The Birmingham age-herald., 1909-05-23

established in Turkey. Under the con- stitution the provinces were to elect rep resentatiYes with free votes. Instead, the Turkish officials threatened the pub lie, especially the Armenians into east ing their votes for certain Turkish ty- rants most of whom were the leaders of the 1895 massacres. However the Ar menians succeeded in having eight repre- sentatives, two of them the most able lawyers of their country, During the nine months of the parliamentary ses- sion, repeated complaints came from the provinces that the usual atrocities were growing worse. The president of the chamber, Ahmed kiza the present grand vizier to be, put them to one side and those who insisted on having their com plaints before parliament were threat ened with being thrown out of office, for the Young Turks are Pan-Islamites
 There is another clement in the re- former party in Turkey which, while standing out for constitutional govern ment and the empire, would leave large measures of self government to the races and cities composing it. After the con stitution was restored last summer, a number of broad-minded, well-educated Moslem officials who were exfled by the old regime and who also were members of the Young Turk party returned to Constantinople. They noticed that the committee of union and progress was 
 and discriminating against different Chris tian clements because of racial prejudice. These leaders, the nucleus of the present liberal party, held that If 300 years of tyranny and occasional butchery could not force these different proud old races to forget their nationality, the present system could not force them to do so and make them Ottomans now that they had been given freedom of press and speech. Besides, they pointed out, 1t was the Christian element which had advanced the commerce, the industry, the skilled labor and art.
 No sooner had the liberal party with it's broader notions come into power, early in April, than the reactionaries provoked the military uprising in Constantinople, which provoked the counter revolution of the Young Turks, and has led by quick stages to the deposition of the old Sultan. While the Young Turks were still march, ing on Constantinople the ecclesiastics, suspecting what their fate would be, fled inland to the Armenian provinces to ag- itate massacre and plunder there.
 My belief is that the real struggle in Turkey is yet to come, whether the pro- gramme of the liberals or of the com- mttee of union and progress shall be car ried out. The liberals have a certain DOT ton of the army on their side, which has kept neutral during the last two weeks trouble; the ecclesiastics are by no means shorn of their strength. An oriental par able says that when the two horses fight the donkey that goes between gets the worst of it. That is the case with the Armenians. What plead for Is such action by the Christian nations as will save them from slaughter whatever the outcome between the civil factions at Constantinople It is all but farce to say that the Turkish government cannot con- trol the mob Turkish mobs are towards, and one soldier, if he has proper com mand, can stop 100 civilians If he levels his gun in a business-like manner hor the Christian who had gun in his house and threatened to shoot the mob did not venture on that house. But Christians in Armenia are not armed For 10 years they have been put into prison if so much as a revolver has been found in their houses; while the Moslems do business in the market place with revolvers in their belts ornaments. Yet the civilized world wonders why the Armenians die like sheep.
 Great Britain signed treaty with the powers in Berlin that she would protect the Christians in Turkey. She has not washed her hands of the stain of 100000 victims in 1895, and she is not much con cerned now Is this protection honor- ing of one's signature? What has a help less child to do with politics that it must die because Germany approves the Sul- tan's actions for Bagdad railroad conces- sion, or because England and Russia can