should not be disavowed, but that under the pressure of public opinion the manifestos from Prague would develop more and more on radical lines.
On the day before the opening of the Parliament at Vienna (May 29, 1917) the National Council issued a proclamation, drawn up by Professor Masaryk, in the form of a protest against the summoning of Parliament. It emphasized the illegal character of this proceeding. The mandates of the deputies had not been issued in time, and more than fifty of them were unable to exercise their Parliamentary functions. Moreover, the Constitution of 1867, which did not acknowledge the Czechs, was no longer in existence, having been infringed on several occasions by Franz Josef. There were also other grounds for protest. The Austrian Government had declared war without Parliamentary sanction and against the will of the Czech nation. In every possible manner it had persecuted the Czechs, had expended the sum of 60 milliards on the war, had refused to admit eight Czech deputies into Parliament, and was instituting new repressive measures against Czechs who showed any racial consciousness. By summoning Parliament, the Austrian Government wished to transfer responsibility for the war to the nations which it governed. It also wished to exact declarations of loyalty from them, and thus produce an influence upon the Entente to their detriment.
The Czech authors had repudiated the responsibility of the Czech nation for the war, and declared themselves in favour of independent Czech territories, together with Slovakia. As, however, any considerable anti-Austrian manifestos in the Czech areas would certainly have been suppressed, it was only the National Council in Paris which was free to display the will of the nation. It therefore protested against all Austrian intrigues, and declared that the resolutions of the Parliament at Vienna could not be binding upon the Czech nation, and it expressed an unflinching determination to achieve complete independence. This declaration of the National Council met with wide comment in the Allied Press.
The reservation of State rights which the Czech League, by arrangement with the National Council, brought forward in the Austrian Parliament on May 30, 1917, demanded State rights, and emphasized the principle of the self-determination of nations. It claimed a democratic Czech State, united with Slovakia. It did not contain any declaration against the Empire,
