GOVERNMENT AND ADMINISTRATION. -ilH 



special form under the influence of the Mongolians and. of the ecclesiastical and 

 legal usages inherited of Byzantium. The Czarism of the Romanovs received 

 its final touch from the bureaucratic institutions introduced from Germany, and 

 from the absolute ideas of legitimacy elevated by Joseph de Maistre into State 

 dogmas. Thus the autocratic power of the Emperor is, in theory at least, to some 

 extent due to the reaction from the French Revolution, consolidated by the 

 dissensions of the various nationalities in the empire, especially since the annexa- 

 tion of Poland. For even since the time of Peter the Great the autocracy of the 

 Czar has not always been an absolute principle. Peter drew up reports for the 

 Senate, although this body had been created by himself, while in 1730 the 

 Empress Anne signed the charter limiting the autocracy by a council of the chief 

 functionaries. And although this charter was afterwards torn up, yet Alexander I. 

 endeavoured, with his friends, to found a " Committee of Public Safety " for the 

 purpose of studying the means of " bridling the despotism of his Government." 



Legislative, administrative, judicial power flow all from the Czar, who is 

 bound to respect only the old laws guaranteeing the predominance of the National 

 Church and the order of succession to the throne. But based as they are on the 

 " right divine," may not these laws themselves be modified by the same right ? 

 In theory the empire moves only at the pleasure of the Czar. 



Peter the Great, reluctant to avail himself of the council of the boyards {duma 

 hoiorshaya), or of the States General, created in 1711 an assembly which has 

 never ceased to exist, but whose functions have been frequently changed. This is 

 the so-called "Directing Senate" {praviteht-voyushchiy senat), which he is said 

 to have wished to assimilate to the Dutch States General. To it " everything was 

 to be intrusted ; " " all were to obe}^ it as the Czar himself; " and its decrees were 

 called ukases, as if they emanated from him. But the appointment of its members 

 lay with the Emperor, who, four years afterwards, named a "Reviser-General" 

 of the ukazes, and then selected every month an officer of the guard to watch over 

 the legislators, and conduct them to prison if they failed in their duty. Be 

 himself bullied them with threats of forfeiture, disgrace, and death, in case of 

 remissness. At present this institution is merely a court for registration and 

 publication of the imperial decrees, and in judicial matters a Supreme Court of 

 Cassation. Its titles of " Keeper of the Laws," "Controller of all the Adminis- 

 trative Departments," " Defender of every Russian citizen's legal rights," are 

 empty formulas, or justified only in trivial matters. 



The only dignitaries entitled, by virtue of their office, to share in the legisla- 

 tive functions are the ministers. By their reports, issued with the imperial 

 approbation, and still more by their explanatory circular notes, they enjoy very 

 great authority. There are eleven ministerial departments — Imperial Household, 

 Foreign Office, AYar, Navy, Home Office, Public Instruction, Finance, Justice, 

 Crown Lands, Public Works, General Control. Each minister depends directly on 

 the sovereign, and the ministerial functions are, moreover, confided to the head of 

 the third section of the Imperial Chancery — that is, the secret police ; to the 

 director of the fourth section, who, in the name of the reigning Empress, administers 

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