The order of Catherine II was drawn up by the Empress personally as a guide for the Legislative Commission, which was specially convened to codify and draw up a new code of laws of the Russian Empire, whose activities fall on 1767-1768. However, this document cannot be considered as a mere practical instruction. The text of the Order includes Catherine's reflections on the essence of laws and monarchical power. The document demonstrates the high level of education of the Empress and characterizes her as one of the brightest representatives of Enlightened absolutism.
Identity of the Empress
Born Sophia-Frederica-Amalia-August of Anh alt-Zerbstskaya (in Orthodoxy, Ekaterina Alekseevna) was born in 1729 in Pomeranian Stettin in a well-born, but relatively poor family of Prince Christian-August. From an early age, she showed interest in books and thought a lot.
Strong family ties have been established between the German princes and the Russian Romanov dynasty since the time of Peter I. For this reason, Empress Elizaveta Petrovna (1741-1761) chose for the heir to the thronewife from among the German princesses. The future Catherine II was her husband's second cousin.
Relations between the spouses did not work out, the heir openly cheated on his wife. In speed, the empress also cooled off towards Catherine. Not good for their relationship was the fact that Elizabeth immediately took the newborn son of Peter and Catherine, Paul, and actually eliminated his mother from his upbringing.
Rise to power
Having barely inherited the throne, Peter immediately demonstrated his inability to govern the state. The shameful exit from the successful Seven Years' War and the incessant revelry provoked a conspiracy in the guard, which was led by Catherine herself. Peter was removed from power during a palace coup, after some time he died under mysterious circumstances in captivity. Catherine became the new Russian Empress.
State of law in the Russian Empire
The official legal code of the state was the very outdated Cathedral Code, adopted back in 1649. Since that time, both the nature of state power has changed (from the Moscow kingdom it turned into the Russian Empire), and the state of society. The need to bring the legislative framework in line with the new realities was felt by almost all Russian monarchs. It was practically impossible to apply the Council Code in practice, since the new decrees and laws directly contradicted it. In general, a complete mess has been established in the legal sphere.
Ekaterina did not immediately decide to correct the situation. Someit took her time to feel firmly on the throne, to deal with other possible contenders (for example, Ivan Antonovich, who was deposed in 1741, had formal rights to the throne). When that was over, the Empress got down to business.
Composition of the Statutory Commission
In 1766, the Empress's Manifesto was issued, which later formed the basis of the "Instruction" of Catherine II of the Commission on the drafting of a new Code. Unlike the previous bodies created for this purpose, the new commission had a wider representation of townspeople and peasants. A total of 564 deputies were elected, of which 5% were officials, 30% were nobles, 39% were townspeople, 14% were state peasants, and 12% were Cossacks and foreigners. Each elected deputy had to bring orders from his province, in which the wishes of the local population would be collected. It immediately became clear that the range of problems was so wide that many delegates brought with them several such documents at once. In many ways, it was this that paralyzed the work, since the activities of the Legislative Commission were to begin with the study of just such messages. The "mandate" of Catherine II, in turn, was also one of the recommendations presented.
Activity of the Legislative Commission
In addition to drawing up a new code of laws, the Legislative Commission was supposed to find out the mood of society. Due to the complexity of the first task and the unbearableness of the second, the activities of this meeting ended in failure. The first ten meetings werespent on conferring various titles on the empress (Mother of the Fatherland, Great and Wise). The "mandate" of Catherine II and the work of the Legislative Commission are inextricably linked with each other. Its first meetings were devoted specifically to reading and discussing the message of the Empress to the deputies.
A total of 203 meetings were held, after which no concrete steps were taken to improve the situation in the country. Economic reforms were discussed especially often at these meetings. The laid commission, according to the "Instruction" of Catherine II, was supposed to test the ground for the liberation of the peasants, but deep contradictions were discovered between the deputies on this issue. Disappointed in the activities of the commission, Catherine first suspended its activities, referring to the war with Turkey, and then completely dissolved.
Structure and history of writing "Instruction" by Catherine II
The only obvious evidence of the existence of the Legislative Commission was the document drawn up by the Empress. This is a valuable source not only on the history of Enlightened absolutism and intellectual ties between Russia and Europe, but also evidence of the state of affairs in the country. "Instruction" of Catherine II consisted of 526 articles, divided into twenty chapters. Its contents covered the following aspects:
- issues of state structure (in general and Russia in particular);
- principles of lawmaking and law enforcement (the branch of criminal law is especially developed);
- problems of social stratification of society;
- questionsfinancial policy.
Ekaterina II began work on the "Instruction" in January 1765, and on July 30, 1767, its text was first published and read at meetings of the Legislative Commission. Soon the empress supplemented the original document with two new chapters. After the failure of the commission, Catherine did not abandon her offspring. With the active participation of the Empress, in 1770 the text was published as a separate edition in five languages: English (two versions), French, Latin, German and Russian. There are significant discrepancies between the five versions of the text, clearly at the behest of their author. In fact, we can talk about five different versions of the "Order" of Empress Catherine II.
Document Sources
Thanks to her deep education and connections with European enlighteners (Catherine was in correspondence with Voltaire and Diderot), the Empress actively used the philosophical and legal writings of foreign thinkers, interpreting and clarifying them in her own way. Montesquieu's essay On the Spirit of the Laws had a particularly strong influence on the text of the Mandate. 294 articles of Catherine's text (75%) are somehow connected with this treatise, and the empress did not consider it necessary to hide it. In her document, there are both extensive quotations from the work of Montesquieu, and those given briefly. The decree of Catherine II of the Legislative Commission also demonstrates the empress's familiarity with the works of Kene, Beccaria, Bielfeld and von Justi.
Borrowings from Montesquieu were not always direct. In her work, Catherine used the text of the treatise of the French enlightener with comments by Elie Luzak. The latter sometimes took a rather critical position in relation to the commented text, but Catherine did not pay attention to this.
Government Issues
Catherine based her political and legal doctrine on the dogmas of the Orthodox dogma. According to the views of the Empress, faith must permeate all elements of the state system. No legislator can compose instructions arbitrarily, he must bring them into line with religion, as well as with the will of the people.
Catherine believed that, in accordance with both Orthodox doctrine and popular aspirations, a monarchy is the most optimal form of government for Russia. Speaking about this more broadly, the Empress noted that the effectiveness of the monarchy significantly exceeds the republican system. For Russia, the emperor must also be an autocrat, since this directly follows from the peculiarities of her history. The monarch not only makes all the laws, but he alone has the right to interpret them. The current affairs of administration should be decided by bodies specially created for this purpose, which are responsible to the sovereign. Their task should also include informing the monarch about the discrepancy between the law and the current state of affairs. At the same time, government institutions must guarantee society protection from despotism: if the monarch adopts a certain decree that contradicts the legislativebase, you need to tell him about this.
The ultimate goal of government is to protect the safety of every citizen. In the eyes of Catherine, the monarch is a figure leading the people to the highest good. It is he who should contribute to the continuous improvement of society, and this is again carried out by the adoption of good laws. Thus, from Catherine's point of view, legislative activity is both a cause and a consequence of monarchical power.
"Order" of Catherine II of the Legislative Commission also justified and fixed the existing division of society into classes. The Empress considered the separation of privileged and non-privileged strata to be natural, directly related to historical development. In her opinion, the equalization of estates in rights is fraught with social upheavals. The only possible equality is that they are equally subject to the laws.
It should be noted that Catherine did not say a word about the position of the clergy. This is consistent with the ideological program of Enlightened absolutism, according to which the allocation of clergy to a special layer is unproductive.
Lawmaking
Concrete methods of adopting laws and their implementation in the "Instruction" is practically not given attention. Catherine limited herself to a general ideological scheme directly related to issues of state structure. Perhaps the only aspect of interest to Catherine in this complex of problems is the restriction and possible abolition of serfdom. This consideration directly followed from the idea of the equality of all before the law. ownedpeasants could not use this right to the landowners. There was also an economic interest in this: Catherine believed that rent relations between the peasant and the landowner led to the decline of agriculture.
In her work, the empress introduced the principle of the hierarchy of normative acts, previously unknown in Russia. It was especially stipulated that some normative acts, such as imperial decrees, have a limited duration and are adopted due to special circumstances. When the situation stabilizes or changes, the execution of the decree becomes optional, according to the "Instruction" of Catherine II. Its significance for the development of law also lies in the fact that the document required the legal norms to be stated in clear language for each subject, and the normative acts themselves should be few in order not to create contradictions.
Economic issues in the structure of "Nakaz"
Especial attention paid by Ekaterina to agriculture was due to her idea that this particular occupation is most suitable for rural residents. In addition to purely economic considerations, there were also ideological ones, for example, the preservation of the patriarchal purity of morals in society.
For the most efficient land use, according to Ekaterina, it is necessary to transfer the means of production to private ownership. The empress soberly assessed the state of affairs and understood that peasants work much worse on foreign land and for someone else's benefit than for themselves.
It is known that in the early versions of "Instruction" Catherine IIdevoted much space to the peasant question. But these sections were subsequently significantly reduced after discussion by the nobles. As a result, the solution to this problem looks amorphous and restrained, rather, in a recommendatory spirit, and not as a list of specific steps.
"Order", written by Catherine II, provided for changes in financial policy and trade. The empress strongly opposed the guild organization, allowing its existence only in craft workshops. The welfare and economic power of the state are based only on free trade. In addition, economic crimes had to be judged in special institutions. Criminal law should not apply in these cases.
The result of the activities of the Legislative Commission and the historical significance of the "Order"
Despite the fact that the goals stated during the convening of the Legislative Commission were not achieved, three positive results of its activities can be distinguished:
- the empress and the upper strata of society got a clearer idea of the true state of affairs thanks to the orders brought by the deputies;
- an educated society got to know the advanced ideas of the French enlighteners at that time (largely thanks to Catherine's "Instruction");
- Catherine's right to occupy the Russian throne was finally confirmed (before the decision of the Legislative Commission on conferring the title of Mother of the Fatherland on the Empress, she was perceived as a usurper).
Ekaterina II valued her "Instruction" very highly. She ordered that a copy of the textwas in any office. But at the same time, only the upper strata of society had access to it. The Senate insisted on this in order to avoid misunderstandings among the subjects.
"Order" of Catherine II was written as a guide to the work of the Legislative Commission, which predetermined the predominance of general philosophical reasoning over specific proposals in it. When the commission was dissolved, and the adoption of new laws did not take place, the empress began to say in her decrees that a number of articles of the "Order" were mandatory for execution. This was especially true of the prohibition of torture during the judicial investigation.
At the same time, it should be noted that the main thing that was the meaning of Catherine II's "Instruction" still belongs to the ideological sphere: Russian society got acquainted with the greatest achievements of European philosophical thought. There was also a practical consequence. In 1785, Catherine issued two letters of commendation (to the nobility and cities), which fixed the rights of the burghers and privileged strata of society. Basically, the provisions of these documents were based on the relevant paragraphs of the "Instruction". The work of Catherine II, therefore, can be considered the program of her reign.
