The_Legislative_Commission_Of_1767

The Legislative Commission Of 1767 The document was written by Sergei Solov’ev to describe the events taking place at the Legislative Commission held by Catherine during 1767. The purpose of the commission was to clarify the laws of the Russian state since laws had been put into effect previously, without the knowledge of many Russian citizens. In order to guide the Legislative Commission Catherine wrote a set of “Instructions” in July of 1767.[1] The Commission Catherine set up consisted of 580 deputies, including members of the nobility, townspeople, free peasants, and other social groups.[2] Catherine’s original intent was to take a step towards liberalism in forming the commission. Although Catherine’s “Instructions” was a very liberal document, in fact it was not liberal at all. In Catherine’s instructions she specifies that the “ruler of Russia is absolute”, then proceeding to say that any other power would not be able to operate with such effectiveness. By Catherine claiming absolute power in her Instructions, she was attempting to convey her political legitimacy to the Russian people. By telling them that there is no other form of government that would be able to do a better job than “the ruler of Russia” she is letting them know that she is commission, russian, nobility, catherine, legislative, status, military, each, order, noble, new, instructions, during, class, citizens, rank, population, old, concerns, catherine’s, achieving, able, views, through, take, since, should, set, servicemen, service, punishment, people, opinions, one, legislation, laws