With Russia being the largest country on the globe, it has always depended on its rulers to face the many hardships and struggles in the past couple centuries. Whether the problem consisted of political disagreement, neighboring countries, or even different religious views, there still had to be someone making the call. Although citizens of Russia may not have always agreed with these calls, they still went with them. Not all of the decisions made by the rulers helped the country. In fact, some led to inner-country crisis. Throughout the past, Russia has been led by many different rulers that are known for many different things. Names like Nicholas II, Alexander I, or Alexander II are known strictly because they all ruled Russia at some time in their life. In order to better understand Russia under the rule of Alexander II, one must research his great reforms, his effect on the culture, and the man himself and what he really felt about society. Most of the time a ruler of a country is usually judged by what he/she does right or by what he/she does extremely wrong. One of the historical events that Alexander II is known by is the emancipation of the serfs (Norris 35). In 1861, Alexanders very first reform was his decision to free the serfs (Kort 100). Even before he took the throne Alexander never agreed with serfdom, he believed it was damaging to the long time welfare of Russia and he thought it was immoral (Hughes). During this time period of his first reform, which is known as The Great Reform about 25 million serfs were freed (Tessendorf 9). A reform is an amendment of what is corrupt, or a correction of an error. Usually after a reform, in this case, people could live more of a society friendly life. The Great Reforms (1861-70) under Alexander II were primarily the achievement of the progressive section in the bureaucracy working under the stimulus of a press then for a time comparatively free and in conjunction with committees, sometimes elected, sometimes appointed of the serf owners or professional. Another memorable reform of Alexander the II was choosing to