The instability of the vast structure buttressed on the chronic alcoholism of the people was duly perceived by public opinion, and a campaign was started in the. Duma to put an end to this shameful and perilous situation. One of the Duma members, Chelyshiv, was the soul of this active agitation in the Legislative Assemblies and in Government circles. He succeeded in obtain- ing the formation of a commission to examine and report on the subject, but his abolitionist plans were obstructed by the oppo- sition of the Finance Ministry, which did not see its way to balance the budget without the resources supplied by the monop- oly of the sale of spirits.
Yet signs were not wanting that the welfare of the country was seriously threatened, in spite of the deceptive appearances of an enormous and duly balanced budget. The harvest of 191 1 was so poor that in 1912 Russia was visited by a severe famine. Yet the Government refused to let voluntary organizations assist in fighting the disaster; only associations affiliated to the Red Cross or to the Zemstvos were allowed to send agents into the provinces, to collect and to distribute funds. The public works organized by bureaucratic boards were conducted in a very unsatisfactory manner: the peasants got hardly any help from them, as support was systematically directed to assist household- ers who owned horses and were altogether better off. Public opinion was incensed but powerless. As regards workmen in factories and workshops some progress was made in connexion with insurance against ill-health, but in other respects the em- ployers were left very much to their own way, with the result that strikes, which had decreased considerably in number and intensity after the collapse of the revolutionary movement in 1907, began to multiply again. In 1912 2,032 cases of strikes were registered, in 1913 4,098. On many occasions the unrest was quelled by the intervention of Cossacks and soldiers. The most terrible case of the kind occurred in the gold-fields of a company largely supported by British and other foreign capital the Lena Company: a dispute as to wages and maintenance was terminated by a fusillade in which 162 workmen were killed.
It is difficult to estimate the exact effect of this kind of adminis- tration on the peasants and workmen subjected to it, although there can be no doubt that bitter resentment was increased by the fact that it was driven underground. But indirectly the disappointment and disaffection of society left its mark in the growth of political opposition in spite of all the efforts of the Government to suppress it and to obtain outward compliance by means of artificial restrictions of the franchise and downright pressure on the electors.
The dissolution of the Third Duma on the completion of its period of five years presented an opportunity for an attempt of this kind on a large scale. The Third Duma had been led by the Octobrist party in conjunction with the moderate Right. This policy had suffered shipwreck through the absolutist bent of Stolypin's administration and the colourless leadership of Ko- kovtsov. In the last sessions before its dissolution the Duma assumed a frankly hostile attitude towards the Ministry and the leader of the Octobrists, A. Guchkov, pronounced thunder- ing indictments against the " irresponsible influences " which shaped the course of politics from behind the scenes: the egre- gious mismanagement of the Artillery Department, presided over by the Grand Duke Serge Mikhailovich, and the scandalous influence of the Empress's protege Rasputin, gave good grounds for these attacks. The decree of June 3 1907, which had intro- duced an intricate and restricted franchise, provided convenient handles for the gerrymandering of elections, and Kokovtsov's Government made full use of them in order to secure a Govern- ment majority in the Fourth Duma. Especially conspicuous was the mobilization of the parish priests by command of the Procurator of the Holy Synod, Sabler: the clergy were enjoined to exert all their influence on the peasants in order to ensure the election of deputies of the Right. The bureaucracy was so far successful in this campaign that, thanks to its pressure and to the evident breakdown of the plan of a coalition with the Govern- ment, the Octobrists were defeated in a number of districts and their leader, Guchkov, succumbed at the polls.
The party grouping may be tabulated as follows: (i) The Right, 67; (2) Moderate Right, 38; (3) Nationalists, 55; (4) Centre (Kru- pensky's group), 28; (5) Octobrists, 87; (6) Progressists, 37; (7) Constitutional Democrats, 60; (8) Social Democrats, 14; (9) Polish circle, 13; (10) Mahommedans, 6; (n) No party,2o; (12) Group of Toil, 7; (13) Of unknown party allegiance, 17.
The new Duma was thus apparently more reactionary than the one which had preceded it. But public discontent and the inability of the Government to frame any effective policy of reform produced the unexpected result that a combination was brought about between the groups of the Left, the Octobrists, and even, in some cases, the Right Centre. In a general way the Duma assumed an attitude of opposition as regards the Govern- ment and the reactionary Council of the Empire. This line of policy was especially conspicuous in a long series of interpella- tions and resolutions of want of confidence carried against arbi- trary acts of the authorities. The following interpellations may be mentioned among many: on the illegal acts of the police dur- ing a search in the house of the deputy Petrovsky; on the acqui- sition of the Kiev- Voronezh railway line by the State; on naphtha trusts; on the secret dealings of the Government with Baron Giinsburg, the principal director of the Lena gold-field; on an illegal ordinance of the Petrograd prefect concerning the suppres- sion of hooliganism; on a reform of the Medico-Surgical Academy of Petrograd by an illegal order of its principal; on the spending of money without warrant from the Legislature and failures in carrying out the conditions as to grants and credits, etc. And yet when a bill was passed by the Duma to establish rules as to the responsibility of civil servants, the Council of the Empire refused to sanction the most modest requirements in this respect, although even the Minister of Justice had expressed his agree- ment. On the other hand, the Government did not scruple to prosecute a deputy (Kusnetsov) for a speech he had made in the Duma, and the administrative department of the Council of the Empire laid down the principle that members of the Legislature were liable to prosecution in such cases.
All measures of home policy, even the most urgent ones, were regarded from the point of view of political strife. The Education Committee of the Duma, in conjunction with the Zemstvos, had worked out a plan for the provision and equipment of a sufficient number of elementary schools in order to secure universal instruction throughout the country. It was calculated that some ten million children had to be accommodated in the schools, in addition to about five million who were already enrolled for a course of three years in the schools of the towns and the Zemst- vos (provinces). In order to achieve the result by 1924, the Duma proposed to develop gradually a network of schools by means of appropriations successively increased by 10,000,000 rubles a year in the course of 10 to 12 years. This scheme could not be carried out in its entirety and in a systematic form on account of obstruction from the Board of Education and from the Council of the Empire. Besides the distrust of these reaction- ary bodies as regards all kinds of enlightenment, they were opposed to any policy which gave precedence to secular schools over Church schools, although it could not be contested that the former were much more advanced and perfect in teaching and organization. The comprehensive law of consolidation which would have ensured a steady progress towards systematic instruction in the country was wrecked by the Council of the Empire: the " enlightened bureaucrat " Count Witte did not scruple to oppose the bill in alliance with the stalwarts of reac- tion, because, as he expressed it himself, it was an attempt to obtain paradise by means of child-murder, the murdered child being the Clerical school organization. Thwarted in its compre- hensive policy, the Duma nevertheless proceeded on its course by occasional increase of credits for elementary education.
These constant conflicts produced a perceptible sliding towards the Left in the ranks of the Duma legislators. One of the symp- toms of this process consisted in the disruption of the Octobrist party. It broke up into three small groups the Left, hardly distinguishable from the Cadets; the Centre, which professed to devote its activity mainly to the strengthening of the Zemstvos; and the Right, which still clung to the idea of a possible alliance
