"Tsar Alexander I wanted to reform the serf system but was stymied. With his news law, only 7,300 male peasants with families were freed (about 0.5%), but all classes except the serfs could own land, a privilege previously confined to the nobility.
Alexander I reigned as Emperor of Russia from March 23, 1801, to December 1, 1825. He was born in Saint Petersburg to Grand Duke Paul Petrovich, later Emperor Paul I, and succeeded to the throne after his father was murdered. He ruled Russia during the chaotic period of the Napoleonic Wars. As prince and emperor, Alexander often used liberal rhetoric, but continued Russia's absolutist policies in practice. In the first years of his reign, he initiated some minor social reforms and in 1803–04 major, liberal educational reforms, such as building more universities. He promised constitutional reforms and a desperately needed reform of serfdom in Russia but made no concrete proposals. Alexander appointed Mikhail Speransky, the son of a village priest, as one of his closest advisers. The Collegia was abolished and replaced by the The State Council, created to improve legislation. Plans were also made to set up a parliament and sign a constitution.
In the second half of his reign he was increasingly arbitrary, reactionary, and fearful of plots against him; he ended many earlier reforms. He purged schools of foreign teachers as education became more religiously oriented and politically conservative. Speransky was replaced as adviser with the strict artillery inspector Aleksey Arakcheyev, who oversaw the creation of military settlements. Alexander died of typhus in December 1825 while on a trip to southern Russia. He left no children as heirs and both of his brothers wanted the other to become emperor. After a period of great confusion that included the failed Decembrist revolt of liberal army officers, he was succeeded by his younger brother, Nicholas I…"
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