15 May 1882 – 9 Sivan 5642
After the Russian pogroms (centering on Kiev) of 1881, Czar Alexander III created a series of committees to determine what exactly in the Jews’ economic circumstances had prompted the peasant population to rise up and massacre them. The resulting May Laws were originally intended as a temporary measure, to limit Jews’ commercial activities in keeping with the committee’s conclusions, but in fact they remained in place for over thirty years. Jews were forbidden to live in villages, as opposed to towns, even outside the boundaries of the Pale of Settlement; deeds and real estate contracts recording Jewish ownership of land in any such areas were voided, and Jews were forbidden to buy and sell on Sundays and Christian holidays.
Feel free to share
