The prospects for Russian Jewry appear to improve significantly when the relatively liberal-minded Tsar Alexander II ascends the throne in 1855, succeeding his father, Nicholas I.

Ending the practice of drafting Jewish youth into the military, the new tsar grants Jews access, albeit limited, to Russian education institutions and various professions previously closed to them.

Consequently, a thriving class of Jewish intellectuals, the maskalim (”enlightened”), emerges in cities like Odessa, just as they had in Western Europe and Central Europe after emancipation.

The maskalim believe that Tsar Alexander II is ushering in a new age of Russian liberalism that, as in the West, will eventually lead to the emancipation of Russian Jewry.