ForewordII 
he Czech demands find expression in a manifesto of the Bohemian (Czech) foreign committee, issued in Paris on the 14th day of November, 1915, from which the following at least should be quoted: “All Bohemian political parties have up to this time been fighting for a qualified independence within the limits of Austria-Hungary. But the events of this terrible war and the reckless violence of Vienna constrain us to claim independence without regard to Austria-Hungary.—We ask for an independent Bohemian-Slovak state.—The Bohemian people are now convinced that they must strike out for themselves. Austria was defeated not only by Russia, but by the little, despised Serbia, and is now a dependency of Germany. To-day Berlin has galvanized this corpse, but it is the last effort. Austria-Hungary has abdicated. We have lost all confidence in its vitality; it has no longer any reason for existence. By its incapacity, by its voluntary subordination to Germany it has convinced the whole world that the former belief in the mission of Austria is out of date, forever overthrown by the European war. Those who defended the usefulness, even the necessity of Austria-Hungary, and at one time the great Bohemian historian and statesman Palacky was one of them, thought of Austria as a federal system of nations and lands with equal rights. But Austria-Hungary as a dualistic monster became the oppressor of all who were not Germans or Magyars. It is a standing threat to the peace of Europe, a mere tool of Germany seeking conquest in the East, a state having no destiny of its own, unable to construct an organic state composed of a number of equal, free, progressive races. The dynasty living in its traditions of absolutism manages to maintain the semblance of the former world power through the undemocratic cooperation of a sterile nobility, a bureaucracy that belongs to no race, and a body of army officers that is against every race.” 
This is the authoritative expression of the Bohemian position. I have neither the right, nor the desire, to deviate in the smallest degree from the programme so defined. Independence that one word embodies 
the whole Bohemian programme. I do not lose sight of the fact that under favorable conditions the principle of nationality may find realization in a federal state, and, as you have noticed in the excerpt from our manifesto, Czechs and Slovaks at one time sought to make of Austria such a federal state, where the various nationalities embraced within its boundaries would be treated with fairness and even-handed justice. The hope in the possibility of a federal Austria is so persistent that it is worth while to endeavor to lay this ghost once and forever, and especially to demonstrate that there is no legitimate comparison between Austria and our own federal government. This is especially desirable because even the printed statement of the aims of this conference, formulated by the committee, holds: “That a federal form of government offers the most satisfactory method of giving local self-government in a country great in territory or complex in population.” Let us remember that the American federal state, to some extent at least, is made possible by the underlying uniformity of Anglo-Saxon traditions and culture, and by uniformity of language, the English language. Whether we like this or not, we must accept the fact that the profoundest influences in American life are Anglo-Saxon traditions and Anglo-Saxon culture. As a nation we are different from the English, of course, but only different. The mainsprings of our national thought fundamentally are quite similar. Even those of us who are not of Anglo-Saxon descent unconsciously use Anglo-Saxon methods of thought and build upon Anglo-Saxon traditions. This uniformity of outlook and uniformity of language outweigh many centrifugal tendencies, caused, for instance, by divergent economic interests; tendencies which otherwise might seriously endanger the stability of the American state—using the term state in its broadest sense, and not speaking of our American political subdivisions. In various press comments upon the death of Emperor Francis Joseph one could even notice statements referring to Austrian hyphenism, as if American hyphenism and the aspirations of the various Austrian nationalities could be compared! It must never be forgotten that, for instance, the Czechs in Europe live within their own historic boundaries, within their own old home, where once they were masters of their own destiny, and where they enjoyed rights of which they were deprived, and still are being deprived, by force. The difference between European nations and the United States was strikingly set forth some years ago by Mr. Joaquim Nabuco, late Brazilian Ambassador to this country, in the following words: “You are a nation in some respects of a unique type. . . . Every other nation is, or was, composed of a race or of separate races, speaking each its own language; you are a nation formed by the fusion of races of different languages, brought, by superior inducements, to speak only the hereditary language of the country. In other words, you are a nation formed of nations by their own will. Here lies all the difference: you are formed by free immigration, not by conquest. . . . This is the first and greatest influence I would point out of the discovery of America on civilization: the appearance on earth of an immense continent destined to be the new home of the old European races, where they would meet and mix and speak the same language, while in the native soil their old stocks would continue separated and up till now belligerent. In other words, a fact never seen or imagined before, of a mankind, a new mankind, formed by self-selection.” The ultimate test of the right of any state and any government to exist is to be found in the treatment it accords its various citizens. Unless it treats its citizens, or, as the European term runs, its subjects, equally, it loses the right to loyal support on the part of these subjects or citizens. If this test is applied to Austria, Austria appears to be the most dismal failure in modern history.
he Czech demands find expression in a manifesto of the Bohemian (Czech) foreign committee, issued in Paris on the 14th day of November, 1915, from which the following at least should be quoted: “All Bohemian political parties have up to this time been fighting for a qualified independence within the limits of Austria-Hungary. But the events of this terrible war and the reckless violence of Vienna constrain us to claim independence without regard to Austria-Hungary.—We ask for an independent Bohemian-Slovak state.—The Bohemian people are now convinced that they must strike out for themselves. Austria was defeated not only by Russia, but by the little, despised Serbia, and is now a dependency of Germany. To-day Berlin has galvanized this corpse, but it is the last effort. Austria-Hungary has abdicated. We have lost all confidence in its vitality; it has no longer any reason for existence. By its incapacity, by its voluntary subordination to Germany it has convinced the whole world that the former belief in the mission of Austria is out of date, forever overthrown by the European war. Those who defended the usefulness, even the necessity of Austria-Hungary, and at one time the great Bohemian historian and statesman Palacky was one of them, thought of Austria as a federal system of nations and lands with equal rights. But Austria-Hungary as a dualistic monster became the oppressor of all who were not Germans or Magyars. It is a standing threat to the peace of Europe, a mere tool of Germany seeking conquest in the East, a state having no destiny of its own, unable to construct an organic state composed of a number of equal, free, progressive races. The dynasty living in its traditions of absolutism manages to maintain the semblance of the former world power through the undemocratic cooperation of a sterile nobility, a bureaucracy that belongs to no race, and a body of army officers that is against every race.” 
This is the authoritative expression of the Bohemian position. I have neither the right, nor the desire, to deviate in the smallest degree from the programme so defined. Independence that one word embodies 
The Horologe-Tower (built in the year 1474) of
the City Hall of Prague, the Capital of Bohemia
I do not lose sight of the fact that under favorable conditions the principle of nationality may find realization in a federal state, and, as you have noticed in the excerpt from our manifesto, Czechs and Slovaks at one time sought to make of Austria such a federal state, where the various nationalities embraced within its boundaries would be treated with fairness and even-handed justice. The hope in the possibility of a federal Austria is so persistent that it is worth while to endeavor to lay this ghost once and forever, and especially to demonstrate that there is no legitimate comparison between Austria and our own federal government. This is especially desirable because even the printed statement of the aims of this conference, formulated by the committee, holds: “That a federal form of government offers the most satisfactory method of giving local self-government in a country great in territory or complex in population.” Let us remember that the American federal state, to some extent at least, is made possible by the underlying uniformity of Anglo-Saxon traditions and culture, and by uniformity of language, the English language. Whether we like this or not, we must accept the fact that the profoundest influences in American life are Anglo-Saxon traditions and Anglo-Saxon culture. As a nation we are different from the English, of course, but only different. The mainsprings of our national thought fundamentally are quite similar. Even those of us who are not of Anglo-Saxon descent unconsciously use Anglo-Saxon methods of thought and build upon Anglo-Saxon traditions. This uniformity of outlook and uniformity of language outweigh many centrifugal tendencies, caused, for instance, by divergent economic interests; tendencies which otherwise might seriously endanger the stability of the American state—using the term state in its broadest sense, and not speaking of our American political subdivisions. In various press comments upon the death of Emperor Francis Joseph one could even notice statements referring to Austrian hyphenism, as if American hyphenism and the aspirations of the various Austrian nationalities could be compared! It must never be forgotten that, for instance, the Czechs in Europe live within their own historic boundaries, within their own old home, where once they were masters of their own destiny, and where they enjoyed rights of which they were deprived, and still are being deprived, by force. The difference between European nations and the United States was strikingly set forth some years ago by Mr. Joaquim Nabuco, late Brazilian Ambassador to this country, in the following words: “You are a nation in some respects of a unique type. . . . Every other nation is, or was, composed of a race or of separate races, speaking each its own language; you are a nation formed by the fusion of races of different languages, brought, by superior inducements, to speak only the hereditary language of the country. In other words, you are a nation formed of nations by their own will. Here lies all the difference: you are formed by free immigration, not by conquest. . . . This is the first and greatest influence I would point out of the discovery of America on civilization: the appearance on earth of an immense continent destined to be the new home of the old European races, where they would meet and mix and speak the same language, while in the native soil their old stocks would continue separated and up till now belligerent. In other words, a fact never seen or imagined before, of a mankind, a new mankind, formed by self-selection.” The ultimate test of the right of any state and any government to exist is to be found in the treatment it accords its various citizens. Unless it treats its citizens, or, as the European term runs, its subjects, equally, it loses the right to loyal support on the part of these subjects or citizens. If this test is applied to Austria, Austria appears to be the most dismal failure in modern history.