Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-11-24
THE LATE ELECTIONS IN RUSSIA.

the elections for the third duma. OF the
442 electors to the duma
Octobrists recent cablegrams report the
results as follows: Right
Aneao' lists and monarchists. 1875;
octobrists, 1913; cadets. 81; pacific regen-
Grafton, 4; Polish nationalists, 10: Moham-
medan. 6: leftsts. %; socialist democrats.
IL; independents. 2. Total to date, 42o-
There is decided diminution in the num-
Der of parties represented. which may be
taken as a hopeful sign of progressive,
even if very slow, evolution.
The Star of January 6. 1907. referring
to the changing conditions in Russia
on the eve of the elections to the second
duma said:
; Parties in Russia are numerous. but
hopelessly divided. The cerebral cells OF
the Russian are even more complex than
that of other peoples There is no unity
of action possible under such physical
conditions, a fact which will contribute
to the strength of government in the
future duma The country must have be-
come wearied with the reign of riot and
revolution and, assuming this to be true,
the coming duma will be composed OF
more orderly and tractable type tnah
those that composed its unhappy prede-
cessor.'
The second duma. indeed, was quite as
bad failure as the first.
In the first duma the hitherto doclle
mouiik or peasant soon fell under the
charm of such demagogues as Alexis
Alaydin, who was so encouraged by Ger
tain admirers in America as to visit TINS
country to propagate anarchlsm. Inc
first duma was veritable zoologlcal ex-
hibition. cage Of chatterlng monkeys, a
caricature Of parliamentarsm. The 2lst
Of July, 1906 an imperial ukase closed It's
life and the world, all save Alexis Alay-
din, believed that it died none too soon
for the cause it affected to MAINTAIN.
The second duma, which met under the
wise regime of the Stolypin ministry,
promised salutary progression. Unfortu-
nately it was afflicted with disease
which seems endemic in Russia, vero1age,
a war of words. expressed CURLY by the
first duma. which had its verbose and
violent left. 1t developed logomachic
right Just here may be recalled the
appreciation of NJ. Schwanebach. whose
authority the writer has had occasion to
cite: Our parties are not we'll dehned'
and exist for the most part In name only.
They lack direction. also a program
Take for example. the cadets, relatively
the best organized. What do you see
party which calls itself monarchlst,
whose members signed the revolutionary
manifesto at Viborg, seeking today to
ally itself with the radicals of the left.
Is is due to their own faults and inco-
herence that they lost influence and not
to the acts of government Today the
cadets. in my opinion. do not exist as a
opportunity by playing the role at once
of friend to the government and to the
terrorists. To this policy, manifestly
sterile, the second duma owes it's dissolu-
ton.
II
Russia is now face to face with a
third duma. The Octobrists. who num-
bered twenty-seven in the
Reacttonary first duma and twenty-six
rendencv in the second, number 12s
in the third, which. with
it's possible coalition. gives it a predom-
mating influence. The Octobrist party
indeed is the center right. but the ex-
treme right is the bloc whose decided
majority constitutes a menace. The
party Is strongly reactionary and very
much more "czarist than the car" The
car indeed has shown himself reformer
and liberal. and with such a minister as
M. stolypin 1t would seem that the third
duma enters upon its work under pecu-
liarly promising conditions.
The electoral law Of June 16 constituted,
as has been heretofore explained in de-
tail, the establishment of the "curias Z"
which are mainly responsible for the
change Of complexion in the present
duma.
The 10th of October in public meeting
held in st. Petersburg NJ. Milioukof de-
CARED that in his opinion a hundred ca
diets would be elected to the third duma,
and NJ. Golovine was equally optimistic.
The result shows how very far away he
was from the true figures. The olsen
chantment is great and disaffection has
already commenced First NJ Mandal-
stamm. who abandons the central COM
mittee because NJ. Golovini's candidate
- Ii
declared himself a dissenter. and then
again NM. Boulgakof. Strive. Mak'a-
koff. all undoniablA symptoms of dsin-
tegration of the cadet party which erst-
while dominated all others.
Prof Milioukof in the Contemporary Re-
view Of London undertakes the vindica-
ton of the second duma He declares it
was IAN industrious body filed with the
idea of checking revolution and inspired
by the desire to cure the ills of the Rus
sian people," He refers to a report drawn
up by the leading party in the duma, the
cadets or constitutional democrats, and
addressed to the electors and the whole
country. This party NJ. M'lioukof de-
clares, tried amid all the turmoil of the
revolutionary struggle to secure what the
parliamentary action. But their efforts
wera baked by the revolutionists who
tried to make the duma a center and a
basis for revolutionary agitation, and by
tIle dDSOlutlStS VINO DREADED the triumph
of representative government"
M. Milioukof Is doubtless sincere in
this declaration, but it is undeniable that
the cadets were playing double role in
the duma and complacently listened to
the ferocious speeches of the terrorists
and acted in concert with them. Nor
does it appear that Prof. Milioukof re-
buked as he might have done either the
terrorist or the cadet, whose union was
an accepted fact.
The reader will recall how the terror
lists in the preceding duma emulated
the conduct of the chiefs
1eTrorlsr of the French convention
rnAu.n.a and how one of them de-
livered one of Robes
pierre's celebrated speeches as his own,
and was applauded by his auditors, by all
save one more serious than the others,
who quietly remarked to the orator that
'he had omitted Robespierre's most eff
fective expression
M. Isvolski declared when In Paris that
the Stolypin ministry would be con-
fronted in the present duma by the oppo-
sition of the extreme right, opposition
at least as formidable and redoubta BILE
as that Of the extreme left. This is one
of the surprises Of Russian politics. little
understood in Russia. and scarcely under
stood at all beyond the Russian frontiers
One of the principal subjects which will
attract the undivided attention of the
present duma will be the agrarian cues
ton. The duma will devote large space