Chief Justice White Is in the Act of Administering the Oath of Office to the President Before a Vast

Audience

R

USSIA experienced during the four

days of March 8-11, 1917, the most dramatic and effective political upheaval in recorded history. The Romanoff dynasty, which had ruled the nation for more than 300 years, was completely overthrown, as in the twinkling of an eye. The most absolute autocracy in the civilized world crumbled and fell almost without a struggle, and was replaced by a modern democratic Government without serious loss of life. The new régime set up by the people is pledged to extremely advanced ideas of liberalism and democracy, including universal suffrage.

The news of the revolution came upon the world outside of Russia with startling suddenness on Friday, March 16. There were intimations two days earlier that some political crisis was at hand, but they were so meagre and fragmentary that they gave no clue to the stupendous nature of the change in progress. It was on March 16 that the Provisional Government issued its Appeal to the People, and this act may be accepted as the beginning of the established career of the new régime.

For weeks all the news from Russia had indicated a state of unrest, dissatisfaction and imminent crisis. There were evidences of gross mismanagement in the distribution of supplies, the transport system was faulty, the munitions supply irregular, the hospital service subject to constant criticism. Finally food in the cities became so short that prices rapidly mounted to prohibitive figures, and the poorer classes were on the verge of starvation. Previous to these conditions there was a general feeling, which gained strength every day, that a certain clique or camarilla of the nobility and ruling classes was traitorous and proGerman, intriguing to have Russia desert the Allies and effect a separate peace. In November, 1916, Professor

Paul N. Milukoff, the present Minister of Foreign Affairs, and one of the leaders of the revolution, delivered a speech in the Duma in which he denounced the Prime Minister, Stürmer, as a pro-German and a traitor to Russia, and intimating that the Premier had betrayed his country for German gold. This speech, though its publication was forbidden in Russia, leaked out and produced a profound sensation. The Trepoff-Protopopoff Ministry, which succeeded, was at first supposed to be liberal, but it soon became even more reactionary than its predecessor, and hints were freely circulated that it was corrupted by Germany and intended to betray the country. In fact, charges were openly made in the Duma early in March that the failure of the army administration was intended to impede the progress of the war, and that the shortage of food in the great cities was a deliberate plot of the Government to inflame the masses so that they would demand a separate peace.

This was the critical situation of affairs on March 8, when a group of workingmen in Petrograd decided on a general strike and began manifestations of discontent against the shortage of food.

For weeks there had been protests and threats of a general strike, but it was the opinion of the liberal leaders in the Duma that, despite the wretched state of affairs, an open revolution was impossible, as the country realized that a revolution would seriously interrupt the work of the war and would be playing into the hands of those who had this very end in view.

Open letters were printed in the Petrograd newspapers from popular Duma leaders, and proclamations were posted in the streets, urgently begging the population not to create demonstrations or cause disorders which might lead to interruption of the manufacture of muni

tions or paralyze the industrial activity of the city.

People at Last Convinced

Manifestations already arranged for March 6, including a general strike and the marching to the Duma of a deputation of workingmen, were in this way averted. But the moment was only postponed. The people, who were convinced that they were being exploited by a hostile clique, received what they regarded as the last proof of the inefficiency and corruption of their own Government when they were apprised that the already insufficient supply of food had become still more meagre and that for some days it would be necessary to go without bread altogether.

Patient and long suffering by nature, this was too much for the population of Petrograd, who knew that the interior of Russia was stored with immense quantities of grain and all kinds of provisions, and, without other motive at first than to voice a demand for bread, the people paraded the streets, and this demonstration was the spark that started the conflagration.

The unrest at first expressed itself in an unusually mild manner, without excitement and with no indication of revolutionary intent, but merely as an insistent demand for a vigorous solution of the food problem.

The Duma meanwhile was actively debating the question, and the majority received with ill-concealed irritation the statements and explanations of the Minister of Agriculture.

On the 10th General Chavaloff, commander of the Petrograd district, issued a proclamation forbidding all assemblies in the streets and warning citizens that the troops had been authorized to use their arms or any means to preserve order in the capital. On the 11th the Czar put the match to the powder train by issuing two ukases suspending the sittings of the Russian Duma and Council of the Empire. This was the final stroke, and the revolution soon came full grown into being.

Michael V. Rodzianko, President of the Duma, a man of strong force and firm conviction, realized that a serious blun

der had been committed, and telegraphed the Czar that the hour had struck. The Duma unanimously decided that it would not dissolve. The Imperial Council, realizing the gravity of the situation, added its appeal that the Emperor should hearken to the demands. of the people. The Emperor, who was absent from Petrograd, hastily started back to the capital, but it was too late.

How the Flood Broke

The story of the upheaval as related by accredited correspondents is as follows:

The most phenomenal feature of the revolution was the swift and orderly transition whereby the control of the city passed from the régime of the old Government into the hands of its opponents.

The visible signs of revolution began on Thursday, March 8. Strikes were declared in several big munitions factories as a protest against the shortage of bread. Men and women gathered and marched through the streets, most of them in an orderly fashion. A few

bread shops were broken into in that section of the city beyond the Neva, and several minor clashes between strikers and police occurred.

Squads of mounted troops appeared, but during Thursday and Friday the utmost friendliness seemed to exist between the troops and the people.

This early period of the uprising bore the character of a mock revolution, staged for an immense audience. Cossacks, charging down the street, did so in a half-hearted fashion, plainly without malice or intent to harm the crowds, which they playfully dispersed. The troops exchanged good-natured raillery with the working men and women, and as they rode were cheered by the populace.

Long lines of soldiers stationed in dramatic attitudes across the Nevsky Prospect, with their guns pointed at an imaginary foe, appeared to be taking part in a realistic tableau. Machine guns, firing rounds of blank cartridges, seemed only to add another realistic touch to a tremendous theatric production which was using the whole city as a stage.