104 REFORM OF RUSSIA'S FINANCES AND CENTRAL ADMINISTRATIONpopulation. The peaants were surely not happy about the increase in
the capitation (poll) tax which was ordered in 1811. Nor could the
small village traders relish the yearly turn-over tax levied in proportion
to the amount and nature of their trade. But the greatest outcry, and
the one best known to us, came from the nobility. The landowners had
been benefiting from the cheap money created by the assignats and
their tax exempted status. Now the assignats threatened to rise in
value, and in 1811 a temporary income tax was to be imposed on the
landowners. This tax was not very burdensome, for not only was it a
temporary emergency measure, it was also levied entirely on the basis
of uncontrolled, voluntary, individual self-assessments. The government
wanted to rely on the good faith and patriotism of the nobility.
Nonetheless, the nobility considered this measure as an infringement
of its privileges and as an effort on the part of an upstart minister
to lower its social and political prestige.
As the author of these measures - which complemented and im-
plemented the proposals contained in his Plan - Speransky became
an object of hatred for all those whose interests had been hurt or
privileges mfringed. Speransky had expected this reaction, for, as he
later wrote to Alexander I from exile, whoever introduces new taxes,
however necessary they might be, is never very popular. Someone,
though, had to do the job, and it fell to his lot to be the symbol of
these unpopular measures. But Speransky indignantly rejected the
accusation that the unpopularity of "his" fiscal decrees had under-
mined the people's loyalty to the Emperor and given rise to rebellious
feelings among the peasantry.l He was convinced that after a brief
period of murmurs and dissatisfaction, the people would become
aware of the advantages of the new policy. Unfortunately, the condi-
tions were such as to prevent the beneficial effects from manifesting
themselves rapidly. 2
In spite of its solemn promise not to issue any more assignats, the
government was forced to resort to this expedient again to meet the
cost of its military preparations on the eve of the war with Napoleon.
The maximum of 577 millions rubles of assignats in circulation, set
by a decree in the summer of 1810, could not be maintained. The in-
ternal loan on which Speransky had counted so much, met with but
temporary and limited success, as John Quincy Adams had to note
1 Speranskii, "Opravdatel'naia zapiska," Russkii Arkhiv (1892), pp. 67-68 and
letter to Alexander 1 from Perm' (Jan. 1813), in Shil'der, Imperator Aleksandr I,
1II, p. 522.
2 For what remained yet to be done, in Speransky's opinion, see his "Otchet v
delakh 1810 ... ", Sbornik IRIO, 21 (1877), pp. 452-455.