Abuse of power with selfish motivation of officials in the estates of the Peasant Bank at the turn of the XIX–XX centuries (historical and legal aspect)

The study of the historical and legal foundations of the restriction of corrupt actions testifies to the appearance of the term “official crimes” in the Military Article of Peter the Great. Among its varieties: abuse of power for the selfish purposes of officials, bribery, etc. The article attempts, based on the analysis of the facts of abuse of power at the turn of the XIX–XX centuries, to study the forms of manifestation of corrupt behavior by the head of the estates of the Peasant Bank and the clerks hired to help him, detourers, the headman. The study of archival material reveals proven cases of corruption among officials in the bank’s estates in 1893–1899. Despite the prosecution of people involved in corruption in the Tambov branch and with the beginning of the ХХ century, there were facts received from peasants for renting land, embezzlement of funds. A similar selfish behavior of officials was characteristic of the Ryazan branch of the Bank. In general, the revealed manifestation of forms of forms of corruption in the activities of a state credit institution led to undermining the confidence of peasants in the presence of legal order in the Russian Empire and created a prerequisite for the emergence of a revolutionary situation in the village.