File No. 861.00/2972
[Enclosure—Translation]
The Lettish National
Council to the American Ambassador in
Russia (
Francis
)
protest of the lettish
national council
Possessing an unshakeable faith in the final victory of right and
justice, the Lettish people have sacrificed without stint their
wealth and their best sons in the struggle against the
subjection and oppression of nations by Germany. Nevertheless,
in the month of February, the enemy accomplished the occupation
of all Latvia. Its young and flourishing economic culture is in
ruins and its very intense intellectual life is checked. Its
rich and picturesque farms are burned and its bustling cities
are plunged in a profound silence. About 70 per cent of the
inhabitants of Latvia have voluntarily left their hearths or
have been forced to do so and have since then been wandering the
roads of immense Russia. Before the war Courland numbered
800,000 inhabitants; after the German invasion there remained
only 200,000; the city of Riga numbered 520,000 inhabitants
before the war; at present it numbers only 210,000.
The peace of Brest inflicted the most terrible blow on ruined
Latvia. Courland and the city of Riga with its district are
given over to the protectorate of Germany; the rest of Lettish
Livonia, namely, the districts of Wenden, of Wolmar, and of
Walk, are subjected to German occupation until peace and order
shall have been reestablished in agreement with the wishes of
the population; the fate of Latgalia, comprising the districts
of Rezekne, Dvinsk, and Ludza of the government of Vitebsk,
remains undecided.
[Page 834]
In this way the territory of Latvia, inhabited by a people united
by a particular civilization, by a community of political and
national aspirations, and by economic interests, is artificially
dismembered and partitioned between two states under quite
different political conditions. The treaty of Brest is a crime
directed against the national, political, and economic existence
of the Lettish people in the future; it is a violation of the
principles of democracy, an offense against the right of a
people to dispose of itself.
The German occupying power has forged for Latvia heavy chains
shackling the economic and intellectual life of the country. The
Germanization of the administration and the schools has already
commenced. The military authorities have replaced most of the
mayors of the rural communes, all the mayors of the cities, and
municipal councilors by functionaries devoted to the local
nobility. Teachers conscientious in their duties have likewise
been replaced by ill-educated masters whose sole merit is their
pro-Germanism. All freedom of speech in the press and in social
life is prosecuted and prohibited. Social and intellectual life
is completely stopped; travel, even local, is strictly regulated
and limited.
Espionage and informing are penetrating into private life as well
as into public life and prevail everywhere; the repatriation of
war refugees is disorganized and impeded in every way.
The Letts now living in Latvia, as likewise those who have just
returned or who are still wandering in the plains and cities of
Russia, would never desire the annexation of Latvia by Germany,
nor the personal union with the King of Prussia. The two
countries, Latvia and Prussia, have neither political or
national aspirations nor economic or cultural interests in
common; they are not even contiguous enough to have sufficient
organic ties. For that reason, relying upon armed force, the
occupying power is trying to subjugate Courland to German
imperialism and militarism; the fate of Posen and
Alsace-Lorraine threatens Latvia.
In order to create a juridical and moral basis for these acts of
violation of justice within the dismembered portions of Latvia,
the military authorities have hastened to form Landesrats
composed of the mayors of rural communes and cities and of the
representatives of the great landlords of German origin. The
resolutions passed at the sessions of these Landesrats give an
absolutely false idea of the political tendencies and the will
of the Lettish people. The Landesrats are usurping the right of
the people to political self-determination, masking the final
annexation of Latvia to Prussia. Thus, on March 8, 1918, the
Landesrat of Courland passed a resolution setting up the
province of Courland as a duchy and offering the crown to the
Hohenzollern dynasty; on April 12, 1918, the “United Landesrat,”
composed of representatives of the municipality of Riga, of
Livonia, of Ösel Island, and of Esthonia, decided to set up the
Baltic provinces as a monarchy joined with Prussia by a personal
union through its king, and to offer the crown of the new
monarchy to the German Emperor. The German Government has just
given the order to conclude military and economic conventions
between the Duchy of Courland and Germany.
The Landesrats created by the occupying power have no right
whatever to discuss and decide, in the name of the Lettish
people, the fate of Latvia. Their members have not been elected,
but appointed by the German administration; they are not
representatives of the Lettish people, but of the Baltic
nobility, carrying out the annexationist aims of the
Pan-Germanists. In order [Page 835] to get an idea of the way in which these Landesrats look
after the interests of Latvia, it is enough to recall the
resolution pledging Courland, the blood of its sons, and all its
riches, to German imperialism. In order to perceive how deeply
the members of this Landesrat have taken to heart the vital
needs of the working class, the historic phrase uttered at
Berlin by M. Bernewitz must be quoted: “You
ask for lands, but the lands of Courland ask for colonists,”
although 70 per cent of its rural population is landless,
demanding lands for centuries.
In view of the great importance of the coast of the Baltic Sea,
the problem of Latvia has become an international problem of
world importance. The Baltic Landesrats created by the occupying
power have neither the qualifications nor the competence to
solve it. It must be solved by the Lettish people themselves, in
accord with the interests of world democracy, at the general
peace conference.
The Lettish National Council, uniting all national political
parties, central communal institutions, and most important
social organizations’, excepting the extremist parties—the
maximalist-internationalists on the one hand and the little
group of monarchists on the other—on April 4, 1918, submitted a
vigorous protest to the German Imperial Chancellor,
Count Hertling, and the Zemstvo of
Livonia took a similar action with respect to the German
Imperial Chancellor and the Commander in Chief of the army of
occupation. The two protests have had no result.
The Lettish National Council, supported by the unanimous national
will of an undivided and indivisible Latvia, in this historic
moment addresses to the governments and nations of the entire
world its energetic protest against the dismemberment of the
territory of Latvia and against the falsification of the will of
the Lettish people, and it declares categorically and firmly the
will of the Lettish people:
- 1.
- The treaty of Brest of March 3, 1918, dismembering the
territory of Latvia, is an act of violence against the
right of the people to self-determination and must be
regarded as null and void.
- 2.
- The Lettish people do not desire the annexation of
Latvia to Germany nor the personal union of Latvia with
Prussia.
- 3.
- The decisions of the Landesrats are gross
falsifications of the wishes of the population of
Latvia.
- 4.
- The military and economic conventions which the German
Government is about to conclude with the Landesrats of
Latvia will not be recognized nor carried out by Latvia
and the Lettish nation.
- 5.
- The Lettish National Council protests against the
violation of the freedom of the press, of speech and of
assembly, of personal liberty and of travel, against the
arbitrary replacing of the mayors of communes and cities
by the occupying power.
- 6.
- It deems an urgent necessity the recognition of the
Lettish National Council as the supreme institution of
the Lettish state until the war refugees shall have
returned to their homes and the political constitution
of Latvia shall have been drawn up and put into
effect.
- 7.
- It demands the creation of an independent and
indivisible Lettish state under international
guarantee.
The President of the Department of Foreign
Affairs of the Lettish National Council
-
J.
Goldmans
-
Secretary,
J. Seskis
[Received at the
Embassy in Petrograd, July 14,
1918.]