From the Tsarevich to the Tsar, or the Metamorphosis of the Ascension of Nicholas the Second

Abstract

The essay examines D. A. Andreev’s monograph “Autocracy at a turning point: 1894 in the history of the dynasty and power” dedicated to the process of transformation of Tsarevich Nicholas Alexandrovich into Tsar Nicholas II. The monograph addresses the key problems of its topic: the formation of the bureaucratic competence of Nikolai Alexandrovich and the question of the political testament of Alexander III to his son; the perception of the interregnum of 1894 by representatives of the ruling elite and the oppositional public; the reflection on the relationships between Nicholas II and his entourage by Empress Alexandra Feodorovna on the pages of her husband’s diary at the end of 1894; the circumstances of the first major personnel decisions of Nicholas II, which were the dismissal of the Minister of Railways A. K. Krivoshein and the appointment of Prince M. I. Khilkov as his successor. The paper draws a special attention to the central plot of the monograph — the speech of Nicholas II delivered on January 17, 1895, before representatives of the estate and local governments. The author of the essay comes to the conclusion that the January 17 speech symbolized the distancing of Nicholas II from the zemstvo, who sought to politicize local self-government, and from adherents of parliamentary constitutionalism, according to which, the monarch, as in England, “reigns, but does not rule”. In other words, the notorious speech did not mean the tsar’s refusal to cooperate with loyal zemstvo and to implement, at the same time, a reformist course aimed at gradually transformation the state system of the Russian Empire.