The Provisional Government and the Ex Com were agreed that Nicholas must abdicate, but whereas the Ex Com — and the whole Soviet — were determined to abolish the monarchy at once, most of the new ministers originally wanted to save it in some modified form under a different monarch. To this end Milyukov drew up for the Czar’s signature an act of abdication in favor of the 12-year old Czarevitch, with the boy’s uncle, Grand Duke Michael, named as Regent.
