THE RUSSIAN MERCHANTS IN THE STRUGGLE FOR ESTATE RIGHTS IN THE SECOND HALF OF THE 18TH CENTURY

The article studies social and legal aspects of the trading activities of the Russian merchants in the second half of the 18th century. The author reveals the forms of the merchants’ struggle for the estate rights, first of all, for the right of trade. The attempts of merchants to include the persons engaged in the city trade, but not registered as suburbanites, into the register of taxpayers were significant among them. The article analyzes the history of confrontation between the Kazan merchants and the Kazan sloboda Tatars that lasted from the late 17th century till the early 1760s. An important form of defending the merchants’ estate rights was filing collective petitions. The author analyzes the petitions of the merchants of Pskov and Opochka submitted to Empress Catherine II in 1780. They allow examining the merchants’ complaints against the economic and court peasants, as well as those against the nonresident and foreigners engaged in illicit trade. The article shows the attitude of Empress Catherine II to such petitions. Addressing the authorities by means of collective petitions had no prompt response, but eventually led to the legislature granting merchants the exclusive right to trade in the “Charter to the Towns”. After the 1775–1785 reforms, the means for asserting the right of trade remained official publications, detours to trading posts, and the fight against illegally built stores in towns. The merchants defended their rights within the framework of existing legislation, while taking advantage of new institutions at different administrative levels and actively resorting to the assistance of the city’s self-government bodies.