The Montgomery advertiser., 1904-09-25
RUINED BY RUSSIAN OPPRESSION.
Csar Has Reduced Films Frqm Indepen-
 dence to Beggary.
Seattle Post-Intelligencer.

Seattle Post-Intelligencer.
 As an incident of the crushing of Finland by Czar Nicholas II. over 300- 900 Films have left the fatherland in little over two years. Previous to February, 1899. the Films were a people unknown to the world. except through the tales of travellers, and. in a general way, to readers of history. Today there are 200, 900 of them in the United States alone. Up to that date they were content to remain in their own bleak and inhospitable land. where they had become almost universally prosperous and contended. Today the tide of emil grafton that Is carrying them out from under the yoke of oppression seems de- stined to create a wilderness where few years ago was a peaceful. happy and prosperous state. It would be fitting rebuke to the perfidy of a weak and evilly counseled czar.
 In 1909 Finland was ceded by Sweden to Russia. For ninety years Russian monarchs permitted and even guaran- teed the existence of conditions solemn ly agreed to when that now unhappy land became subject to the Russian crown.
 The people of Finland had adopted constitution in 1792. They had a relig- ion of their own. Russia guaranteed
  ever, and promises that the constitu- tion of 1792 should be forever upheld. And for 90 years the trust was kept. It has remained for Nicholas II. to violate every honored promise of his fathers and to Invoke by a single decree the de- struction of a state, together with all It's institutions of language, church, government and literature. and the ban ishment of a people from a land they | L. Itn-A.. records few more pathetic national tragedies.
 few years ago the Films were a self governed people And. 1t Is openly alleged. because Russia feared the in- f1uence of the spectacle. the czar issued a manifesto February IS, 1899, suspen- ding the Finnish constitution, reducing the people to the level of the poorest Russian subjects; making them subject to obligatory military service and kill ing even their literature by establish ing the Russian language. Out of 2,700 900 people, but 5000 could speak Russian at all
 During the years they were left to govern themselves the people of Fin land had made great progress They had left far behind them the gloomtof ignorance in which Russia is destined to grope for further generations. Hitter acy was practically unknown. They had become moral. intelligent people, who goverened themselves so wisely and well as to elicit the admiration of students of statecraft everywhere they were farmers who owned their own lands; artifcers who owned their own shops; fishermen who controlled their own interest. and as a nation the Films had established and were maintaining schools and academies of high order. 1 By their own efforts they had carved out their own state and created the conditions that made them happy and prosperous. By one stroke of his pen the czar robbed them of all he had promised to hold In sacred trust for them. He destroyed their whole fabric ot state and society and reduced them from the pinnacle of independence to which they had raised themselves to the most humiliating depths of depen- dencv and beggary. It was an act un- worthy of a great ruler. even though that ruler be the czar of the Russias. ! The Films have the sympathy of the whole world Nicholas IT. has only its sCOrn.