RUSSIA 



MIS 



RUSSIA 



Social and Political Conditions 



Society in General. Many conditions have 

 combined to prevent civilization in Russia from 

 advancing as rapidly as it has in the countries 

 of Western Europe. Chief among these causes 

 are the extent of the count ry. with :i consequent 

 ry of interests; the great number of 

 races represented in the population; a land 

 which has been exceedingly oppressive 

 to the common people, and a bureaucracy 

 which has administered the government in its 

 own interests. Russian society may be divided 

 into three classes: the aristocracy, which until 

 1917 held almost absolute sway over the na- 

 tion; the great middle class, including profes- 

 sional men, merchants and other business men 

 and those peasants who have acquired wealth 

 and obtained education ; and the ordinary peas- 

 antry, constituting by far the largest part of 

 the population, the majority of whom have long 

 lived in extreme poverty and ignorance. 



The assimilation of these classes and the di- 

 rection of their united energies to a great na- 

 tional purpose is a task requiring not years or 

 decades, but at least a century. But, notwith- 

 standing these great obstacles, many of the Rus- 

 sian people in the large cities made wonderful 

 progress in education, literature, science and 

 art, and their scientific and literary organiza- 

 tions, museums and art galleries compare favor- 

 ably with those of other European countries. 



As a whole, the Russian people are senti- 

 mental, poetical, truthful, superstitious and sat- 

 isfied to live modestly and simply. They pos- 

 sess wonderful patience and endurance under 

 hardship. They are not understood by those 

 who have not lived in the country and are 

 frequently misrepresented and called an inferior 

 race, a supposition disproved by the achieve- 

 ments of their great men in literature and sci- 

 ence, and by the steady advancement of the 

 nation towards a greater freedom. 



Education. The people of Russia, like those 

 under every other despotic government, have 

 had their struggle for better education. While 

 the wealthy classes enjoyed the greatest privi- 

 leges of education, the masses were kept in 

 ignorance. For a century military and theo- 

 logical schools were the only institutions of 

 higher education that were well patronized or 

 that received government aid. They were re- 

 spectively under the direction of the Minister 

 of War and the Holy Synod. A system of 

 primary schools secured a much larger attend- 

 ance of pupils and proportionately extending 



its influence, and the schools contained several 

 llent features. In many villages a garden 

 or field in which the pupils were taught prac- 

 tical agriculture was connected with the school. 

 In 1914 there were ten universities, with a total 

 enrollment of 40,000 students. There were also 

 a number of secondary, technical and special 

 schools and there were more than 8,000,000 pu- 

 pils in the elementary schools. One of the 

 encouraging features of the 1917 revolution was 

 the interest shown in education by those who 

 formerly were kept in ignorance, and a complete 

 system of public education was established by 

 the Bolshevik government. 



Government. Previous to the revolution of 

 1917 the government of Russia was aptly char- 

 acterized as "a constitutional monarchy under 

 an autocratic czar." Until October 30, 1905, 

 Russia was an absolute monarchy with the su- 

 preme authority vested in the czar. He was 

 assisted by a Council of Ministers, known as 

 the Council of the Empire. The members of 

 this Council were appointed by the czar and 

 were responsible to him only. In 1905 a con- 

 stitution providing for an elective assembly was 

 granted (see DUMA). The Council of the Em- 

 pire was made the Upper House of the Parlia- 

 ment, and the Duma, the Lower House. The 

 czar held the power to dissolve the Duma at 

 his pleasure, and the first assembly was promptly 

 dissolved because of criticism of the acts of the 

 government. Partial local self-government was 

 provided through the zemstvo (which see). 



The New Government. After the czar was 

 deposed an attempt was made to establish a 

 Socialistic republic under the leadership of 

 Alexander Kerensky. The radical faction, 

 headed by Nikolai Lenine, succeeded in over- 

 turning the Kerensky regime in November, 

 1917, and a soviet republic was established. 

 Soviet means about the same as committee. 

 The plan of government is as follows: Every 

 Russian workman and peasant is entitled to 

 vote for representatives in his local soviet, the 

 number varying according to the size of the 

 electorate. The local Soviets are authorized to 

 choose delegates to the All-Russian Assembly 

 of Soviets, which in turn select the Central 

 Executive Committee. The latter passes all 

 acts of importance, which are issued as laws by 

 the Council of People's Commissaries. The 

 term of the Executive Committee lasts only to 

 the next meeting of the Assembly, which passes 

 upon its acts and those of the People's Commis- 



