CORRESPONDENCE.
THE RUSSIAN DUMA AND POLITICAL ASSASSINATION.
(TO THE EDITOR OF TRH .SPROTATOR.")
SIE,—The question which at this moment holds the attention of different political parties in Russia is this the Duma, as representative of the nation, frankly condemn all political terrorism ? The importance of this question it is almost impossible to overrate. Upon its solution depends the future character of the movement of liberation in Russia ; beyond that, the terrorism on both sides has cast a slur on Russia as a whole, and she has now an opportunity of putting herself straight in the opinion of the civilised world. , We must pause to note that the very fact that the question has now become a burning one is in itself something for which all well-wishers of Russia must be devoutly thankful. There were times when Russia seemed to be carried away into a remote realm of impossible romance ; yet observers who retained their sanity could never believe that for Russia all the ordinary laws of political morality and political expediency were to be read backwards; and now, when the Duma seems . willing to consider the question of terrorism, it is precisely . shame in the presence of foreign ()Pinion that most urgently presses them, men of widely different views, to deal with the matter. The utterances of various party leaders have been couched in terms which show not merely that sound principles are acknowledged, but that the speakers are painfully conscious of the blot which has rested on the country as a whole.
Terrorism is not specially a Russian product. It is in many ways peculiarly uncongenial to the Russian nature. But the policeman who outraged his prisoners and the revolu- tionary who launched his bomb were links in a long chain of . historical development. Training in character, that most essential part of civilisation, was always comparatively lacking in Russia. It was late in her history that Russia came into any close touch with Europe ; and, most unfortu- nately for her, this first contact came just at the time when Europe was itself disturbed by those first waves of oppositional criticism which were to break in the storm of the French , Revolution. The Russian Government, which till then had been a tardy leader of a still more tardy people, definitely succumbed to the common fear which fell upon all Govern- , merits; and from that time to this, except for certain intervals of twilight, it has maintained a deeply pessimistic attitude . towards the people over which it ruled. The very vastness of the country, the very ignorance of the people, in a word the apparent impossibility of their faith, threw the first . embittered claimants for reform into Utopian theories and into a melodramatic acceptance of the most desperate weapons. At the moment when the lively Russian mind was producing some of the best romantic literature of the nine- teenth century, the censorship of the reactionary reign of Nicholas I. was, so to speak, " uneducating" the. nroat elementary social instincts, and, in the words of one of the censors, was "thrusting Russia back into barbarism." The reforms of Alexander IL, at once belated and immature, came to that early end which so often awaits the children of aged parents ; and the illusions which had been cherished both by the Government and by the educated population only tended to deepen the darkness whieh now followed. A whole new generation of intelligence, which had for a few years enjoyed the semblance of public interests and of public life, found itself pushed back into the boles and corners from which it had issued, and the reaction of the last twenty years, in the mouth of Mr. Pobedonostzeff, preached all kinds of perverted maxims and inverted commonplaces which seemed to proclaim that whatever was true for Europe must, for that reason, necessarily be untrue for Russia. These " real Russian" maxims did not remain abstractions of the pulpit; they were the guiding principles of the Government itself, and even the Church was employed as a weapon to carry this creed of despair into execution.
Such has been the genesis of terrorism in Russia. In a word, the Government was at war with the intelligence of the nation; and than this no more grievous misfortune could occur in a country where the Government has always been deeply imbued with the spirit of patriotism, and where every member of the people, including the revolutionaries themselves, sucks in an indefinable and inalienable patriotism with his mother's milk. The Government undoubtedly initiated the terrorism by falling into a panic long before there was need to fear ; but it is on the Government, and especially upon the Emperor, that the weight of terrorism has fallen with the most crushing force. How could an Emperor of Russia be happy ? How could he come into touch with the mass of his people if the unscrupulousness of a few revolutionary theorists confined him as a prisoner within the walls of his palace ? The Empire went on growing farther and furthers beyond the competence of the directing power, even of a Peter the Great or a Napoleon; yet the Emperor was further and further isolated from his people.
The only hope of better things lay in the creation of a great middle term between the Sovereign and the intelligence of Russia; that is, of a healthy and active public opinion which should make impossible any repetition of the time when the Nihilists openly published the death-sentence of Alexander IL and the neutral mass of the people stood looking on with indifference. What was wanted was, in fact, the diffusion of the sense of responsibility. In this respect a beginning was made by the Zemstva, or County Councils, which absorbed the best work of men of high families, the natural leaders of the national life. More important still, the Russian peasants have in the last twenty years so gained in intelligence and in initiative that they are no longer to be recognised as the same people even by those who have known them best. To this great movement of progress the Japanese War gave a great increase of impulse ; and though the forces of reaction attempted to barricade themselves around the Emperor, the mass of Russia organised itself with an extraordinary solidarity for the obtaining of elementary reforms. The first leaders were men of the Zemstva; but the creation of a great central Liberal party will be associated in history with the name of Mr. Milyukoff.
The movement won great triumphs ;. but the new liberties always came as concessions, and usually came too late. The promise of a Constitutional regime was followed immediately by the pogroms of Kieff and Odessa, in which the Government reports revealed the clearest traces of connivance by the police. The movement was still a conflict. The chief concessions had in more than one case followed immediately on bomb outrages. Even after October 17th, 1905, the mass of the people refused to believe in their sincerity ; and the revolutionary forces, claiming all the victory for themselves, continued to advance both in the extremeness of their demands and in the .un- scrupulousness of their methods. It was felt that the liberties of person, property, speech, meeting, &a, were nothing if not guaranteed by a control Oier the Ministers, to be exer- . . cised by the representatives of the people. The first barna, understanding that the Government would not give way on this head, turned itself into a tribune for appealing to the people for support against the Government. This was another act of war, and was followed by a similar reply on the part of the Government—the Duma was dissolved. The new Prime Minister declared himself in favour of a national Assembly, and pledged himself to important reforms ; but during the last two years the Government, whilst making certain salutary changes in the law, had multiplied further and further the exceptional ordinances until the mass of the nation might be said to be under police supervision. This state of things once more gave an artificial prominence to the terrorists. In order to fight them the Government introduced the field Courts- Martial, which, being guarded by only the vaguest rules and ad- ministered in the crudest way, aggravated the whole nation, and not seldom, as is admitted on all hands, resulted in the gravest judicial errors. The only real defence of these Courts made in the second Duma was based on the admission that they are an act of war,—that is, an appeal to physical force. Two weeks ago the Prime Minister refused to abridge the time of their action, although legally it must expire on May 3rd. The reign of force, therefore, still exists.
Meanwhile the situation has in many ways improved. The Prime Minister at least claims to be a Constitutionalist. The deliberate and almost wholesale repression practised at the elections is in open conflict with this claim; but at least Mr. Stolypin's honesty continues to be admitted on all hands, and he has anyhow done great- things towards the restoration of the moral authority of the Government. The Liberal Party has quite dropped the attitude of open hostility which it took up at Viborg, and is no longer so bent on capturing the support of the extreme Radicals. The gap between the Govern- ment and the Liberals is still very great ; but it is incom- parably less than that which separated Mr. Plehve from his revolutionary opponents. Both Mr. Stolypin and the Liberals have every reason to wish the Duma to exist as long as possible; the progress in the direction of compromise which both alike represent would receive a very serious set-back from another Dissolution. It is even doubtful whether Mr. Stolypin could dissolve and remain in office.
It is in these circumstances that the question of con- demning terrorism comes up ; in a very real sense, it is the question of peace ; and the decision arrived at is likely to have a stronger and more direct influence than the resolutions of any Hague Congress. Revolutionary terrorism has failed to upset the Government, and Governmental terrorism has failed to pacify the people.
Mr. Milynk6ff should have, before this, separated his party from all taint of terrorism. The initiative should have come from him, precisely because he was the creator of the middle term. In the first Duma Mr. Stakhdvich proposed to add to the demand for an amnesty a condemnation of political associations : the Liberals received other instructions, and Mr. Stakhdvich was hopelessly outvoted. Two articles on 'The Value of Human Life" were rejected by the chief Liberal organ on the same grounds ; the Liberals were waiting for the Government to move first. But in the present Duma the Extreme Right is vigorously represented, and the claim for the abolition of field Courts-Martial led to a jangle of recriminations. It has for some time been clear that the side which moved first in condemning terrorism would secure an immense moral victory. It is all very well to bring in Motions condemning terrorism in your enemies ; the victory is for those who-will condemn it in their friends. No one could ever have accused the Liberals of using this weapon ; but even a few weeks ago they held the opinion that to condemn it was to break with the country. If this policy of theirs is to be justified, then we shall have to doubt whether they can feel sufficiently assured that the country gives its full moral support to the movement of liberation, and even whether the country as a whole is fit for Constitutional government. However, all the more temperate members of this great party have long felt disgust at political murders ; and most of them have come to the conclusion that it is an instrument which completely fails of the effect aimed at. 'After the unproductive debate on the field Courts-Martial, the party of the Right suddenly brought on the moment of decision by proposing a Motion on the condemnation of terrorism. At first this Motion only condemned "terrorism on the Left," and in such a form it could only lead to a conflict of the old kind. But the Right decided to leave out the words "on the Left," and it is understood that its spokesmen will all condemn the terrorism of the pogroms as severely as the murders of officials. Thus challenged, the Liberals, who have at least had less to do with terrorism than the "Union of the Russian People" represented on the Right, are likely to be quite as general in their condemnation. Indeed. Mr. Maklokdff in his admirable speech on the field Courts. Martial has already made the most eloquent plea for law all round. In spite of repression, or perhaps even partly because of it, the country has sent but a small number of Conservatives to the Duma; and if the Duma as a whole passes any Resolu- tion of the kind which I have suggested, the moral result will be such as to mark an epoch. All those who wish to believe that Russia is in process of renovation, and is capable of work- ing out her destiny as a Constitutional State, will breathe a sigh of relief on the news of such a decision. Nor is the moral reward of the Russian people likely to be any the less because the decision is taken before the final settlement of the questions still impending between the governing and the
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