The Reforms of Alexander II

In 1853-56 the Crimean War occurred between Russia on one side and the allied forces of England, Turkey, France, and Sardinia on the other side. The war clearly showed the backwardness of the Russian Empire compared to England and France. The military equipment was obsolete; communication systems and bureaucracy were inefficient. Russia also lacked railroads and steamers. It was clear now that radical reforms were needed. Frustrated by the humiliated defeat Tsar Nicolas I died in 1855. The new emperor Alexander II started an ambitious program of wide-scale reforms.

In 1861 serfdom was abolished as it was the main obstacle for the development of capitalism. Compulsory labor was never efficient. Freed peasants could now be hired at factories and plants which needed them badly or become independent farmers.

In 1864 the judicial reform was carried out. Everybody became equal before the law. The courts became independent from state administration. Judges were elected now rather than appointed. The institutions of juries and attorneys were introduced. Legal proceedings became open for public. The judicial reform made people feel more secure about their businesses and careers and stimulated their activity.

The same year the so-called zemstvo reform was conducted. It meant that rural regions (povity) got the right to a limited self-government which made them more flexible and efficient for the development of capitalism and improving living conditions.

In 1870 cities got the right to self-rule. The most capable city-dwellers could be elected now to city councils, called dumas.

The educational reform (1864) introduced a single system of primary education, improved the system of secondary schools, and granted autonomy to universities.

The military reform (1864-1883) established a universal military service (6 years in ground forces and 7 years in the navy). Before the reform the soldiers served for 25 years. The army was rearmed. Corporal punishments were abolished.

The reforms stimulated the socio-economic modernization of the Russian Empire; promoted the democratization of society and educational system; enforced the role of law. Industry and trade started to grow rapidly, urbanization increased sharply, many peasants became hired workers. The reforms opened the way for the establishment of industrial society.

The Hromada movement in the 1860-90s

At the end of the 1850s when the tsarist regime started a program of liberal reforms the Ukrainian national movement, silent after the repression of the Brotherhood of Sts Cyril and Methodius, got a new opportunity to develop. The former members of the Brotherhood (Kostomarov, Bilozersky, Shevchenko, Kulish), who had been released from exile, went to St Petersburg, where many influential Ukrainians lived. There, in 1859, they formed the so-called Ukrainian Hromada (community), an informal cultural-educational organization for popularizing of the Ukrainian idea. The Hromada published its journal Osnova (1861-62) dedicated to the problems of Ukrainian folklore, ethnography, literature, history, education, etc. Osnova was the first Ukrainian journal in the Russian empire.

The reviving Ukrainian movement also included a group of young Polish szlachta, who felt ashamed of their ancestors who had exploited the Ukrainian people. The group was nicknamed khlopomany, or peasant lovers.³ They changed their Catholic faith to the Orthodox one; wore embroidered peasant shirts; sang Ukrainian songs; collected Ukrainian ethnographic material (ethnography is a science that studies the way of life, cloth, and dwellings of the peasants). Their leader was Volodymyr Antonovych. In 1861 this group joined the Kiev Hromada which mostly consisted of professors and students of Kiev University.

Besides the Kiev Hromada, which was the most significant, many other smaller hromadas appeared in other Ukrainian cities and towns (over a hundred in total). Their aim was establishing Sunday schools with the Ukrainian language, writing and publishing textbooks, preparation of Ukrainian-speaking teachers, study of ethnography and history, etc. In a word these societies were devoted to the promotion of Ukrainian culture and enlightenment of the masses. Hromada members as well as other Ukrainian activists and sympathizers generally became known as the Ukrainophiles (українофіли). The word actually meant “those who loved everything Ukrainian.” The hromadas experienced some difficulties in encouraging peasants to study in the Ukrainian language. Many peasants did not want their children to study in a “villain language” (мужицькою мовою). They shouted, “We do not want our children to be uncivilized villains” (Не хочемо, щоби наші діти були когутами). The Russian language for them was connected with civilization and the prospects for a career growth. It should be noted that over 90 percent of Hromada members could not speak Ukrainian and they conducted their meetings in Russian. It did not mean that they did not love the language; they could read and understand Ukrainian but they found it difficult to express their thoughts in Ukrainian at the meetings.

At first the activities of the hromadas did not disturb the Russian government but after the Polish uprising of 1863 it started to think that the hromadas’ cultural activity could lead to political demands in the future. (The government feared that Ukrainians might think that their culture was too different from the Russian one and demand independence). These considerations led to the so-called Valuev Edict (July 20, 1863) which forbade the publication in Ukrainian of all scholarly, religious, and especially pedagogical publications. Only belles-letters were allowed to appear in the “Little Russian dialect.” Petr Valuev, the minister of internal affairs, declared that the Ukrainian language “never existed, does not exist and shall never exist.” Those who thought that Ukrainian was not a Russian dialect were accused of “separatist thoughts hostile to Russia.” Valuev as well as other Russian political leaders believed that the “Little Russian dialect” was in fact the same Russian language but spoiled by Polish influences. The Valuev Edict led to temporal extinction of the hromada movement.

The recovery took almost ten years. Hromadas reemerged in Kiev and other cities. Their practical activities were again cultural. At this time Ukrainophiles organized Ukrainian publications in Austro-Hungary and their delivery to Russian-ruled Ukraine. It was partly because of these publications that the imperial government launched a new attack on the Ukrainophiles.

In 1875, M. Yuzefovych, a Ukrainian cultural and public figure, wrote a report to St. Petersburg warning the authorities of the danger of the Ukrainian national movement for the unity of the Russian Empire. As a result of the report, the government formed a special commission (Yuzefovych became a member of that commission) with the aim to work out necessary measures to weaken the Ukrainian movement. The commission produced a report signed by the Emperor Alexander II on May 18, 1876. This report came down into history as the Decree of Ems (it was signed in a small German resort town called Ems). The Decree of Ems of 1876 totally banned the import⁴ and publication of Ukrainian books, prohibited the use of Ukrainian on the stage (even the lyrics of Ukrainian songs that were sung in the theater were translated into other languages). The decree also banned all public lectures and concerts in Ukrainian. The Ministry of Education was instructed to prohibit the teaching of any subject in Ukrainian in schools, to remove from school libraries books in Ukrainian or by Ukrainophiles, and to replace Ukrainophile teachers with Russian patriots (many educated Ukrainians considered themselves Russian patriots at the time). Dozens of Ukrainian activists lost their jobs and were exiled from Ukraine. In short, this was a more systematic and ruthless attempt than Valuev’s had been to paralyze the Ukrainian movement.⁵