298 PRO]EGrS FOR REFORMING THE PROVINCIAL ADMINISTRATION
pomeshchiks.^1 By stating this idea in rather extreme form, he dis-
regarded the important social and psychological fact that the peasants
believed that the land was theirs (or perhaps God's and the state's);
that it was theirs by virtue of the labor they had put into it to make
and keep it productive. This erroneous perspective prevented Speransky
from reaching the conclusion that, as a matter of right, the peasant
must be freed with all the land he is working. It is true, before 1812,
Speransky had advocated the freeing of the serf with land and had
argued against sale and emancipation without land. But even then he
had been satisfied in giving the peasant only a portion of the land he
worked. In any case, he did not concede to the peasant a legal or moral
right to the land but rather viewed the land grant as a favor or gift
given by the -nobility.
On the other hand, Speransky correctly understood the process which
had resulted in the intensification of serf relations from the 16th
century onwards. This process had taken place in two stages: first, the
peasant had been tied to the land, had b~come inseparable from it.
In the second place, he had lost his personal freedom; he had become
an "object" which could be disposed of independently from the land on
which he was settled and which he worked. 2 This evolution had largely
been the result of policies dictated to the state by its fiscal and military
needs, especially in the reigns of Peter the Great and of his successors.
For this reason, from the outset, the state could not take steps which
might stop or alleviate the harmful effects of this historical develop-
ment.^3 All of Speransky's descriptions and arguments concerning serf-
dom pertain only to the second stage. One has the distinct impression
that the first stage, i.e., the tying of the peasant to the land, did not
meet with his disapproval in principle. As a matter of fact, his concrete
proposals pointed to the reestablishment of the peasant in his earlier
status of glebae adscriptus, perhaps as a transitional phase.
In his historical and legal analysis, Speransky emphasized that serf-
dom was a perfectly legal and regular form of social relationships. He
explicitly denied that serfdom - even in its undesirable consequence
of personal slavery - was the outcome of abuses and illegal acts. What-
- Speranskii, "Opredelenie i ustroistvo krepostnogo sostoianiia," Pamiati, p. 846;
"Zapiska 0 krepostnom prave ... ," in P. Bartenev (ed), Deviatnadtsatyi vek, II
(1872), p. 160; d. also "Istoricheskoe obozrenie izmenenii v prave pozemel'noi
sobstvennosti ... ," in "0 zakonakh - Besedy grafa M. M. Speranskogo ... ,"
Sbornik [RIO, XXX (1881), pp. 45Off.
2 "Istoricheskoe obozrenie izmenenii v prave pozemel'noi sobstvennosti ... ," loco
cit., p. 464.
3 "Zapiska 0 krepostnom prave ... " loco cit., p. 160. Also, "Opredelenie i ustroistvo
krepostnogo sostoianiia," loco cit., p. 847.