Page:The Bohemian Review, vol1, 1917.djvu/192

 been much editorial comment in American papers on this important announcement. It is virtually the end of all dreams of a federalized Austria-Hungary. The young emperor who was expected to emancipate his realm from William’s control by giving a share in the government to elements hostile to Germany has publicly abandoned all plans for a thorough reform. He pledged himself not to permit interference with the dualistic structure of his inheritance, not to tolerate efforts to give equal rights to the majority of the people of Hungary. Federalization of Austria alone, even if it were not vetoed by the Germans of Austria, would be a farce, if the process cannot be applied to Hungary. The artificial splitting of the Slavs to enable Germans and Magyars to rule would continue. The Czechs in Bohemia, Moravia and Silesia would remain separated from the Slovaks of northwestern Hungary; the Slovenians, Croatians and Serbians would be still divided between Austria, Hungary and the annexed provinces of Bosnia and Herzegovina, not to speak of the Serbians of Serbia. The Little Russians of northeastern Hungary would still be cut off from their brothers in Galicia, as they in their turn would be kept separated from the people of Ukraine, and the Roumanian subjects of Charles would be still Germanized in Bukovina and Magyarized in Transylvania. The plan of a federalized Austria was nothing but a dream from the very beginning; the authoritative pronouncement just made in the parliament of Budapest should make that much plain to all who do not defend Austria from ulterior motives.

It is too late in the day to save the empire of Charles and Zita. It is not worth saving. Americans, especially, who are democrats and believe in the rights of peoples, not in the inherited rights of monarchs, have no reason to lift a finger to prolong the life in an artificial state, the very existence of which violates the principles of the found ers of the American nation. A Frenchman, Louis Eisenmann, whose standard work “Le Compromis Austro-Hongrois”, entitles him to speak with authority on the subject of the Hapsburg monarchy, wrote recently in La Nation Tchèque:

“The Austria-Hungary which people want to save is the dynastic Austria-Hungary. It is a question of preserving an empire for the House of Hapsburg. It is to the interest of a reigning family that people would sacrifice—unwittingly and certainly without wishing it—thirty million souls whose ardent sympathy goes to the Entente; and would sacrifice with them the whole fruit of this terrible war, the future of Europe and of the world

“There is a young couple, without great intelligence, without merit, who have not made great mistakes or committed great crimes, but who are overwhelmed by a heavy inheritance of crime and error. Around them stand twenty, fifty or a hundred families without nationality, without a real fatherland, cosmopolitan as people were two or three centuries ago, a last refuge of a tradition which elsewhere has yielded to the new spirit of the modern world. It is this group, this group alone, dynasty and aristocracy, that makes up Austria-Hungary. And we are asked to make peace with that, and for its sake to give up our ideals, sacrifice our friends and prepare our own undoing.”

You cannot reform the empire of the Hapsburgs. As long as Austria-Hungary continues to exist, it will stand for the rule of a dynasty based on the privileged position of two minority races, and Germany will command the resources of another enmpire larger in area and almost as populous as the Hohenzollern empire. If you want to draw Germany’s fangs and smash her Central Europe schemes, replace the dynastic state on the Danube with national states and erect instead of the present government by bayonets governments based on consent of the governed.

Several regiments on the Italian front have refused to obey orders and by way of punishment have been sent to Palestine. So the Czechs that once fought to win the Holy Land from the infidels are expected to fight now to save Jerusalem for the Turks.

There is one sure way of definitely limiting the power for ill of Germany, and that is the distruction of Austria-Hungary and thereby of the Central European bloc; if we wish to strike Germany for our purposes in a vital spot, we must strike at Austria-Hungary.

Contemporary Review

Although Kramář and his colleagues have been pardoned, they have not been forgiven. The Austrian Treasury is suing Karel Kramář and Dr. Alois Rašín for six and a half million crowns damage which, it is claimed, the state has suffered through their treasonable acts.