PATER'S CHATS WITH THE BOYS.

Otago Witness, Issue 2734, 8 August 1906, Page 74

PATER'S CHATS WITH THE BOYS.

THE DISMISSAL OF THE DUMA.

My third Chat on '"The Nile" I shall hold over in order to outline this week what has happened in Russia, and to institute a parallel. ; To commence, let- us revise a little of recant Bussian history. I may say my main source of information for this paragraph is the lafest issue of Hazell's Annual. In December, 1904, the Czar issued a manifesto which seemed a definite ,refusal to concede self-government ; as a result, political discontent, combined with great depression, caused popular outbursts. In January, 1905, workmen in the shipbuilding yards on the Neva arranged a public meeting, intending to. petition the Czar for "liberty of assembly, speech, and person, self-government, etc. The authorities lost their heads, and what would have been a peaceful demonstration was turned into a butchery." This threw many of the educated and upper classes on the side of the masses, and revolts broke out at Moscow, Riga, Reval, Odessa, Warsaw, Lodz, and other places. On March 3, the Czar issued a manifesto regretting that distur- i bances had broken out "to the joy of our i enemies, and to our own doep sorrow." This, not containing any relief, caused a general strike, and the disorder became so great that, the same evening, the Czar issued a rescript promising a Legislative Assembly in the following words : — "I am j resolved, henceforth, with the helj) of God, ! to convene tihe worthiest men, possessing the confidence of the people, and elected by them, to participate in the elaboration and consideration of legislative measures." But this did not bring peace. In April and May peasant riots Were reported from al l parts. Attempts were made on the lives of 116 officials : 42, including a governor, wer-e killed outright ; and 62 were wounded. On April 30, a decree was promulgated conceding freedom of worship and abolishing religious disabilities.- On May 27, 28, the Japanese defeated the Russian fl«et, and to crush the outbuust of indignation,^ General Trepoff, on June 4, was given fall powers in * "all matters connected with crime and the protection oi public safety." . . . . He was authorised to forbid/the assembling of Congress when he considered proceedings harmful to public safety and order ; to close temporarily, for periods «p. to one year, associations, assemblages, leagues, and analogous institutions of all kinds in similar circumstances; and he was given supreme control as regards the conditions of detention of persons accused of crime against the State.*' These powers, you see, were very large. This was followed by mutiny >n the Black and Baltic Sea fleets, and in insurrection; in Lodz about 600 were killed and 1000 j wounded. In August, the Peasants' Congress at Moscow demanded : — ! 1. Universal suffrages. 2. Legislative initiative. j 3. Control of the national finances. 4. Personal inviolability for the National Assembly. 5. Universal free education. 6. A system of peasant proprietorship. This was followed on August 3 by the Czar issuing a manifesto promising a State Council or Duma. This was not regarded as satisfactory, and in September there were fresh outbursts. In Baku, the oil industry was ruined for the time being, and there were 1000 killed and several thousands injured and 100,000 thrown out of work ; at the same time there were upheavals and brutal suppressions elsewhere. By the middle of October, "a million men Were OUt on strifcej famine tKreaten«d many cities, the gas and electric light vrete cut off in St. Petersburg. . . . The people stopped vTork in order to force reforms upon the Government, and they succeeded, for the Czar signed a Constitution at Peterhof, October 20, and Count Witte was appointed Prime Minister of a responsible Ministry." Parts of the Constitution are as follow : — - , 1. To grant the population the immutable foundations of civil liberty, based on real inviolability.* of the person, and freedom of conscience, speech, union, and association. 2. Without deferring the elections to the State Dum» already oidered, to call to participation in the Duma, as far a 6 possible, in view of the shortness of time before the Duma is to assemble, those classes of the population now completely deprived of ■electoral rights, leaving the ultimate development of the principle of the electoral right in general to the newly-established legisative order of things. 7. To establish it as an immutable rule that no law can come into force without the approval of the State Duma, and that it shall be possible for the elected of the people to exercise a real participation in the supervision of the legality of the acts of the authorities appointed by us. - - As a result, Count Witle formed a Ministry, but had great difficulty in doing so, because most of the progressive leaders refused to act. The Constitution did not go far enough for the Radicals, who in November 1 demanded : — 1. The abdication of the Czar. 2. Abolition of the autocracy.

_u_ i 3. Voting by ballot. 4. Manhood suffrage without distinctioi of creed, sex. or nationality. 5. A Socialistic Republic. On November 9, as a result of contiaued outbreaks against Trepoff 's methods, h« was relieved of his duties. This, however, was followed \by an organised revolt, not only of workmen, bufc of naval and military forces also. Sevas* topol was captured on November 24, and! a regular battle took place. Admiral Pisai'evsky was shot ; but the revolutionaries were finally crushed. What happened this year we Know. The Duma was elected, but spent most of its time, as the Parliaments of the Stuarts did, in discussing grievances and disis bilities. Now. in this brief outline, untangled; from two or three more or less mixed o* disagreeing accounts, t have cried to trace the events in sequent order ; but I haVe taken more space than I xpected, srf must just mention what else I had in view. Read the history of the quarrel of the Stuarts with the people and the Commons. What was the result ? Charles I and James II went so fax that the one lost his head and the other his throne^ Then there are men and women still living who remember the riots and loss of life when reform was. introduced in 1832. Again, the blindness of George IH and , his followers caused the American revolt.

I Take another illustration. The French' I put up as long as they could with an aufco- ,* cratic sovereign and a grinding nobility ; and tnese, failing to read the signs of the times, suffered accordingly. Both the King and his wife went under the guillotine, and the nobility were sent the same way literally by the waggon-load. What of Russia? The last Czar was pretty well I blown to pieces, and it must have cost millions of money to preserve the life of I the present Czar against the well-nigh innumerable plots against his person. And even with this very brief allusion j to what I should have liked to work" oat ! more fully I haven't completed my programme, for I also intended to give a paragraph or twe on the eclipse of the moon, or rather on the moon and the new ' theory that is gaining ground — that it. isn't ;so dead as we Rave imagined. I think I mus' ask "Magister" to relieve me of this part of my projected programme, for our columns work pretty well together.