The displeasure of the Belarusan gentry with the divisions of Rzecz Pospolita and the breach of the Polish Constitution of 1815 by the Russian Empire led to the outbreak of a national liberation uprising in November 1830. It enveloped Poland, Lithuania, Western Belarus and Western Ukraine. This uprising, suppressed in October 1831, had the character of a conservative revolution and prevented a joint Prussian-Russian intervention into revolutionary France and Belgium.

An outstanding feature in the development of the Grand Duchy of Litva, later of Rzecz Pospolita, and in particular of the Belarusan lands proper was the peaceful coexistence of different religious communities - Orthodox that emerged here in the 11th century, Catholic that started in the 14th century, Hebrew in the 15th, Protestant in the 16th. In 1596 after the creation of Litva-Poland confederation at the decision of the Brest synod the Greek-Catholic or Uniate church was created. It became the national religion of Belarusans. The church was under the Pope and recognized Catholic dogmas but kept to Orthodox rites. But in 1839 the Uniate church was liquidated at the decision of the Russian government forced onto the Polotsk synod. The Russian tsarism was based on the Orthodox church and was against other religions, that's why the Uniate books were burned and the Uniates were forcibly convened into the Orthodox religion. At the same time the use of the Grand Duchy of Litva Statute on the territory of Belarus was banned. Soon the tsar's edict was issued that banned the name Belarus.

Starting from this moment the Belarusan lands began to lose their independence, and the majority of their national peculiarities. The Belarusan language was banned in the official sphere and Russian took its place. As a result of the Russian expansion to the west, Belarusan lands together with the peasants were given to Russian landlords. The senior positions in the local administration were taken by officials sent from the inner regions of Russia. The Russian Orthodox church that was the preeminent and supreme one in the Russian Empire started to persecute and push out other religious communities. Belarusan lands were settled by representatives of other nations. There came hard times for the Belarusan people.

The Russian emperors conducted the systematic liquidation of cultural and spiritual centers of the Belarusan nation, pursued the official policy of russification that included the banishment of, and property confiscation from the Belarusan officials and religious activists and replacing them with the Russian officials and Orthodox church clergy. Belarusans were mostly limited to receiving primary education in church schools. It was forbidden to send young Belarusans abroad to continue their education there. Thus Belarus became a Central European colony of Russia. Since the 19th century it was known as the North-Westem Region of the Russian Empire and the Belarusan people were assimilated into it by force.

But despite the oppression the Belarusan people did not want to put up with the tsarist policy. In 1863 the young Belarusan patriot Kastus Kalinousky started a new stage of the liberation struggle of the Belarusans. The cause of the national liberation uprising of 1863-1864 led by Kastus Kalinousky in Belarus, Lithuania, and Poland was the strive of the progressive people of the western parts of the Russian Empire for national independence, liquidation of the feudal relations, for social and political changes. Kastus Kalinousky led the enslaved people against the colonial regime of the Russian tsarism and at the age of 26 was publicly executed by the gendarmes in March 1864 in Vilnia (Vilnius), which was at that time the political and cultural center of the Belarusan people.