The title, which deserves a great contribution to science, culture or economics - the Honorary Citizen of St. Petersburg - is awarded once a year on the eve of the celebration of City Day, May 27. This title can be awarded to any citizen of the Russian Federation, another state and even a person without a specific citizenship.
Procedure
The Legislative Assembly of the city selects people worthy of the title "Honorary Citizen of St. Petersburg" from the nominations made by the Governor, Chairman of the Legislative Assembly, public organizations and associations, and persons already awarded such a title.
Of the submitted lists, only two candidates are approved, but there were cases when the deputies could not come to a consensus on this issue. Then the title "Honorary Citizen of St. Petersburg" was not received by anyone. The regulation provides for a closed election regime. Candidates are usually discussed from all sides; people who want to speak out for this person and against are heard.
Sign
A jewelry plate, which is a silver laurel wreath of two branches with small cubic zirconias around the entire circumference, is a badge that an honorary citizen of St. Petersburg receives. The lower part of the sign is decorated with a silver ribbon, and in the space that forms the wreath, there is a piece of the Peter and Paul Fortress in the form of a fragment of granite. This is a symbol of the native land and the grateful city.
The reverse side of the stone is equipped with a round silver plate, on which the inscription "Honorary Citizen of St. Petersburg", the date of receipt of the rank and diploma number are displayed. The sign is quite voluminous: in diameter it is eighty-five millimeters.
Rights and benefits
Honorary citizens of St. Petersburg receive the right to an extraordinary reception from the governor, chairman of the Legislative Assembly, heads of all city institutions and officials, they have the right to take legislative initiative. They are also entitled to free use of all types of public transport.
Honorary citizens of St. Petersburg can rely on services in halls reserved for official delegations, have the right to reside in the city during all festive events at the expense of the city, and also, probably, soon after the adoption of the relevant amendment to the law, they will be buried at state expense.
List
There are not too many honorary citizens of St. Petersburg, only thirty-nine, since they began to reassign this title only in 1993. Visitors to the Mariinsky Palace can see their portraits. This is D. S. Likhachev, who was awarded a high rank in 1993; blockade poet O. F. Berggolz, who received the title "Honorary Citizen of St. Petersburg" posthumously, M. M. Bobrov, V. N. Kharitonov, L. I. Egorova and Patriarch Alexy II, noted with this honor in 1994; and in 1995, the title was awarded to the poet I. A. Brodsky and the magnificent actor K. Yu. Lavrov.
Further, the honorary title was awarded every year, except for 2004, 2014 and 2015, when the deputies failed to make a choice. In subsequent years, honorary citizens of St. Petersburg continued the list. They became: E. A. Lebedev, M. K. Anikushkin, N. M. Dudinskaya, A. P. Petrov, V. P. Kondrashin, A. E. Mazurenko, I. P. Bogacheva, J. I. Alferov , A. B. Freindlikh, I. D. Spassky, Yu. S. Tyukalov, T. N. Moskvina, V. L. Alexandrov, D. A. Granin, F. L. Karmazinov, L. A. Verbitskaya, V V. Putin, V. A. Gergiev, S. K. Krikalev, N. P. Bekhtereva, V. N. Alexandrov, Dick Lawyer, Metropolitan Vladimir, Yu. Kh. Temirkanov, L. D. Faddeev, A. A Sobchak, A. M.Granov, M. B. Piotrovsky, O. V. Basilashvili, L. A. Listova, V. N. Vasiliev, V. V. Ostropilov, V. A. Chernushenko.
Story
Like in every other city, in St. Petersburg there are statutes and laws. It is in accordance with the articles of these documents that the highest honorary title for citizens of the city, country, and the world is established if they have made an outstanding contribution to the development of St. Petersburg, thereby increasing its role and authority both in the Russian Federation and in the international arena, strengthening democracy and protecting human rights, raising to new heights science, art, moral and spiritual life of society.
This is a revived tradition that existed in the nineteenth century. There was no title "Honorary Citizen of St. Petersburg" before the revolution, it was an estate class established by the manifesto of Emperor Nicholas I in 1832. This was a new estate for the urban inhabitants. They also had some advantages over other residents: they were exempted from salary and recruitment, corporal punishment was not applied to them, they could participate in elections and be elected in positions not lower than merchants of the second guild.
Honor
Those marked with the title had the right to be named in all documents and acts as honorary citizens by attaching this name to other names (guild, for example). This right was given for life, the children of these people were also honorary citizens from birth. The title was also assigned to women, but it was not passed on to either the husband or the children. Honorary citizens were not included in the revision tales, moreover, they were called "your nobleness" as nobles. It was possible to deprive this title only by court and sentence, in rare cases - with the loss of a good name or in the case of worst bankruptcy.
If an honorary citizen enrolled in a craft workshop or went into service, a number of advantages were removed from him, including honor: in the letter he was not called an honorary citizen. Sometimes the title was bestowed on foreign scientists or artists, merchants or manufacturers, even if they did not enter Russian citizenship, but it was good for Russia to do such that the Ministry petitioned for them. Jews in the provinces where they are allowed to live also sometimes received this high rank with a special imperial decree, but only for extraordinary merits. Despite the fact that honorary citizenship is an estate, it existed more as a reward.
Highest rewards
For special merits, it was possible to claim awards. Honorary citizenship consisted of such a long series of requests provided for by special rules:
- the gratitude and graciousness of His Imperial Majesty;
- rank;
- order;
- purpose of rent;
- a gift on behalf of His Imperial Majesty;
- one-time cash issue;
- title of personal (or hereditary) honorary citizenship;
- medal;
- caftan;
- set-off time for private classes for the good of the country in the active public service without the right to production
- public service law;
- removal of criminal record.
Sale
In those days, reckoning with honorary citizenship was even sold: sixty rubles in silver for the charitable institutions of the province where the applicant is registered, two hundred and forty rubles for the development of industry and trade, thirty rubles for the very execution of the letter. Scientists and artists could contribute less. Naturally, not all requests were granted.
They even refused for incorrectly executed documents. St. Petersburg was the most popular place for joining the new estate, probably for the reason that there were much more people who had the right and were able to work with papers. In 1901, more than two thousand people acquired honorary citizenship in this city alone.
Personalities
The title “Honorary Citizen of St. Petersburg” is best described by the people themselves, who have been awarded this title.The first was the largest philologist in Russia, an academic art critic, the author of many works on the history of culture, on the theory of Slavic literature, and the history of Russian writing. In 1993, the title of "Honorary Citizen of St. Petersburg" was received by Dmitry Sergeyevich Likhachev, only posthumously awarded the State Prize of Russia. It is unlikely that anyone more than Dmitry Sergeyevich Likhachev did for Russian literature. The main thing for him was the further development of the Russian language in all scientific studies of ancient Russian literature. He traced the paths of its development from antiquity, outlining the system of genres and the evolution of styles.
Academician Likhachev fought all his life for the purity of Russian culture. His first and most popular book for the general public, and not for fellow scholars, was a historical and literary essay on the main Russian book - "The Word about Igor's Campaign". And then, from the 1950s to the 2000s, he worked tirelessly, developing the artistic direction of our education, and collaborated a lot with television. It was D. S. Likhachev who created the popularly favorite channel "Culture".
Olga Berggolz
The list of honorary citizens of St. Petersburg was continued by Olga Fedorovna Berggolts, who devoted her life to a beloved city by a poetess, journalist and radio host. She was born in May 1910 in St. Petersburg, survived the blockade. At first she wrote children's poems, her books were readily published. She worked in print media, wrote articles, went to great construction sites for materials. She was awarded the USSR State Prize in 1951, the Order of Lenin in 1967, the Order of the Red Banner of Labor in 1960, and the medals "For the Defense of Leningrad" and "For Valiant Labor".
She held the blockade on the Leningrad radio, and very soon the whole city was heard in her quiet voice, he became his personification. Olga Fedorovna herself became a symbol of this blockade - the very stamina, courage and courage, truly "Leningrad Madonna". All these broadcasts subsequently became the book "Says Leningrad." Its lines remind the world of those one hundred days of the blockade. "Nobody is forgotten and nothing is forgotten" is carved on the granite wall of the Piskaryov cemetery.
Dick Lawyer
Dirk Nicholas Lawyer - Honorary Citizen of St. Petersburg since 2008. This is a soccer player from the Netherlands and a football coach who has worked in many countries, including the St. Petersburg football club Zenit, with whose team he began working in 2006.
Immediately, a change in the club’s game became noticeable, although in the first year of the Lawyer’s work, “Zenith” failed to rise above fourth place in the Russian championship, but in 2007 the team already became a champion. Then they won the UEFA Super Cup. In 2010, Dick Advocaat began training the Russian team after signing a contract for four years.
