Part 8 (1/2)
FRANCIS BERTIE.
(_In the absence of the Marquis of Lansdowne._)
(”Foreign Relations of the United States (1902),” pp. 910 _et seq._, 42 _et seq._, and 550).
(_h_) THE CONFERENCES OF LONDON, ST. PETERSBURG AND BUCHAREST (1912-13).
In connection with the Balkan complications of the last ten years, which form the overture to the present war, the Jewish organisations in Western Europe and America--chiefly the London Jewish Conjoint Committee--lost no opportunity of keeping the grievances of the Rumanian Jews before the Great Powers and of maintaining the liberties already won in South-Eastern Europe. The work has been of a more arduous and far-reaching character than the public suspect, and, although it has not achieved final success, it has been far from unfruitful. Of this work it is only possible to speak in a very summary way, as much of it is still confidential and all of it is directly related to negotiations still pending and necessarily belonging to the domain of what is invidiously called secret diplomacy.
In 1908, on the occasion of the annexation of Bosnia and the Herzegovina by Austria-Hungary, the Conjoint Committee seized the opportunity of endeavouring to reopen the Rumano-Jewish Question. The annexation was a technical infraction of the Berlin Treaty and required the sanction of the Great Powers, for which probably a Conference would be held. The Conjoint Committee addressed to Sir Edward Grey a request that the scope of the proposed Conference should be extended to other infractions of the Treaty, and accompanied it with a review of the Rumano-Jewish Question, which const.i.tutes one of the most important State Papers produced in the Jewish community.[46] Unfortunately the projected Conference was abandoned, but Sir Edward Grey was so impressed by the statements of the Conjoint Committee that he ordered an investigation to be made, and he afterwards formally avowed, in a letter to the Conjoint Committee, that the charges made in the Memorandum were accurate and that Rumania had not fulfilled her Treaty pledges. This perhaps may not seem to be a great gain, but those who know anything of international politics will be aware that an official statement of this kind has considerable practical importance, and, indeed, it was not lost upon the Cabinet of Bucharest.
The last occasions on which attempts were made to put an end to the Rumanian scandal were in connection with the Conferences of London, St.
Petersburg, and Bucharest, which liquidated the various questions arising out of the Balkan wars in 1912-13. Here two questions confronted the Conjoint Committee. While the international questions at issue were confined to the trans-Danubian States, all that was necessary was to secure for the populations of the transferred territories in that region a reaffirmation of the clauses of the Treaties of 1830 and 1878, by which the liberties of racial and religious minorities were guaranteed.
When, however, Rumania joined in the war, this question became of much greater importance, and it involved the reopening of the whole question of Rumania's violation of the Treaty of Berlin. In spite of the efforts of the Conjoint Committee, neither the three Conferences of London, nor the Conference of St. Petersburg dealt with these questions. At the Conference of Bucharest the United States Government, at the instance of the American Jewish Committee, made a suggestion that the civil and religious liberties of the populations of the territories transferred under the proposed Treaty should be specially guaranteed. On the proposal of the Rumanian Prime Minister, however, the Conference agreed that such securities were not necessary, but expressed their readiness to give a verbal a.s.surance that the wishes of the United States would be fully realised.[47] A long correspondence ensued between the Conjoint Committee and the Foreign Office, and eventually Sir Edward Grey agreed to a suggestion of the Committee that the Great Powers should be consulted with a view to making their sanction of the new territorial arrangements in the Balkans conditional on the guarantee of full civil and religious liberty to all the inhabitants of the annexed territories.[48] This important a.s.surance was reaffirmed by the Secretary of State towards the end of July 1914, within a week of the outbreak of the present war.
DOc.u.mENTS.
EXTRACT FROM THE PROTOCOLS OF THE CONFERENCE OF BUCHAREST.
_Protocole No. 6.--Seance du Mardi, 23 Juillet (5 Aout), 1913._
[Le President] fait part a la Conference de la note suivante que lui a remise S.E. Monsieur Jackson, Ministre des etats-Unis d'Amerique a Bucarest.
”Le Gouvernement des etats-Unis d'Amerique desire faire savoir qu'il regarderait avec satisfaction si une provision accordant pleine liberte civile et religieuse aux habitants de tout territoire que pourrait etre a.s.sujetti a la souverainte de quiconque des cinq Puissances ou qui pourrait etre transfere de la jurisdiction de l'une des Puissances a celle d'une autre, pourrait etre introduite dans toute convention conclue a Bucarest.”
M. Maioresco estime que les delegues sont unanimes a reconnaitre pleinement, en fait et en droit, le principe qui a inspire la note precitee, le droit public des etats const.i.tutionnels representes a cette Conference en ayant consacre de longue date l'application. Le President pense donc que la note des etats-Unis d'Amerique ne saurait soulever aucune difficulte: il est peut-etre bon de rappeler quelquefois les principes, meme lorsqu'ils sont universellement admis. Aussi, croit-il etre l'interprete des sentiments de MM. les Plenipotentiaires en declarant que les habitants de tout territoire nouvellement acquis auront, sans distinction de religion, la meme pleine liberte civile et religieuse que tous les autres habitants de l'etat.
M. Venizelos considere qu'a la suite des declarations du President, qui seront consignees au Protocole, toute insertion dans le traite a conclure, d'un principe deja universellement reconnu serait superflue.
Cette maniere de voir de M. le premier delegue de Grece a recueilli l'a.s.sentiment unanime.
(”Le Traite de Paix de Bucarest--Protocoles de la Conference,” Bucarest, 1913, pp. 24-25.)
EXTRACTS FROM CORRESPONDENCE BETWEEN THE CONJOINT COMMITTEE AND SIR EDWARD GREY.
CONJOINT JEWISH COMMITTEE,
19 FINSBURY CIRCUS, E.C.
_13th October, 1913_.
SIR,--The Jewish Conjoint Foreign Committee of the London Committee of Deputies of British Jews and the Anglo-Jewish a.s.sociation have had under their consideration the diplomatic acts--princ.i.p.ally the Treaty of Bucharest--by which the new territorial system in the Near East has been adjusted, and they have instructed us to invite the attention of His Majesty's Government to the omission from those doc.u.ments of provisions either confirming or repeating on their own account, for the benefit of the annexed territories, the guarantees of civil and religious liberty and equality contained in the Protocol No. 3 of the Conference of London of February 3rd, 1830, and in Articles V, XXVII, x.x.xIV, XLIV, and LXII of the Treaty of Berlin.
Owing to the vast changes which have been made in the distribution of the Jewish communities throughout the region lying between the Danube and the aegean, and more especially in view of the annexations to the Kingdom of Roumania, where hitherto the Civil and Religious Liberty Clauses of the Treaty of Berlin have been systematically evaded, this question has caused the Jewish people the gravest anxiety. The Conjoint Committee are well aware that in four of the annexing States, namely, Greece, Bulgaria, Servia, and Montenegro, the Const.i.tutions provide for the equal rights of all religious denominations, and they gratefully acknowledge that for many years past the Jews in those countries have had no reason to complain; but in the new conditions of mixed races and creeds which confront those States, and in face of the symptoms already apparent of an accentuation of the long-standing inter-confessional bitterness and strife, they prefer not to relinquish the international obligations by which the rights of their co-religionists have hitherto been secured. In this view they find themselves supported not only by all the Jewish communities of the Balkans, but also by all of the religious minorities in the dominions which have recently changed hands.
The reasonableness of their view is further supported by the const.i.tutional changes effected in like circ.u.mstances in Moldo-Wallachia and Servia three-quarters of a century ago to the prejudice of the Jews, and also by the continued encouragement to religious intolerance afforded by the legalised oppression of a quarter of a million Jews in the Kingdom of Roumania.