PLEHVE, VIATSCHESLAF KONSTANTINOVICH (1846-1904), Russian statesman, was born of Lithuanian stock in 1846. He was educated at w arsaw ana at tne university of St. Petersburg (Leningrad) before he entered the department of justice, in which he rose rapidly to be assistant solicitor-general in Warsaw, then solicitor-general in St. Petersburg, and in 1881 director of the state police. As assistant to the minister of the interior he attracted the attention of Alexander III. by the skill he showed in investigating the circumstances of the assassination of Alexander II. He received the title of secretary of state in 1894, became a member of the council of the empire, and in 1902 succeeded Sipiaguine as minister of the interior. Plehve carried out the "russification" of the alien provinces within the Russian Empire, and earned bitter hatred in Poland, in Lithuania and especially in Finland. He despoiled the Armenian Church, and
oppressed the Armenians of the Caucasus. He certainly did nothing to discourage pogroms against the Jews, and he was credited with being accessory to the Kishinev massacres. His logical mind and determined support of the autocratic principle gained the tsar's entire confidence. He opposed commercial development on ordi nary European lines on the ground that it involved the existence both of a dangerous proletariat and of a prosperous middle class equally inimical to autocracy. He was a determined and success ful opponent of Witte's policy. An attempt was made on his life early in 1904, and he was assassinated on July 28 of the same year by a bomb thrown under his carriage as he was on his way to Peterhof to make his report to the tsar; the assassin, Sasonov, was a member of the socialist revolutionary party.