without power a century earlier (engineers, women, priests, officers) by the 1860s had gained important voices in shaping Russia (Freeze 102). Cracraft offers a less sanguine assessment of Russia after the reforms: "Politically the Russian Empire remained . . . a top-heavy autocracy, with all executive, legislative, and judicial power concentrated in the hands of the emperor" (Cracraft 313).
Not surprisingly, the period of reform was one of turbulence and confusion. The emancipation of the serfs signaled not only radical change for the serfs, but also for the nobility which accepted the need for emancipation but rejected the specifics of its implementation. One spokesman for the nobility declared, "We sincerely admit that we ourselves do not understand the Statute [of Emancipation]" (Freeze 104). The nobility apparently saw the writing on the wall with respect to emancipation of the serfs. Serfdom was an institution doomed by its inhumanity: "The worst evil of the system was that serfs, like slaves, had no civil rights and were without redress, totally subject to the arbitrary will of their owners" (Massie 288). However, the nobility did everything they could to minimize the impact of that reform and others on themselves (Cracraft 314). Nevertheless, even without the resistance and manipulation of the nobility, the implementation of the plan to free the serfs was fraught with perils. For example, a crucial part of the plan was the granting of land to the serfs, but the poor condition of the national economy made such a massive program virtually impossible. Nevertheless, attempting it was absolutely necessary, as was some form of payment to the landowners: "Emancipation without reimbursement meant ruin for the landlord; emancipation without land, ruin for the peasant." Massi
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