The end of the 17th and beginning of the 18th centuries were marked by a number of reforms that transformed the pre-Petrine system of regional government, opening a new period in its historical development - a period that closed with the establishment of provinces in 1775. This period can be called transitional - from the fiscal and military administration of the 17th century. to the civil and public amenities management of the present time.
A series of reforms with which it opens: the separation of villages from cities in 1699 and finally in 1720, following the formation of magistrates; division of the empire into provinces in 1708 and finally in 1719, when the provinces were divided into provinces, provinces into counties. Thus, following these reforms, a ladder of administrative instances was established in the regional administration - provincial, provincial, district, city and rural administration.
Each of these authorities received its own structure. However, it should be noted that not in all the instances we have listed, the structure of government was outlined with equal clarity: the structure of government of the provincial, provincial and city was more defined, and much less so of the district and rural.
We have chosen as our task to trace the structure of the administration of the highest regional authority - provincial administration in the narrow sense - until the radical transformation of the entire system of regional administration by Catherine II on November 7, 1775.
We proposed to consider: the administrative division that was established at the beginning of the 18th century and existed before the reform of 1775; speaking about the structure of the provincial government, they proposed to outline the development of laws on governors and their comrades, on the structure of the provincial chancellery and the subjects of its department - judicial, police and financial affairs, on the procedure for supervising the provincial government - initially through fiscal officials, later through prosecutors. We consider it necessary to preface all this by considering those general principles that were gradually revealed in the regional administration of the 18th century, determining its structure.
Thus, our discussion naturally falls into three sections: 1) a general view of the development of regional government in the 18th century; 2) administrative division; and 3) the provincial government structure.
The main source for our discussion was the Complete Collection of Laws (vol. III - XX), which is almost the only source for studying the administration of the 18th century. The memoirs of contemporaries, such as Danilov and Bolotov, and the even more precious work of Radishchev, containing a lot of interesting data both for studying the social and for getting to know the governmental side of the 18th century, do not have the character of an undoubted source due to their unofficial nature alone.
Sh We stopped, therefore, at 18 vfkyo - an era of curiosity, filled with ourselves. lively interest. In the midst of the 18th century situation. our social mores were formed, the fundamental principles of our administrative system were developed, determining its unique structure; in the midst of the situation of the 18th century, the notorious heroes of Krutogorsk grew up and stocked themselves with everyday rules; In the midst of the situation of the 18th century, administrative centralization was developed and government guardianship was formed.
Under the influence of these new principles of our administration, the previous character of regional government was modified, new forms were introduced into everything: The fiscal and military character of the regional rulers of the 17th century was replaced by the civil and well-organized character of the rulers of later times - from the guardian of the interests of the treasury, the regional ruler was transformed into the owner and guardian of the province; the moving out hut was transformed into the provincial chancellery, from which the present chambers were made up; The not fully defined order of business proceedings was filled with a complex capler’s procedure. In the 18th century, most of the technical forms of administrative Forms were developed that exist to this day: we think, therefore, that for the correct formulation, for the satisfactory resolution of many technical issues that in recent times have become more and more likely to be caused by an increased social self-awareness - it is necessary to comprehensively study the 18th century.