Chapter XXII: The Trend

Whither? The future of Russia--Why the revolution has not yet
succeeded--Probable outcome of the struggle--Inevitableness of
eventual overthrow of present régime--Attitude of foreign
Powers--The Russian people during the period of rebellion--Effect
upon national character--The Czar and the people--The Czar and the
world--What we may expect.

Say not the struggle naught availeth,
The labor and the wounds are vain,
The enemy faints not, nor faileth,
And as things have been they remain.

If hopes were dupes, fears may be liars;
It may be, in yon smoke conceal’d,
Your comrades chase e’en now the fliers,
And, but for you, possess the field.

For while the tired waves, vainly breaking,
Seem here no painful inch to gain,
Far back, through creeks and inlets making,
Comes silent, flooding in, the main.

And not by eastern windows only,
When daylight comes, comes in the light;
In front, the sun climbs slow, how slowly!
But westward, look, the land is bright!
_Arthur Hugh Clough._

When the troubled year 1906 ended, the shadow of reaction began to deepen over the Russian empire. One by one the granted liberties and promised reforms of the manifesto of October, 1905, were being revoked and recalled. Early in 1907 the second Duma met, struggled through a brief existence, and was dissolved by the magic word of the Czar. Discouragement then possessed the people--a sense of heartbreaking hopelessness. To the men and women who had borne the heat and burden of the struggle it seemed as if all the efforts and the sacrifices, the lives surrendered to the cause of liberalism and progress, had been in vain. The world at large passed hasty judgment: “The revolution has petered out.” The announcement that a new Duma would be convened in the late autumn of 1907 sounded hollow, for the new election laws, which disenfranchised millions of peasants, promises so completely to devitalize the results of the elections at the very outset, that the whole institution of parliamentarism seems reduced to a mere shell.

The results of my observations lead me to accept this period of stagnation and temporary inactivity as a matter of course, a natural phenomenon, consistent and compatible with the mighty struggle in which the Russian nation is now plunged.

At the beginning of this book I pointed out that the periods of great revolutions are seldom brief. M. Leroy-Beaulieu said to Tolstoi that Russia’s struggle might continue fifty years. Even that, it seems to me, is a comparatively short time for the working out of all the changes which Russia must undergo before she will be brought to the standard of modern civilization. The political phases of the situation are secondary to the vital social and economic changes which are working out. The ideas of a nation, as well as the customs of a great people and the forms of an ancient government, are all in the flux. Decades must necessarily elapse before such vast renovation is completed. And in the meantime the movement making for this renovation remains of world-wide importance, palpitating as it does with human interest, and involving as it does the concern of a substantial amount of the world’s commercial interest. France, Germany, Austria, England, and America all have business and commercial associations in Russia which are affected by the development or retardation of industrial and agricultural Russia. The intellectual influence of the philosophy of the revolution is equally universal, watched closely by Germany, and Austria, and France, and ultimately destined to touch the uttermost parts of the world. So was it in France--to a greater degree, perhaps, shall this be true of Russia.

Precisely as there cannot be mountains without valleys, or flow without ebb, so there cannot be revolution without counter-revolution, or progress without reaction.

In the manifesto of October, 1905, Czar Nicholas II said:

“We charge our government to carry out our inflexible will as
follows:

“1. To establish an unshakable foundation of the civic liberties of
the population, such as inviolability of the person, liberty of
conscience, of speech, of meetings, and of unions....

“3. To lay as an unchangeable rule that no law can enter into force
without the approval of the imperial Duma; and that the
representatives of the people should be entitled to an effective
control over the executive power....”

All the world knows how speedily every one of these glorious promises was swept aside. The “inflexible will” of the present Emperor of Russia is the most anarchistic influence in the world to-day. It submits to no discipline, it bows to no law, refuses to remember even through brief days most solemn pledges made to the Russian people before the world, and nonchalantly acquiesces in the careless breaking of even God’s laws. The government of Russia to-day rests not on law, or order, or right, but on might, militarism, and simon-pure terrorism.

In Appendix D may be found the report of Captain Pietuchow on the Siedlce pogrom, in which is quoted the following utterance of Colonel Tichanowsky: “We must set against the terrorism of the revolution a still more frightful terrorism.” And this is what the officials of czardom are doing to-day. And the terrorism of the government is not only a “more frightful terrorism” than the “terrorism of the revolution,” it is the most frightful and the most monstrous terrorism of modern times, because the forms of government are converted into the tools of absolute lawlessness, and the victims of this terror are often the helpless among the people of the empire--women and girls thrown to the lust of Cossacks, old men and children the marks of police brutality. In the chapter on governmental terrorism, and in the appendix, there is adduced overwhelming evidence, and proof, of official complicity and governmental connivance with this terrorism. Beside the terrorism, the brutality and the ruthlessness of the Russian government, and the soldiers and officials acting in the name of the Russian government, the most heinous offenses of the people pale into insignificance. Individuals are human, and there comes a snapping-point when the sturdiest intellect can no longer beat back frenzy. But a government! A government, surely, cannot be exonerated on these grounds. Madness, desperation, passion should never possess the government of a great empire. If it does, then is the incapability of that government amply proven, and its fall deservedly imminent.

After the dissolution of the second Duma the Moscow “Viedomosti,” a reactionary organ, printed the following:

The population of Russia amounts to some 150,000,000 souls. But in
the revolution not more than 1,000,000 are inclined to take any
active part. Were these 1,000,000 men and women shot down or
massacred, there would still remain 149,000,000 inhabitants of
Russia, and this would be quite sufficient to insure the greatness
and prosperity of the Fatherland.

I myself heard a prominent Russian officer coolly advocate the immediate execution of _two million men and women_ judiciously chosen from every section of the empire, in order to stamp out the movement toward constitutionalism!

As for the attitude of the Czar himself I have a conception which is based on careful observation, but which may be at variance with popular opinion in America. I believe that the Czar considers himself a God-ordained autocrat. I believe that he aspires to hand over to his heir and successor as absolute an autocracy as he inherited from his fathers. Elsewhere I have quoted a remark said to have been made by the Czar in 1906 to the effect that he believed “Russia could go for twenty years more without a constitution, and he purposed to do all he could to guide Russia back to where it was before the manifesto of October, 1905.”

Everything that has transpired in Russia since these words were spoken points to their truth. The manifesto was wrung from the Czar by the sudden tide of revolution which for once caught the government unprepared. The granting of the constitution was like oil upon troubled waters. But as soon as the government had recovered from the shock it sustained through the revolutionary activity culminating in the general strike, it began quietly to take back everything that had been promised.

The first Duma elections were seriously menaced, then on the eve of the meeting of the parliament its powers were substantially reduced. During the sessions of that body insults and rebukes were heaped upon it, and finally it was disbanded. The elections for the second Duma were still more seriously restricted, and although Duma number two was in many respects an advance upon the first Duma it was presently dissolved upon a ridiculous pretext. It will be no surprise if the career of Duma number three is quite as short as that of the others, and if at the dissolution of it the government will say, in effect: “We have now experimented with parliamentary government, and the people of the country have shown their unpreparedness for self-government”--with the announcement of an indefinite postponement of further Duma experiments. This is practically what happened in Turkey. And in Russia itself, one hundred and fifty years ago, a similar incipient experiment was made. If this should occur now the world may well believe that the Russian government never had the faintest intention of introducing parliamentary government at this time.

As for M. Stolypin--I believe him to be a shrewd, able administrator. I do not believe for a moment that he has liberal sympathies. In this I consciously take issue with many able writers, and even old and tried Russian correspondents. A member of the Constitutional Democratic Party, a deputy in the first Duma, a prominent university professor, who sat on a commission with M. Stolypin, and who had unusual opportunities for studying the premier, said to me: “I believe M. Stolypin to be the strongest man the government has, but _a fanatic_

_of reaction_.” I would not use the word “fanatic,” but I do believe him to be a devoted champion of reaction and autocracy. At the same time, he appreciates the desirability of appearing before the world in the rôle of a would-be reformer. No modern statesman has watched the press of the world more closely than he, and none has been quicker to trim his sails according to the weather indications that he has there discerned.

M. Stolypin, besides being a clever and able minister, is also a brave man. And withal he is blessed with a charming and gracious personality, and it is through the irresistible influence of his polished and cosmopolitan manners that he so diplomatically throws dust in the eyes of the world through the correspondents and business representatives of different countries who from time to time are accorded interviews with him.

It remains true, however, in spite of his grace and affability, that previous to his administration women and young girls and boys of sixteen and seventeen were not hanged and shot for “suspected” revolutionary activity. It was M. Stolypin who inaugurated the field courts-martial which endeavor to confuse petty civil offenses with revolutionary crimes, thus affording an excuse for hundreds of executions.

An Associated Press despatch from St. Petersburg under date of July 23, 1907, read as follows:

From many quarters come reports of summary executions under the new
regulations for the military district courts, which went into force
Saturday. These regulations undo the work of the recent Duma, which
abolished the notorious reign of the drumhead court-martial.

Under them only seventy-two hours are permitted to elapse between
indictment and execution, including the appeal to the Military
Court of Cassation, whereas a fortnight was permitted under the old
régime. These courts, too, have jurisdiction in all provinces,
whereas the old drumhead courts could act only in provinces that
had been placed in a state of extraordinary defense.

At Kieff yesterday five sappers were executed, and to-day another
sapper was sentenced to death. Three peasants have been executed at
Moscow, another at Warsaw, and at Yekaterinoslaff three workmen
have been put to death.

At Riga a young man, named Berland, went into a clothing-store,
chose an overcoat, and then started for the door. When asked to
settle his bill, he drew a revolver, covered the clerk, and got
away. He was captured and sentenced to death. Another young man,
named Danbe, was sentenced to death at Riga for the theft of $5,
and two girl accomplices, aged 12 and 20 years, were sentenced to
exile and hard labor for life.

I quote this telegram because the Associated Press has never been suspected of pro-revolutionary proclivities so far as I know, and because it indicates the true character of M. Stolypin and his non-temporizing administration.

In thus emphasizing the offenses--not to say crimes--of the present government, I doubtless lay myself open to the charge of anti-governmental bias, yet I believe I am neither guilty of this charge nor blind to the faults, weaknesses, and mistakes of the revolutionary movement. My endeavor has been to present a true picture of Russia to-day, and of the struggle going on there as I have witnessed it. Yet I must point out once more that the responsibility of a government is necessarily of a more serious nature than that of individuals who are the victims of governmental and official lawlessness, and whose life and environment, in spite of all they might do, is made insufferable through the corruption, inefficiency, and general immorality of the officials who are set to rule and to administer the land.

There is a terrible menace, a grave danger, it seems to me, in this prolonged struggle. Where all standards of public and private morality are shaken--where rulers

The first woman ever sentenced to hard labor in the mines of Kara.
After spending 23 years in prison and in Siberia she escaped, and
after making a visit to America in behalf of her countrymen she has
returned once more to her hazardous work in the heart of Russia,
where she is now at work disguised as a peasant
]

and lawgivers are arch lawbreakers--the characters of the individuals living under such a régime must suffer. And alas, for the rising generation! When one thinks on these things the prophecy of Tolstoi has greatest weight--perhaps the seer in this, as in so many other things, is right, and Russia will continue to go from bad to worse, until the whole people awake in the very bottom of the abyss, and then, and then only, will they turn to God as their only hope of salvation.

If the public opinion of the world would cry out against foreign bankers periodically advancing money to the present government to maintain its grip at the very throat of the people, governmental concessions would have to be granted. As it is, the people of Russia feel themselves pitted not only against their own government which has all of the machinery of the army and police to support it, but also against the financial interests of Europe and the rest of the world. The mere moral sympathy of America is not much of an offset to a French loan, or an Anglo-Russian alliance, unless it results in preventing American bankers from advancing American money to perpetuate the existing régime.

These foreign loans are a terrible discouragement to the Russian people. Whenever the people reach the point where they believe their government will be obliged to yield certain fundamental human rights, through sheer inability to longer feed the forces of reaction, and to pay for the upkeep of the army, then the foreign bankers spring to the rescue.

In Russia I do not look for any voluntary “grant” of liberties or freedom from czardom. I believe that, however much one may desire constitutional reform, the Russian people will eventually obtain their liberties through fighting for them. I foresee a long, long struggle.

Since October, 1905, the Russian people have advanced enormously, and the Duma experiments, handicapped as they were, have yet proved immense educational influences; they have served to arouse the whole people to what may be, and to awaken within them a realization of what sooner or later must be. On this count alone the value of these short-lived parliaments must not be underrated. The Russian people now understand their own situation as they never have grasped it before. They have not merely lost faith in the Czar, they have learned that the trouble with Russia to-day is that it suffers a blight, and that blight is autocracy, which in its very essence is incompatible with modern civilization, and that while the obliteration of autocracy may be a long task, the only escape from their present bondage is the accomplishment of this task. And the period of the struggle making for this end will be recorded in history as the Russian Revolution.

APPENDICES

A--Caucasian testimony; B--The Duma’s Reply to the Throne Speech;
C--M. Lopuchin’s letter to M. Stolypin; D--Report on Siedlce
pogrom; E--Notes on Wages and Cost of Living.