Bureaucratic obstacles on the path of Russian thought

2024 Author: Seth Attwood | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-16 15:55

In the middle of the 19th century, a lifetime monument to the "inventor" of the electromagnetic telegraph was erected in the central park of New York. Monument to the artist Samuel Morse, a man by profession, very far from technology and electricity, who patented in 1837 a device that transmits signals over long distances, with which he also equipped the Washington-Baltimore experimental line in 1844.

How many Russians, even with the exception of scientists, know that the first electric telegraph was invented in Russia by Baron Schilling? Usually the honor of this discovery is attributed to the American S. Morse, although in reality, the latter only improved the electromagnetic telegraph with mechanical devices and received for this in 1868 in Paris an international award of 400 thousand francs. Since then, Morse is revered as the inventor of the telegraph.

Earlier, the discovery of the telegraph was attributed to the Englishman Cook, who did not even understand the structure of the apparatus invented by Schilling.

Schilling built the world's first electromagnetic telegraph in the early thirties, he openly demonstrated his devices at the lectures of the Society of Naturalists. It was visited in 1835 by the emperor Nikolai Pavlovich, who wrote on a sheet of paper: "Je suis charme d'avoir fait ma visite & Schilling". ("I am fascinated to have visited Schilling"). This was the first unmistakably telegraphic message! Unfortunately, this autograph, mentioned in many foreign publications and which Academician Hamel saw back in 1869, has sunk into oblivion.

Professor of physics at the University of Heidelberg Munke, brought from St. Petersburg one copy from Schilling's devices to his place and demonstrated it in his lectures. From one of the students, Gopner, the Englishman William Cook, who studied the manufacture of anatomical preparations, learned about this wonderful device, was carried away by his idea and, abandoning all his studies, built the same device and went with it to England, where he promoted it. In May 1837 he met with Professor Wheatstone, and from that time on the introduction of the telegraph began in England. In taken by Cook and Wheatstone privilege only says on the improvement of the device, who was with Professor Munke (!).

This is the fate of the Russian invention. Originally recognized " authoritative commission "" absurdity ”, And soon foreigners took advantage of the new idea, while the real inventor got only oblivion and almost complete obscurity.

Regardless of this, Schilling has the honor of inventing cables and overhead conductors for the telegraph, which caused a wave of laughter in the "authoritative commission": how is it to entangle the earth with wires !?

The German edition: "Electro-Magnetic Telegraph" 1867 says: "It is necessary to recognize not only that Baron Pavel Lvovich Schilling von Kanstadt has great services in telegraphy, but also that the honor of inventing the telegraph belongs to Russia." In the middle of the 19th century, this was already recognized in Germany, Austria and France, and the entire history of Schilling's invention was documented, while in Russia, the name of the Russian inventor remains a secret and is almost unknown to the modern world.

A few more pages from unrealized Russian ideas:

The Academy of Sciences awarded the V. N. Moshnin on physics to I. F. It should be noted that this discovery was made by Mr. Usagin in 1872 and at the same time was published by in the magazine "Electricity". Then Mr. Usagin did not have the means to properly exploit his invention, and in 1873 the foreigners Golar and Gibs announced their discovery of the transformation of currents, while the priority in this discovery belongs to IF Usagin.

The craftsman of the Tula plant Petrov in 1876, invented a rifle that was significantly superior to the one produced at that time, the Berdan rifle; during tests, the new rifle hit the target at a distance of 1200 arshins (850 meters), and Berdan's bullet barely reached and fell, losing strength. The cost of manufacturing a Petrov rifle during production did not exceed 10 rubles, while the production of a licensed Berdan cost 32 rubles.

As the "Zemledelcheskaya Gazeta" informs for 1877, there is a Russian invention - the winnowing fan of Mitrofan Andreyevich Antonov, which in its simplicity (it can be made by every carpenter), strength, cheapness and speed in work far surpasses all foreign winnowing machines. The author of the note testifies that he himself tested and gives the address of the inventor: Art. Gavrilovka, Kursk-Azov railway etc.

The Russian people already then gave the world a number of great scientists, inventors, technicians who discovered new ways of scientific and technical development. However, both scientific work and technical discoveries almost did not find industrial application within the country. Why did the authors of many inventions not formalize their priorities and did not seek to obtain patents for them?

High fees charged by the state for the grant of a patent. Using all the funds to purchase books and instruments, the late Baron Schilling left no money behind him even for a funeral. Relatives buried him at their own expense.

Requests for a patent are resolved by the Minister of Finance or Agriculture, or State Property, while a duty of 90 to 450 rubles is collected. A patent is issued for a period of 5 or rarely 10 years, with one small condition: if within a third of this period, the invention is put into service, the patent is terminated.

The largest Russian chemists - Mendeleev, Zinin, Menshutkin, Butlerov, Kucherov and others - created the basis for a deep technical revolution with their discoveries. But the great Mendeleev tried in vain to interest the predatory "racial" capital with his brilliant technical foresight and projects for the development of Russian industry, the study and use of the natural resources of Russia; all these projects ran into a blank wall of indifference and inertia, drowned in the jungle of bureaucratic offices.

The remarkable Russian chemist Zinin was the first to synthesize aniline, opened a new era of organic synthesis for the chemical industry, the possibility of obtaining aniline dyes, medicines, aromatic substances, and explosives from coal tar. However, Zinin's attempts to organize the production of aniline dyes in tsarist Russia were met only with ridicule and mockery. The scientist received 30 rubles for scientific work. a year (!), conducted his experiments in an unequipped basement. His discoveries were used by the British and especially the German chemical industry, which created a number of new branches of production of enormous economic and military importance.

Engineer of Ways of Communication I. A. Karyshev and his brother, A. A. Karyshev, applied to the Imperial Russian Technical Society with a statement about the development of a submarine project by them and asked the Council of the Society to consider this project. The project involved the immersion of the device with a crew of 11 people to a depth of 1200 feet, at a speed of 15 versts per hour, and to remain at the said depth, without surfacing and without harm to people trapped in it for 12 hours.

Further history showed that in Germany, during the First World War, there were 372 submarines of this type, of which 178 died, but they sank 5708 ships, of which 192 were military. And if the implementation of this project had taken place in Russia in the 1890s, then there would have been no Tsushima, Port Arthur and … the shameful peace with Japan. However, even this greatest invention of the 19th century stumbled upon a blank wall of deadly bureaucracy in tsarist Russia.

In historiography, there is an opinion that since the time of Peter I, trade, industry, foreign policy, even the domestic economy of Russia were under the direct leadership of foreigners. This is only partly true! Yes, Emperor Peter cut a window. Through that window, he brought the light of knowledge, enlightenment and science into his homeland. He invited scientists and experienced people. He sent Russian youth to Europe to study. He himself went there to study.

But Peter, as a great patriot, ordered people knowledgeable - to teach the mind to the mind of their dark - subjects, but these teachers clearly, accurately and definitely knew that they intended only to teach, not to dominate … They were teachers, but not bosses. Trained and down with. Russians in Russia were both the people and the government, and foreigners mercenaries.

Peter was gone, and things took a different turn. All these Swedes, Germans, French and others took Russia into their tenacious hands and began to command it as their property. Now all of Russia is enslaved. Remember Biron, Minich, Osterman … What was the position of our princes, boyars and nobles? What kind of Russian originality could there be! …

True, soon a lot of arrogance was put down, these crooks, nevertheless, these natives retained their special position even up to the XX century. Very often they surrounded the tsars with an impenetrable ring and did not allow any of the Russians to the throne …

Russian princes, boyars and honorable servicemen were, if not pushed aside, then often far from in the honor that they deserved. They had to be more restrained and more careful in their thoughts and feelings, for the favorites at the court were proud, power-hungry, self-confident, if not impudent foreigners.

Take the administration, for example. The highest positions were occupied mainly by foreigners who treated Russia at least contemptuously, while the lower administrative positions were occupied, albeit by Russians, but liberals, cosmopolitans, who disdained “ leavened patriotism"… The official spheres developed an" official "and treated the" Russian man "with contempt.

According to the Berezin encyclopedia of 1876, volume 3 / 3, page 660:

Many of the Russians traveled abroad and almost all of them were negatively influenced by the “abroad” in a national sense. The more stupid, seeing the culture, luxury and conveniences abroad, returned home with contempt and disgust for everything Russian. They came home only to collect crumbs of money from the same Pithecanthropus and return again abroad. Others understood the science and enlightenment of the West, appreciated it, made it the ideal for their homeland, but they treated their homeland and their relatives either indifferently and indifferently, or with the intention of eradicating everything Russian and imposing foreign statutes and rules.

The basis of the patent law in Russia was the German Patent Law, which monopolized the granting of patents in the interests of state protection of monopolies. But in Russia this law played the role of a brake, to be more precise, the role of economic betrayal. Disbelief in Russian thought, the incompetence of ministerial officials at the Department of Trade and Manufactures, who make up the selection committee, hampered the development of science and technology, stifled education and culture, retarded the growth of productive forces, and doomed the great people of Russia to a shameful lag behind other countries.

This can be clearly demonstrated by the statistics of the customs authorities of Russia. More than 800,000 foreigners arrive in Russia annually during the period from 1879 to 1882, in the previous decade, up to 950,000 foreigners arrived annually, during the indicated time from 1879 to 1882, no more or less than 9,148 arrived in Russia., 000 people foreigners, 8,000, 000 returned back!

By nationality, the specified number of foreigners is distributed as follows: Germans (German and Austrian subjects) 6,100,000 people, Czechs and other Slavs Austrian subjects - 77,000 people, Persians 255,000 people, French 123,000 people, Turkish subjects 70,000 people, Romanians, Serbs and Bulgarians 42,000 people, British - 21,000 people, Italians 17,000 people, Greeks 1b, 000 people. and other nationalities (each individually less than 15,000 people) 121,000 people.

So approximately more than 100,000 people (one hundred thousand!) Annually remain in Russia. Where does all this mass of foreigners go?

Here are the first seeds of a foreign infection. To them can be added our great passion for teachers, mentors, uncles, nannies, even stewards, cooks, maids, tailors and dressmakers, etc., from foreigners and foreign women. Of course, they all extol everything of their own and destroy everything Russian. They run to us from their daily bread. Talented people, scientists, artists, artisans, in a word, capable of something, find means of livelihood and home. If they are not good for anything in their homeland, then what benefit will they bring to Russia?

Alexander Bulgakov - Russian diplomat, senator, while in Naples had a conversation with an English diplomat. The Englishman asked: "Are there stupid people in Russia?" Somewhat puzzled by this question, Bulgakov replied: - "Probably there is no less than in England."

During the reign of Nicholas I in the ministries, office work was carried out in Russian and French, especially important papers - only in French. A foreign language reigned in government institutions, and only in 1900, Emperor Nicholas II ordered the introduction of the Russian language in government institutions.

A small historical excursion into the bureaucracy of the tsarist period, which slowed down not only inventive thought, but also the development of entrepreneurship. The Russian newspaper "Russian Trud" in 1906 provides a list of instances that must be overcome by a Russian who is starting some kind of industrial business:

And so not only in all branches of industry, but also in all forms of social life in Russia. And in the press and in historiography, there is one "misfortune" - Russian inertia, laziness and other indirect signs of the "stupidity" of the Russian character, but without touching, however, the main culprit - the corrupt Russian bureaucrat.

The responsibility of the bureaucracy is fictitious. Only occasionally was it heard that the First Department, plucking up courage, called for accountability before the law of one or another of the governors who had violated the law. And, in general, in the depths of Russia, the disenfranchised masses patiently bear the brunt of administrative arbitrariness.

There is nowhere to complain, because to complain about an official to his superiors is to seek protection often from someone who encouraged him to break the law. Representatives of the administrative power of various degrees, are, as it were, in an alliance of "mutual insurance", support each other, assist each other, constitute one solid bureaucratic family.

Thus, bureaucratic irresponsibility is established. At best, this irresponsibility is justified by the interests of the "Prestige of Power" in the eyes of the population; at worst, it is simply selfish concern for one's own interests. We see that the bureaucratic system has found a complete expression in that legislation, and the population is deprived of almost any opportunity to fight against bureaucratic arbitrariness.

A cry of despair escaped Ogarev's administrative chaos:

Tell me how, by what force

The law of nature is perverted;

A luminary rises from the West, Is there darkness and sleep in the east?

And at this time in the West … Look at the numbers in the table, in the figure in the title. Where the American and French governments have set themselves the task of patronizing inventors.

But since the government has taken the inventor under its powerful hand, the latter can be firmly convinced that his invention will be recognized and sanctioned by everyone, no matter who he turns, and that no one will dispute his rights. European states, for example Germany and Austria, and even Russia, are far from this correct view of things. Their patent is the Bureau - nothing more than a "reference" bureau, to which the inventors submit their drawings, drawings, plans, and necessarily - a full description of the invention on permission bureaucratic machine.

The French and English patent laws, after filing an application and establishing priority for an invention, provided time to finalize the invention, in England up to 9 months from the date of filing the application, the author had the right to “modify” both the documentation and the invention itself.

German patent law from the very birth in the interests of industrial growth, the issuance of a compulsory license to an author in the interests of monopolies has become widespread, which cannot be said about Russia.

The royal patent, which is not associated with the main obligation to carry out the invention, is thus of a semi-colonial nature, for it marks the economy of a country dependent on foreign capital. This dependence on foreign capital is also prominent in other articles of the 1896 “Regulations on Privileges for Inventions”, which establish special privileges for foreigners. Thus, the main rule on the novelty of an invention for its patentability is undergoing changes in favor of foreigners. This practice was used to discourage independent inventors and entrepreneurs from pursuing research.

October has come…. The revolution broke out and, most importantly, the servants of Russia remained in the Crimea, in Port Arthur, lay down in the trenches of the First World War …

And before Europe stood in all its mighty growth, a free Russia, with a huge future ahead, wishing to live and control its own life. In addition to the material wealth that the land and fields are rich in, the people rushed to knowledge and the possession of spiritual and intellectual wealth, an inexhaustible source of popular thought.

The "teachers" felt that the "dumb mass of slaves" was leaving their hands, and began to keep it with the remnants of their influence, by the force of three centuries of traditions of uncomplaining submission of the Russian bureaucracy. A " leftovers"Were considerable - these are 200,000 landowners and 16 million (!) philistines, most of whom bore the "hard fate" of the Russian bureaucracy, decorating the buttonholes of frock coats with scarlet bows ready to "insert sticks" of the young workers 'and peasants' government.

Look further, who sits in city and regional councils. In the beginning, these were workers and soldiers. During the years of war communism - two workers and one "bourgeois specialist". Further, in all institutions - already two, or even all three members of the board consisted of "specialists", which usually include the former owners of the enterprise, in city and provincial departments "specialists" from the old, tsarist bureaucracy. And so everywhere.

"Everything is returning to its place." Truly, unexpected tricks are thrown out by history, dumbfounded by hot but ignorant heads. In the commissariats, in addition to members of the collegiums, the rest of the directors and heads of departments are old "specialists", there are many old ministers, comrade ministers, directors and vice directors, members of the committee of ministries and experts … This is the case in all these "Gosplan", "Economic Councils", "People's Commissars".

Look at some very interesting statistics characterizing the state of society during the NEP period. "On the dynamics of the distribution of income" is evidenced by the table given by the commission on tax legislation of the Council of People's Commissars, a table in percent, by which the average per capita income increased in 1925/26 against 1924/25. In rubles for each group separately:

1st group (proletariat) - 20, 9%

2nd group (artisans, etc.) - 12.6%

3rd group (bourgeoisie) - 34.6%

4th group (beggars, declassed) - n / a

5th group (farm laborers) - 20, 0%

6th group (not hired peasants) - 25, 7%

7th group (peasants with 1 worker) - 22.5%

8th group (peasants with 2 workers or more) - 23%

Thus, the per capita income of the bourgeoisie (the third group, which includes the factory and factory administration and public administration), in terms of the percentage increase (and even more so absolutely), significantly outstripped both the workers and peasants. This is mainly due, of course, to the so-called "high conjuncture" in 1925-26 for the profit of private capital and the lack of proper tax regulation of the growth of bourgeois incomes, which manifested itself at that time in rather distinct forms.

Who entered and studied at institutes and universities in the 1920s?

I'm sure you won't guess! After all the insinuations with which historiography is crammed and prevails in the public mind, for you it will be a logical revelation - you studied literate ! These are the bourgeoisie and their children, the children of clergymen, the children of the numerous Russian administration …

Therefore, the criterion of public opinion - the division of the country into "commies" and "non-commies" - is the illogism of an ideological war. From time immemorial in Russian public life there was a simple division into Slavophiles and Varangophiles, it legally prevailed for centuries, and politically unorganized. This division supplanted all the other political, class divisions. It dominates everything and everyone.

Example? 900 thousand inventions adopted, but not introduced into production by May 1, 1933, is one of the indicators of the existing gap between the possibility and reality in the field of technical reconstruction of all areas of the national economy of the USSR.

The Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) pointed out that: “the use of inventions, improvements, work proposals at enterprises and in economic agencies is completely unsatisfactory, which is the consequence of red tape and sabotage resulting from the sabotage of classes of hostile elements and from completely unacceptable inertia, complete irresponsibility and underestimation economic, trade union and party organizations of all the importance of mass invention in the creation of new technology, providing in the USSR an increase in labor productivity unprecedented in capitalism conditions"

(Decree of October 26, 1930). This assessment remains fully correct to this day.

Do not forget that creative people of science and technology are people of very moderate political views, for them the prestige of the "Russian" was much higher than all political preferences.

And all of them equally seemed - and indeed were "indigestible" - to "Varyagophiles - bureaucrats", because in their concepts inventive thought and their work are support for the power they sabotaged and against which they fought. The deeper and more serious the scientific activity of Russian scientists was, the more zealously followed them and fought the bureaucracy, relying, in tsarist times, on monarchism and religion, under Soviet power on the opinion of foreign powers.

The introductory decree to the 1924 Patent Decree governs the renewal of pre-Soviet patent rights - as before. The wording of the law is changing, but the legal content of the Soviet patent is most clearly revealed in the case of a foreign patent holder. According to from. 5 of the decree on patents “foreign citizens enjoy the rights to obtain a patent for an invention on an equal basis with citizens of the USSR”; Art. 9 of the decree applies equally to the patent holder, a Soviet citizen, and to a foreigner.

In practice, bureaucratic tricks - the concessionaire draws up a patent for a technology or apparatus and … He does not invest in the Soviet industry, but receives Soviet "assistance" for the manufacture, implementation, etc., so that the Soviet government suffered direct losses.

Glavkonnveskom asked for a special explanation of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR Art. 5 and 9 of the Patent Decree in relation to the operational rights of foreign patent holders. The bureaucrats of the Council of People's Commissars explained that the aforementioned articles do not in any way cancel the laws in force on the territory of the USSR on the procedure for admitting foreign capital to industrial, commercial and other economic activities on the territory of the USSR, as well as laws regulating the procedure for opening and acquiring industrial and commercial enterprises (extract from the minutes Ms 78 of the meeting of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR dated December 23, 1924).

An example of red tape and sabotage of some inventions by the bureaucracy is described in the article: "The shadow of a branchy cranberry."

Wendell Burge, in his book International Cartels, M. 1947, writes: “Monopolies use the patent system to discourage independent inventors from research. “The patent system,” as the author of the book figuratively writes, “played the role of police power in the service of“private governments”.

In modern literature, you can find a lot of examples when Soviet inventors found their creations in foreign production - this is the complicity of our bureaucracy of "Varyagophiles" and while we are in the "captivity" of our laws, we will remain a "dark" spot in the development and implementation of domestic thought.

The famous Russian statesman of the tsarist era, Speransky, the author of major bills and reforms, formulated a number of principles of the life of the Russian bureaucratic apparatus that were relevant in tsarist times and … to this day:

- Formulate laws in such a way that no one can exercise their most legitimate rights without a piece of paper signed by an official.

- To formulate laws in such a way that it would be impossible to fulfill them all and completely. This is so that no one in the empire would feel innocent before the law and everyone could be “attracted”. Therefore, so that everyone, regardless of their position and merit, when entering the office of an official, should tremble.

- Periodically change laws by-laws so that no one can study them enough to use them in their own interests to the detriment of the interests of the bureaucracy.

- Periodically change the forms of documents so that it is necessary to periodically re-register your legal rights.

- Change the structure and personnel of the state apparatus so often that no one can use their connections in the apparatus and knowledge of moves and exits in their own interests to the detriment of the interests of the bureaucracy.

The only period of time when a “bridle” was put on the bureaucracy for conciliation was the Stalin era from 1928 to 1953. when a multi-million army of people's correspondents exposed the activities of the bureaucracy and demanded that they be held accountable. And they punished …