Honorary Citizens (Estate)

All-imperial honorary citizenship should not be confused with the honorary citizenship of Russian cities. The latter, although not regulated by law, was very widespread. The title of honorary citizen of the city was awarded at the request of the City Duma and symbolized "an exceptional form of expression of gratitude and gratitude (...) to society for the activity for the benefit of the city, as well as a tribute to people who have special merits to the Fatherland" . Cities often granted this title to various persons known for their merits, but as an honorary title, he was not associated with any duties and was not related to this estate .

The historical predecessor of honorary citizenship was the estate of eminent citizens , singled out by Catherine II in the Letter of Merit of 1785 from the composition of urban inhabitants. They were freed from corporal punishment; they were allowed to have gardens, country yards, to ride in a carriage in pairs and four , it was not forbidden to start and maintain factories, plants, sea and river vessels.

January 1, 1807 (Art. 19) The highest manifesto, the title of eminent citizens was abolished for the merchants and preserved only for scientists and artists ^[1] . But due to the fact that membership in the merchants was determined only by an entry in the guild , even the most respectable merchant family, which for some reason was unable to declare capital (that is, was not assigned to one or another guild), was immediately transferred to the class of bourgeois or rural the inhabitants, and at the same time subject to recruitment , and a capitation salary, and corporal punishment.

This order of things prompted the Minister of Finance EF Kankrin back in 1827 to enter with the proposal to establish special honorary citizenship, which was carried out by the manifest on April 10, 1832 ^[2] .

The title of Honorary Citizen was abolished by the decree of the All-Russian Central Executive Committee and the Council of People's Commissars of November 11, 1917 "On the destruction of estates and civil ranks" ^[3] .

Honorary citizenship was of two kinds:

• personal , applicable only to the person and his wife;
• hereditary , belonging to all descending family members.

Acquisition

Both personal and hereditary were acquired in three ways.

By birth or adoption

Some categories of persons by birth:

• hereditary:
  • From June 11, 1845, children of personal nobles received hereditary honorary citizenship automatically.
  • children of Orthodox clergy, if the latter have completed a full course at an academy or seminary with known degrees,
  • children of Lutheran and Reformed preachers;
• personal:
  • children of clergymen who do not fit the above conditions,
  • children of the ranks of the highest Muslim Transcaucasian clergy,
  • from March 12, 1891, persons adopted by noblemen and hereditary honorary citizens.

Request for reckoning

Some people used the right to apply for admission to honorary citizenship:

• hereditary:
  • merchants - and manufactory advisers , their widows and children;
  • merchants who have been members of the first guild for 20 years or who have received a rank or order outside the service order ;
  • Persons who received at one of the Russian universities the academic degrees of a doctor or master;
  • since 1839, artists of the Imperial theaters and artists - by experience.
• The right to ask for personal honorary citizenship was acquired by education:
  • persons who have received a certificate of successful completion of a full course of study at Russian universities, or a certificate for the title of full student, or for a candidate’s degree;
  • pupils of commercial schools .

Appeal for honorary citizenship could also: Jews (by decree of the Emperor), since 1850 - " learned Jews under the governors"; since 1849 - doctors, pharmacists, agronomists, industrial engineers, veterinarians.

Assignment by Service or Special Representation

Personal honorary citizenship was counted among those who received the rank of XIV class and all the highest to the ninth or the ninth (or chief officer) class upon retirement.

Honorary citizenship could be acquired by special representations of the respective ministers. Awarding the title of personal honorary citizen could be requested to persons of all classes for the useful activities they performed in the public fields that lasted at least 10 years; the title of a hereditary honorary citizen could be claimed for persons who had been at least 10 years in the same fields with the title of personal honorary citizen.

Rights

Persons to whom an honorary citizenship was granted by virtue of birth, enjoyed the rights and advantages of this title without special approval; if they wanted to receive a certificate of honorary citizenship, they should have requested that the heraldry department of the Governing Senate . Applications for reckoning with honorary citizenship, personal or hereditary, were also filed here. The Senate issued certificates for hereditary honorary citizenship, and certificates for personal.

The special rights and advantages of an honorary citizen consisted of freedom from recruitment , from capitation , from corporal punishment , the right to be referred to in all acts as honorary citizenship, as well as to participate in elections for immovable property in the city and to be elected to city public offices.

The mere fact of belonging to honorary citizenship, personal or hereditary, still did not give the right to enter the civil service, while the sons of personal noblemen, clergy, and commercial advisers used this right by origin.

Loss

The law distinguished between the loss of rights of honorary citizenship (as a result of court sentences) and their restriction: the latter occurred, for example, when an honorary citizen entered into service for domestic work.

In 1840, there were 4,800 honorary citizens in the country, which made up only 0.1% of the country's urban population. By 1897, their number (together with family members) increased to 342,900 people (throughout Russia, including the Kingdom of Poland , but without Finland), but the share in the total population of the Empire remained small - 0.3%. The statistics of 1910-1912 give the number of honorary citizens, with family members, 372,400 people (0.5% of the population), of which hereditary - 197,300 people.

For example, in 1858 in Omsk there were 1489 honorary citizens of both sexes, both personal and hereditary, which accounted for 6% of the population ^[4] .

Historical Sources

Since 1847, hereditary citizens and personal nobles were recorded in the 5th part of the town philistine book and published in the St. Petersburg Senate Gazette. In the year this title was received by more than 2 thousand people. For example, in 1858 there were 21.4 thousand honorary citizens. Documents on honorary citizens are stored in the Russian State Historical Archive ( RGIA ) ^{[5] [6] [7]} .

• Eminent citizens
• Honorary Citizenship
• Honorable Sir
• Personal nobility

• Honorary citizenship // Brockhaus and Efron Encyclopedic Dictionary : in 86 volumes (82 volumes and 4 additional). - SPb. , 1890-1907.
• Belokrys A. Honorary citizenship in pre-revolutionary Russia (Neopr.) . Moscow Journal, No. 3 . mj.rusk.ru; archive.org (2005). - Inaccessible link replaced by archived . Date of treatment June 13, 2013. Archived June 13, 2013.
• Semenova A., Bely M., Sobachkin A. , Perov S., Mozaleva Z., Dachaeva H. Time to present orders. Almost all Russian regions rushed to establish local awards and honorary titles (neopr.) . New Izvestia . newizv.ru (February 6, 2008). Date of treatment June 13, 2013. Archived June 13, 2013.

• April 10, 1832 - The titles of Honorary Citizens for some categories of persons of non-noble origin were introduced in Russia // Calend.ru
• Personal and hereditary honorary citizens. The program "Russian Dynasties" (neopr.) . geno.ru (February 13, 2006). Date of treatment June 13, 2013. Archived June 13, 2013.
• Belousova L. Integration of Jews into the Russian estate society ... (neopr.) . Moriah, No. 5 . moria.hut1.ru (2006). Date of treatment June 13, 2013. Archived June 13, 2013.