31 1824 October, the
В Tiflis (Tbilisi), was born into a noble family of Armenians Mikhail Loris-Melikov — military leader, statesman. Author of the draft constitution. "The Velvet Dictator."
I view the support of society as the main force that can assist the authorities in restoring the correct course of state life, from the interruption of which the interests of society itself suffer the most.
My father was a merchant and did business with Leipzig. In 1836 he sent his son to the Moscow Institute of Oriental Languages, but he was soon expelled for petty hooliganism.
From 1841 he studied at the cavalry school in Petersburg, lived in the same apartment with Nikolai Nekrasov.
In 1847, at 23, he went to the Caucasian War. He fought against the highlanders in Chechnya и Dagestan, He received several awards and two golden sabers "For Bravery." At 32, he was promoted to major general. He was the commander of troops in Abkhazia, skillfully managed the territories entrusted to him, and had a brilliant military career under Alexander II.
In 1877, at 53, he conducted several successful operations in the Russo-Turkish War and received the title of count. At 54, he left military service for civilian life. He opened a business with his own money. Vladikavkaz vocational school.
At 55, during the plague epidemic, he led Saratov, Samara и Astrakhan Governorates-General. He managed to contain the spread of the epidemic, and spent only 300 of the 4 million rubles allocated to him.
He was appointed as the Kharkiv Governor-General in place of the prince killed by terrorists. Dmitry Kropotkin. He avoided harsh repression, earned the respect of the locals, and the Narodnaya Volya members did not even include him on their “execution” list.
In 1880, after the terrorist attack on the Winter Palace, he was summoned to St. Petersburg to fight the revolutionary movement.
Whatever the government, we have to make Russian history with this government, and not copy it from England.
He headed the Supreme Administrative Commission, which granted him broad powers. He served as temporary head of the "Third Section" (the secret police). He organized foreign intelligence and Senate audits throughout the empire, revealing that people were dissatisfied with the incompleteness of the tsar's reforms.
In the last months of the reign of Emperor Alexander II, he held the post of Minister of Internal Affairs.
In 1880 he survived an assassination attempt.
The bullet slid across the coat, tearing it in three places.
(eyewitness)
The student who shot Loris-Melikov was later executed.
He proposed to the Tsar a program of liberal reforms – the “Loris-Melikov Constitution,” also known as the “dictatorship of the heart.”
If these are the words of a dictator, then it must be acknowledged that his dictatorship is a dictatorship of the heart and mind. It inspires not fear, but trust, since it is not based on material force.
(Voice newspaper)
The main ideas included broad freedoms for zemstvos and cities, tax and passport reforms, a progressive income tax, a reduction in redemption payments for former serfs, optimization of the bureaucracy, and freedom of the media.
I wish him all the best, all the success. God forbid if they turn back to the old road.
(Fedor Dostoevsky)
In early 1881, Emperor Alexander II approved the project, but was assassinated by a terrorist shortly thereafter.
Little of Loris-Melikov's proposal was actually achieved: the excise tax on salt and capitation taxes were abolished, and redemption payments were reduced.
During the 16 months that he headed the Ministry of Internal Affairs, 32 political trials were held in Russia and 18 death sentences were handed down to members of the People's Will. However, the assassination of the emperor, as he believed Alexander III and Chief Prosecutor Pobedonostsev, Loris-Melikov “missed the mark” (although he persistently recommended that Alexander II temporarily refrain from traveling around the capital).
All the Romanovs are not worth a penny, but they are necessary for Russia.
(from a private conversation between Loris-Melikov and Admiral Ivan Shestakov)
Alexander III did not continue his father's work and rejected the course of liberal reforms. After this, Loris-Melikov resigned and moved to France.
For the St. Petersburg bureaucracy, my "I" will remain far from known. Raised on different principles, I could not be infected with their disease.
He died in 1888, at 64, in Nice.
