"5. Restriction of the rights of the Cretan government in the matter of conclusion of treaties of commerce and agreements with foreign powers."
What the "rights of the Sultan" might be were not specified then, nor have they been since: but articles four and five were enough to throw the whole of Crete into a state of wildest excitement. The Turks, after having lost the island, were trying to win it back.
Left to themselves (as they had every reason to believe) the Cretans convoked the National Assembly for April 26, 1910. The Assembly was opened in the name of George I., King of the Hellenes. The Moslem deputies immediately presented a protest in which they rejected the sovereignty of Greece over Crete. The deputies were then asked to take the oath of allegiance in the name of King George. A second petition was presented by the Moslem deputies, declaring that, as the Sultan of Turkey held "sovereign rights" in the island, they, in the name of their Moslem constituents, protested against such an action. They refused to take the oath. Should they be excluded from the Assembly, or be allowed to sit without taking the oath?
Instead of insisting on the admission of the Moslem deputies, the Powers again gave "friendly counsels." Once more M. Venizelos pleaded that they speak out their mind in the matter of the legal status of the island. The diplomats "temporized" again, and the warships reappeared to assure to the Moslem deputies "their lawful rights." When M. Venizelos could get no statement from the Powers as to the grounds upon which these "lawful rights" rested, he saw that all hope of help from the Powers was over, and that he was only wasting his time. Like Cavour, when he turned with disgust from his efforts to interest the Powers and had the inspiration, Italia fara da se, the Cretan leader abandoned the antechamber of the chancelleries. While the Powers still sought a modus vivendi for Crete, M. Venizelos made one. From that moment the Balkan War was a certainty.
The Young Turk Cabinet, arrogant and drunk with the success of their boycott against Austria-Hungary, and at the same time knowing that they must turn public attention away from the loss of Bosnia and Herzegovina, began to press the Powers for the restoration in Crete of the status quo as it had existed before the diplomatic blunders I have outlined above, and, in addition, for the coaling station and for control over Crete's foreign relations. At the same time, they demanded of the Athens Cabinet that Greece renounce formally, not only for the present but also for the future, any intention of annexing Crete. The Young Turks represented that public opinion in Turkey was so wrought up over the Cretan question that war with Greece would certainly follow. To illustrate to the Powers and to Greece the force of this public opinion, a widespread boycott against everything Greek in Turkey was started. This economic warfare is described in another chapter. In some parts of Turkey the boycott has never ceased. There is no doubt that this boycott was one of the very most important factors in bringing on the Balkan War. For it taught the Greeks, who were continually being bullied and threatened with an invasion in Thessaly, the imperative necessity of reconciliation with Bulgaria by a compromise of rival claims in Macedonia.
Thinking that he could serve his country better in Greece than in Crete, M. Venizelos posed his candidacy to the Greek Chamber in the summer of 1910. Seemingly he was abandoning Crete to its fate, and he had to bear many unjust reproaches from his fellow-countrymen. His wonderful personality and extraordinary political genius soon brought him to the front in Greece. The Cretan revolutionary became Prime Minister of Greece. Steadfast in his purpose he began to negotiate with the other Balkan States and with Russia. He was able to accomplish the impossible. The war with Turkey is largely his personal success. No statesman since Bismarck has had so brilliant a triumph.
In 1910, M. Venizelos took the step which was the turning point in his career and in the history of Greece. Firmly persuaded that Crete could be annexed to Greece only by Greece proving herself stronger than Turkey, and not by diplomatic manoeuvres, he decided to desert Cretan politics, and enter the larger sphere open to him at Athens. It was easy to secure a seat in the Greek Parliament, but that was the only easy part about it. When one considered the fickle character of the Greek people in their politics, the selfish narrowness and bitter prejudices of their leaders, the inefficiency of the army and navy, whose officers had been ruined by political activity, the emptiness of the treasury, the unpopularity of the royal family, and the general disorder throughout the country, it seems incredible that M. Venizelos should have been willing to assume the responsibility of government, let alone succeed in his self-imposed task. Had you asked the leading statesmen of Europe five years ago what country presented the most formidable and at the same time most hopeless task tor a Premier, there would have been unanimity in selecting Greece.
But for Eleutherios Venizelos there was no difficulty which could not be overcome. It is the nature of the man to refuse to see failure ahead. "If one loves to work, and works for love," he has declared, "failure does not exist."
Called to be Prime Minister in August, 1910, M. Venezelos began to reform everything in sight. His first step was to endow Greece with a new constitution, whose most important changes were a Council of State, chosen for life and irremovable, to act as a Senate (Greece has single-chamber government), legalizing the state of siege, sanctioning the employment of foreigners in the service of the Government, fixing twenty-four hours as the maximum delay for bringing one who had been arrested before a magistrate, forbidding the publication of uncensored news relative to military and naval operations in time of war, establishing free, obligatory primary instruction, excluding from Parliament directors in corporations, and facilitating the expropriation of property for public purposes. I have given enough to show the practical character of the new constitution.