I shall not attempt to narrate the events which prevented the accession of a Polish and Catholic prince to the throne of Russia. It will be enough for my purpose to state that the people and the clergy were unanimous in their dislike to this foreign and "heretical" ruler. The folkmotes, or veches, not only in Novgorod, but also in those parts where they had hitherto been quite unknown, as in Kasan, or Nijni Novgorod, entered into correspondence with each other, local militia united, and an army, called into existence by the patriotic sentiments of simple burgesses like Minin, marched from Nijni Novgorod to Moscow, under the command of Pojarsky. At the same time a correspondence was begun with the object of forming a new Sobor, which was to be a really representative body, composed of delegates sent by all the estates. The writs of summons sent out by the head of the army, Pojarsky, have fortunately been preserved, so that we can get a clear notion of what was meant at that time by the term "General Council of the land," a term employed more than once in the documents of the time. Addressing the people of Poutivl or of Wichegodsk, the commander-in-chief insists on the necessity of sending to Jaroslav, the place selected for the meeting of the new Assembly, two or three men from each of the estates (chinov)of the nation. From Jaroslav the Sobor, following the army, removed to Moscow, where it sat in common with the boyars of the council, the high commission of the clergy (osviaschenini Sobor), and the representatives of the regular and irregular military forces, that is, the Strelzi and the Cossacks. It was this Assembly which elected Michael Theodorovich Romanov to be Czar of Russia.
Before proceeding to the election of the Czar, the Sobor called on all the inhabitants of the country to fast for three consecutive days. It then passed a law, due mainly to the influence of the popular section of the Assembly, prohibiting the election of any foreign prince. The nobility would have had no objection to the placing of a Swedish or Polish pretender on the vacant throne. The higher and lower orders differed widely as to the man they wished to choose from among the Russian boyars; the names of Golitzin, Vorotinsky, Troubezkoy, and even that of the dethroned Basilius Schouisky, were, for a time, to be found on the list of candidates supported by the nobility. The first to declare himself in favour of the young Romanov was one of his relations named Scheremetiev, and his proposal was favourably listened to by the lower nobility, the Cossacks and the burgesses. His election, however, was so unexpected an event that his own father, a bishop then closely imprisoned by the Poles, was the first to suggest, in a letter written to Scheremetiev, that certain constitutional limits should be imposed On the power of the future Czar. Strahlenberg(7*) is quite correct in his statement that the idea of these limitations was borrowed from Poland where already in the middle of the sixteenth century, under Stephen Bathory, the States-General, or Seim, and the Council possessed considerable rights. The reasons which operated in favour of the young Michael Romanov were, first of all, his relationship with the extinct dynasty of Rurik through his great aunt, Anastasia Romanov, who was one of the wives of ivan the Terrible; secondly, the small number of relations which was looked upon as a safeguard against further depredations on the demesne lands in the form of beneficiary donations; and thirdly, the popularity of his family, which had been persecuted by the boyars from the time of Boris Godounov. His father, Philarete, who had been forced to become a monk, was especially endeared to the nation by his virtues; he had attained a high position among the clergy, having been made Bishop of Jaroslav.
The late Patriarch Germogen, who had been much beloved by the people, had also been favourably disposed towards the election of young Romanov, and this fact contributed greatly to secure him the sympathy of the clergy. At the time of his election Michael was but a boy of fifteen, and his father being a prisoner in Magdeburgh, Scheremetiev and the members of his party looked upon it as highly probable that the real government would pass into their hands.
The Sovereign power which was offered to young Romanov was far from being the same as that enjoyed by Ivan the Terrible.
Autocratic power had had to yield before the new theories of constitutional limitations directly imported from Poland. That Michael had to sign a compromise is a fact briefly mentioned by Russian eye-witnesses, such as Kotoschichin, as well as by foreigners then residing in Russia. The chronicles of the city of Pskov speak of it in contemptuous terms. It was not enough, say they, for the boyars to have reduced the country to the miserable state to which they had brought it. They wanted to go on in the same way of pillage and oppression; they had no regard for the Czar, did not fear him on account of his youth, and all the more so since they had induced him, at the time of his accession to the throne, to take an oath, by which he renounced the right of inflicting capital punishment on persons belonging to the higher nobility. Capital punishment was to be superseded by close imprisonment. No mention is made in the chronicles of any further limitation of the Sovereign power of the Czar.
