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The Ukrainian Constituent Assembly had a no more happy fate than the Russian Assembly, for it was unable even to assemble. These last elections, just as those which took place in the Ukraine for the Russian Constituent Assembly and also for the local self-governments, show by their figures the opinions of the people—viz., that they had confidence only in the Ukrainian patriots.
3. The Austro-Hungarian Ukraine after 1848.
If the will of the people in the Ukraine of the former Russian Empire was clearly shown, the will of the Ukrainian population of Austria-Hungary was expressed still more clearly.
We have already said that Galicia had been absorbed by the Austro-Hungarian Empire in 1772. Until 1848 the Ukrainian people, placed under the yoke of this empire, lived in servitude and complete ignorance. But the patriotic ideas of Shevchenko, and later on those of Dragomanov and several other writers of Kiev, awoke the sentiment of the people, dulled through the slavery. On the other hand, the more or less constitutional Government of Austria during the second half of the nineteenth century, and the many years' struggle with the Poles, had strengthened the Ukrainian national spirit in that country.
(a) Before 1918.
Before 1918 the Ukrainians of Austria-Hungary had for a long time (1848) demanded the union of Galicia, Bukovina, and Hungarian Ukraine in one autonomous province. But at the beginning of the constitutional régime the Poles had succeeded in getting consent from the Emperor for the union of Eastern and Western Galicia, and in this autonomous province the absolute authority belonged to the Polish feudal landlords. The Ukrainians could obtain nothing, neither a school nor any institution, without running up against the difficulties raised by the Polish Administration. All advantages were given to the Poles by the electoral law before 1907.
