October Manifesto creates a Duma

October 30, 1905

Pressured by the 1905 Revolution, Tsar Nicholas II issued a manifesto promising civil liberties and a legislative assembly, the State Duma. It was the first step toward constitutional monarchy in Russia, and Nicholas regretted it immediately. He would spend the next twelve years trying to take the powers back, dissolving assemblies and manipulating elections until the monarchy itself dissolved in 1917.