Conservative Party: leaders, program. Conservative parties in Russia at the beginning of the 20th century

2024 Author: Henry Conors | [email protected]. Last modified: 2024-02-12 02:42

In connection with the revolutionary events of 1905, about fifty political parties were formed in Russia - both small-town and large, with a network of cells throughout the country. They can be attributed to three areas - radical revolutionary-democratic, liberal-opposition and monarchist conservative parties in Russia. The latter will be mainly discussed in this article.

Party Creation Process

Historically, the formation of various political parties occurs with a precise system. Opposition left parties are formed first. During the revolution of 1905, that is, a little after the signing of the October Manifesto, numerous centrist parties were formed, uniting, for the most part, the intelligentsia.

And finally, as a reaction to the Manifesto, right-wing parties appeared - monarchist and conservative parties in Russia. An interesting fact: all these parties disappeared from the historical stage in the reverse order: the right was swept away by the February Revolution,then the October Revolution abolished the centrists. Moreover, most of the leftist parties merged with the Bolsheviks or dissolved themselves in the 1920s, when show trials of their leaders began.

List and leaders

The Conservative Party - not one - was destined to survive 1917. They were all born at different times, and died almost at the same time. The conservative party "Russian Assembly" existed longer than all others, because it was created earlier - in 1900. It will be discussed in more detail below.

The conservative party "Union of the Russian People" was founded in 1905, the leaders are Dubrovin and since 1912 - Markov. The "Union of Russian People" existed from 1905 to 1911, then until 1917 it was purely formal. V. A. Gringmuth in the same 1905 founded the Russian Monarchist Party, which later became the "Russian Monarchist Union".

High-born aristocrats also had their own conservative party - the "United Nobility", created in 1906. The famous Russian People's Union named after Michael the Archangel was led by V. M. Purishkevich. The national conservative party "All-Russian National Union" disappeared already in 1912, it was led by Balashov and Shulgin.

The Moderate Right Party ended its existence in 1910. The "All-Russian Dubrovinsky Union of the Russian People" managed to form only in 1912. Even later, the conservative party "Patriotic Patriotic Union" was created by the leaders Orlov and Skvortsov in 1915. A. I. Guchkov assembled his "Union of the Seventeenth of October" in 1906 (the same Octobrists). Here are about all the main conservative parties in Russia at the beginning of the 20th century.

Russian collection

St. Petersburg was the birthplace of the RS - "Russian Assembly" in November 1900. The poet V. L. Velichko in a narrow circle complained that he was constantly haunted by vague, but clearly prescient visions of how some dark forces were capturing Russia. He proposed to create a kind of community of Russian people, ready to resist the future misfortune. This is how the RS party began - beautifully and patriotically. Already in January 1901, the charter of the RS was prepared and the leadership was elected. As the historian A. D. Stepanov put it at the first meeting, the Black Hundred movement was born.

So far, it didn't sound as threatening as, say, eighteen or twenty years from now. The charter was approved by Senator Durnovo and sealed with warm words full of bright hope. Initially, the meetings of the RS were like a Slavophile literary and art club.

Intellectuals, officials, clergy and landowners gathered there. Cultural and educational goals were put at the forefront. However, after the revolution of 1905, thanks to its activities, the RS ceased to be like other conservative parties in Russia at the beginning of the 20th century. She became brightly right-wing monarchist.

Activities

In the beginning, the RS held a discussion of reports and arranged thematicevenings. The meetings took place on Fridays and were devoted to political and social problems. "Literary Mondays" were also popular. All "Fridays" were first de alt with by V. V. Komarov, but they became popular and influential in the fall of 1902, when V. L. Velichko became their head.

Since 1901, in addition to "Mondays" and "Fridays", separate meetings began (here it should be noted the activity of the Regional Department, chaired by Professor A. M. Zolotarev, later this department became an independent organization of the "Russian Border Society"). Since 1903, under the leadership of N. A. Engelhardt, "literary Tuesdays" have become increasingly popular.

Already in 1901, the "Russian Assembly" numbered more than a thousand people, and in 1902 - six hundred more. Political activity boiled down to the fact that, starting from 1904, petitions and loyal addresses were periodically submitted to the tsar, deputations were organized to the palace and propaganda was carried out in the periodical press.

Deputations at different times were decorated with their presence by Princes Golitsyn and Volkonsky, Count Apraksin, Archpriest Bogolyubov, as well as no less famous people - Engelhardt, Zolotarev, Mordvinov, Leontiev, Puryshev, Bulatov, Nikolsky. The Sovereign received the delegations of the RS with enthusiasm. Conservative political parties, Nicholas II, one might say, loved and trusted them.

RS and revolutionary unrest

In 1905 and 1906 "RussianThe Assembly "did nothing special, and nothing happened to it, except for the post-revolutionary circular, which was forbidden to be members of the tsarist army in any political communities. Then the liberal and conservative parties lost many of their members, and the RS left its founder - A. M. Zolotarev.

In February 1906, the RS organized an All-Russian Congress in St. Petersburg. In fact, the Russian Assembly became a party only by 1907, when the program of the conservative party was adopted and additions were made to the charter. Now RS could elect and be elected to the State Duma and the State Council.

The basis of the program was the motto: "Orthodoxy, Autocracy, Nationality". The "Russian Assembly" did not miss a single monarchist congress. However, it took a very long time to create an independent political faction. The First and Second Dumas did not give the RS a chance, so the party decided not to nominate candidates, on the contrary, to vote for the extreme left (such a trick against the Octobrists and Cadets). The political position at the Third and Fourth Dumas clearly did not recommend to its deputies to bloc with the centrists (Octobrists) and even with moderate right-wing nationalist parties.

Splits

Until the end of 1908, passions raged in the monarchist camp, the results of which were splits in many organizations. For example, the conflict between Purishkevich and Dubrovin split the "Union of the Russian People", after which the "Union of the ArchangelMikhail". Opinions in the RS were also divided. The party was haunted by quarrels, departures and deaths, but especially by bureaucratic dead.

By 1914, the leaders of the RS decided on the absolute depoliticization of the party, seeing in the educational and cultural orientation the right way to resolve conflicts. However, the war deepened all the rifts in relations, since the Markovites were in favor of an immediate conclusion of peace with Germany, and Purishkevich's supporters, on the contrary, they needed a war to a victorious end. As a result, by the February Revolution, the "Russian Assembly" had become obsolete and turned into a small circle of the Slavophil direction.

SRN

The Union of the Russian People is another organization representing conservative parties. The table shows how high passionarity was at the beginning of the twentieth century - all kinds of societies, communities multiplied like mushrooms under an autumn rain. The SRN party began to operate in 1905. Its program and activities were entirely based on chauvinistic and even more anti-Semitic ideas of the monarchist type.

Orthodox radicalism especially distinguished the views of its members. The NRC was actively opposed to any kind of revolutions and parliamentarism, stood up for the indivisibility and unity of Russia and advocated joint actions of the authorities and the people, who would be an advisory body under the sovereign. This organization, of course, was banned immediately after the end of the February Revolution, and recently, in 2005, they tried to recreate it.

Historical background

Russian nationalism has never been alone in the world. The nineteenth century is universally marked by nationalist movements. In Russia, active political activity was able to appear only during the state crisis, after the defeat in the war with the Japanese and the cascade of revolutions. The king only then decided to support the initiative of right-wing public groups.

First, the aforementioned elite organization "Russian Assembly" appeared, which had nothing in common with the people, and its activities did not find a sufficient response from the intelligentsia. Naturally, such an organization could not resist the revolution. As, however, and other political parties - liberal, conservative. The people already needed not right, but left, revolutionary organizations.

"The Union of Russian people" united in its ranks only the highest nobility, idealized the pre-Petrine era and recognized only the peasantry, merchants and nobility, did not recognize the cosmopolitan intelligentsia either as a class or as a stratum. The course of the SRL government was criticized for the international loans it took, believing that in this way the government was ruining the Russian people.

NRC and terror

The "Union of the Russian People" was created - the largest of the monarchical unions - on the initiative of several people at the same time: doctor Dubrovin, abbot Arseny and artist Maikov. Alexander Dubrovin, a member of the Russian Assembly, became the leader. He turned out to be a good organizer, politicallysmart and energetic person. He easily got in touch with the government and administration and convinced many that only mass patriotism can save the current order, that a society is needed that will carry out both mass actions and individual terror.

Conservative parties of the 20th century are beginning to engage in terror - it was something new. Nevertheless, the movement received support of all kinds: police, political and financial. The tsar gave his blessing to the NRC from the bottom of his heart in the hope that even terror is better than the inactivity shown by other conservative parties in Russia.

In December 1905, a mass rally was organized in the Mikhailovsky Manege of the RNC, where about twenty thousand people gathered. Prominent people spoke - famous monarchists, bishops. The people showed unity and enthusiasm. The "Union of the Russian People" published the newspaper "Russian Banner". The tsar accepted deputations, listened to reports and accepted gifts from the leaders of the Union. For example, the distinctive signs of members of the RNC, which both the tsar and the crown prince wore from time to time.

Meanwhile, the appeals of the RNC of absolutely pogromist anti-Semitic content were replicated among the people for millions of rubles received from the treasury. This organization grew at a tremendous pace, regional sections were opened in almost all major cities of the empire, in a few months - more than sixty branches.

Congress, charter, program

In August 1906, the charter of the RNC was approved. It contained the main ideas of the party, its program of action and the concept of development. This document forlaw was considered the best among all the statutes of monarchical societies, because it was short, clear and precise in wording. At the same time, a congress of leaders from all regions was convened to coordinate activities and centralize them.

The organization has become paramilitary due to the new structure. All the rank and file members of the party were divided into dozens, dozens were reduced to hundreds, and hundreds to thousands, respectively, with subordination to foremen, centurions and thousandths. The organization of such a plan helped well the popularity among the people. A particularly active monarchist movement was in Kyiv, and a huge part of the RNC members lived in Little Russia.

In the Mikhailovsky Manege for the next celebration on the occasion of the consecration of the banner, as well as the banner of the RNC, the deeply revered John of Kronstadt, the All-Russian priest, as he was called, arrived. He said a welcoming speech and later joined the NRC himself, and until the very end he was an honorary member of this Union.

To prevent revolutions and maintain order, the NRC kept self-defense, often armed, on alert. The "White Guard" from Odessa is a particularly well-known squad of this kind. The principle of the formation of self-defense is a military Cossack with captains, atamans and foremen. Such squads existed at all factories in Moscow and St. Petersburg.

Collapse

By its fourth congress, the RNC was the first among the Russian monarchist parties. It had over nine hundred branches, and the overwhelming majority of the delegates were members of this Union. But at the same time, contradictions began among the leaders. Purishkevich tried to remove Dubrovin from business, and he soon succeeded. He pulled over all the publishing and organizational work, many leaders of local branches no longer listened to anyone except Purishkevich. The same applies to many founders of the RNC.

And there was a conflict that went so far that the most powerful organization quickly came to naught. Purishkevich in 1908 created his "Union named after the Archangel Michael", withdrew from the RNC Moscow Department. The Tsar's Manifesto on October 17 finally split the NRC, since the attitude towards the creation of the Duma was diametrically opposed. Then there was a terrorist attack with the murder of a prominent State Duma deputy, in which Dubrovin's supporters and himself were accused.

The St. Petersburg department of the RNC in 1909 simply removed Dubrovin from power, leaving him an honorary membership in the Union, and very quickly ousted his like-minded people from all posts. Until 1912, Dubrovin tried to fight for a place in the sun, but realized that nothing could be returned, and in August he registered the charter of the Dubrovin Union, after which regional branches began to break away from the center one by one. All this did not add to the credibility of the NRC organization, and it finally collapsed. The conservative parties (right) were sure that the government was afraid of the power of this Union, and Stolypin personally played a huge role in its collapse.

Prohibition

It got to the point that in the elections to the State Duma, the RNC formed a single bloc with the Octobrists. Subsequently, attempts were repeatedly made to recreate a single monarchical organization, but no one achieved success here. And the February Revolution banned monarchist parties, incitingagainst heads of lawsuits. Then came the October Revolution and the Red Terror. Most of the leaders of the RNC in these years were waiting for death. The remaining reconciled, erasing all past contradictions, the White movement.

Soviet historians considered the SRN an absolutely fascist organization, far anticipating their appearance in Italy. Even the RNC members themselves, many years later, wrote that the "Union of the Russian People" became the historical predecessor of fascism (one of the leaders, Markov-2, wrote about this with pride). V. Laker is sure that the Black Hundreds have gone about half way from the reactionary movements of the nineteenth century to the right-wing populist (that is, fascist) parties of the twentieth century.