The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1904-05-27
Mobility and Peasantry
The Great Middle Class and St. Petersburg.
BY A B. SWITzER.

The nobility form separate body il
every province, being governed by T;
marshal of their choosing. They pay
no poll tax, but are no longer free from
CONSUMPTION. After them comes tn,
clergy, which for twenty years has MOI
been hereditary class. The sons o.
clergymen, irrespective of their prefer
ences, are not obliged to follow the
service of the church. The merchant:
are next in the social scale, and Their
the burghers and peasants. Since the
abolition of serfdom in Russia, there are
no castles and since then social distinc-
lions are less marked than they form.
erly were. A peasant may become a
merchant or noble. He may enter the
church and all government preferments
are open to him. The son of priest
may become peasant or noble. The
fences are down, although the fields are
still staked out; but the classes are So
cial rather than political.
The slavery of the Russian was of a
double kind. He was bound to the soil
and to his master. The Tartar COM
position of his blood made him prone to
wander and to wander at pleasure meant
to rebel. Therefore the slavery of the
Russian peasant was, primarily, mat
ter of state policy. The noble was the
Cars police officer, though unappointed.
He was a task master and often hard
one, and he was also an unofficial pre-
server of the peace. In way he accom-
plished his mission; for the peasantry,
as a class, were never the Nihilists of
tates of the nobility and were allowed to
get living from certain piece of land
as long as they remained rooted to the
soil. How the mobiles abused their po-
sition to crush manhood and degrade wo-
manhood has been told in whole Ibrar-
les. The strongest protests, however,
come from a numerous outside class. The
Emperor freed the 100000 serfs and
gave them land to cultivate. He issued
the imperial decree two years before Lin
coin signed the Proclamation of Eman-
cipation, but Alexander of Russia only
changed one form of slavery into an
other. That of the later days is not
quite so grievous, which is the best that
can be said of it.
Once the peasant was bound personally
to the noble; now he is bound financial
ly to both the Car and the people-a
double bondage. The government as
and received the hut and the garden
patch as his own and was an authorized
member of the commune which holds the
village lands, that he was indebted to his
former master to a certain amount. He
had no freedom of choice; the land was
thrust into his hands, and he was made
a financial slave. The government adj
vances four fifths of his debts to the
noble, and the remaining fifth he still
ment also receives its five per cent in
terest on the sum it advances, this be-
ing paid to it by the village of COM
mune of which every peasant is mem
Der. The commune is the local govern
ment in which every peasant has voice.
To it, the government granted lands in
common, which are appointed every three
years, according to the n:lmher cf !s5cr-
.ng men and women which the family
can muster. The commune is response
BILE as whole for the government inter-
est, the fifth of the debt due the no
biiiIy and ali other taxes and duties. in
some communes the soil is poor; in 9TH
ers there are too many idlers. Some
times the peasants manage to meet their
liabilities, and at other times they can
not see how Alexander the Car did
them so good turn. Under the old
serf system, when an estate was not
proftably cultivated, it was customary
for the landlord to allow his peasants to
seek other mere profitable employment;
such a course of action was designated
"for the good of the estate" 1t is for
a similar reason that the communes
throughout Russia are granting leaves
of-absence by the thousands, to the man
ufacturing and commercial towns of the
empire. The peasant could run away if
he had a noble master; as now he can
flee from his commune; but if he has not
made up his mind to cut all Russian ties
he is obliged to pay into the treasury of
his commune percentage of his extra
earnings, as he was when he had a
noble for master. In many cases, also
the peasant works for his old master
cultivating the smaller estates with his
own communal field, and with the aid
of whole family, faithfully striving to
lift CALLING burden of debt which was
placed there by imperial hands which
were supposed to be friendly. He is
almost as much slave to the soil as he
was previous to 1861, when he was po-
litically serf.
1t is against such a state of affairs
that large class of educated Russians
is growing up between the Nihilists and
the government. Their blood boils al
the abuses, but they are not bloodthirsty
There are many Count Tolstois in spirit
but few so bold and none so able. Thu
Nihilists compose the visible opposition
to nobility and royalty, and their darl
red organization is one of the wonders
of the century. How great or how littl