icals out of the movement. But on its most dedicated members it had the opposite effect; disappointment made them even more determined to find a strategy which would bring the system to its knees.
The solution adopted in 1878-9 was terror. It was argued by radical theorists that a campaign of assassinations against high government officials would accomplish two aims; demoralize and eventually grind to a halt the machinery of government, and at the same time demonstrate to the peasant the vulnerability of the monarchic system which he held in such awe. But once initiated, terror acquired a momentum of its own and its perpetrators quickly forgot their aims. Any sequence of daring suicidal acts, publicly committed - assassinations, bombings, self-immolations, hijackings - seems to produce a kind of resonance in some people who then become compulsively driven to re-enact it. Thesocialist-revolutionary terror, launched in 1878 and carried on for four years, kept on intensifying even after it had become apparent it would neither paralyse the government nor incite the peasants to rebel. In the end, it became terror for the sake of terror, carried out with impressive cunning and courage simply to prove that it could be done: a contest of wills between a tiny band of radicals and the whole imperial establishment.
As incidents of terror multiplied - and because of the very slight machinery for protecting government officials, they succeeded surprisingly often - the authorities were thrown into a state approaching panic. Although the actual number of terrorists at any one time was very small (the so-called Executive Committee of the People's Will, its whole effective force, had some thirty members), the psychology of an authoritarian regime is such that it tends wildly to over-react to direct challenges. In some respects, such a regime is like a commercial bank and its authority represents a form of credit. A bank keeps on hand only a small part of the capital entrusted to it by depositors - just enough to meet ordinary withdrawals - and the rest it invests. Depositors (those aware of the fact, at any rate) do not mind this practice as long as they are certain that whenever presented their claim will be fully honoured. But should a bank fail to meet even a single withdrawal demand, confidence in it is at once shattered, and depositors rush to reclaim their funds. The result is a bank run which forces the bank to suspend payments. An authoritarian state similarly succeeds in exacting universal obedience not because it has the forces required to meet all the possible challenges, but because it has enough of them to meet any anticipated ones. Failure to move decisively, producing a loss of prestige, invites multiple challenges and results in a kind of political bank run known as revolution.
In its eagerness to meet the threat posed by terrorism, the imperial government greatly over-reacted. It began to set in motion, sometimes overtly, sometimes secretly, all kinds of countermeasures, which in their
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totality strikingly anticipated the modern police state and even contained some seeds of totalitarianism. Betweeen 1878 and 1881 in Russia the legal and institutional bases were laid for a bureaucratic-police regime with totalitarian overtones that have not been dismantled since. The roots of modern totalitarianism, one may well argue, are sought more properly here than in the ideas of a Rousseau or Hegel or Marx. For while ideas can always beget other ideas, they produce institutional changes only if they fall on a soil well conditioned to receive them.
The imperial government's initial response to terror was to turn for assistance to the military. On 4 August 1878, a terrorist striking in broad daylight on a St Petersburg street knifed to death the Chief of Gendarmes. Five days later, the government issued a 'temporary' ruling - one of the many destined to acquire permanence - that from that time on armed resistance to government organs or assaults on government personnel while in performance of their duties would be tried by courts martial in accord with military statutes operative in wartime. The sentences required only the confirmation of the Chief of the local Military District. Thus, as far as terrorist activities were concerned, Russia was to be treated by its government as if it were occupied enemy territory. Even more far-reaching was a secret circular issued on 1 September 1878 (unpublished so far) detailing stiff preventive measures.14 These empowered members of the Corps of Gendarmes, and, in their absence, regular police officers, to detain and even exile administratively anyone suspected of political crimes. To exile someone under these provisions, the gendarmerie or police required only the approval of the Minister of the Interior and the Chief of Gendarmes; there was no need to request permission of the Procurator (Attorney General). The circular of 1 September marked in several important respects a major advance toward a police regime. Until that time, a Russian citizen actually had to commit a subversive act (verbal or written expression being included in that category) before being liable to exile. From now on, to suffer this fate it was enough for him merely to arouse suspicion. This measure put in place a second pillar of the police state; the first, set in 1845, had made it a criminal offence for a private individual to concern himself with politics; now he was treated as a criminal even if he only appeared likely to do so. Introduced here was the preventive element essential to the proper functioning of every police state. Secondly, die wide latitude granted to bureaucrats and policemen to sentence Russian citizens to exile entailed a diminution of the crown's authority. This was the first of several measures taken during diis critical time which (unintentionally, of course) distributed prerogatives previously exercised exclusively by the monarch among his subordinate officials. Finally, the right of functionaries to exercise judiciary powers without consulting the Procurator marked the
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beginning of a shift of judiciary prerogatives from the Ministry of Justice to the Ministry of the Interior.*
These extraordinary precautions did not inhibit the terrorists. In April 1879, yet another attempt was made on the life of the tsar, whereupon the government instituted in several major cities of the empire 'Temporary Governors General' whom it entrusted with wide discretionary powers over several contiguous provinces. These officials, usually drawn from the army, were authorized to turn over to military courts and to exile by administrative order not only persons suspected of harbouring designs against the government and its officials, but also those deemed prejudicial to 'peace and order' in general. In this manner another bit of authority was transferred from the crown to its subordinates.
Early in 1880, a revolutionary disguised as a carpenter succeeded in smuggling into the Winter Palace quantities of explosives which on 5 February he set off under the imperial dining room. Only the late arrival of the guest of honour saved Alexander 11 from being blown to bits. That terrorists should have been able to penetrate the imperial household demonstrated beyond doubt how inadequate were the existing precautions. Indeed, the Third Section was small, poorly subsidized, and ludicrously inefficient. In August 1880 it had on its payroll only seventy-two employees and even not all of those worked on political counter-intelligence. Much of its limited budget was used for counter-propaganda. There was gross confusion of competence between the Third Section, which functioned as part of the Imperial Chancellery, the Corps of Gendarmes which was under its jurisdiction as far as security operations were concerned but came under the Ministry of War in matters of military competence, and the regular police which served under the Ministry of the Interior.