Page:America in the Struggle for Czechoslovak Independence (1926).pdf/95

RV 91

The Secretary of State desires to announce that the proceedings of the Congress of Oppressed Races of Austria-Hungary, which was held in Rome in April, have been followed with great interest by the Government of the United States, and that the nationalistic aspirations of the Czechoslovaks and Jugoslavs for freedom have the earnest sympathy of this government.

Anyone carefully comparing the announcement with Dr. Putney’s survey will readily notice not only similarity, but identity of terminology (nationalistic aspirations); but today it is possible to go a step further than a mere surmise of this kind and authentically to declare that A. H. Putney was entrusted with the formulation of the declaration, in fact did write it and that it was given to the public as drafted by him.

Naturally, the full purport of the announcement, and its vital importance, cannot be grasped unless we know something of the Rome congress and of the aspirations there voiced. This congress was one called by a committee formed for the liberation of the oppressed nationalities of Austria-Hungary and was held in Rome on April 8, 9 and 10, 1918. The peoples represented were Italians, Czechoslovaks, Roumanians, Poles, Jugoslavs. The following resolutions were unanimously adopted: