The Role of the State Apparatus in the Development of Factory Legislation in the Russian Empire in the 19th and Early 20th Centuries

The article analyzes the problems of the causes of the genesis of Russian labor legislation. As a premise of the study, a hypothesis is asserted about the insufficient objectivity of the established in the Soviet era ideas about the labor movement as the only reason for the consolidation of legal norms on hired labor in the 19th century. The concept of public legal consciousness is put forward as at least an equivalent reason for the emergence of factory legislation. In the general national legal consciousness, a key role is assigned to the views and attitudes of the political elites of the Russian Empire. With reference to archival data, publications of the 19th and early 20th centuries, scientific works provide facts confirming the role of the state apparatus in the formation of a compromise labor legislation. The traditional idea of Soviet science that the state apparatus of the Russian Empire adhered to negative protective views on the adoption of factory laws is refuted. Already at the beginning of the 19th century, among the highest administrative circles of the empire, ideas about the legislative delineation of the interests of workers and employers were publicly voiced. By the last quarter of the 19th century the apologetics of pro-labor laws in the political elites had a pronounced, stable character. Active supporters of the consolidation of workers’ rights were representatives of both the highest and middle administrative levels (ministers, governors, senators, representatives of the gendarmerie). A special role in the development of labor legislation belonged to ministers N.Kh. Bunge, S.Yu. Witte. At the level of regional authorities and the gendarmerie, there was open opposition to employers’ abuses in relation to workers. In general, it is concluded that civil servants in their most progressive part acted as the general driving force for the legalization of labor relations, opposing the conservative convictions of entrepreneurs.