chinovnik

The chinovnik (Russian and Ukrainian: Чиновник; Belarusian: Чыноўнік) was a Russian title for a person having a rank and serving in the civil or court service, i.e. the Tsarist bureaucracy. The institution of chinovniks existed de facto in the Tsardom of Russia and the Russian Empire, but until 1722 it did not have a clear structure. The de jure chinovnik institute was structured by the establishment of the Table of Ranks on February 4, 1722. "As the peasants were slaves of the landowners, the Russian people are still slaves of chinovniks", wrote Lenin in 1903, "Political freedom means the people's right to choose all the chinovniks themselves". After the victory of the October Revolution in 1917, the Table of Ranks was abolished, and the institution of chinovniks was liquidated. Persons e...