Self-government is not only an ideal but a necessity to Bohemians. Why should Bohemia, in addition to paying for her own needs, make good the deficits of lands which are passive, and in whose domestic affairs she has no greater interest than the State of New York has, for instance, in the local constabulary of Nevada? Year after year Bohemians justly complain that Vienna wrings millions in taxes from them that it spends on lands that are passive. It is partly this feature of the case, the high revenue flowing from the Bohemian Kingdom, which has made Vienna hostile to the home rule agitation. Is it reasonable to suppose, however, that if Austria could not wholly suppress the national aspiration of Bohemians in times of peace, under normal conditions, she is more likely to accomplish it if she returns home from the war exhausted, humiliated, perchance vanquished?

It may seem hazardous to forecast Austria’s future in the event of the Allies winning. But this much is already apparent, that the Austria of 1914, the government of which rested on the mediæval idea that one white race was superior to another white race, is doomed to perish. Austria needed a crushing blow from without, such as a lost war, to send toppling the ramshackle structure that has menaced for so long a time the security of the Slavic inhabitants. For, though rent by internal discord, the monarchy obviously lacked forces powerful enough to effect its own redemption. If the Teutonic forces are beaten, the logical sequel will be the breakdown of the Germanic hegemony and a corresponding rise of Slavism. With Poland resuscitated and Serbia strengthened, Vienna, it is certain, will be powerless to hold the Bohemians down.

But no matter what may happen, whether Austria-Hungary will remain Hapsburg, whether the Allies will impose their will on her destiny, or whether the Russians will become the masters of the North Slavs, let us hope that the future map-makers will not be military conquerors, as was the case at the Congress of Vienna in 1814, or statesmen of the Bismarck type, who, at the Berlin Congress in 1878, were determined to separate the people of one race, instead of uniting them. Let the map-makers be ethnologists who will, wherever practicable, deliminate boundaries according to racial, not political lines, giving German territory to the Germans, Magyar territory to the people of that race, Slavic lands to the Slavs.

Bohemia would not assume the serious task of self-government as an inexperienced novice. Bohemia is one of the oldest states in Central Europe. As a kingdom she antedates the German kingdoms, not excepting Prussia, Saxony, Bavaria. Some of these were yet minor states when she already played a conspicuous rôle in the affairs of Europe. In point of population the United States of Bohemia—including Bohemia herself, Moravia, Silesia, and Slovakland—would have within her borders a population numbering about 12,000,000. The combined area of the three first-named states is almost twice the size of Switzerland. Prague, the capital, had in 1910 581,163 inhabitants. As a wealth-providing and revenue-yielding country Bohemia stands unrivalled among the Hapsburg States.

T. Č.

New York

CONTENTS

I. Have the Bohemians a Place in the Sun?[17]
Thomas Čapek.
II. The Slovaks of Hungary[113]
Thomas Čapek.
III. Why Bohemia Deserves Freedom[123]
Professor Bohumil Šimek.
IV. The Bohemian Character[130]
Professor H. A. Miller.
V. Place of Bohemia in the Creative Arts[153]
Professor Will S. Monroe.
VI. The Bohemians and the Slavic Regeneration[160]
Professor Leo Wiener.
Addenda. The Bohemians as Immigrants[176]
Professor Emily G. Balch.