ORIGIN AND ORGANIZATION 29
the very basis of local government, destroying the bonds that were
supposed to connect it with the great mass of the people. Vital con-
siderations therefore seemed to demand a radical reform of the zem-
stvo franchise on non-class principles. Moreover, the problem had
arisen of changing the entire structure of the zemstvos themselves so
as to keep pace with their expanding functions.
According to the zemstvo statutes, the district zemstvo was the
lowest unit of local government. There were also, no doubt, smaller
administrative units, volost” and village community, representing
the organizations of the peasant class, but these were subordinated
directly to the control of the local officers of the central govern-
ment in matters of administration and police jurisdiction. Already
at the time of the emancipation of the serfs the question had been
raised of forming a lower unit of local government, in the shape of
a volost organization embracing all classes. And during the closing
years of the nineteenth century the question of establishing a volost
zemstvo was again broached. This time it was no longer a theoretical
discussion, but a very vital necessity, in view of the increasing com-
plexity of zemstvo activities and the need of enlisting the codpera-
tion of large sections of the population that had not shared in this
work heretofore. Yet the demands of the zemstvos were not heeded.
On the other hand, the elaborate character of the work carried on
by the zemstvos urgently required a certain amount of codrdination
and unification. But there, again, there were difficulties in the way;
for a law had been in existence since 1867 prohibiting zemstvos of
different provinces from communicating with each other “concern-
ing matters pertaining to the competence of the central government
or concerning questions which, under the law, are subject to the
jurisdiction of government departments.” The problem of establish-
ing an organization combining all the zemstvos had been discussed
intermittently at the zemstvo assemblies for years, but, just as in the
case of the volost zemstvos, it could not be solved in face of the stub-
born opposition of the Government. The only concessions obtained
prior to the Japanese War were the following: (1) In 1899 it per-
mitted several provincial zemstvos to combine to establish in the city
of Orel an organization for the collective purchase of farming im-
plements and machinery; and (2) in 1904 it authorized the pro-
" Volost—a small administrative unit comprising several village com-
munities.
