Broke 100 Balkan Treaties.

New York Times 100 years ago today, November 2, 1912:
Reformers Promised for 125 Years, but Butchery Was Not Stopped.
Special Correspondence The New York Times.
    CONSTANTINOPLE, Oct. 29.— That writers in Europe and America should be chiding the Balkan States for ignoring the "olive branch" which Turkey held forth after their mobilization was started is viewed with amazement by all intelligent and well-informed men here. Turkey announced that she had decided to "apply the law of 1880" in Macedonia in conformity with Article 23 of the Treaty of Berlin. This treaty, to which Turkey was a party, (and the party who gained most,) solemnly pledged justice and equitable treatment to the Christian populations of European Turkey. As these Christian populations were being handed back to Turkey after they had been emancipated by the Treaty of San Stefano, the powers and Turkey were assuming a sacred obligation. Turkey was receiving a gift on the promise of good behavior. The powers were incurring a great risk in putting back Christians under Moslem rule, and it certainly has been their responsibility to see that these Christians did not suffer too much as a result of their jealousy and selfishness.
    This was thirty-four years ago, and two years later the "law of 1880" was drawn up. Had Turkey enforced this law, had the powers successfully insisted upon its enforcement, the present war would not have been fought and the Balkan States would not have to be giving their blood for the freedom of their oppressed kinsmen in Macedonia.
    The very fact that the law dates from 1880 and is just now being brought out of the dusty archives to turn aside a storm is typically Turkish. When we study the history of Turkish promises to reform we find three things: That the promises are numerous; that they are never made except under circumstances analogous to those at present, and that they are never kept.
    The New York Times correspondent has under his eye as he writes a collection of "reforms" promised by Turkey for the protection of Christians in her dominions. There are just 100 of these "promises" in the form of sworn treaties extending from 1774 to 1904. Not one of them has ever been observed. This could be proved by an examination of the treaties themselves. They reiterate the same points for 125 years! The burden of the last promise is the same as that of the first, and asserts that his Imperial Majesty the Sultan will grant to his Christian subjects in European Turkey liberty and equality before the law with Moslems. Let us examine the conditions under which the most celebrated of these laws were promulgated. Most illustrious of all is the Hatticherif or Law of the Tanzimat, given on Nov. 31, 1839. It is a most sweeping proclamation of equality before the law, privilege of military service, opening of Government posts, &c., to the Christians of Turkey. It was given under pressure of extreme fright. Turkey had been saved from dismemberment, which the rebellious and victorious Mohammed Ali of Egypt was threatening, only by the interposition of the European powers.
    Next comes the equally famous Hattihumatoun of Feb. 18, 1856. It was more generous even than the Tanzimat. This law was decreed through the pressure of England and France, who at the tremendous cost of the Crimean War had saved Turkey from destruction at the hands of Russia.
    In 1876 Abdul Hamid came to the throne. In his accession speech he declared: "Placing my confidence wholly in God, I hope firmly that all the Ministers and functionaries of the empire will associate themselves with me to aid me in the realization of my intentions. My sole desire is the consolidation and glory of my empire, and I promise the perfect enjoyment to all my subjects, without any distinction of creed, of liberty and the benefits which come from public tranquillity and good distribution of justice." The man who uttered these words will go down in history as the great assassin and butcher of modern times, at whose word probably more than 1,000,000 people were killed during his inglorious reign of thirty-three years.
    Every edict of reform that has been given out by the Sublime Porte under compulsion of the powers has been followed by an increase in persecution of  the Christians. The Bulgarians and Servians and Montenegrins and Greeks know this. They live next door to Macedonia, and it is their own flesh and blood which are being offered up every year as the price of maintaining the Turk in Europe. As long as they were weak and disunited they had to listen to the empty promises of the Porte and the diplomatic platitudes of Europe. Now, for the moment at least, they are united, and who could be credulous enough to think that a promise to "apply the law of 1880" would hold back their hand. The promise is hypocritical, as all Turkish promises have been. It was a mere blind to gain time  to complete military preparations and  replenish an empty exchequer.
    During the past Summer The Times correspondent has been through Macedonia and seen with his own eyes the unspeakable conditions there. It is easy enough to talk of peace conferences and  reference to The Hague Tribunal from a comfortable London or New York chair. The Turk knows only force in his dealings with others. Only by opposing force to force, violence to violence, can his grip upon the wretched Macedonian be loosened. In Bulgaria and Servia and Greece, and everywhere, one could hear about this approaching war. The Balkan States are risking everything to aid their enslaved Macedonian brethren. They are fully aware that Austria-Hungary will rob them of any material advantages which they might have a right to realize from victory. So this war for them is a crusade, and, having taken up their arms in a holy cause, they are not going to lay them down.