Address of the Five

one of the liberal projects of reforms presented to Alexander II in September 1859 by members of the provincial committees A. M. Unkovskii (Tver’ Province), D. N. Khrushchov, A. G. Shreter (Khar’kov Province), D. V. Vasil’ev, and P. N. Dubrovin (Yaroslavl’ Province).

The address, composed by Shreter, put forth a program of bourgeois liberal reforms: the emancipation of the peasants with land for redemption payment; the formation of local elected economic and administrative organs composed of all estates; the establishment of trial by jury; the introduction of public trial; and so on. The Address of the Five criticized the project of the editing commissions for establishing large peasant allotments and low obrok (quitrent) rates. The address did not achieve its goal, and its authors received a reprimand in the name of the tsar. The address was published in G. A. Dzhanshiev’s book A. M.Unkovskii i osvobozhdenie krest’ian (1894).