Events prove the freedoms promised in the Tsar’s October manifesto to be a fraud, and his Duma a fiction. January—first congress of the new Constitutional Democrat (Cadet) Party, which supports a constitutional monarchy. 27th April—opening of the First State Duma. All its demands for reforms rejected by the Tsar. 9th July—Duma dissolved. Strikes and riots continue, but with less intensity than the previous year.
Sofia’s son-in-law Mikhail Sukhotin elected to the Duma. She prepares twelfth edition of Tolstoy’s Complete Works. Tolstoy writes ‘On the Meaning of the Russian Revolution’, and starts on ‘The Children’s Law of God’. June—peasants steal wood from the Yasnaya estate and Sofia calls police, which provokes bitter arguments with Tolstoy. August—Sofia critically ill with peritonitis, and has operation to remove fibroma of the womb. 26th November—Masha Tolstaya dies of pneumonia.