M. STOLYPIN.

Dominion, Volume 2, Issue 458, 17 March 1909, Page 7

M. STOLYPIN.

' IN A CRITICAL CONDITION. (Nt TEI.EOIHI'II—I'KKSS ASSOCIATION—COPTHIOIIT.) St. Petersburg, March 15. M. Stolypin, the Russian Primo Minister, is in a critical condition. A DIFFICULT ROLE. M. Stolypin's policy has been the subject of the keenest controversy. The part he played in the suppression of this second Duma has been much criticised, but the severest of his critics has had to admit the extraordinary difficulty of the role ho has had to play in stamping out the revolutionary movement, without surrendering entirely to the reactionaries. By means or a moderate policy,. M. Stolypin has endeavoured to preservo something of the Constitution, .which, though. shorn of its original breadth, still constitutes the main hope of a Russian democracy.' Last year Mr. AV. T. Stead described the Russian Prime Minister as the equivalent of an English Whig. Peter Arkazhevich Stolypin was born in 1863, and is thus only 45 years of age. The son of a.popular general, he had a brilliant career at the University of St. Petersburg, and, after graduating in 1884, obtained an appointment at tho Ministry of the Interior. After two years he was transferred to the Ministry of Agriculture, whero he remained another two years, then retiring for a time into private life, and devoting himself to the management of his estate in Kovno Government. Ho served as Marshal of the District Nobility, President of the Arbitration Board, and Justice of .the Peace, and in 1899 became Marshal of the Provincial Nobility. He was appointed Vice-Gov-ornor of Grodno in 1902, Governor of Saratoff in 1903, and from Saratoff he was called to St. Petersburg to take up the portfolio of tho Interior. He was one of the few Ministers to ivhom the Duma was ready to listen. When M. Goremykin resigned in 1906, M. Stolypin sutceeded him as Premier, and was thanked by the Tsar for his services and appointed a member of the Council of the Empire on January 13, 1907. In 1908 he was given the rank of State Secretary. His life has several times been attempted.