Solovyov in Tsarist Russia 1796

Of the two Mikhails, one is the son of a prince and has been honored for generations. He even almost married a relative of his own family to marry the queen of Tsar Peter II, but in the end he failed. The girl later remarried a distinguished duke, and then He was not blessed to enjoy it and soon died of pneumonia. ; The other one, no matter how you look at it, is a descendant of the nouveau riche. It has only been passed down for three generations. Sometimes some people even call them "Groomman" or "Butler Baron", but they forget that sometimes "Butler" is also called "Butler" in the palace. A position that only a noble person can hold. Moreover, both families can be involved in the period from Ekaterina I, Peter II, Empress Anna to Elizaveta Petrovna. This is the most unstable stage of the Russian court. By the time of Ekaterina Queen Na II, who came from a German state, deposed Peter III, and the country stabilized.

But these things have happened only a few decades ago. If it were 70 years ago, the elders of the two families might have fought to the death to decide the winner before they could stop. But now they are talking together.

"Tu es Mikhal, et moi aussi. C'est un hasard si nos noms ontété choisisà un an d'intervalle. Parfois, il faut croire au destin." (You are Mikhail, so am I, our two names What a coincidence, and it took a whole year to get it. Sometimes, you have to believe in fate.)

The young prince said this. He had been fiddling with an eyebrow pencil in his hand. This color number was very interesting. It seemed to be prepared for his sweetheart, because most of the people in Prince Dolgorukov's family They were all close ministers of the emperor, and their children often accompanied the crown prince and Grand Duke Constantine. around, and the hair and eyebrows of this color are darker. If he reminds him, it must be Ekaterina Pavlovna, the noble princess of Russia, the most popular among the sisters. The beloved one, but at this moment, this noble Grand Duchess is still a child.

Therefore, it is not necessarily this person. You must know that among the Russian aristocracy, only some aristocratic women are pious and observe women's ethics. There are also many who are lovers and beloved ones. Even at the moment of speaking, Mikhail Petrovich also suggested that Mikhail Solovyov pursue a young girl and start not even speaking in French, so as not to worry about being eavesdropped by those who do not speak Russian.

"Misha, listen to me. Grenadier officers and hussar officers are very popular. We light cavalry guards, hehe, are all here because of our good family backgrounds. You are so smart and you can do it again." If you know this thing, you will definitely find a way to please girls in the future. What kind of thing do you like?"

"Why are you asking me this question? Your Highness, you know, if we talk about family status, it is fine in the countryside of Ryazan, but no one will mention us when we arrive in Moscow. Only my father's old chief and his relatives still remember us. , and in Petersburg, if we talk about the nobles who were granted the title in 1727, they are all called "Menshikov's". Think about it, this is not very good. Some people say that we are "groommen" and "smugglers". hawker'."

"Who cares about that! Misha, they are just making excuses. This thing is good. I will bring some to the palace then, and I will ensure that I can open up sales for you. The emperor is currently implementing the 'New Deal', and he has many things to do. "

Speaking of Tsar Paul, if we go by the stereotype, he is Peter III's No. 2 machine, and his behavior is definitely that of Peter III's biological child. From his hobbies to his behavior, he is very similar, and because of his love for Suvorov The Persecutions and Peter III 2 According to No. 1 (mostly because he was against his mother Ye Er), he had a bad reputation in later generations. However, the Tsar, the emperor of all Russia, did things after he ascended the throne. In fact, he was more "enlightened and autocratic" than his mother. That set needs to be improved a bit.

Because this tsar, in addition to being crowned with the empress for the first time at the coronation ceremony. In addition to this ceremonial work, he first announced an amnesty. Those who had previously opposed the empress's methods of rule, whether it was freedom of speech or enlightenment, Movement, or directly rebellious Poles, a total of 87 people with status and status regained their freedom, and they did not even need to be loyal to the emperor himself, as long as they signed a guarantee One of the famous "rebels", a hero of the American War of Independence, the leader of many Polish uprisings, and the pen pal of US Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson, Andrzej General Tadeusz Bonaventura Kosciuszko, the "rebel" who had rebelled several times in this way, was even allowed to settle freely in the United States and France. It seems that the so-called "authoritarian" Paul is even more civilized than his so-called "enlightened" mother. 20,000 Polish political prisoners who were imprisoned and lived in harsh living conditions were released. Although they were exiled to Western Siberia, After all, give them a place to make a living, which doesn't look bad, and they won't be able to cause trouble to the Russian emperor.

In addition, the emperor seems to be a bit outrageous in judicial issues. He does not like the death penalty, and during his reign he added the following words to death sentences: "Thank God, there is no death penalty in Russia. This is not what I came for." introduced.”

This death sentence was the only one during his reign.

As for the status of serfs, Russia has always been extremely backward on this issue. Although Tsar Paul's military reforms were somewhat ridiculous, he should have sincerely wanted to improve the treatment of serfs. When he was the crown prince, he often took a carriage and took the Gatchina guards on the road and between various manors, and he had realized some problems. And out of the idea of ​​opposing some nobles and twisting his deceased mother, in the end, at the coronation, there was no mention of the treatment of nobles, the treatment of the army, and the treatment of free people. Even the royal documents were not released. Tsar Paul issued the "Three-Day Corvée Declaration". Since the emergence of Russian serfdom, this bill legally restricted the use of peasant labor for the first time to support the court, the state and landowners to rest three days a week and prohibit forced peasants from working on Sundays. The declaration has religious and social significance because it prohibits self-employed farmers from working on Sundays (this day is for them to relax and go to church) and promotes the development of independent peasant farms. The declaration clearly stipulates that the remaining three working days are for farmers to work for their own interests.

Although some people always say that he is a mentally ill emperor, just like his father Peter III, but from the actions of an autocratic monarch, at least he still has the idea of ​​improving the living conditions of serfs in his heart (this proves that he is not bad at all. His mother's approach is just to win over the ruling class, and he himself is more or less thinking about the issue of serfs and puts the edict first). Compared with his mother Catherine II's approach, he wants to start liberating serfs. This is also the beginning of the 64-year-long tug-of-war within the Russian ruling class, and finally the abolition of feudal serfdom during the reign of Alexander II.

What the tsar wanted to do was gradually reflected in his policies. Some enlightened nobles and large landowners still supported this issue, but such people are always a minority.

There were too few people who treated serfs as human beings like Count Tolstoy did. The Duke of Volkonsky only thought of improving the treatment of the serfs they saw around them. Most of them used whips to solve the problem like Marshal Kamensky and his eldest son. Even the theater of serfs who were no longer employed had to use whips to solve the problem.

In the eyes of some people, serfs should be tied to the land, and it doesn't matter if they are beaten to death. This makes it seem like it is not in Europe, but in the old Dixie in the southern United States. However, even in the old Dixie, there is still some concern about the living environment of black slaves. This is personal property. The serfs are clearly under the "feudal serfdom", but the situation is extremely bad, which led to Tsar Paul's edict to be written more clearly to prevent the people below from not understanding.

When the landlords sell slaves (serfs), it is forbidden to break up the family, sell the people in the manor, and sell the serfs without land.

Paul issued a three-day corvée declaration, prohibiting landlords from corvée (exploiting slaves) on Sundays, holidays and more than three days a week. For the first time, slaves (serfs) had their own free day - Sunday.

The grain tax, which was a devastating blow to the serfs, was abolished, and the overdue poll tax was waived.

Salt, the most important and scarce food resource at the time, began to be sold at a preferential price.

They began to sell bread from the state reserve to reduce the high price, a measure that led to a significant drop in the price of bread.

The various high officials and local governors were ordered to monitor the attitude of the landlords towards slaves (serfs), and if there was any cruel treatment of serfs, they were ordered to report to the emperor.

From this perspective, it seems that the peasants and serfs really waited for a "Little Tsar" who was willing to improve their treatment. When he traveled to Italy in his early years, he also saw the way the locals petitioned, so he began to implement this petition system in Russia and began to carry out postal reforms. He planned to set up petition boxes and mailboxes in Russia to listen to the voices of all classes. However, at this time, the nobles obviously had louder voices, but Tsar Paul was not very friendly to them, because the following new policies also included relevant content:

Additional policies on the status of serfs: On September 19 (30), 1797, a decree was issued to abolish the obligation of serfs to raise horses and provide food for the army; instead, they began to receive "15 kopecks per person, in addition to the per capita salary."

On October 21 (November 1), 1797, the decree confirmed the right of state-owned (national) farmers to register as merchants and philistines.

At the same time, Tsar Paul was also cutting court expenses, cutting the expenses of the Russian royal family to one-tenth at once; at the same time, he melted the gold and silver furniture in the palace into gold and silver coins and put them on the market to stabilize inflation. These currencies were very heavy and obviously exceeded the currencies of other countries, and they received a good response in the market; finally, nearly 5 million banknotes that could not support circulation were publicly burned in the Winter Palace Square, which was his main policy to reduce inflation.

As for his terrible mother, she was able to kill his father, which was also closely related to the Russian inheritance law. What he did next was to deprive women of the right to inherit the throne, and also formulated regency rules. When the Tsar was not in the country, he always needed the royal family or ministers to come out to regent.

The above are actually beneficial to everyone. Only the serf reform harmed the interests of the nobles and landlords. However, the subsequent projects are the places where "the laws of ancestors cannot be changed". Tsar Paul dared to take action and directly came up with a new policy. If he were in the same era as Yongzheng, he would have a lot of common language. How can you see that the two did the same thing, although there are many differences due to differences in national conditions.

What the nobles feared more was the following policies:

Paul I ordered the trial of nobles who evaded civil and military service, and the emperor strictly restricted the transition from the military to the civil service.

On January 2 (13), 1797, Paul abolished the clause in the charter prohibiting the use of corporal punishment against the noble class. Corporal punishment was imposed on murder, robbery, drunkenness, debauchery and violations of official regulations.

On April 24 (May 5), 1797, Paul I deprived the nobles of the right to file collective complaints to the monarch, the Senate and local governors.

On May 4 (15), 1797, the emperor issued a decree prohibiting the nobility from petitioning collectively. Paul thus limited the nobility's ability to represent and file complaints. This was possible only with the permission of the high officials.

On November 15 (26), 1797, the emperor issued a decree prohibiting nobles who had been dismissed for misconduct from participating in elections. The number of voters decreased, and high officials were given the right to interfere in elections.

By the decree of December 18 (29), 1797, the nobility were obliged to pay taxes to maintain the local government in the provinces. In 1799, the amount of taxes increased.

In 1798, Paul I prohibited nobles who had served as officers for less than one year from resigning.

In 1799, the nobility began to pay a tax of 20 rubles "from the heart".

Also in 1799, the provincial noble councils were abolished.

On August 23 (September 4), 1800, the right of the noble society to elect judicial jurors was abolished.

It's no wonder. Where have you seen such a Russian tsar? He gave benefits to the serfs, but began to criticize the masters. This tsar, who might be "mentally ill", was like a German Kaiser with a disabled hand, but that one wanted to increase the wages of workers in front of the capitalists.

As for other aspects, this Russian emperor wanted to do a lot of things, but his "enlightened" series of policies affected the interests of many people, forcing him to use the most extreme autocratic means to solve the problem. After all, he was the emperor of all Russia.

The most ridiculous thing is that some nobles slandered him for exiling tens of thousands of people during his reign. When counting the heads, most of them were Poles, and the number of Russians who were actually exiled and executed, including nobles, free men and serfs, was actually not much.

It seems that this really affected the interests of the great nobles. The load-bearing walls had to be smashed when renovating the house. Otherwise, there would not be some conspiracy organizations after the coronation ceremony to overthrow him.

It was May 1797, and Prince Mikhail Dolgorukov was telling Baron Mikhail about Tsar Paul's policies. The two young men got along well when they talked about politics, but Solovyov was worried about his family's income. Supporting a French stepmother, plus the expenses of his father and sister, and the expenses of the manor, were not a small amount.

In this regard, although the young prince was the youngest son in the family, his knowledge was no worse than his brother, and he also suggested that the Solovyov family should really develop some industries.