The October Manifesto and the birth of the duma

Across the empire, events during 1905 revealed how increasingly fragile the tsarist system had become under the weight of rapid industrialisation and social inequality.

On 22 January, a peaceful procession of workers, who were led by Father Georgy Gapon, marched to the Winter Palace in St Petersburg, intending to deliver a respectful petition to the tsar.

They carried religious icons, sang hymns, and called for shorter working hours, better pay, and an end to the war with Japan.

However, imperial troops opened fire without warning, killing at least 200 people, though some estimates placed the death toll at over 1,000, with more than 1,000 wounded.

Bloody Sunday quickly became known as the massacre and it effectively shattered public trust in the monarchy and led to strikes, riots, and armed revolts across urban and rural areas.

Soon after, workers had formed soviets in many cities, which coordinated protest activity.

For their part, the peasants had begun to seize land in some regions, and student groups had shut down universities to join the protests.

That same year, the Battleship Potemkin mutiny, which occurred on 27 June (14 June Old Style), provided a notable example of naval unrest.

Nicholas II attempted to restore order by removing reformist ministers and replacing them with hardliners, yet repression ultimately increased tensions. 

By late September, the empire had ground to a near halt because a general strike halted transport and trade, as food shortages and fuel crises began to affect daily life in several major cities.

St Petersburg became the primary centre of coordinated resistance. Workers there had by then formed the Soviet of Workers’ Deputies, led by Leon Trotsky, who was vice-chair and later chairman.

Alexander Parvus, who influenced events behind the scenes, increasingly began to issue political demands.

As a result, government ministries had largely stopped operating, and postal and telegraph services had stopped entirely, while, in Moscow, revolutionary groups had gathered weapons for a possible uprising.

As unrest intensified, Nicholas turned to Grand Duke Nikolai Nikolaevich to restore order, yet the Grand Duke refused to act unless specific political concessions were made.

Under pressure from all sides, the tsar recalled Sergei Witte, who had recently returned after he had negotiated peace with Japan.

Witte argued that the only way to avoid revolution was to establish legal reforms that would sufficiently satisfy liberal and moderate opinion without ending the monarchy.

An earlier attempt to offer compromise through the Bulygin Constitution in August proposed a purely advisory Duma, but it had failed to gain support and was never implemented. 

On 17 October 1905, the tsar issued the October Manifesto, which formally guaranteed basic civil rights and announced the creation of a State Duma with limited powers.

The manifesto explicitly promised freedoms of speech and conscience together with the right to assemble, along with a commitment that no law would be enacted without the Duma’s consent.

Importantly, this constituted the first time a Romanov ruler had formally accepted any limitation on his power.

Under Witte’s direction, the manifesto was framed as a moderate reform primarily intended to restore stability to society and preserve the monarchy.

Many liberal politicians, particularly the newly formed Constitutional Democratic Party (Kadets), led by Pavel Milyukov, welcomed the manifesto but demanded further changes, while radical socialist parties, including the Socialist Revolutionaries and Bolsheviks, condemned the document as a distraction designed to prevent revolution.

Their rejection indicated a growing split between reformist and revolutionary factions, which would later dominate Russian politics. 

Soon after, Witte had begun constructing the electoral system for the new Duma, as the franchise extended to adult men, yet property qualifications and indirect voting effectively ensured that landowners and the wealthiest classes retained greater influence than others.

Still, the elections of early 1906 drew participation from a wide range of society, and turnout exceeded 60 percent in several regions among eligible voters.

On 27 April the First Duma convened in the Tauride Palace in St Petersburg.

Delegates included lawyers, teachers, landowners, and notably a large number of peasant representatives.

Many delegates arrived with strong grievances and no desire to compromise, as the Kadets firmly demanded sweeping land reform, the removal of reactionary officials, and full legislative authority, while the more radical Trudoviks, drawn largely from peasant and labour backgrounds, pressed for immediate redistribution of land.

Nicholas was offended by the tone of the speeches and the Duma’s open criticism, so dissolved the chamber after just 72 days.

By this stage, Witte's political influence had largely faded, and he resigned shortly afterward. 

After the First Duma’s dismissal, the tsar sharply modified the electoral laws to reduce representation from workers and peasants.

Although the Second Duma, elected in 1907, returned with even more radicals and socialists, it too proved uncooperative and was dissolved within a few months.

Nicholas then approved changes that concentrated voting power among landowners and conservative groups.

The Third and Fourth Dumas, elected under these revised conditions, offered little resistance to the government and passed more legislation in cooperation with the monarchy.

However, the tsar continued to appoint his ministers without parliamentary consent, and the Duma held no control over military or foreign policy.

The 1906 Fundamental Laws were issued just before the First Duma convened and had already affirmed that the tsar retained supreme autocratic authority.

Article 87 in particular allowed him to issue emergency decrees when the Duma was not in session, though these were meant to be submitted to the Duma for later approval, a requirement that was routinely ignored.

As a result, it operated largely as an advisory assembly. Yet even within these constraints, the Duma provided at least a limited political platform that enabled emerging parties to refine their ideas and gain experience in legislative debate. 

During the First World War, the Duma persisted as an active body, although its authority remained largely limited until the tsarist regime collapsed under the weight of war and domestic failure.

On 12 March 1917, amid strikes and army mutinies in Petrograd, the Duma formed the Provisional Committee and positioned itself as a temporary alternative source of national authority.

Within days, Nicholas II abdicated, and the Provisional Government formed from the Duma's Provisional Committee, which had quickly positioned itself as a national authority after the monarchy's collapse.

The October Manifesto was first issued as a desperate compromise in the face of revolution and had effectively introduced the language of constitutionalism into Russian politics.

The tsar never intended to honour its full implications, but the document significantly changed public expectations about how the country was run.

The Duma’s creation failed to save the monarchy, as it notably changed politics in ways that would continue into the revolutionary upheaval of 1917 and later.