The princess Elizabeth, second in the order of nomination, exhibited no desire to avail herself of the testament of her mother, although she was strongly urged to do so by Lestocq, her physician, preferring to enjoy the ease of a life unburdened by the cares of the state. In these circumstances the council, the senate, and the great officers of state assembled to consult upon the election of a successor to Peter II. Although the male line of the Romanovs was extinct in that sovereign, yet the female line was preserved in the three daughters of Ivan, the stepbrother of Peter the Great, and for some time a partner with him in the government. The eldest was separated from her husband, the duke of Mecklenburg; the second, Anna, duchess of Courland, was a widow living at Mittau; and the third was still unmarried, residing at St. Petersburg. The objection that was entertained against foreign alliances determined the senate to reject the claims of the first, and the choice consequently fell upon Anna Ivanovna.
ANNA IVANOVNA (1730-1740 A.D.)
From the time of the death of Catherine I the prejudice against foreigners had insensibly acquired weight amongst those influential persons who surrounded the throne. The Dolgoruki were the most active agents of this sentiment, through which they hoped at last to reap the largest share of profit themselves. Taking advantage of the jealousy in which the old aristocracy held their privileges, and apprehensive that the new sovereign might act upon the system of her immediate predecessors, they struck upon an expedient by which they hoped to deprive her of the power of exercising her own judgment, and to place her under the control of that irresponsible council which had been instituted by Catherine I. “The welfare of the nation,” said Galitzin, in an address to the assembly, “demands that the supreme authority and the unlimited power of the sovereign, by which Russia has suffered so much and which has been sustained chiefly by the influx of foreigners, should be circumscribed, and that the crown should be conferred upon the new sovereign under certain conditions.” This proposal was received with universal approbation, and the following conditions were unanimously agreed to:
That the empress should govern solely by the resolves of the high privy council; that she was not, of her own motion, either to wage war or make peace; that she could not, of herself, impose any new tax upon the people; that she could not dispose of any important office, nor inflict capital punishment on any nobleman, nor confiscate his estate, unless he had been previously convicted of the crime laid to his charge; that she should not alienate any lands belonging to the crown; and that she could not marry, or nominate an heir, without obtaining, in the first instance, the consent of the council. A strange article was added to these conditions—that her chamberlain, von Biren, should not accompany the empress into Russia.
These conditions, which were apparently intended to curb the tyranny of the throne, aimed at nothing more than the abolition of one description of despotism, for the purpose of substituting a worse in its stead. If it abrogated the supreme and unlimited power of the sovereign, it transferred that power to the secret council, which was thus elevated above the sovereignty and the senate and invested with a complete control over the administration of the public affairs. The proposed change was from an unlimited monarchy to an irresponsible oligarchy.
The drift of this capitulation was speedily detected by those whose interests it affected—the aristocracy. They saw that it concentrated the power of the state in the hands of seven persons; that the Dolgoruki had already possessed themselves of the voice of the council; and that the issue would be the sacrifice of the empire to a family contract. The capitulation, therefore, was scarcely passed when a powerful opposition was raised up against it; and the people, accustomed to the despotism of an unlimited sovereignty, from which, amidst all its severities, they had derived many valuable safeguards and benefits, declared that they preferred rendering obedience to one master instead of seven. This feeling rapidly spread amongst the guards, who had good reasons for objecting to a clause which would throw the patronage of the army into the hands of a few persons, who, instead of promoting the meritorious, would, as a matter of course, provide for their own friends and relatives.
Anna Ivanovna
(1693-1740)
Nor was the princess Anna insensible to the wrong which she suffered from this novel procedure; and, when the deputation from the council waited upon her to inform her of her election, and the conditions which were annexed to it, she would have refused to subscribe to the capitulation, had she not been already prepared by the advice of General Iagushinski as to the course she ought to pursue. That officer had previously recommended her to accept the conditions, but to revoke them immediately after she should be acknowledged as empress, assuring her, at the same time, that she would be powerfully supported in the proper quarter. She accordingly agreed to the demands of the deputation, and was crowned in the usual forms.