What might have been?

150 years ago today, Czar Alexander II signed into law the Edict of Emancipation, freeing from servitude more than 1/3 of the entire population of the Russian Empire and ushering in the largest era of reform that particular empire had seen in more than 100 years.

A man who was never supposed to be Czar at all (his elder brother died at age 24), who grew into adulthood partying his way across central Europe and making quite the name for himself among the noble ladies of the day (and not a few illegitimate children) along the way. He married a young German princess, had 8 legitimate children (six of whom were boys) and became the reform emperor of the age.

In 1881, only days before he was to sign into law the establishment of a "duma" for the people (a popularly-elected legislative body) that would share his authority in (very nearly) a 50/50 split and ushering in a constitutional monarchy the likes of which the rest of Europe wouldn't see for another 50 years... he was publicly assassinated by multiple bombs and he died of his wounds in the very room where he signed the Edict of Emancipation twenty years earlier.

I remember walking into the massive and unbelievably beautiful Church of the Savior on Spilled Blood, built on the exact spot where the bombs went off, and hearing the Intourist guide ask the question: "Imagine... what might have been had these men not thrown those bombs? How different would the world be now?"

With the death of Alexander II, the repressive nature of the "old guard" returned with a vengeance, and the common man was once again afraid to speak his mind in the streets for fear of being "ratted out" to the secret police of the Kremlin elite and the new Czar, Alexander III. Alexander III had a son, Nicholas II... and these two would be the last Czars. Both of them were authoritarian rulers with little regard for popular opinion of government operation, and both were dedicated to the idea of "rule by divine right"... which always leads to trouble with the "working class" if you ask me.

Can you imagine, though... a world without Lenin, or the Bolsheviks, without Stalin and the purges, without the Cold War. There is even the outside chance (since anything is possible in the world of "What If?") that the Nazis would never have risen to power, since WWI wouldn't have happened as it did, either (especially if Nicholas II had only a portion of the power he did).

Makes your head hurt, doesn't it?