State peasants are a special class that was formed in Russia in the 18th century. Three categories of the free population of the village joined him. The first were black-sown peasants. They were settled on "sovereign black lands." The second category was the "economic" peasants. These people inhabited the monastery territories. The third category was odnodvortsy. They were considered the descendants of service people who had been populating the southern borders of Muscovite Russia since the 16th century, which were not included in the noble estate during the reformation of Peter. At the same time, in a number of provinces (in Voronezh, Kursk, Oryol, Tambov), the courtyards constituted the majority of the local population.
The state peasants as a class at the beginning of the reign of Nicholas amounted to about seventeen million people. Since the days of Moscow Russia, this class has retained not only personal freedom, but also self-government. State peasants were not subjected to corporal punishment .
According to some historians, this class was mainly located outside of Great Russia. However, this is not quite true. Even in the central part of the country, more people belonged to the state peasantry than in the western regions. By the time the Code of Laws of the 1830s was published, it constituted the bulk or the entire mass of the population in thirty-six provinces of the European part of the state and in Siberia. It was the largest class of Russian society at that time.
State peasants were vested with the right to freely move from one volost to another, from one province to another, from county to county. At the same time, resettlement from one territory to another was often encouraged by the government. State peasants had the right (as whole societies, or separately) to enter into contracts and agreements with private individuals. They could also acquire property (movable or immovable), pledge it. After the issuance of a special decree in 1801, December 12, the state peasantry was vested with the right (like philistinism and merchants) to acquire land in private ownership.
While the nobles were enslaved by military service, and then endowed with excessive liberties, a "third estate" was formed. He was replenished by representatives of the state peasantry, along with industrialists and merchants. The most numerous class of the state also had the right to join trade ranks, guilds, open factories, craft and industrial establishments, trade enterprises and maintain them.
It should be noted that at the time of accession to the throne of Nicholas, the state peasantry was in crisis. The department of the Ministry of Finance headed this class of population . It must be assumed that this body tried to "squeeze" as much of the state peasants as possible, trying to get from them taxes that could not be taken from the landowners. The local noble administration shifted in-kind duties to the rural population , and the heaviest ones. It must be said that this not only benefited the landlords, but also to a certain extent facilitated the life of serfdom. At the same time, the noble administration often concealed the arbitrariness of landowners who sought to cash in at the expense of communal lands. The economic situation of the state peasantry was constantly deteriorating. At the same time, the government allocated significant amounts for its maintenance in lean years.
With the beginning of the reign of Nicholas, the position of the state peasantry began to be determined by general civil law, and not by administrative acts. This was the result of large-scale work Speransky to streamline the laws of the country. However, many decrees in public form appeared for the first time.