2022 Exam: 4. The August Manifesto

Question 1

Nicholas II straight after Bloody Sunday

Answer 1

• Unperturbed - failed entirely to appreciate the seriousness of the situation that was developing around him
• Required straight talking by ministers to persuade him that Russia was on the brink of full-blown revolution

Question 2

What was always the Tsar’s first instinct when threatened by revolution?
What reinforced this instinct?

Answer 2

• To rely on force to suppress aggregation - an instinct reinforced by the murder in Feb of his Uncle, Grand Duke Sergei, Governor of Moscow, by the SRs Combat Organisation

Question 3

Why was the Tsar’s reliance on force alone not a realistic option?

Answer 3

• Agitation was too widespread to be easily contained and a large part of the army was engaged in fighting the Japanese

Therefore - Tsar agreed to make concessions, if only to buy time

Question 4

What promise from January 1905 did the government fail to keep?

Answer 4

That an inquiry would be held into the grievances of St Petersburg’s factory workers

Question 5

Government announcement in Feb 1905

Answer 5

• An elected assembly would be established - and consulted before new laws were introduced
• Interior minister - Alexander Bulygin - given task of drawing up detailed arrangements

Question 6

In what sense were liberals unimpressed with the government’s plans for an elected assembly?

Answer 6

• In the sense that the tsar’s concessions fell a long way short of the parliament and constitution they were demanding

Question 7

Elements of the August Manifesto (‘Bulygin Constitution’)

Answer 7

1) The new elected assembly was to be called the Duma (name derived from the Russian verb meaning to think or consider)
2) Was to be purely advisory or consultative - would be given opportunity to discuss proposed new laws - wouldn’t have any power
3) Complex electoral system - favouring peasants and landowners - urban workers, the national minorities, Jews and much of the intelligentsia left without the vote

Question 8

How did some ultra-moderate liberals react to the August Manifesto?

Answer 8

• Thought that it offered a basis for further negotiation
• But almost everyone else on the opposition side dismissed it as totally inadequate - seen as a cosmetic proposal that left the essentials of Tsarist intact