The principal source of this movement [the pogroms], which is so
incompatible with the temper of the Russian people, lies--according
to Ignatyev--in circumstances which are of an exclusively economic
nature. For the last twenty years the Jews have gradually managed to
capture not only commerce and industry but they have also succeeded
in acquiring, by means of purchase and lease, a large amount of
landed property. Owing to their clannishness and solidarity, they
have, with few exceptions, directed their efforts not towards the
increase of the productive forces [of the country] but towards the
exploitation of the original inhabitants, primarily of the poorest
classes of the population, with the result that they have called
forth a protest from this population, manifesting itself in
deplorable forms--In violence.... Having taken energetic means to
suppress the previous disorders and mob rule and to shield the Jews
against violence, the Government recognizes that it is justified in
adopting, without delay, no less energetic measures to remove the
present abnormal relations that exist between the original
inhabitants and the Jews, and to shield the Russian population
against this harmful Jewish activity, which, according to local
information, was responsible for the disturbances.

Alexander III. hastened to express his agreement with these views of his
Minister, who assured him that the Government had taken "energetic
measures" to suppress the pogroms--which was only true in two or three
recent cases. At the same time he authorized Ignatyev to adopt
"energetic measures" of genuine Russian manufacture against those who
had but recently been ruined by these pogroms.

The imperial ukase published on August 22, 1831, dwells on "the abnormal