromises, it took into account the interests of the landowners much more than the peasants, and had a very short “time resource” - no more than 20 years. Then the need for new reforms in the same direction should have arisen.
And yet the peasant reform of 1861 was of enormous historical significance. It opened up new prospects for Russia, creating an opportunity for the broad development of market relations. The country has confidently embarked on the path of capitalist development. new era in her history.
The moral significance of this reform, which ended serfdom, was also great. Its abolition paved the way for other major changes that were to be introduced in the country modern forms self-government and courts, push the development of education. Now that all Russians have become free, the question of the constitution has arisen in a new way. Its introduction became the immediate goal on the path to the rule of law.
Alexander II
Contrary to the existing erroneous opinion that the overwhelming majority of the population of pre-reform Russia was in serfdom, in fact, the percentage of serfs to the entire population of the empire remained almost unchanged at 45% from the second revision to the eighth (that is, from before), and by the 10th revision ( ) this share fell to 37%. According to the 1859 census, 23.1 million people (of both sexes) out of 62.5 million people inhabiting the Russian Empire were in serfdom. Of the 65 provinces and regions that existed in Russian Empire in 1858, in the three above-mentioned Baltic provinces, in the Land of the Black Sea Army, in the Primorsky region, the Semipalatinsk region and the region of the Siberian Kirghiz, in the Derbent province (with the Caspian region) and the Erivan province there were no serfs at all; in another 4 administrative units (Arkhangelsk and Shemakha provinces, Transbaikal and Yakutsk regions) there were also no serfs, with the exception of several dozen courtyard people (servants). In the remaining 52 provinces and regions, the share of serfs in the population ranged from 1.17% (Bessarabian region) to 69.07% (Smolensk province).
Causes
In 1861, a reform was carried out in Russia that abolished serfdom and marked the beginning of the capitalist formation in the country. The main reason for this reform was: the crisis of the serfdom system, peasant unrest, which especially intensified during the Crimean War. In addition, serfdom hampered the development of the state and the formation of a new class - the bourgeoisie, which had limited rights and could not participate in government. Many landowners believed that the liberation of the peasants would bring positive results in the development of agriculture. The moral aspect played an equally significant role in the abolition of serfdom - in the middle of the 19th century, “slavery” existed in Russia.
Preparation of the reform
The government program was outlined in a rescript from Emperor Alexander II on November 20 (December 2) to the Vilna Governor-General V. I. Nazimov. It provided: the destruction of personal dependence peasants while maintaining all the land in the ownership of the landowners; provision peasants a certain amount of land, for which they will be required to pay rent or serve corvee, and over time - the right to buy out peasant estates (a residential building and outbuildings). To prepare peasant reforms, provincial committees were formed, within which a struggle began for measures and forms of concessions between liberal and reactionary landowners. The fear of an all-Russian peasant revolt forced the government to change the government program of peasant reform, the projects of which were repeatedly changed in connection with the rise or decline of the peasant movement. In December, a new peasant reform program was adopted: providing peasants the possibility of purchasing land and creating peasant public administration bodies. To review projects of provincial committees and develop peasant reform, Editorial Commissions were created in March. The project drawn up by the Editorial Commissions at the end differed from that proposed by the provincial committees in increasing land allotments and reducing duties. This caused discontent among the local nobility, and in the project the allotments were slightly reduced and duties increased. This direction in changing the project was preserved both when it was considered in the Main Committee for Peasant Affairs at the end, and when it was discussed in the State Council at the beginning.
On February 19 (March 3, New Art.) in St. Petersburg, Alexander II signed the Manifesto on the abolition of serfdom and the Regulations on peasants emerging from serfdom, which consisted of 17 legislative acts.
The main provisions of the peasant reform
The main act - “General Regulations on Peasants Emerging from Serfdom” - contained the main conditions of the peasant reform:
- peasants received personal freedom and the right to freely dispose of their property;
- The landowners retained ownership of all the lands that belonged to them, but were obliged to provide the peasants with “sedentary estates” and field allotment for use.
- For the use of allotment land, peasants had to serve corvee or pay quitrent and did not have the right to refuse it for 9 years.
- The size of the field allotment and duties had to be recorded in the statutory charters of 1861, which were drawn up by the landowners for each estate and verified by the peace intermediaries.
- Peasants were given the right to buy out an estate and, by agreement with the landowner, a field allotment; until this was done, they were called temporarily obligated peasants.
- the structure, rights and responsibilities of the peasant public administration bodies (rural and volost) courts were also determined.
Four “Local Regulations” determined the size of land plots and duties for their use in 44 provinces of European Russia. From the land that was in the use of peasants before February 19, 1861, sections could be made if the peasants' per capita allotments exceeded the highest size established for the given area, or if the landowners, while maintaining the existing peasant allotment, had less than 1/3 of the total land of the estate left.
Allotments could be reduced by special agreements between peasants and landowners, as well as upon receipt of a gift allotment. If peasants had smaller plots of land for use, the landowner was obliged to either cut off the missing land or reduce duties. For the highest shower allotment, a quitrent was set from 8 to 12 rubles. per year or corvee - 40 men's and 30 women's working days per year. If the allotment was less than the highest, then the duties were reduced, but not proportionally. The rest of the “Local Provisions” basically repeated the “Great Russian Provisions”, but taking into account the specifics of their regions. The features of the Peasant Reform for certain categories of peasants and specific areas were determined by the “Additional Rules” - “On the arrangement of peasants settled on the estates of small landowners, and on benefits to these owners”, “On people assigned to private mining factories of the Ministry of Finance”, “On peasants and workers serving work at Perm private mining factories and salt mines”, “About peasants serving work in landowner factories”, “About peasants and courtyard people in the Land of the Don Army”, “About peasants and courtyard people in the Stavropol province”, “ About peasants and courtyard people in Siberia”, “About people who emerged from serfdom in the Bessarabian region”.
The “Regulations on the Settlement of Household People” provided for their release without land, but for 2 years they remained completely dependent on the landowner.
The “Regulations on Redemption” determined the procedure for peasants buying land from landowners, organizing the redemption operation, and the rights and obligations of peasant owners. The redemption of a field plot depended on an agreement with the landowner, who could oblige the peasants to buy the land at his request. The price of land was determined by quitrent, capitalized at 6% per annum. In case of redemption by voluntary agreement, the peasants had to make an additional payment to the landowner. The landowner received the main amount from the state, to which the peasants had to repay it annually for 49 years with redemption payments.
The “Manifesto” and “Regulations” were published from March 7 to April 2 (in St. Petersburg and Moscow - March 5). Fearing the dissatisfaction of the peasants with the conditions of the reform, the government took a number of precautions (relocation of troops, sending members of the imperial retinue to places, appeal of the Synod, etc.). The peasantry, dissatisfied with the enslaving conditions of the reform, responded to it with mass unrest. The largest of them were the Bezdnensky uprising of 1861 and the Kandeyevsky uprising of 1861.
The implementation of the Peasant Reform began with the drawing up of statutory charters, which was mostly completed by the middle of the year. On January 1, 1863, peasants refused to sign about 60% of the charters. The purchase price of the land significantly exceeded it market value at that time, in some areas 2-3 times. As a result of this, in a number of regions they were extremely keen to receive gift plots, and in some provinces (Saratov, Samara, Ekaterinoslav, Voronezh, etc.) a significant number of peasant gift-givers appeared.
Under the influence of the Polish uprising of 1863, changes occurred in the conditions of the Peasant Reform in Lithuania, Belarus and Right Bank Ukraine: the law of 1863 introduced compulsory redemption; redemption payments decreased by 20%; peasants who were dispossessed of land from 1857 to 1861 received their allotments in full, those dispossessed of land earlier - partially.
The peasants' transition to ransom lasted for several decades. K remained in a temporarily obligated relationship with 15%. But in a number of provinces there were still many of them (Kursk 160 thousand, 44%; Nizhny Novgorod 119 thousand, 35%; Tula 114 thousand, 31%; Kostroma 87 thousand, 31%). The transition to ransom proceeded faster in the black earth provinces, where voluntary transactions prevailed over compulsory ransom. Landowners who had large debts, more often than others, sought to speed up the redemption and enter into voluntary transactions.
The abolition of serfdom also affected appanage peasants, who, by the “Regulations of June 26, 1863,” were transferred to the category of peasant owners through compulsory redemption under the terms of the “Regulations of February 19.” In general, their plots were significantly smaller than those of the landowner peasants.
The law of November 24, 1866 began the reform of state peasants. They retained all the lands in their use. According to the law of June 12, 1886, state peasants were transferred to redemption.
The peasant reform of 1861 entailed the abolition of serfdom in the national outskirts of the Russian Empire.
On October 13, 1864, a decree was issued on the abolition of serfdom in the Tiflis province; a year later it was extended, with some changes, to the Kutaisi province, and in 1866 to Megrelia. In Abkhazia, serfdom was abolished in 1870, in Svaneti - in 1871. The conditions of the reform here retained the remnants of serfdom to a greater extent than under the “Regulations of February 19”. In Armenia and Azerbaijan, peasant reform was carried out in 1870-83 and was no less enslaving in nature than in Georgia. In Bessarabia, the bulk of the peasant population was made up of legally free landless peasants - tsarans, who, according to the “Regulations of July 14, 1868,” were allocated land for permanent use in exchange for services. The redemption of this land was carried out with some derogations on the basis of the “Redemption Regulations” of February 19, 1861.
Literature
- Zakharova L. G. Autocracy and the abolition of serfdom in Russia, 1856-1861. M., 1984.
Links
- The most merciful Manifesto of February 19, 1861, On the abolition of serfdom (Christian reading. St. Petersburg, 1861. Part 1). On the site Heritage of Holy Rus'
- Agrarian reforms and development of the rural economy of Russia - article by Doctor of Economics. Adukova
Wikimedia Foundation.
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See what the “Peasant Reform of 1861” is in other dictionaries: Bourgeois reform, which abolished serfdom in Russia and marked the beginning of the capitalist formation in the country. The main cause of K. r. There was a crisis in the feudal serf system. “The power of economic development that pulled Russia in... ...
Great Soviet Encyclopedia
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Encyclopedia of Russian life of the 19th century 1861, the main reform of the 1860s and 70s, which abolished serfdom in Russia. Carried out on the basis of the “Regulations” on February 19, 1861 (published on March 5). Peasants received personal freedom and the right to dispose of their property. The landowners kept...
The content of the peasant reform was set out in a lengthy document entitled: “Regulations of February 19, 1861 on peasants emerging from serfdom.” The guiding principles of the “Regulations” were explained to the people by the Tsar’s Manifesto on February 19. It was composed so intricately that Leo Tolstoy said: “The men won’t understand a word, and we won’t believe a word” (as if “it was written in French and translated into clumsy Russian by some German,” noted I.S. Turgenev). The Manifesto was compiled by Moscow Metropolitan Filaret Drozdov - “Filka”, as the people called him. This is where the expression “filkin’s letter” came from (i.e., a stupid document). Its essence, clogged with verbal husk, was as follows.
Landowner peasants (23.1 million people) received personal freedom, as well as an estate and field plot for permanent use, which they could not, even if they wanted, refuse earlier than after 9 years. During this 9-year period, the peasants had to continue to serve corvee for the allotment or pay quitrent. The size of the allotment and the volume of duties of the peasants were recorded in statutory charters, which took two years to compile. The landowners themselves had to draw up the charters, and check whether they were drawn up correctly (without deception) - mediators who were appointed from local landowners. It turned out that the same landowners turned out to be intermediaries between peasants and landowners. Of course, they almost always (with very rare exceptions) “clarified” or corrected charter charters in favor of the landowners.
Charter charters were concluded not with individual peasants, but with the “peace”, i.e. with rural society from all the peasants of this or that landowner (if there were 1000 souls in the society, then with all of them together). This established mutual responsibility and responsibility of the entire “world” for each peasant and for his duties.
In order to establish and record the size of the allotment in the charter, both landowners and peasants had to take into account the norms of allotment plots - the highest and the lowest. Peasants could not demand an allotment above the established maximum, and landowners could not cut the allotment below the established minimum. That was the rule. But exceptions were made from it - /194/ of course, not in favor of the peasants. On the one hand, if before the reform a peasant had an allotment in use that was less than the minimum established after the reform, the landowner did not always cut off his land to the minimum, but on the condition that the landowner would have at least a third (in the steppe zone - at least half) of comfortable lands. On the other hand, if the allotment that the peasant used before the reform exceeded the post-reform maximum, the landowner cut off the “surplus” from it. The main thing is that the very norms of peasant plots were calculated so that there were as many segments from them as possible (tens of times) and correspondingly fewer additions to them.
As a result, landowner peasants received an average of 3.3 tithes per revision per capita, i.e. per man (land was not allocated to women). This is less than the land they used before the reform, and did not provide them with a living wage. In total, in the black earth provinces, the landowners cut off 1/5 of their lands from the peasants. The peasants of the Volga region lost the most land. If in the Moscow, Smolensk, Novgorod provinces the segments amounted to from 3 to 7.5% of peasant lands, then in the Kazan province - 29.8%, in Samara - 41.8%, in Saratov - 42.4%. “The tsar gave the peasant land, and drove it so much that he had almost one foot per soul,” says the populist proclamation about this. It was then that the saying was born: “There is nowhere to let the chicken out.”
In addition to the plots, the landowners found other ways to infringe on the interests of the peasants: they resettled them on unusable land, “on sand”, deprived them of grazing, pastures, watering places, forests and other lands, without which it was impossible to conduct independent farming. This is how the government auditor K. Mecker saw the peasant plots in the villages of the Galibitsa-Nemchinovskaya volost in the Pskov region: “In the peasant plots, completely unproductive lands are included under the name of pastures and firewood, such as: bushes in the swamp, sparse and completely cut down forest spaces, and more "In total - peat bogs, sometimes covered only with hummocks and plants, such as wild rosemary, cotton grass, and similar herbs that are not used by livestock for food."
The real scourge of peasant farms was striping: the landowners' lands were driven into the peasants' lands like a wedge, which is why the peasants were forced to rent the landowners' wedges at usurious prices. The same Mecker stated: “With the strictness of the supervision established by the landowner over the borders of the villages located among his lands, with the aim of seizing peasant livestock during grazing, these traps and snares set up in the plots bring the peasants to final ruin.”
All land that the peasants received for “permanent use” legally remained the property of the landowners /195/ until the redemption transaction was concluded. Until this deal was concluded, the peasants were considered "temporarily obligated" those. continued to perform feudal duties for the use of land. The duration of the temporarily obligated state was not initially determined. Only on December 28, 1881 (in the context of the second revolutionary situation) was a law on compulsory redemption followed - a law according to which all temporarily liable peasants were transferred to redemption, but not immediately, but from January 1, 1883. Thus, legal liquidation serfdom lasted for 22 years - this is in the provinces of central Russia. On the outskirts (in Georgia, Azerbaijan, Armenia), temporary relations remained until 1912-1913, i.e. more than half a century.
For the use of land, peasants had to perform two types of duties - corvée and quitrent. The size of the quitrent varied different regions from 8 to 12 rub. per capita allotment per year, but there was no correspondence between the amount of quitrent and the profitability of the allotment. Peasants paid the highest quitrent (12 rubles) near St. Petersburg, where the land was infertile, and in the black earth Kursk and Voronezh provinces the quitrent was lower - 9 rubles. This paradox reveals the feudal essence of the post-reform quitrent. As before the reform, the quitrent represented the landowner’s income not only from the land, but also from the personality of the peasant: after all, in the industrial provinces, the peasants paid the landowners money earned not so much from their handicraft plots, but from all kinds of crafts.
The correspondence between the profitability of land and the size of quitrents was further disrupted by the so-called gradation quitrent: the first tithe of land was valued more than the next. So, in the non-black earth zone, where the highest allotment was set at 4 dessiatinas, and the quitrent at 10 rubles, 5 rubles were due for the first dessiatine. (50% of the quitrent), for the second - 2 rubles. 50 kopecks (25%) and for the remaining two - 1 rub. 25 kopecks (i.e. 12.5%) from each tithe. Thus, than less land the peasant received, the more it cost him.
Gradation was introduced mainly in non-black earth provinces, where land was valued low, but labor was expensive. She tempted the peasants to take more land Since each additional tithe had to be paid less, the peasants agreed to this. It was profitable for the landowners to sell rich land to the peasantry and thereby replenish their money capital, which was so necessary in industrial regions. In the event of a reduction in peasant plots, gradation allowed landowners to largely maintain their income. In a word, the gradation of rent was, in essence, a monetary bonus to landowners for the loss work force.
As for corvée, as before the reform, all peasants had to serve it - men from 18 to 55 years old and /196/ women from 17 to 50 years old. Only now the corvee regime was somewhat streamlined, and the landlords' arbitrariness was partially curbed. For each highest allotment, it was necessary to work 40 men's and 30 women's days, no more (although 3/5 of the time was in the summer).
So, the duties of temporary peasants were almost no different from the duties of serfs and were only more precisely regulated by law. That's why the peasants were so reluctant to sign charter documents. They hoped for “genuine, real will” (with the land) and they themselves spread the rumor among themselves that such a will would come in two years. That is why the peasants literally throughout Russia lived with the consciousness that if “whoever signs the statutory charter during these years, he will enslave himself again, but whoever survives these two years will be free.” As a result, by January 1, 1863, when the drafting of the statutory charters was supposed to be completed, 58% of the landowner peasants still had not signed the charters, citing the fact that “the signature will attach them again.”
The reform gave peasants the right to buy their estates and field plots. The ransom amount was determined by capitalizing from 6% of the quitrent established for the allotment, i.e., wanting to receive the required ransom amount, they calculated how much money needed to be deposited in the bank so that with 6% of the annual increase the landowner would have an income equal to the quitrent. Simply put, the quitrent was equal to 6% of the redemption amount. Here is an example: quitrent = 10 rubles, what should the ransom amount be in this case?
Since 10 rub. make up 6% of the redemption amount, then we obtain, according to the equation (X: 10 = 100: 6), X = (100 10) : 6 = 166 rubles. 60 kopecks It can be even simpler: 100 is 16 2/3 times more than 6. This means that the easiest way to determine the ransom amount is to multiply the quitrent amount by 16 2/3. Thus, not the value of the land, but the quitrent, which included, in addition to the value of the land, the value of serf labor, was the criterion for the size of the redemption amount.
The fact that the ransom amount included a disguised ransom of the peasant's personality is shown by its comparison with the market price of the land. At prices of 1854-1855. peasant land cost 544 million rubles, and the ransom for it was set at 867 million (the 323 million difference is compensation to the landowners for the personal liberation of the peasants).
The role of intermediary between peasants and landowners in the redemption process was assumed by the state, which profited from the redemption operation. The peasant immediately paid the landowner 20% of the redemption amount, and the remaining 80% was contributed by the state for the peasants (this was a redemption loan, which the peasants seemed to borrow from the state). The operation to repay the debt /197/ lasted for 49 years with an annual payment of 6% of the redemption amount. Therefore, the peasants had to pay 294% of the redemption loan. Only since 1906 (in the context of the first Russian revolution) payment of redemption payments was stopped. By that time, the former landowner peasants had contributed 1 billion 570 million rubles. redemption - for land, which cost 544 million rubles, i.e. 3 times less!
From the moment the redemption deal was concluded, the peasants ceased to perform duties in favor of the landowners and turned from temporarily obligated people into “peasant owners.” From now on, the land, which had previously been legally the property of the landowners, became peasant property, and the law protected it from encroachment by the landowners.
Household servants, of whom there were 1.5 million at that time, were exempted in a somewhat special way, i.e. 6.5% of landowner peasants. They were released without ransom, but not immediately, but after two years, and, most importantly, they did not receive either an estate, or a field allotment, or any kind of remuneration for their work for the landowner. The sick, elderly, and disabled were literally thrown out onto the street, since they had nothing but freedom... to go around the world. These were the conditions for the liberation of the landowner peasants. The reform also extended to appanage peasants (owned royal family) and state ones.
The appanage department was formed in 1797 under Paul I. It provided the royal family with income from the palace lands and the peasants attached to them. By the beginning of the 60s, the royal inheritance amounted to 9 million dessiatines of land in 20 provinces and exploited 1.7 million serf souls.
A special provision on appanage peasants was adopted on June 26, 1863. “The first Russian landowner” - the tsar also did not want to return the land to the peasants for free. Appanage peasants bought their land on the same terms (by capitalization from 6% quitrent) as landowner peasants; only appanages were transferred to compulsory redemption not after 20 years, like landowners’, but after 2 years. The emancipation of appanage peasants did not come without cuts, although somewhat smaller than those of the landowner peasants (10.5% of total area peasant lands). On average, appanage peasants received 4.8 tithes per revision per capita.
Even later, on June 24, 1866, the “Provisions of February 19” were extended to state peasants, who were considered personally free, but paid feudal rent ( quitrent ) to the treasury. All of them (and there were 19 million of them) retained the lands that were in their use, and could, at their own request, either, as before, pay the quitrent tax to the state, or conclude a redemption deal with the treasury, subject to a one-time contribution of such capital, interest on which /198/ would be equal in the amount of the quitrent tax. The average size of the plots of state peasants was 5.9 dessiatinas - more than that of landowner and appanage peasants.
The reform significantly changed the legal status of peasants. For the first time, she gave former serfs the right to own property, engage in trade and crafts, enter into transactions, marry without the consent of the landowner, etc. There was a broad step along the path from feudal lawlessness to bourgeois law. However, the landowners retained a number of feudal privileges, including police power over temporary peasants. As before the reform, they represented the interests of peasants in court. Corporal punishment for peasants remained (until 1903!). Alexander II “prohibited the flogging of men not according to the law, but ordered them to be flogged according to the law,” the populist magazine “Land and Freedom” wrote about this.
To manage the peasants, special bodies were created during the reform, which were loudly called “self-government”. Their lower link was a rural society of peasants on the land of one landowner. It constituted a village assembly, which elected a village headman and a number of officials: tax collectors, store keepers, etc. The village headman ensured order in his district, monitored the fulfillment of duties, and could punish for unimportant offenses, i.e. fine, force people to do community service, even put them under arrest.
Several rural societies formed a volost, which was built on a territorial principle (with the number of inhabitants from 300 to 2 thousand revision souls). The highest peasant body of the volost was the volost assembly of representatives of rural communities. The volost assembly elected the volost government, headed by the volost foreman, and the volost court. The volost elder had the same functions as the village elders, only within the scope of the volost, the village elders were subordinate to him. As for the volost court, it dealt with litigation between peasants in the volost territory and tried those guilty for offenses more serious than those for which the village headman punished.
All this “self-government” had no independence. He was controlled by a global mediator, who, according to the law, approved (or may not have approved) the election of officials of the peasant “administration” and, therefore, selected candidates he liked from among the “prudent” and obedient peasants. Those who were disobedient and “uncontrollable,” who were nominated by the peasants themselves, were dismissed by the world mediator as “inciters.”
Peace mediators were appointed by governors on the recommendation of leaders of the nobility from local landowners. The serf owners predominated among them, but the liberals also differed little from the serf owners, since they defended the same landowner interests /199/. Only a few of the world's mediators, like Leo Tolstoy or the Decembrist Andrei Rosen, rose to the level of protecting peasant interests. They were, as a rule, fired or lost from their positions. Tolstoy, before resigning, complained: “I<...>despite the fact that he conducted the matter in the most cold-blooded and conscientious manner, he earned the terrible indignation of the nobles. They want to beat me and bring me to trial.”
The peace mediators reported to the district congress of peace mediators, chaired by the district leader of the nobility, and above the district congress was the provincial presence for peasant affairs, in which the governor himself presided. So, a world mediator, above him a district congress, an even higher provincial presence and at the very top a governor - this is the pyramid that suppressed peasant self-government. The power of one landowner over the peasants was replaced by the power of representatives of the local nobility, which did not change its class content. “And there were so many bosses,” recalled a contemporary, “that the peasant rarely had the opportunity to put on a hat.”
In general, the reform of 1861 was the most important reform for Russia in its entire history. It served as a legal boundary between the two largest eras of Russian history - feudalism and capitalism.
The seemingly peasant reform of 1861 was bourgeois in content, since it created the conditions necessary for the victory of the capitalist mode of production. The main one of these conditions was the personal liberation of 23 million landowner peasants, who formed the market for hired labor. Since the feudal lords and serf owners carried out the bourgeois reform, it also took on serf-like features. The peasants were deceived and robbed, they went from slavery to the landowners into bondage to the same landowners.
This is what the poet of peasant democracy N.A. wrote about the reform. Nekrasov. The half-heartedness of the reform was expressed in the fact that the economic basis became new, capitalist, but within it the remnants of the old, feudal-serf system were preserved - first of all, landownership and the labor system, i.e. cultivation of landowners' lands by peasants for land rent, cash loans, etc. Remnants of serfdom hampered the development of a country that had already firmly taken the path of capitalism. Therefore, the class struggle did not subside after 1861, but, on the contrary, as we will see, flared up even more intensely, because to the old social war (peasants against landowners) a new one (workers against capitalists) was added. As a result, according to V.I. Lenin, “1861 gave birth to 1905.”The great chain has broken,
Torn and hit
One end for the master,
To others - according to the man -
Test
The era of great reforms. Peasant reform of 1861
1. Prerequisites and reasons for the abolition of serfdom in Russia. Preparation of the reform
serfdom reform
Contrary to the widespread misconception that the overwhelming majority of the population of pre-reform Russia was in serfdom, in fact, the percentage of serfs to the entire population of the empire remained almost unchanged at 45% from the second revision to the eighth (that is, from 1747 to 1837), and by the 10th th revision (1857) this share fell to 37%. According to the population census of 1857-1859, 23.1 million people (of both sexes) out of 62.5 million people inhabiting the Russian Empire were in serfdom. Of the 65 provinces and regions that existed in the Russian Empire in 1858, in the three above-mentioned Baltic provinces, in the Land of the Black Sea Army, in the Primorsky region, the Semipalatinsk region and the region of the Siberian Kyrgyz, in the Derbent province (with the Caspian region) and the Erivan province there were no serfs at all; in another 4 administrative units (Arkhangelsk and Shemakha provinces, Transbaikal and Yakutsk regions) there were also no serfs, with the exception of several dozen courtyard people (servants). In the remaining 52 provinces and regions, the share of serfs in the population ranged from 1.17% (Bessarabian region) to 69.07% (Smolensk province).
The first steps towards the abolition of serfdom in Russia were taken by Emperor Alexander I in 1803 with the publication of the Decree on free cultivators, which stipulated legal status peasants released into freedom.
In the Baltic (Baltic) provinces of the Russian Empire (Estonia, Courland, Livonia), serfdom was abolished back in 1816-1819.
The crisis of the serf system became obvious by the end of the 1850s. In an atmosphere of peasant unrest, which especially intensified during the Crimean War, the government moved to abolish serfdom.
The main reasons for the abolition of serfdom in Russia were the following:
Serfdom hampered the development of industry, and capital accumulation was slow. Russia could become a secondary state;
peasant farms went bankrupt, as landowners increased the corvée system in the Black Earth Region, and quit-rent peasants went to work in factories, the basis of the serf-dominated economy, based on the forced, extremely ineffective labor of serfs, was undermined;
The crisis of serfdom was one of the main reasons for the country's defeat in Crimean War, which showed the military-technical backwardness of Russia. Was blown up financial system; the peasants went bankrupt due to recruitment and increased duties. A mass flight of peasants from the landowners began;
the growth in the number of peasant unrest (in 1860 there were 126 peasant uprisings) created a real threat of the transformation of scattered uprisings into a new “Pugachevism”;
awareness among the ruling circles that serfdom was a “powder keg” under the state. From liberal landowners, scientists, even relatives of the tsar, in particular the younger brother of Grand Duke Constantine, the government began to receive proposals and projects for reforming land relations. Alexander II, speaking in 1856 to representatives of the Moscow nobility, said: “If we do not free the peasants from above, then they will free themselves from below”;
Serfdom, as a form of slavery, was condemned by all layers of Russian society.
The government program was outlined in a rescript from Emperor Alexander II on November 20 (December 2), 1857 to the Vilna Governor-General V.I. Nazimov. It provided for: the destruction of the personal dependence of the peasants while maintaining all the land in the ownership of the landowners; providing peasants with a certain amount of land, for which they are obliged to pay quitrents or serve corvee, and over time - the right to buy out peasant estates (a residential building and outbuildings).
In 1858, to prepare peasant reforms, provincial committees were formed, within which a struggle began for measures and forms of concessions between liberal and reactionary landowners. The fear of an all-Russian peasant revolt forced the government to change the government program of peasant reform, the projects of which were repeatedly changed in connection with the rise or decline of the peasant movement, as well as under the influence and participation of a number of public figures (for example, A.M. Unkovsky).
In December 1858, a new peasant reform program was adopted: providing peasants with the opportunity to buy out land and creating peasant public administration bodies. To review projects of provincial committees and develop peasant reform, editorial commissions were created in March 1859. The project drawn up by the Editorial Commissions at the end of 1859 differed from that proposed by the provincial committees by increasing land allotments and reducing duties. This caused discontent among the local nobility, and in 1860 the project included slightly reduced allotments and increased duties. This direction in changing the project was preserved both when it was considered by the Main Committee for Peasant Affairs at the end of 1860, and when it was discussed in the State Council at the beginning of 1861.
Preparations for the peasant reform took place in an atmosphere of socio-political upsurge in the country. In the 50s of the 19th century, two ideological centers emerged that led the revolutionary-democratic direction of Russian thought: A.I. Herzen and N.P. Ogareva, N.G. Chernyshevsky and N.A. Dobrolyubova in London.
There was a noticeable revival of the liberal opposition movement among those sections of the nobility who considered it necessary not only to abolish serfdom, but also to create class-wide elected bodies of government, establish a public court, introduce openness in general, carry out reforms in the field of education, etc.
By the end of August 1859, the draft “Regulations on Peasants” was practically prepared. At the end of January 1861, the project was submitted to the final authority - the State Council. Here a new “addition” was made to the project in favor of the landowners (Appendix 1): at the suggestion of one of the largest landowners P.P. Gagarin, a clause was introduced on the right of the landowner to provide peasants, accordingly, by agreement with them, with immediate ownership and free of charge, i.e. “as a gift” I put on a quarter. Such an allotment was called “fourth” or “donation”; the peasants themselves called it “orphan”.
2. Manifesto of Alexander II of February 19, 1861. The main provisions of the peasant reform
On February 16, 1861, the discussion of the draft “Regulations on peasants emerging from serfdom” was completed in the State Council. The signing of the “Regulations” was timed to coincide with February 19, the 6th anniversary of the accession of Alexander II to the throne.
February "Regulations" (Appendix 2), and they included 17 legislative acts, were signed by the tsar and received force. On the same day, the tsar signed the Manifesto for the liberation of the peasants.
After the Manifesto and the “Regulations” were signed by the tsar and the required number of copies were printed, the adjutants of the tsar’s retinue were sent with them to the provinces, who were entrusted with the responsibility of declaring the “will”. They were given broad powers to suppress possible peasant “unrest.” All local authorities and troops stationed in the provinces became subordinate to the aide-de-camp.
“The general provision on peasants emerging from serfdom” (Appendix 3) concerned only the landowner peasants of Great Russian, Ukrainian, Belarusian and Lithuanian provinces and provided for the liberation of serfs in stages, over a fairly long period. It decreed: “Serfdom for peasants established on landowners’ estates and for serfs is abolished forever.”
2.1 Size of plots
Based on the provisions of the reform, it should be noted that maximum and minimum dimensions peasant plots. It was possible to reduce allotments on the basis of special agreements between peasants and landowners, as well as in the case of receiving a gift allotment. If peasants had smaller plots of land in use, the landowner was obliged to either cut off the missing part of the land plot from the minimum size (the so-called “cut”), or reduce duties. Reductions took place only if the landowner retained at least a third (in the steppe zones - half) of the land. Was taken for the highest shower allotment set size quitrent from 8 to 12 rubles. per year or corvee - 40 men's and 30 women's working days per year. If the allotment was larger than the highest one, then the landowner cut off the “extra” land for his own benefit. If the allotment was less than the highest, then the duty was reduced, but not proportionally.
As a result of this state of affairs the average size The peasant allotment of the post-reform period was 3.3 tithes per capita, which was less than before the reform. In the black earth provinces, the landowners cut off a fifth of their lands from the peasants. The greatest losses were suffered by the peasants of the Volga region. In addition to land plots, other instruments for infringing on the rights of peasants included resettlement to infertile lands, deprivation of pastures, forests, reservoirs, paddocks and other lands necessary for every peasant. The striping also posed enormous difficulties for the peasants, which forced the peasants to rent land from the landowner, which was inserted like wedges into the peasant plots.
2.2 Duties of temporarily obliged peasants
The peasants continued to be in a temporary state of obligation until the conclusion of the redemption transaction. At first, the duration of this condition was not indicated. It was finally installed on December 28, 1881. Based on the resolution, it was decided to transfer all temporarily liable peasants to redemption from January 1, 1883. The fact of a similar situation occurred only in the central regions of the empire. On the outskirts, the temporarily obliged state of the peasants continued to persist until 1912-1913.
In the temporarily obligated state, peasants were required to pay quitrents or work in corvée for the use of land. The size of the quitrent for a full allotment ranged from 8-12 rubles per year. The profitability of the allotment and the size of the quitrent were in no way connected. The highest quitrent (12 rubles per year) had to be paid to the peasants of the St. Petersburg province, whose lands were extremely infertile. On the contrary, in the black earth provinces the amount of quitrent was significantly lower.
As another defect of the quitrent, it seems possible to confidently name the fact that it was graded, in which the first tithe of land was usually valued, for some reason, more expensive than the rest. This circumstance forced the peasants to purchase land, and the landowners were given the opportunity to sell infertile lands at a profit.
All men aged 18 to 55 years and all women aged 17 to 50 were required to serve corvée. Unlike the previous corvee, the post-reform corvee was more limited and orderly. For a full allotment, the peasant had to work no more than 40 men's and 30 women's days in corvee.
2.3 Local provisions
A number of other “Local Provisions” basically repeated the “Great Russian”, but taking into account the specifics of their regions. The features of the Peasant Reform for certain categories of peasants and specific areas were determined on the basis of the “Additional Rules” - “On the arrangement of peasants settled on the estates of small landowners, and on benefits to these owners”, “On people assigned to private mining factories of the Ministry of Finance”, “About peasants and workers serving work at Perm private mining factories and salt mines”, “About peasants serving work at landowner factories”, “About peasants and courtyard people in the Land of the Don Army”, “About peasants and courtyard people in the Stavropol province ", "About peasants and courtyard people in Siberia", "About people who emerged from serfdom in the Bessarabian region."
2.4 Liberation of domestic peasants
The “Regulations on the Organization of Household People” provided for their release without land and estate, but for 2 years they continued to remain in complete direct dependence on the landowner. Household servants at that time made up 6.5% of serfs. Thus, we can conclude that a huge number of peasants found themselves practically without a livelihood.
2.5 Redemption payments
The content of the provision “On the redemption by peasants who have emerged from serfdom, their settlement and on the government’s assistance in the acquisition of field land by these peasants” determined the procedure for the redemption of land by peasants from landowners, the organization of the redemption operation, the rights and obligations of peasant owners. The redemption of the field plot was directly dependent on the agreement with the landowner, who had the right to oblige the peasants to buy the land at his request. The price of land was usually determined by quitrent, which was capitalized at 6% per annum. In the event of a buyout based on a voluntary agreement, the peasants had to make an additional payment to the landowner. The landowner received the main amount from the state.
The peasants were required to immediately pay the landowner 20% of the redemption amount, and the remaining 80% was to be paid by the state. The peasants were obliged to ensure its repayment annually for 49 years through equal redemption payments. The annual payment was 6% of the redemption amount. Thus, the peasants paid a total of 294% of the redemption loan. In modern terms, the redemption loan was a loan with annuity payments for a period of 49 years at 5.6% per annum. Payment of ransom payments was stopped in 1906 during the First Russian Revolution. By 1906, peasants paid 1 billion 571 million rubles in ransom for land, which was valued at 544 million rubles. Thus, the peasants actually (taking into account the interest on the loan) paid a triple amount, which was the subject of criticism from observers who took populist positions (and subsequently from Soviet historians), but in this case was a mathematically normal result for such long-term loan. The loan rate of 5.6% per annum, taking into account the non-mortgage nature of the loan (for non-payment of redemption fees, there was the possibility of confiscation of the personal property of peasants that does not have production value, but not the land itself) and the manifested unreliability of borrowers, was balanced and consistent with the prevailing rates lending to all other types of borrowers at that time. Since penalties for late payments were repeatedly written off, and in 1906 the state forgave rural communities the entire unpaid portion of the debt, the redemption operation turned out to be unprofitable for the state.
To ensure the regular receipt of taxes from the peasants and the fulfillment of their duties, communal land use was preserved, and mutual responsibility was introduced: the entire rural society bore financial responsibility for each of its members. Such a communal order was legalized in the overwhelming majority of Great Russian provinces, in three “Novorossiysk” provinces (Ekaterinoslav, Tauride and Kherson), partly in Kharkov, as well as in Mogilev and in a number of districts of the Vitebsk province.
Thus, liberation from serfdom on the basis of the law of February 19, 1861 took a long time and was painfully difficult for the peasants, who for the most part did not have the money to buy out the land. Even 10 years after the proclamation of the abolition of serfdom in Russia, over 30% of peasant farms continued to be in the position of temporarily obliged people.
3. Historical meaning peasant reform
The “Manifesto” and “Regulations” were published from March 7 to April 2 (in St. Petersburg and Moscow - March 5). Fearing the dissatisfaction of the peasants with the conditions of the reform, the government took a number of precautionary measures (relocation of troops, sending members of the imperial retinue to places, appeal of the Synod, etc.). The peasantry, dissatisfied with the enslaving conditions of the reform, responded to it with mass unrest. The largest of them were the Bezdnensky uprising of 1861 and the Kandeyevsky uprising of 1861.
The implementation of the Peasant Reform began with the drawing up of statutory charters, which was largely completed by mid-1863. On January 1, 1863, peasants refused to sign about 60% of the charters. The purchase price of land significantly exceeded its market value at that time, in some areas by 2-3 times. As a result of this, in a number of regions there was an urgent effort to obtain gift plots and in some provinces (Saratov, Samara, Ekaterinoslav, Voronezh, etc.), a significant number of peasant gift-holders appeared.
Under the influence of the Polish uprising of 1863, changes occurred in the conditions of the Peasant Reform in Lithuania, Belarus and Right Bank Ukraine - the law of 1863 introduced compulsory redemption; redemption payments decreased by 20%; peasants who were dispossessed of land from 1857 to 1861 received their allotments in full, those dispossessed of land earlier - partially.
The peasants' transition to ransom lasted for several decades. By 1881, 15% remained in temporary obligations. But in a number of provinces there were still many of them (Kursk 160 thousand, 44%; Nizhny Novgorod 119 thousand, 35%; Tula 114 thousand, 31%; Kostroma 87 thousand, 31%). The transition to ransom proceeded faster in the black earth provinces, where voluntary transactions prevailed over compulsory ransom. Landowners who had large debts, more often than others, sought to speed up the redemption and enter into voluntary transactions.
The abolition of serfdom also affected appanage peasants, who, by the “Regulations of June 26, 1863,” were transferred to the category of peasant owners through compulsory redemption under the terms of the “Regulations of February 19.” In general, their plots were significantly smaller than those of the landowner peasants.
The law of November 24, 1866 began the reform of state peasants. They retained all the lands in their use. According to the law of June 12, 1886, state peasants were transferred to redemption.
The peasant reform of 1861 entailed the abolition of serfdom in the national outskirts of the Russian Empire.
In October 1864, a decree was issued on the abolition of serfdom in the Tiflis province; a year later it was extended, with some changes, to the Kutaisi province, and in 1866 to Megrelia. In Abkhazia, serfdom was abolished in 1870, in Svaneti - in 1871. The conditions of the reform here retained the remnants of serfdom to a greater extent than under the “Regulations of February 19”. In Azerbaijan and Armenia, peasant reform was carried out in 1870-1883 and was no less enslaving in nature than in Georgia. In Bessarabia, the bulk of the peasant population was made up of legally free landless peasants - tsarans, who, according to the “Regulations of July 14, 1868,” were allocated land for permanent use in exchange for service. The redemption of this land was carried out with some derogations on the basis of the “Redemption Regulations” of February 19, 1861.
Contemporaries called this reform great, since it brought freedom to more than 30 million serfs, serfdom was destroyed, and the road was cleared for the establishment of bourgeois relations and economic modernization of the country.
However, this reform was half-hearted. It was a complex compromise between the state and the whole society, between the two main classes - landowners and peasants, as well as between various socio-political movements. The process of preparing the reform and its implementation made it possible to preserve landownership, but doomed Russian peasants to land shortage, poverty and economic dependence on the landowners, since the peasants, when dividing the land, were forced to give the landowners a fifth of their plots.
The reform of 1861 did not remove the agrarian question in Russia, which remained central and most acute for a long time. Despite the predatory nature of the reform of 1861 for the peasants, its significance for further development the country was very large. This reform was a turning point in the transition from feudalism to capitalism. The liberation of peasants contributed to the intensive growth of the labor force, and the provision of some civil rights to them contributed to the development of entrepreneurship. For landowners, the reform ensured a gradual transition from feudal forms economy to capitalist.
At the beginning of the twentieth century, the first Russian revolution broke out in Russia, largely peasant in composition driving forces and the tasks that faced her. This is what made P.A. Stolypin to implement land reform, allowing peasants to leave the community. The essence of the reform was to resolve the land issue, but not through the confiscation of land from the landowners, as the peasants demanded, but through the redistribution of the land of the peasants themselves.
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