Law/1. History of State and Law

                                      Candidate of law. Prikhodko M.A.
                  Moscow State University of Law behalf of O.E. Kutafin, Russia

    Ministry of Commerce and the state system of the Russian 
                  Empire at the beginning of the XIX century

                          (Historical and legal aspects)                                        

       A distinctive feature of this ministry was that the establishment of the Ministry of Commerce ahead of time the formation of the Ministry of Commerce.
More September 13, 1800, G.P. Gagarin was appointed minister of commerce, to carry out the principal guide of Commerce board and the main control all the customs officials.
       Its management was entrusted to the Commercial Office of the President and the Board of Commerce board, soon renamed the Office of the Minister.

       December 11, 1801 was appointed Minister of Commerce N.P. Rumyantsev.
September 8, 1802 established the Ministry of Commerce with the transfer of its management board and Commercial confirmation tenure as Minister of Commerce N.P. Rumyantsev.

       The competence of the Ministry determined the main subjects of Commerce board of reference: 1) business in foreign trade - correspondence with diplomatic agents and consuls in the subjects of trade, to collect information on prices, taxes, duties, treatises, regulations, the trade relations of foreign countries; Manual trading companies abroad; maintaining the balance of the importation and exportation of goods, drafting of assumptions about changes in tariff, trade and merchant statutes, the appointment of consuls and the establishment of offices; correspondence with the heads of the port cities, transit trade issues; monitoring of compliance with trade treatises; 2) cases of Internal Trade - correspondence concerning domestic trade with government agencies, the collection of background information in the provinces of fisheries, factories and companies, the quantity and quality of products, the demand for it, and the possibility of selling its exports, monitoring of trades, fairs and sea fishing; development and implementation of measures to enhance fisheries, increasing the number of goods produced, providing loans and keeping domestic credit; 3) in the case of domestic and foreign trade of communication - the collection and processing of information on the trade routes, ports, shipbuilding, the number of marine and river vessels, the ways of merchant shipping; guide merchant shipyards, staffing merchant shipping skippers and sailors, insurance vessels develop assumptions about the construction of shipyards; 4) cases in customs management  - treatment and revision of documents customs affairs on staff, arrangement and maintenance of customs cases involving confiscation of goods, litigation between Russian and English merchants.

       These items were conducting expeditions in the management of the relevant Commercial Board: 1) business in foreign trade; 2) the internal affairs of trade; 3) in the case of domestic and foreign commercial communications; 4) cases in customs administration.
       January 8, 1803 established the Department of Commerce Minister - the main executive body under the Ministry of Commerce.

       With the accession of the Russian Empire in 1807, the continental blockade of England, run by the Ministry of Commerce established St. Petersburg, the liquidation commission. Whose tasks include superintendence of goods and property of the British, have been subject to sequestration and satisfaction of this property Russian lenders.
       June 18, 1809 under the jurisdiction of the Minister of Commerce established the St. Petersburg Commission on neutral navigation, to deal with cases of admission to the Russian ports of foreign ships during the continental blockade.

       These institutions and the structure of the Ministry of Commerce made ​​(Department of the Minister of Commerce, Commercial College, the Liquidation commission and the Commission on neutral navigation).
       In addition to the direct objects of reference, the Ministry of Commerce to promote the establishment of commercial schools, which oversees the activities of nautical and navigational schools and published the newspaper "St. Petersburg Commercial Gazette" 1802-1810 years.
       July 25, 1810 the Ministry of Commerce was abolished, with the transfer of terms of reference to the Ministry of Finance (the case of Foreign Trade and Customs Administration) and the Ministry of the Interior (the case of Internal Trade).

 

                                               References:

1.     Higher and central government agencies in Russia. 1801-1817. Volume 3. St. Petersburg. 2002.

2.     Russian statehood. Dictionary of. Book 3. Moscow. 2001.

3.     Ministry of Finance 1802-1902. Part 1. St. Petersburg. 1902.

4.      Eroshkin N.P. History of state institutions of pre-revolutionary Russia. Moscow.  1997.