Alexander I established the Fundamental Council

On March 30 (April 11), 1801 under the decree of Alexander I was established the supreme advisory body – the Fundamental Council.

Initially the Council included twelve persons – heads of the most important public institutions and authorized representatives of the tsar: Field-Marshal General N. I. Saltykov, Prosecutor General D. I. Troshchinsky, counts P. V. Zavadovsky, A. P. Vorontsov, P. A. Zubov and V. A. Zubov, etc.

The Council was charged with discussion of the most important state affairs and especially bills debate: ‘immutable state decrees’ and ‘temporary state decrees’, in other words it dealt with the issues of the current legislation. Besides the Council was authorized to develop draft reforms for the state at its discretion and submit them to the tsar.

The emergence of this body did not mean the limitation of the monarch power. The decree noted that the Council "has no interaction with the external, is not included in any disposition on the part of the executive ..., does not issue any orders on its behalf... has no power other than deliberative one". However, the highest titled nobility and the bureaucracy being part of the Council, made it quite influential. Thus, even before his coronation, Alexander I submitted to the Council a draft decree to ban the sale of the peasants without land. However, the Council disapproved the draft, fearing peasants’ unrest and resistance of the nobility, so the emperor was obliged to confine himself to just banning print ads on peasants’ sale in the newspapers.

This and other failures of collaborative reforms had led to the fact that from 1802 the emperor preferred to consider the most important questions of public administration in a circle of close associates and subordinates, without recourse to the Fundamental Council, which had lost its original meaning.

On January 1 (13), 1810 in accordance with the manifesto of Alexander I on establishment of the State Council, the Fundamental Council was completely abolished.

Lit.: Ерошкин Н. П. История государственных учреждений дореволюционной России. М., 1968; Кодан С. В. «Постановить силу и блаженство империи Российской на незыблемом основании закона…» Государственный Совет в России // ЧиновникЪ. 2002. № 102(17).

Based on the Presidential Library’s materials:

Alexander I (1777–1825) // The House of Romanov. The Zemsky Sobor of 1613: [digital collection];

Полное собрание законов Российской империи. Т. 26 (1800-1801). СПб., 1830. № 19806. С. 598.