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Vestnik Evropy and the Polish Question in the Reign of Alexander II

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  27 January 2017

Extract

Writing from Italy in the summer of 1904, the noted jurist V. D. Spasowicz lamented the assassination of the minister of interior V. K. Pleve: “The news of the catastrophe with Pleve has reached us … I regard it … as a pity because at least under him the Polish question could be raised.“

Spasowicz spoke with authority on the Polish question. Himself a Pole, he had closely observed the painful evolution of the issue for fifty years. It was not only a difficult issue to raise, but defenders of Poland in Russian society were rare. The same was true of the Russian press where few publications were willing to support the Poles. The prominent liberal journal Vestnik Evropy, for which Spasowicz himself wrote, was an exception. After 1871 it emerged as a critic of the government's program of Russification in the Congress Kingdom.

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Copyright © Association for Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Studies. 1987

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References

1. Spasowicz to A. N. Veselovskii, 2 August 1904, Tsentral'nyi gosudarstvennyi arkhiv literaturyi iskusstva (hereafter TsGALI), onrf80, opis’ 1, ed. khr. 200, list 10.

2. The Polish question in the nineteenth century could be defined from several different pointsof view, nearly each in conflict with each of the others. To the Poles of Russian Poland, the Congress Kingdom, it was the Kwestia narodowa or national question. How could Polish identity be maintained in the Russian Empire, if at all?

In the reign of Alexander II, before the January Insurrection of 1863–1864, the Russian government defined the Polish question in terms of its mistrust of four groups: the Poles of the Congress Kingdom; the Polish nobility that dominated the western region made up of the nine Ukrainian, Belorussian, and Lithuanian provinces of the empire; members of the Polish diaspora scattered throughout the empire, but concentrated primarily in St. Petersburg; and the Polish émigrés in western Europe, especially in Paris, who attempted to poison European attitudes toward the tsarist regime. See the annual reports for 1860–1862 of Prince V. A. Dolgorukov, head of the Third Section. Tsentral'nyigosudarstvennyi arkhiv Oktiabr'skoi revoliutsii, fond 109. I am grateful to Dr. Orest Pelech for providing me with this material.

After the January Insurrection the regime focused attention on two of those groups. In the Congress Kingdom it pursued a strict policy of cultural and administrative Russification. In the western region it sought to enhance the position of the Orthodox peasantry at the expense of the Polish Catholic nobility. Alexander II acquiesced in limited debate on those policies, which the Russian press called the Polish question. His assent contrasted with the attitude of Nicholas I, who had for bidden any reference to Poland in print after the November Insurrection of 1830–1831.

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13. Paradoxically, a reputation for Polish sympathies among its circle may have made the initiation of the journal possible. When Stasiulevich first requested permission to publish Vestnik Evropy on 9 November 1865 the minister of interior P. A. Valuev refused him. Stasiulevich resubmitted the petition later that month, and on 30 November Valuev granted it. No satisfactory explanation hasever been given for the minister's change of mind. (See K. K. Arsen'ev, “Vzgliad iz proshlogo,” V.E., no. 1 [1909]; 219.) The answer may lie in Valuev's anguish over the regime's harsh policy toward Poland. He observed the formulation of that policy first hand and tried as best he could to argue against it. In late November 1865 Valuev expressed grave misgivings over decisions taken in thenewly formed Polish Committee. He condemned N. A. Miliutin, in particular, for addressing the committee “with his usual hysteria against the Poles.” Dnevnik P. A. Valueva, ed. P. A. Zaionchkovskii (Moscow, 1961) 1: 78 (23 November 1865). See also pp. 78–81 (25 and 29 November 1865). In granting permission to Stasiulevich and his circle, Valuev may have been seeking to encourage limited defense of the Poles in the Russian press.

14. Stasiulevich to his wife, 23 September 1889, Perepiska 2: 27.

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33. Katkov, M. N., “Usilenie pol'skoi intrigi v nekotorykh peterburgskikh sferakh i gazetakh,” Moskovskie vedomosti, no. 46 (2 March 1868)Google Scholar. Although Stasiulevich insisted that Vestnik Evropy wasdevoted to historical scholarship, the first issue of 1 March 1866 revealed a definite tendency towarda version of political liberalism. See A. E. Pogorelskin, “Scholar and Journalist: The Career of M. M.Stasiulevich, 1850–1882” (Ph.d. diss. Yale University, 1976), pp. 189–200.

34. Katkov, Moskovskie vedomosti, no. 101 (10 April 1880).

35. Korsakov, D. A., “Iz vospominanii o N. I. Kostomarove i S. M. Solov'eve,” V.E., no. 9 (1906): 231.Google Scholar

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39. Kostomarov, N. I., Polnoe sobranie sochinenii, kn. viii, t. xvii-xviii (St. Petersburg, 1905), 106.Google Scholar

40. Ibid., p. 113.

41. Kostomarov, “Peterburgskii universitet,” lubileinyi sbornik, p. 138.

42. Pypin, “Pol'skii vopros,” V.E., no. 10 (1880): 697.

43. A. L. Pogodin, Istoriia pol'skogo naroda v XIX veke (Moscow, 1915), p. 220. See also Blejwas, Realism in Polish Politics, pp. 43–44.

44. Naimark, N. M., The History of the “Proletariat “: The Emergence of Marxism in the Kingdom of Poland, 1870–87 (Boulder, Colo.: East European Monographs, 1979), p. 6 Google Scholar.

45. Katkov, M. N., “Otzyv V.EMoskovskie vedomosti, no. 181 (16 July 1876).Google Scholar

46. See Pogorelskin, “Scholar and Journalist,” pp. 224–245.

47. Izvlecheniia iz vsepoddanneishego otcheta ober prokurora (1866), p. 66, as quoted in Freeze, G. L., The Parish Clergy in Nineteenth Century Russia (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1983), p. 323 Google Scholar.

48. M. [Stasiulevich], “Zametka o russkoi pochte,” V.E., no. 7 (1871): 405.

49. Stasiulevich to A. N. Pypin, 20 July 1871, Gosudarstvennaia publichnaia biblioteka im.Saltykova-Shchedrina, Leningrad, Otdel rukopisei (hereafter GPBOr), fond 62, ed. khr. 823, list 22ob. Stasiulevich's correspondence with Pypin, 1869–71 in that fond (ed. khr. 821–823) is filled with hisemotional comments on the importance of the Realschulen for Russia.

50. See Rozhdestvenskii, S. V., Istoricheskii obzor … Ministerstva Narodnogo Prosveshcheniia, 1802–1902 (St. Petersburg, 1902), pp. 588592 Google Scholar. Also Sbornik postanovlenii po Ministerstvu Narodnogo Prosveshcheniia, 1865–70 (St. Petersburg, 1871), pp. 634–635, 1, 105, 1, 109–1, 111, 1, 270–1, 386 whereTolstoi's responsibility for educational policy in Poland was revealed to his contemporaries.

51. Freeze, Parish Clergy, p. 300.

52. Kulczycki, J. J., School Strikes in Prussian Poland, 1901–07 (Boulder, Colo.: East EuropeanMonographs, 1981), p. 15 Google Scholar.

53. Ibid., p. 16.

54. For an account of the Kulturkampf in Germany proper see Craig, Gordon A., Germany, 1866–1945 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1978), pp. 6978 Google Scholar; in Prussian Poland itself see Wandycz, Piotr S., The Lands of Partitioned Poland, 1795–1918 (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1974), pp. 228238 Google Scholar, and Hagen, William W., Germans, Poles, and Jews: The Nationality Conflict in the Prussian East, 1772–1914 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1980), pp. 120136 Google Scholar.

55. M. T. ov [Drahomanov], “Vostochnaia politika Germanii i obrusenie,” V.E., nos. 2–5 (1872).

56. Pavlyk, M., ed. Perepyska M. Drahomanova s Melitonom Buchyns'kym, 1871–77 (L'vov, 1910), p. 102 Google Scholar; 3 January 1872 as quoted in B. I. Rogosin, “The Politics of Mikhail P. Drahomanov” (Ph.D.diss., Harvard University, 1966), p. 282.

57. 17 October 1871, Perepiska (St. Petersburg, 1913) 5: 188.

58. 17 November 1871, ibid., p. 192.

59. Drahomanov, , “Vostochnaia politika,” V.E., no. 2 (1872): 640.Google Scholar

60. Ibid., p. 691.

61. D. Abramovych, “Z lystuvannia M. P. Drahomanova z O. S. Suvorinym,” Ukraina, no. 4 (1927); 129: May 1876, as quoted in Rogosin, “Politics of Mikhail P. Drahomanov,” p. 242.

62. V. D. “Noveishaia istoriia Avstrii,” V.E. nos. 1, 2, 4 (1866).

63. Spasowicz, V. D., “Polskie fantazii na slavianofil'skuiu temu,” V.E., no. 8 (1872): 741.Google Scholar

64. L. L. [Lopatinskii], “Varshavskie pis'ma,” V.E., nos. 2, 4, 7 (1873). For confirmation of hisidentity see Perepiska (St. Petersburg, 1912), 3: 382.

65. V.E., no. 4 (1873): 948.

66. Ibid., pp. 948 and 955.

67. P-ch. [Pavlovich], “Khronika. Pol'skaia pressa v 1871 g.,” V.E., no. 11 (1872): 421. For confirmation of his identity see Perepiska 5: 204.

68. KE.no. 11 (1872): 422.

69. Ibid., p. 427.

70. Lopatinskii, “Pis'mo,” V.E., no. 2 (1873): 934.

71. Ibid., p. 938.

72. Ibid., p. 934.

73. Naimark, History of the “Proletariat,” pp. 33 and 36.

74. In my discussion of Warsaw positivism, I am indebted to Blejwas, Realism in Polish Politics.

75. Ibid., pp. 72–73.

76. Lopatinskii, “Pis'mo,” V.E., no. 2 (1873): 934.

77. Ibid., p. 936.

78. Ibid., no. 4 (1873): 389.

79. Naimark, History of the “Proletariat,” p. 44.

80. Lopatinskii, “Pis'mo,” V.E., no. 2 (1873): 936.

81. 1 December 1872, Perepiska, 5: 204.

82. Arsen'ev, K. K., “Piatidesiatiletie Vestnika Evropy,” V.E. , no. 12 (1915): v.Google Scholar

83. Katkov, M. N., “Obzor del v Tsarstve Pol'skom za 1872 g.,” Moskovskie vedomosti, no. 5 (8 January 1873).Google Scholar

84. Katkov, M. N., “Druzheliubnoe raspolozhenie germanskikh gazet k Rossii,” Moskovskie vedomosti, no. III (5 May 1873).Google Scholar

85. [Lopatinskii], L. L., “Shchastlivyi brak—ocherki iz novogo romana Trollopa: John Caldigate,” V.E., no. 12 (1879): 663665.Google Scholar

86. See, for example, N. I. Kostomarov, “Petr Mogila pered sudom issledovatelei nashegovremeni,” V.E., no. 5 (1874) and “Kudeiar. Istoricheskaia khronika v trekh knigakh,” V.E., nos. 4–6 (1875); P.O. Kulish, “Pol'skaia kolonizatsiia iugo-zapadnoi Rusi,” V.E., nos. 3–4 (1874).

87. “Vnutrennoe obozrenie,” V.E., no. 9 (1877): 359–374. For confirmation of Polonskii's authorship of the anonymous surveys see L. A. Polonskii to M. K. Lemke, 15 August 1911, Institutrusskoi literatury (Pushkinskii Dom) (hereafter IRLI), f. 661, no. 879, list 1. For a complete list ofPolonskii's contributions to V.E. from January 1868 to February 1880 see Polonskii to Lemke, 2February 1912, IRLI, f 661, n. 879, listy 18–19 ob.

88. See their correspondence, IRLI, fond 293, opis” 1, ed. khr. 1144 (1 and 2): 1866–1875 and1876–1906.

89. Ibid. (2), list, 43, 24 August/5 September 1877.

90. Polonskii gave the example of a Polish nobleman who had been exiled in 1863 but petitionedto join the Russian army at the start of the Balkan War. He organized a cavalry unit and diedheroically in the fighting. Polonskii also referred to the presence of “thousands of Poles” in theRussian army at that time. “Vnutrennoe obozrenie,” V.E., no. 9 (1877): 363.

91. Ibid., p. 375.

92. Polonskii to Stasiulevich, 24 August/5 September 1877, IRLI, fond 293, optf 1, ed. khr. 1144 (2), list 43.

93. A. N. Pypin, “Panslavism v proshlom i nastoiashchem,” V.E., no. 9 (1878): 345.

94. Ibid., V.E., nos. 9–12 (1878).

95. Ibid., no. 9 (1878): 345, 347.

96. L. A. Polonskii to A. N. Pypin, GPBOr, fond 621, ed. khr. 677, list 27 ob. 12 January 1880.

97. Ibid., list 29, 14 January 1880. It should be noted that more than the Polish question impelled Pypin's desire for anonymity. Polonskii had broken with Stasiulevich on leaving Vestnik Evropy, and Pypin did not want to jeopardize his position with the journal by appearing to support Strana. SeePolonskii to Stasiulevich, 8 January 1880, IRLI, fond 293, opts” 1, ed. khr. 1144 (2), list 55 and Stasiulevich's reply, 9 January 1880, list 55 ob.

98. Pypin and Spasowicz, Istoriia slavianskikh literatur, pp. ii, xxiii–xxiv.

99. V. D. Spasowicz, “Markiz A. Velepol'skii, ego zhizn’ i politika v pol'sko-russkom konflikte ivoprose,” V.E., nos. 10–11 (1880).

100. Spasowicz had, moreover, been making the same attempt in Warsaw itself. In 1876 he lectured there on the minor romantic poet Wladyslaw Syrokmola (1823–1862) and praised certain themes in his poetry for “preparing the way for positivism” (Blejwas, Realism in Polish Politics, pp.126–127). Also, the scholarly journal Ateneum, which he founded in Warsaw in the same year, had a positivist orientation (Blejwas, Realism in Polish Politics, p. 126; Naimark, History of the “Proletariat”, p. 36). Spasowicz, V. D., Zhizri ipolitika markiza Velepol'skogo (St. Petersburg, 1882), 330 Google Scholar. This wasa one-volume edition of the articles that had appeared in Vestnik Evropy.

101. Pypin, A. N., “Pol'skii vopros v russkoi literature,” V.E., nos. 2, 4, 5, 10, 11 (1880).Google Scholar

102. Pypin, A. N., “Panslavism,” V.E., no. 9 (1878): 345.Google Scholar

103. Pypin, A. N., “Viacheslav Ganka,” in Moi zametki (Moscow, 1910), pp. 269312 Google Scholar.

104. See Chernyshevskii, N. G., “Natsional'naia bestaktnost'” in Polnoe sobranie sochinenii v 15-i tomakh (Moscow, 1939–1953) 7: 777 Google Scholar.

105. Burtsev, V., Za sto let, 1800–96 (London, 1897) 2: 44 Google Scholar.

106. Drahomanov, M., Istoricheskaia Pol'sha i velikorusskaia demokratiia (Geneva, 1882), p. 178 Google Scholar.

107. “P. A. Lavrovskii,” Russkii biograficheskii slovar’ (St. Petersburg, 1914), 10: 23–24.

108. Pypin to his parents, 24 December 1870, TsGALI, fond 395, apis’ 1, ed khr. 86, list 108.

109. Pypin, “Pol'skii vopros,” V.E., no. 11 (1880): 300, and no. 4 (1880); 709.

110. Pavlovich, , “Pol'skaia pressa,” V.E., no. 11 (1872): 421 Google Scholar; Pypin, , “Pol'skii vopros,” V.E., no. 11 (1880): 304 Google Scholar

111. Pypin, , “Pol'skii vopros,” V.E., no. 11 (1880): 304 Google Scholar; Pavlovich, , “Pol'skaia pressa,” V.E., no. 11 (1872): 421.Google Scholar

112. Pypin, , “Pol'skii vopros,” V.E., no. 4 (1880): 694 Google Scholar; no. 5 (1880): 251; no. 10 (1880): 700; no. 4 (1880); 700, no. 2 (1880): 722–723.

113. Annenkov to Stasiulevich, 12/24 February 1880, Perepiska 3: 379. Annenkov objected thatwhat is “intelligent and sensible is always timely. “

114. M. N. Katkov, “Russkoe obshchestvo nakanune pol'skogo miatezha,” Moskovskie vedomosti, no. 101 (10 April 1880).

115. Ibid. Katkov implied either Stasiulevich or Spasowicz, Spasovich as transliterated fromRussian. The first name was a misprint. He no doubt meant Kavelin (K—n) not Kostomarov (K—v).

116. Ibid.

117. Kostomarov, N. I., “Istoricheskaia monografiia iz istorii Malorossii, 1663–87,” V.E., nos.4–6, 8–9 (1879); nos. 7–9 (1880).Google Scholar

118. Stasiulevich to Pypin, 15 August 1881, GVBOr, fond 621, ed. khr. 832, list 9–10 ob. Forfuller discussion of this episode, see A. E. Pogorelskin, “Poriadok and the War Among RussianNewspapers in 1881,” Canadian-American Slavic Studies 17 (Summer 1983): 257–276.

119. Turgenev to A. N. Lukanina, 16/28 May 1881, Turgenev, I. S., Polnoe sobranie sochinenii i pisem v dvadtsati vos'mi tomakh (Moscow-Leningrad, 1968) 13: 89 Google Scholar.

120. Pypin, “Pol'skii vopros,” V.E., no. 11 (1880); 304.

121. Zaionchkovskii, P. A., Rossiiskoe samoderzhavie v kontse XIX stoletiia (Moscow, 1970), p. 59.Google Scholar

122. Pypin, “Pol'skii vopros,” V.E., no. 11 (1880): 300.

123. Ibid., no. 4 (1880); 709.

124. Pypin, “Panslavism,” V.E., no. 9 (1878): 345.

125. The quoted phrase was Lopatinskii's, in V.E., no. 2 (1873): 934.

126. Blejwas, Realism in Polish Politics, p. 119.

127. świętochowski, A., “Na straży,” Przegląd Tygodniowy, no. 2 (1873): 1011 Google Scholar, as quoted inBlejwas, Realism in Polish Politics, p. 94. Also see Blejwas, Realism in Polish Politics, p. 85.

128. Blejwas, Realism in Polish Politics, p. 98.

129. Pogorelskin, “Poriadok and the War Among Russian Newspapers,” pp. 268–271.

130. For a fuller discussion of Vestnik Evropy's liberalism see A. E. Pogorelskin, “Vestnik Evropy, 1866–94,” History of Russian Literary Journals (forthcoming).

131. Blejwas, Realism in Polish Politics, pp. 94, 106.

132. A. N. Pypin, Kwestia polska w literaturze rosyjskiej, ed. A. świętochowski (Warsaw: Prawda, 1881).

133. For a full discussion of its content see Blejwas, Realism in Polish Politics, pp. 141–145.

134. The paper was Kurjer Warszawska. See Blejwas, Realism in Polish Politics, pp. 143 and 264, n. 82.

135. For example, he encouraged contributors to Vestnik Evropy to write about Russian life forAteneum. Polonskii informed Stasiulevich: “in the latest issue of Spasowicz's Ateneum there is anarticle on the zemstvo written by me at Spasowicz's request and translated in Warsaw into Polish,” IRLI, /W293, opis” 1, ed. khr. 1144 (2), list 51 (5/17 July 1879). See also n. 100.

136. Blejwas, Realism in Polish Politics, p. 132.

137. The very name evoked the Russian government's much-hated term for the Congress Kingdom, Privislianskii Krai (the Vistula Land). Introduced some time in 1864, the term gained widecurrency among Russian officials by the early 1870s, much to the resentment of the Poles. See Pogodin, Istoriia pol'skogo naroda, p. 210.