On the one side, hundreds of thousands of hands which assist petty industry in the provinces will be turned aside, when there is no possibility, and for a long time there will be none, of replacing them.

On the other side, the cries and moans of such an enormous number of unfortunates will serve as a reproach to our Government not only in our own country but also beyond the confines of Russia.
Since the time of Speranski and the like-minded members of the "Jewish Committee" of 1803 and 1812[1] the leading spheres of St.Petersburg had had no chance to hear such courageous and truthful words.

Vorontzov's objections implied a crushing criticism of the whole fallacious economic policy of the Government in branding the petty tradesmen and middlemen as an injurious element and building thereon a whole system of anti-Jewish persecutions and cruelties.

But St.Petersburg was not amenable to reason.

The only concession wrested from the "Jewish Committee" consisted in replacing the term "useless" as applied to small tradesmen by the designation "not engaged in productive labor." [Footnote 1: See Vol.