colleges were added to deal with mining, estates, and town organization. Each college consisted of a president, a vice-president, four councilors, four assessors, a procurator, a secretary, and a chancellery. At first a qualified foreigner was included in every college, but as a rule not as president. At that time collegiate administration had found considerable favor and application in Europe. Peter the Great was especially influenced by the example of Sweden and also, possibly, by Leibniz's advice. It was argued that government by boards assured a greater variety and interplay of opinion, since decisions depended on the majority vote, not on the will of an individual, and that it contributed to a strictly legal and proper handling of state affairs. More bluntly, the emperor remarked that he did not have enough trustworthy assistants to put in full charge of the different branches of the executive and had, therefore, to rely on groups of men, who would keep check on one another. The colleges lasted for almost a century before they were replaced by ministries in the reign of Alexander I. Some prikazy, however, lingered on, and the old system went out of existence only gradually.
Local government also underwent reform. In 1699 towns were reorganized to facilitate taxation and obtain more revenue for the state. This system, run for the government by merchants, took little into account except finance and stemmed from Muscovite practices rather than Western influences. In 1720-21, on the other hand, Peter the Great introduced a thorough municipal reform along advanced European lines. Based on the elective principle and intended to stimulate the initiative and activity of the townspeople, the ambitious scheme failed to be translated into practice because of local inertia and ignorance.
Provincial reform provided probably the outstanding example of a
major reforming effort of Peter's come to naught. Again, changes began in a somewhat haphazard manner, largely under the pressure of war and a desperate search for money. After the reform of 1708 the country was divided into huge
The reign witnessed a strengthening of government control in certain borderlands. After the suppression of Bulavin's great revolt, the emperor tightened his grip on the Don area, and that territory came to be more closely linked to the rest of Russia. The cossacks, however, did retain a distinct administration, military organization, and way of life until the very end of the Russian empire and even into the Soviet period - as readers of the novels of Sholokhov realize. Similarly, after Mazepa's defection to Charles XII in Ukraine, the government proceeded to tie that land, too, more closely to the rest of the empire. For example, an interesting order in 1714 emphasized the desirability of mixing the Ukrainians and the Russians and of bringing Russian officials into Ukraine, buttressing its argument with references to successful English policies vis-a-vis Scotland, Wales, and Ireland.
The change in the organization of the Church paralleled Peter the Great's reform of the government. When the reactionary patriarch Hadrian died in 1700, the tsar kept his seat vacant, and the Church was administered for over two decades by a mere
Synod, was appointed to see that that body carried on its work in a perfectly legal and correct manner. Although the new arrangement fell under the conciliar principle widespread in the Orthodox Church and although it received approval from the Eastern patriarchs, the reform belonged - as much as did Peter the Great's other reforms - to Western, not Muscovite or Byzantine, tradition. In particular, it tried to reproduce the relationship between Church and state in the Lutheran countries of northern Europe. Although it did not make Russia Byzantine as some writers assert, nor even caesaropapist - for the emperor did not acquire any authority in questions of faith - it did enable the government to exercise effective control over Church organization, possessions, and policies. If Muscovy had two supreme leaders, the tsar and the patriarch, only the tsar remained in the St. Petersburg era. The Holy Synod and the domination of the Church by the government lasted until 1917.
Peter the Great's other measures in the religious domain were similarly conditioned by his general outlook. He considered monks to be shirkers and wastrels and undertook steps to limit ecclesiastical possessions and eventually to control ecclesiastical wealth. On the other hand, he tried to strengthen and broaden Church schools and improve the lot of the impoverished secular clergy. As one might expect, the reformer exhibited more tolerance toward those of other denominations than had his Muscovite predecessors, on the whole preferring Protestants to Catholics. In 1721 the Holy Synod permitted intermarriage between the Orthodox and Western Christians. The emperor apparently felt no religious animosity toward the Old Believers and favored tolerance toward them. They, however, proved to be bitter opponents of his program of reform. Therefore, the relaxation in the treatment of the Old Believers early in the reign gave way to new restrictions and penalties, such as special taxation.
An evaluation of the total impact of Peter the Great's administrative reforms presents certain difficulties. These reforms copied and adapted Western models, trying to import into Russia the best institutions and practices to be found anywhere in Europe. Efforts to delimit clearly the authority of every agency, to separate powers and functions, to standardize procedure, and to spell out each detail could well be considered revolutionary from the old Muscovite point of view. On the surface at least the new system seemed to bear a greater resemblance to Sweden or the German states than to the realm of the good Tsar Alexis. The very names of the new institutions and the offices and technical terms associated with them testified to a flood of Western influences and a break with the Muscovite past. Yet reality differed significantly from this appearance. Even where reforms survived - and sometimes, as in the case of the local government, they did not - the change turned out to be not nearly as profound as the emperor had intended. Statutes, prescriptions, and precise
rules looked good on paper; in actuality in the main cities and especially in the enormous expanses of provincial Russia, everything depended as of old on the initiative, ability, and behavior of officials. The kormleniia could be abolished, but not the all-pervasive bribery and corruption. Personal and largely arbitrary rule remained, in sum, the foundation of Russian administration; all the more so because despite the reformer's frantic efforts the new system, which was much too complicated to be discussed here with anything approaching completeness, lacked integration, co-ordination, and cohesion. In fact a few scholars, such as Platonov, have argued that the administrative order established by Peter the Great proved to be more disjointed and disorganized than that of Muscovite Russia.
The difficulty of transforming Russian reality into something new and Western becomes even more evident when we consider Peter the Great's social legslation and his overall influence on Russian society. Before turning to this topic, however, we must mention briefly the emperor's financial policies, for they played an important and continuous part in his plans and actions.
Peter the Great found himself constantly in dire need of money, and at times the need was utterly desperate. The only recourse was to squeeze still more out of the Russian masses, who were already overburdened and strained almost to the breaking point. According to one calculation, the revenue the government managed to exact in 1702 was twice, and in 1724 five and a half times, the revenue obtained in 1680. In the process it taxed almost everything, including beehives, mills, fisheries, beards, and bath houses; and it also extended the state monopoly to new items. For example, stamped paper, necessary for legal transactions, became an additional source of revenue for the state, and so did oak coffins. In fact, finding or concocting new ways to augment government funds developed into a peculiar kind of occupation in the course of the reign. Another and perhaps more significant change
