On this day 120 years ago, 17 (30) October 1905, Emperor Nicholas II issued the Supreme Manifesto granting legislative power to the State Duma and establishing the political rights and freedoms of citizens

On this day 120 years ago, 17 (30) October 1905, Emperor Nicholas II issued the Supreme Manifesto granting legislative power to the State Duma and establishing the political rights and freedoms of citizens. It proclaimed, in particular:

To grant the population the unshakeable foundations of civil liberty, based on the genuine inviolability of the person and on freedom of conscience, speech, assembly and association... To establish as an unshakeable rule that no law may take effect without the approval of the State Duma.

Thanks to the relaxation of censorship, dozens of satirical magazines appeared that year. One of the best known was Pulemet (“The Machine Gun”), edited by Nikolai Shebuev. The greatest stir was caused by a composition showing the print of a red hand over the Supreme Manifesto. “General Trepov applied his hand” is Shebuev’s paraphrase of the famous line from Dostoevsky’s The Idiot, “Abbot Pafnuty applied his hand”.

General A.A. Mosolov, who was married to the sister of the Governor-General of Saint Petersburg, writes in his memoirs:

Trepov, summoned at the height of the popular unrest of 11 January, quelled it without shedding a single drop of blood, and did so amid complete bewilderment in the upper echelons.

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On this day 120 years ago, 17 (30) October 1905, Emperor Nicholas II issued the Supreme Manifesto granting legislative power to the State Duma and establishing the political rights and freedoms of citizens

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At the close of the Strugatskys' "Roadside Picnic" the Golden Sphere is asked for this: "Happiness for everybody, free, and let nobody go away unsatisfied!" I do not promise to leave no one aggrieved, but the digest really does come free

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