The constitutional project by M.T. Loris-Melikov: preconditions and implications

The formation of the Russian Parliament was a multi-step, controversial, dramatic process in the conditions of the tsarist autocracy, and in the Soviet period of our history. The tsarism did not need real legislative power, so the projects by S.E. Desnitsky (1768), M.M. Speransky (1809), N.N. Novosiltsev (1820) and M.T. Loris-Melikov (1881) on creating the Parliament in the Russian Empire were rejected for a variety of reasons. As a result, Russia has lagged behind in state and public development. This article suggests a brief analysis of the content of one such project, entitled “The Constitution of Loris-Melikov”, unrealized project of the political reform proposed by the Minister of internal Affairs, count M.T. Loris-Melikov for the consideration by Emperor Alexander II in January, 1881, at the end of an era of great transformations.