"PRANCING PROCONSULS."

Press, Volume LXIV, Issue 13159, 4 July 1908, Page 4

"PRANCING PROCONSULS."

VAGARIES OF RUSSIAN

GOVERNORS

(FROM OCX ST. PKTEKSBtTBG CORRESPONDENT.)

ST. PETERSBURG, May 13

Little attention is now paid to tho Russian question by the foreign public, or at least less attention than was paid to it two years ago. Many things go to prove this, one- good proof being that foreign newspaDcrs. generally, do not devote to the Russia of tho third Duma a hundredth part of the attention they devoted to the Russia of the first Duma. Nevertheless tho position is still as critical and as unstable as ever. This was clearly shown yesterday, May 12th, in the Duma debate on the Homo Office vote, especially by Mr Maklahoff, a Moscow lawyer of Mo:lerate-Liberal views, who is about as far removed from any sympathy for red revolution as is say. Mr Asquith, and by Prince Galitzen, an Octobrist. From these speeches it is evident that Russia's principal trouble at the present moment is tho "prancing proconsul." Tho British pro-consul occasionally prances a little in out-of-the-way parts of the Empire like India and Egypt, but in Russia he does all his prancing at horne —in the bosom of the family., so to speak—and this makes all the difference.

Prince Galitzon emphatically denied that the Government of tho country was a harmonious whole, ruled from the centre, and subject to ono law. On the contrary it was parcelled out among a number of satraps bound by no law and hardly under the control even of the Homo Office. Theso satraps obtained their present almost unlimited powers as a result of the system of "extraordinary law" —something like '"'martial law." which was proclaimed about two years ago, and which is now evidently going to bo permanently maintained. When tho Premier asked General Dumbadze, satrap of Yalta, if ho could not permit the return of a person whom ho had deported, the Governor-General refiisrd, adding that he was only sorry his power did not extend so far as to enable him to deprive tho exile in question of his pension. Prince Galitzen declared that ho and his party bejievo in suspending the ordinary law in cases of extreme necessity, but that they do not believe in extraordinary laws (which moan, practically, the absenco of all law) as a regular and permanent system.

Mr Maklakoff gave the caso of a personal friend of his, a Moscow advocate called Jdanoff. who was arrested some time ago on an absurd chargo of being implicated in :i "hold-up." A military court presided over by General Andrianoff* acquitted him, but General Gershelmann. tho GovernorGeneral of Moscow, made tho court try him again on a new charge, the charge of belonging to a Social-Democrat party. Tho only witness called was tho head of the secret police, who said that his agents had told him Jdanoff was a Social-Democrat. Maklakoff, who defended, protested, but the president of the court saiu that this was enough, no more evidenco was reouired. and forthwith sentenced Jdanoff to throe years' penal servitude. An appeal was lodged, but Gershelmann quashed it, and Jdanoff is now a convict.

In November, 1905 tno Czar promised fhat tho Press should bo no at tho mercy of adimiiiisfcrative orders, but should be judged onjy by tho ordinary law. Tho Pro-Coneute do not, however, observe this, promise. Mr Maklakoff gave an instance. Coramercting on the dissolution of the second Duma, th-o ''Morning," a St. Petersburg paper, said tihia/t several mont-bors of t3i<e Council of Empire (The Russian House of Lords) -wero not illpleased at it. ]<\>r tJiis it was fined £100 by order of the Governor. Leaving tho Council of Empire and officialdom, alone, tho "MorniAg" then began. to speak of affairs in general. It commonted in a somewhat urnsympa•tihetic and humorous manner on. the reactionary Zemsky meeting held in Moscow last .autumn—lined £50. Then it gave up politics entirely. Criticised tho medical arrangement of a certain, pirblic institution—fined £100. Finally it turned to private societies, and spoke of tJic St. Olga Aeßooiataoin—a reactionary Primrose League sort of concern founded by some rabid con-scrvatm-B on the "Novoe Vremya"— fined £50.

So> much for the Press. As for the Parliamentary elections, t'he GovernoreGeneral have thrown great obstacles in t'.ho way of Liberal candidates. It is necessary, as a rule, at Parliamentary elections that the ©lectors know t'h>e names of the men who are "standing" Mud the political opinions they hold, but for printing lists of the Liberal candidates several Moscow papers were suppressed by the Government. These, lists were then, distributed by post, but tho police seizeTl many of ihem in tho post office. Finally they were sent by iiar.id. but the messengers were arrested.

The Pro-Consul is almost as despotic a.nd irresponsible as Haronn Al Raschid. One Governor-General tries by court-martial t'he owner of any house in which bombs are found. In v: ~& it is proved that tho accused dad not know of the existence oF tihese bombs, tho sentence is nevertlinkes £300 or tihreo months. xne Satrap of one Eastern Government took advantage of hia despotic power to repudiate his personal debtfi! The Chief of Police in Moscow elowcl a workman's association, reimmrkirfip:, quite, in the HiarouJi Al Rnschid vein, tihnt he himself would soo that the capitalists did Tiot for got the interests of labotrr. and 81 similar associations have bt>en closed for the same reason. This will, as the orator rightly observed, saddle tlie G<m»rnme>nt with aai amonnit of responsibility wh.ioh no Government is capable of l>earing.