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British-American Diplomacy
The Paris Peace Treaty of September 30, 1783

The Definitive Treaty of Peace 1783

In the name of the most holy and undivided Trinity.

It having pleased the Divine Providence to dispose the hearts of the most serene and most potent Prince George the Third, by the grace of God, king of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, defender of the faith, duke of Brunswick and Lunebourg, arch-treasurer and prince elector of the Holy Roman Empire etc., and of the United States of America, to forget all past misunderstandings and differences that have unhappily interrupted the good correspondence and friendship which they mutually wish to restore, and to establish such a beneficial and satisfactory intercourse , between the two countries upon the ground of reciprocal advantages and mutual convenience as may promote and secure to both perpetual peace and harmony; and having for this desirable end already laid the foundation of peace and reconciliation by the Provisional Articles signed at Paris on the 30th of November 1782, by the commissioners empowered on each part, which articles were agreed to be inserted in and constitute the Treaty of Peace proposed to be concluded between the Crown of Great Britain and the said United States, but which treaty was not to be concluded until terms of peace should be agreed upon between Great Britain and France and his Britannic Majesty should be ready to conclude such treaty accordingly; and the treaty between Great Britain and France having since been concluded, his Britannic Majesty and the United States of America, in order to carry into full effect the Provisional Articles above mentioned, according to the tenor thereof, have constituted and appointed, that is to say his Britannic Majesty on his part, David Hartley, Esqr., member of the Parliament of Great Britain, and the said United States on their part, John Adams, Esqr., late a commissioner of the United States of America at the court of Versailles, late delegate in Congress from the state of Massachusetts, and chief justice of the said state, and minister plenipotentiary of the said United States to their high mightinesses the States General of the United Netherlands; Benjamin Franklin, Esqr., late delegate in Congress from the state of Pennsylvania, president of the convention of the said state, and minister plenipotentiary from the United States of America at the court of Versailles; John Jay, Esqr., late president of Congress and chief justice of the state of New York, and minister plenipotentiary from the said United States at the court of Madrid; to be plenipotentiaries for the concluding and signing the present definitive treaty; who after having reciprocally communicated their respective full powers have agreed upon and confirmed the following articles.

His Brittanic Majesty acknowledges the said United States, viz., New Hampshire, Massachusetts Bay, Rhode Island and Providence Plantations, Connecticut, New York, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Maryland, Virginia, North Carolina, South Carolina and Georgia, to be free sovereign and independent states, that he treats with them as such, and for himself, his heirs, and successors, relinquishes all claims to the government, propriety, and territorial rights of the same and every part thereof.

And that all disputes which might arise in future on the subject of the boundaries of the said United States may be prevented, it is hereby agreed and declared, that the following are and shall be their boundaries, viz.; from the northwest angle of Nova Scotia, viz., that angle which is formed by a line drawn due north from the source of St. Croix River to the highlands; along the said highlands which divide those rivers that empty themselves into the river St. Lawrence, from those which fall into the Atlantic Ocean, to the northwesternmost head of Connecticut River; thence down along the middle of that river to the forty-fifth degree of north latitude; from thence by a line due west on said latitude until it strikes the river Iroquois or Cataraquy; thence along the middle of said river into Lake Ontario; through the middle of said lake until it strikes the communication by water between that lake and Lake Erie; thence along the middle of said communication into Lake Erie, through the middle of said lake until it arrives at the water communication between that lake and Lake Huron; thence along the middle of said water communication into Lake Huron, thence through the middle of said lake to the water communication between that lake and Lake Superior; thence through Lake Superior northward of the Isles Royal and Phelipeaux to the Long Lake; thence through the middle of said Long Lake and the water communication between it and the Lake of the Woods, to the said Lake of the Woods; thence through the said lake to the most northwesternmost point thereof, and from thence on a due west course to the river Mississippi; thence by a line to be drawn along the middle of the said river Mississippi until it shall intersect the northernmost part of the thirty-first degree of north latitude, South, by a line to be drawn due east from the determination of the line last mentioned in the latitude of thirty-one degrees of the equator, to the middle of the river Apalachicola or Catahouche; thence along the middle thereof to its junction with the Flint River, thence straight to the head of Saint Mary's River; and thence down along the middle of Saint Mary's River to the Atlantic Ocean; east, by a line to be drawn along the middle of the river Saint Croix, from its mouth in the Bay of Fundy to its source, and from its source directly north to the aforesaid highlands which divide the rivers that fall into the Atlantic Ocean from those which fall into the river Saint Lawrence; comprehending all islands within twenty leagues of any part of the shores of the United States, and lying between lines to be drawn due east from the points where the aforesaid boundaries between Nova Scotia on the one part and East Florida on the other shall, respectively, touch the Bay of Fundy and the Atlantic Ocean, excepting such islands as now are or heretofore have been within the limits of the said province of Nova Scotia.

It is agreed that the people of the United States shall continue to enjoy unmolested the right to take fish of every kind on the Grand Bank and on all the other banks of Newfoundland, also in the Gulf of Saint Lawrence and at all other places in the sea, where the inhabitants of both countries used at any time heretofore to fish. And also that the inhabitants of the United States shall have liberty to take fish of every kind on such part of the coast of Newfoundland as British fishermen shall use, (but not to dry or cure the same on that island) and also on the coasts, bays and creeks of all other of his Brittanic Majesty's dominions in America; and that the American fishermen shall have liberty to dry and cure fish in any of the unsettled bays, harbors, and creeks of Nova Scotia, Magdalen Islands, and Labrador, so long as the same shall remain unsettled, but so soon as the same or either of them shall be settled, it shall not be lawful for the said fishermen to dry or cure fish at such settlement without a previous agreement for that purpose with the inhabitants, proprietors, or possessors of the ground.

It is agreed that creditors on either side shall meet with no lawful impediment to the recovery of the full value in sterling money of all bona fide debts heretofore contracted.

It is agreed that Congress shall earnestly recommend it to the legislatures of the respective states to provide for the restitution of all estates, rights, and properties, which have been confiscated belonging to real British subjects; and also of the estates, rights, and properties of persons resident in districts in the possession on his Majesty's arms and who have not borne arms against the said United States. And that persons of any other decription shall have free liberty to go to any part or parts of any of the thirteen United States and therein to remain twelve months unmolested in their endeavors to obtain the restitution of such of their estates, rights, and properties as may have been confiscated; and that Congress shall also earnestly recommend to the several states a reconsideration and revision of all acts or laws regarding the premises, so as to render the said laws or acts perfectly consistent not only with justice and equity but with that spirit of conciliation which on the return of the blessings of peace should universally prevail. And that Congress shall also earnestly recommend to the several states that the estates, rights, and properties, of such last mentioned persons shall be restored to them, they refunding to any persons who may be now in possession the bona fide price (where any has been given) which such persons may have paid on purchasing any of the said lands, rights, or properties since the confiscation.

And it is agreed that all persons who have any interest in confiscated lands, either by debts, marriage settlements, or otherwise, shall meet with no lawful impediment in the prosecution of their just rights.

That there shall be no future confiscations made nor any prosecutions commenced against any person or persons for, or by reason of, the part which he or they may have taken in the present war, and that no person shall on that account suffer any future loss or damage, either in his person, liberty, or property; and that those who may be in confinement on such charges at the time of the ratification of the treaty in America shall be immediately set at liberty, and the prosecutions so commenced be discontinued.

There shall be a firm and perpetual peace between his Brittanic Majesty and the said states, and between the subjects of the one and the citizens of the other, wherefore all hostilities both by sea and land shall from henceforth cease. All prisoners on both sides shall be set at liberty, and his Brittanic Majesty shall with all convenient speed, and without causing any destruction, or carrying away any Negroes or other property of the American inhabitants, withdraw all his armies, garrisons, and fleets from the said United States, and from every post, place, and harbor within the same; leaving in all fortifications, the American artilery that may be therein; and shall also order and cause all archives, records, deeds, and papers belonging to any of the said states, or their citizens, which in the course of the war may have fallen into the hands of his officers, to be forthwith restored and delivered to the proper states and persons to whom they belong.

The navigation of the river Mississippi, from its source to the ocean, shall forever remain free and open to the subjects of Great Britain and the citizens of the United States.

In case it should so happen that any place or territory belonging to Great Britain or to the United States should have been conquered by the arms of either from the other before the arrival of the said Provisional Articles in America, it is agreed that the same shall be restored without difficulty and without requiring any compensation.

The solemn ratifications of the present treaty expedited in good and due form shall be exchanged between the contracting parties in the space of six months or sooner, if possible, to be computed from the day of the signatures of the present treaty. In witness whereof we the undersigned, their ministers plenipotentiary, have in their name and in virtue of our full powers, signed with our hands the present definitive treaty and caused the seals of our arms to be affixed thereto.

Done at Paris, this third day of September in the year of our Lord, one thousand seven hundred and eighty-three.

D. HARTLEY (SEAL)
JOHN ADAMS (SEAL)
B. FRANKLIN (SEAL)
JOHN JAY (SEAL)

Source:
Treaties and Other International Acts of the United States of America.
Edited by Hunter Miller
Volume 2
Documents 1-40 : 1776-1818
Washington : Government Printing Office, 1931.

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Avalon Project - British-American Diplomcay : The Paris Peace Treaty of September 30, 1783

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British-American Diplomacy The Paris Peace Treaty of September 30, 1783 In the name of the most holy and undivided Trinity.

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On this date, President Thomas Jefferson approved and signed an act to pay France $11 million dollars for the Louisiana Purchase. The House discussed and approved the payment with a 90 to 25 vote on October 25, 1803. During the deliberations, some Members questioned the constitutionality of increasing the size of the nation and Congress's role in that process. President Jefferson conducted most of the negotiating with Napoleonic France without congressional input. John Randolph of Virginia, chairman of the Ways and Means Committee, asked rhetorically, "Does not the President . . . submit this subject to Congress for their sanction? Does he not recognize the principle . . . that no treaty is binding until we pass the laws for executing it?" The Louisiana Purchase added 828,000 square miles to the United States, stretching northwest from New Orleans to present-day Montana. Daniel Clark of the Orleans Territory became the first delegate from the acquired land in the 9th Congress (1805-1807).

Related Highlight Subjects

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The Louisiana Purchase | US House of Representatives: History, Art & Archives

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On this date, President Thomas Jefferson approved and signed an act to pay France $11 million dollars for the Louisiana Purchase. The House discussed and approved the payment with a 90 to 25 vote on October 25, 1803. During the deliberations, some Members questioned the constitutionality of increasing the size of the nation and Congress's role in that process.

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Swords and ammunition bags were crucial military equipment in 1815, but surveyor's gear was also important for reconnaissance, map-making, and engineering projects like building bridges for troop movement.

On December 24, 1814, British and American representatives who had been meeting in Belgium signed the Treaty of Ghent, the agreement that would end the War of 1812. Did that mean that the Battle of New Orleans, fought on January 8, 1815, was unnecessary? A tragic waste of life caused by the lack of quick communication in those days?

The war was not over when the treaty was signed on December 24. The treaty specifically stated that fighting between the United States and Britain would stop only when both governments ratified the treaty (in the case of the United States, that meant approval by Congress). Congress ratified the treaty on February 15, 1815.

The British had not asked for an immediate end to fighting because they were worried that the United States might still ask for revisions. In fact, the British official who brought the treaty to the United States also brought a copy of the British ratification and had instructions to stop hostilities only if the United States ratified the treaty with no changes. What this meant was that fighting had to continue.

So what if the British had won the Battle of New Orleans and captured the third most important port in the United States? Would the treaty have been re-negotiated?

Probably not. The treaty said that land captured during the war, including any land captured between the signing and the ratification, would be returned to its original country of ownership. By this time, too, the British were more interested in making sure of their claims in Canada than in starting a new colony in Louisiana. But since the best defense is a good offense, the British wanted to continue treaty negotiations from a strong position, and so continued their attacks on American land to make sure that the Americans would agree to peace.

From muskets to tactics, from upcoming events to historical people and places, you can find out more about the War of 1812 at the links below.

Visit 1812 website

the War of 1812 website

Discover 1812

the War of 1812 - a public television documentary with a website that has information about War of 1812, ideas for classroom projects, excerpts from journals of participants, and more.

Chalmette Battlefield and the annual Battle of New Orleans commemoration were featured as a National Park Getaway in December 2011. Follow the link to learn how history comes alive in January each year for the battle's anniversary. Please note that the dates mentioned in the Getaway are for 2012.

The bicentennial of the War of 1812 will be commemorated 2012 through 2015; learn more about the bicentennial here.

Historical research, troop lists, timelines, and other resources can be found here.

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The Treaty of Ghent - Jean Lafitte National Historical Park and Preserve (U.S. National Park Service)

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On December 24, 1814, British and American representatives who had been meeting in Belgium signed the Treaty of Ghent, the agreement that would end the War of 1812. Did that mean that the Battle of New Orleans, fought on January 8, 1815, was unnecessary?

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During his tenure, U.S. President James K. Polk oversaw the greatest territorial expansion of the United States to date. Polk accomplished this through the annexation of Texas in 1845, the negotiation of the Oregon Treaty with Great Britain in 1846, and the conclusion of the Mexican-American War in 1848, which ended with the signing and ratification of the Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo in 1848.

These events brought within the control of the United States the future states of Texas, California, Nevada, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, Washington, and Oregon, as well as portions of what would later become Oklahoma, Colorado, Kansas, Wyoming, and Montana.

Following Texas' successful war of independence against Mexico in 1836, President Martin van Buren refrained from annexing Texas after the Mexicans threatened war. Accordingly, while the United States extended diplomatic recognition to Texas, it took no further action concerning annexation until 1844, when President John Tyler restarted negotiations with the Republic of Texas. His efforts culminated on April 12 in a Treaty of Annexation, an event that caused Mexico to sever diplomatic relations with United States. Tyler, however, lacked the votes in the Senate to ratify the treaty, and it was defeated by a wide margin in June. Shortly before he left office, Tyler tried again, this time through a joint resolution of both houses of Congress. With the support of President-elect Polk, Tyler managed to get the joint resolution passed on March 1, 1845, and Texas was admitted into the United States on December 29.

While Mexico did not follow through with its threat to declare war if the United States annexed Texas, relations between the two nations remained tense due to Mexico's disputed border with Texas. According to the Texans, their state included significant portions of what is today New Mexico and Colorado, and the western and southern portions of Texas itself, which they claimed extended to the Rio Grande River. The Mexicans, however, argued that the border only extended to the Nueces River, north of the Rio Grande.

In July, 1845, Polk, who had been elected on a platform of expansionism, ordered the commander of the U.S. Army in Texas, Zachary Taylor, to move his forces into the disputed lands that lay between the Nueces and Rio Grande rivers. In November, Polk dispatched Congressman John Slidell to Mexico with instructions to negotiate the purchase of the disputed areas along the Texas-Mexican border, and the territory comprising the present-day states of New Mexico and California.

Following the failure of Slidell's mission in May 1846, Polk used news of skirmishes inside disputed territory between Mexican troops and Taylor's army to gain Congressional support for a declaration of war against Mexico. On May 13, 1846, the United States declared war on Mexico.

Following the capture of Mexico City in September 1847, Nicholas Trist, chief clerk of the Department of State and Polk's peace emissary, began negotiations for a peace treaty with the Mexican Government under terms similar to those pursued by Slidell the previous year. Polk soon grew concerned by Trist's conduct, however, believing that he would not press for strong enough terms from the Mexicans, and because Trist became a close friend of General Winfield Scott, a Whig who was thought to be a strong contender for his party's presidential nomination for the 1848 election. Furthermore, the war had encouraged expansionist Democrats to call for a complete annexation of Mexico. Polk recalled Trist in October.

Believing that he was on the cusp of an agreement with the Mexicans, Trist ignored the recall order and presented Polk with the Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo, which was signed in Mexico City on February 2, 1848. Under the terms of the treaty, Mexico ceded to the United States approximately 525,000 square miles (55% of its prewar territory) in exchange for a $15 million lump sum payment, and the assumption by the U.S. Government of up to $3.25 million worth of debts owed by Mexico to U.S. citizens.

While Polk would have preferred a more extensive annexation of Mexican territory, he realized that prolonging the war would have disastrous political consequences and decided to submit the treaty to the Senate for ratification. Although there was substantial opposition to the treaty within the Senate, on March 10, 1848, it passed by a razor-thin margin of 38 to 14.

The war had another significant outcome. On August 8, 1846, Congressman David Wilmot introduced a rider to an appropriations bill that stipulated that "neither slavery nor involuntary servitude shall ever exist" in any territory acquired by the United States in the war against Mexico. While Southern senators managed to block adoption of the so-called "Wilmot Proviso," it nonetheless provoked a political firestorm. The question of whether slavery could expand throughout the United States continue to fester until the defeat of the Confederacy in 1865.

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Milestones: 1830-1860 - Office of the Historian

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Annexation of the Republic of Texas (1845)

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On March 31, 1854, the first treaty between Japan and the United States was signed. The Treaty was the result of an encounter between an elaborately planned mission to open Japan and an unwavering policy by Japan's government of forbidding commerce with foreign nations. Two nations regarding each other as "barbarians" found a way to reach agreement.

The United States Government was determined to take the lead in bringing Japan's two-century-old policy of self-imposed isolation to a close. The Fillmore administration sent Commodore Matthew C. Perry and a small fleet of sloops and the latest steam-powered ships to go to Edo (Tokyo) Bay to insist on a treaty that would protect the rights of American whalers, provide for coaling ports, and eventually lead to trade.

Perry achieved two of his three central objectives by improving America's access to strategic energy resources. He succeeded in getting two coaling ports for the Navy's new steamships and in protecting America's oil workers (the whalers). He did not, however, open Japan to trade. It wasn't until 1858 that the U.S. Consul at last achieved Perry's final objective: establishing a commercial treaty.

One interesting feature is the omission of a Japanese signature on the English language version of the treaty. Perry's letter to the Navy Secretary, also in the holdings of the Archives, offers an explanation: "It will be observed that the practice usually pursued in affixing signatures to treaties was departed from on this occasion, and for reason assigned by the Japanese, that their laws forbade the subjects of the Empire from putting their names to any document written in a foreign language." The missing signature demonstrates that Perry's determination to achieve mission objectives was tempered by a willingness to compromise on issues of custom.

The seeds of tensions and conflicts which would figure prominently in the first century of the Japanese-American relationship are evident in the Treaty of Kanagawa . Yet in the fact that warrior/diplomats on both sides were able to put aside their cannons and swords long enough to reach this accord, we also see the potential for two cultures to find mutual understanding, and we find the roots of a peaceful strategic alliance that has lasted for more than 50 years.

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Enlarge Sketch of Simoda from the Treaty of Kanagawa, 1854 Record Group 11 General Records of the United States Government On March 31, 1854, the first treaty between Japan and the United States was signed. The Treaty was the result of an encounter between an elaborately planned mission to open Japan and an unwavering policy by Japan's government of forbidding commerce with foreign nations.

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Treaty of Versailles | Definition, Summary, Terms, & Facts | Britannica

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Treaty of Versailles, peace document signed at the end of World War I by the Allied powers and Germany in the Hall of Mirrors in the Palace of Versailles, France, on June 28, 1919; it took force on January 10, 1920. Learn more about the Treaty of Versailles here.

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The Treaty of Versailles was signed by Germany and the Allied Nations on June 28, 1919, formally ending World War One. The terms of the treaty required that Germany pay financial reparations, disarm, lose territory, and give up all of its overseas colonies. It also called for the creation of the League of Nations, an institution that President Woodrow Wilson strongly supported and had originally outlined in his Fourteen Points address. Despite Wilson's efforts, including a nationwide speaker tour, the Treaty of Versailles was rejected by the United States Senate twice, in 1919 and 1920. The United States ultimately signed a separate peace treaty with Germany in 1921, although it never joined the League of Nations.

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Research Guides: Treaty of Versailles: Primary Documents in American History: Introduction

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On June 28, 1919, Germany and the Allied Nations signed the Treaty of Versailles, formally ending World War One. This guide provides access to digital materials at the Library of Congress, links to external websites, and a print bibliography.

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Treaty of Versailles—facts and information

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How the Treaty of Versailles ended WWI and started WWII

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Winter 1994, Vol. 26, No. 4

By Milton O. Gustafson

When Russia's provocative nationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky announced last year [1993] that he wanted Alaska back, it inspired cartoonist Jim Borgman of the Cincinnati Inquirer to depict a worried President Clinton asking the National Archives to find the receipt for the purchase of Alaska. The cartoon was a reminder that in the middle of the nineteenth century there was a potential for conflict because Alaska was the place where Russia's movement east across Siberia and to North America met the westward expansion of the United States. Russia's sale of Alaska to the United States after the Civil War, a story told in documents in the National Archives, eliminated Alaska as a source of conflict between the two world powers.

Russia's interest in Alaska dates from 1741, when explorer Vitus Bering reached the North American mainland. In 1799 the tsar established the Russian-American Company and granted it complete political and economic control over the area claimed, and the company established a trading post at Fort Ross, just north of San Francisco. Great Britain's claim to the area around the Columbia River led the United States to negotiate separate treaties with Great Britain in 1818 (joint occupancy of Oregon Country) and Russia in 1824 (setting the southern boundary of Russian America).

In the expansionist years of the 1840s and 1850s, American interest in the north Pacific grew, and Russia began to think of selling Alaska to the United States. During the Crimean War between Britain and Russia, Alaska was neutralized, but Russia realized it might lose Alaska to Great Britain in any future war, and the Russian-American Company required heavy government subsidies from a depleted Russian treasury. In 1856 the Russian minister to the United States, Edouard de Stoeckl, recommended selling Alaska to the United States. Some advisers to the tsar agreed and even suggested a price, $5.6 million. Senator William Gwin of California, who had constituents embroiled in a contract controversy with the Russian-American Company, talked confidentially to Stoeckl and President James Buchanan and suggested $5 million as a fair price. Stoeckl was instructed to seek a higher price but to wait until after the company's charter expired in 1862. Senator Gwin also recommended delay until the election of a new President; the country would not support any proposal from the unpopular Buchanan, and any hint of northern expansion would become embroiled in sectional politics and opposed by slave-state senators.

The pre-Civil War negotiations failed because Russia was not ready to sell and the U.S. offer was not enough. After the war, expansionist spirit in the United States diminished, but Russia was ready to sell.

In December 1866, Stoeckl, in Russia for the first time in seven years, met Tsar Alexander and his leading advisers. It was decided that Stoeckl would return to the United States and use his diplomatic skills to induce the U.S. government to make an offer to buy Russian America for not less than $5 million. Stoeckl was a popular diplomat in Washington, especially after marrying an American, Elizabeth Howard from Massachusetts, but after fifteen years in the United States he hoped that successful negotiation for the sale of Russian America would bring him financial reward and promotion to a better diplomatic post in Europe.

The principal negotiator Stoeckl would face was Secretary of State William Seward. After serving as state senator, governor of New York, and U.S. senator, Seward was a Republican party candidate for President in 1860 but lost the nomination to Abraham Lincoln. Lincoln asked him to be secretary of state, and Seward served with distinction throughout the Civil War. Seward had a broad vision of commercial expansion of the United States, particularly in China and the Pacific, and as early as 1864 he had suggested to the Russian government that talks about Alaska "would be beneficial to us, and by no means unprofitable to Russia."

Stoeckl returned to Washington, met with Seward at the new State Department building on March 11, 1867, and wasted no time with diplomatic maneuvering; he said he was authorized to receive an offer for Russian America. At a second meeting, on Thursday, March 14, Seward announced that he had consulted with President Andrew Johnson, who was "not inclined" toward the purchase but was nevertheless willing to accept Seward's judgment. Seward said he was interested but needed to consult the cabinet. Stoeckl offered to promote the sale by talking to some of his friends in the Senate and House, but Seward insisted on secrecy until the cabinet was agreed. They discussed the price. Seward suggested $5 million, or "perhaps $5.5 million, but no more." Since Seward had raised his own bid, Stoeckl decided to remain silent and suggested in a cable to Russia that he would try to get $6.5 million or at least $6 million. By Friday, March 15, Seward had a draft treaty prepared for the cabinet discussion and asked for authority to pay Russia $7 million for Alaska. There was little interest, no comment from President Johnson, and no cabinet disagreement.

When they met again, Seward told Stoeckl that the cabinet contained opposition, and he could offer no more than $6.5 million. But Seward also wanted to buy all of the property of the Russian-American Company, and he wanted a treaty before Congress adjourned in April. Stoeckl asked for $7 million and Seward agreed. Although both sides started with a $5 million negotiating price, Stoeckl's silence and Seward's desire resulted in a $2 million increase for Russia. On March 25 Seward asked Stoeckl to cable the proposed agreement to St. Petersburg; if the reply came within six days, the treaty could be signed and confirmed by the Senate before its adjournment.

On Friday, March 29, Stoeckl received the cable approving the deal. That evening he walked over to Seward's home on Lafayette Square to give him the news. Seward's son, Assistant Secretary of State Frederick Seward, later reported the conversation:

"Tomorrow, if you like, I will come to the department, and we can enter upon the treaty."

Seward replied, "Why wait until tomorrow, Mr. Stoeckl? Let us make the treaty tonight."

Before proceeding, however, Seward decided it was time to tell Senator Charles Sumner, chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, about the proposed treaty. Sumner's support in the committee and also on the Senate floor was essential-two-thirds of the Senate would have to advise and consent to the treaty before it could be ratified. Seward asked Frederick Seward to find Sumner and deliver a letter to him: "Can you come to my home this evening? I have a matter of public business in regard to which it is desirable that I should confer with you at once." Sumner walked across Lafayette Square to Seward's home and learned that there was a treaty about to be signed for the sale of Russian America to the United States. Sumner listened, asked questions but offered no opinions, and went home. That evening Sumner sent a note to Seward suggesting that after Congress adjourned its legislative session as scheduled at noon on the following day, Saturday, March 30, "the Senate would be glad to proceed at once with Executive business" and thus promptly consider the treaty.

Secretary Seward and two clerks hurried to the State Department building, the newly erected Washington City Orphan Asylum Building on the southeast corner of Fourteenth and S Streets, NW. When Stoeckl arrived at the State Department, he and Seward haggled over details. Russia wanted payment to be made in London within ten months. An ice contract between the Russian-American Company and the city of San Francisco threatened to complicate matters. Seward noted that Congress could not possibly appropriate funds until its next session, in 1868; Stoeckl agreed to payment in Washington instead of London; and Seward added $200,000 to the sale price. The treaty was written in English and French (the Russian diplomatic language), texts were compared, two copies of the treaty were engrossed, and Seward and Stoeckl signed both copies of the treaty at 4 a.m. on Saturday, March 30, 1867.

Article I of the treaty provided for Russia to cede its territories in America, with defined boundaries. Article II provided for the transfer of property, except for property individually owned and for property owned by the Greek Orthodox Church, and for the transfer of "government archives, papers, and documents . . . which may be now existing there." That is why the records of the Russian-American Company are now in the National Archives (Record Group 261). Article III provided for the inhabitants (except for the "uncivilized native tribes") to either return to Russia within three years or stay there and become American citizens. Article IV provided for Russia to appoint agents for the convenient transfer of the property, but the cession was to be considered "complete and absolute" upon the exchange of ratifications. Article V provided for the withdrawal of Russian troops as soon as practicable following the exchange of ratifications. Article VI provided for the United States to pay, within ten months of the exchange of ratifications, $7.2 million in gold for free and clear title to the ceded territory. Article VII provided for the exchange of ratifications to take place within three months, or sooner if practicable.

Seward, hoping for rapid Senate approval of the treaty, wasted no time. By 10 a.m. that Saturday morning he met with the cabinet and President Johnson. Both Johnson and Seward signed the presidential proclamation calling the Senate into special session on Monday, April 1. Johnson also submitted a formal message to the Senate requesting its advice and consent to the treaty, and the Senate referred it to the Foreign Relations Committee. Seward lined up newspaper support (only Horace Greeley's New York Tribune opposed the treaty) and wined and dined influential senators. The key was Chairman Charles Sumner of Massachusetts. Sumner was upset because Seward had failed to consult with senators in the negotiating process and refused to consider postponing treaty approval, but he overcame his objections. Drawing upon the resources of the Smithsonian Institution and the Library of Congress, Sumner quickly became an expert on Russian America. Instead of simply not opposing the treaty, he became its most ardent advocate. After four closed-door committee sessions over a ten-day period, Sumner finally secured committee approval on Monday morning, April 8. When the full Senate met in executive session that afternoon, Sumner spoke for three hours from a single sheet of notes, providing an exhaustive summary of the argument favoring the purchase. Later published as the "Speech of Hon. Charles Sumner, of Massachusetts, on the Cession of Russian America to the United States," the original handwritten draft of the manuscript filled 225 pages. It was during that speech that Sumner first used the word "Alaska" to describe Russian America. On the following day, after six more hours of debate, the full Senate finally approved the treaty by a thirty-seven to two vote.

Tsar Alexander ratified the treaty on May 3, 1867. Stoeckl received word on May 15 that the ratified treaty was on its way to the United States, and he notified Seward. Even though President Johnson did not formally ratify the treaty until May 28, 1867, Stoeckl agreed on May 22 to Seward's request to immediately send American troops to Alaska. Finally, at Seward's insistence, ratifications were exchanged on June 20, 1867, in Washington, two weeks earlier than planned.

The commissioners named to effect the exchange were Brig. Gen. Lovell H. Rousseau and Capt. Alexis Peshchurov. They went to San Francisco and then sailed to Sitka for the formal exchange on October 18, 1867. Although the ceremony started smoothly, there were complications. The Russian flag got stuck, and could not be lowered. Russian officials prepared a formal protocol listing government property (but not private property) to be transferred to the United States, plus a map showing the locations of the buildings and churches. A formal exchange document was signed by Rousseau and Peshchurov. In the end, Alaska belonged to the United States, by treaty as well as by possession. As yet, however, no money had been paid.

When the new session of Congress met in December 1867, President Johnson's message asked for an appropriation to pay for Alaska and a law to establish civil government there. Several private claims against Russia threatened to complicate the appropriation process. The impeachment of President Johnson and his trial in the Senate further delayed business past the April 20 deadline specified in the treaty. Worried about the delay, Stoeckl promised to pay $20,000 in gold to Robert J. Walker, former Mississippi senator and treasury secretary, to lobby for the appropriation. Finally, on July 14, the House voted 113 to 43, with 44 abstentions, to approve the appropriation of $7.2 million for the purchase of Alaska. The Senate approved a modified version, and so a conference committee had to reconcile the versions and resubmit it to both houses again. It finally passed on July 27, 1868.

In the mid-nineteenth century, U.S. government procedures for disbursing $7.2 million in gold appropriated by Congress for the purchase of Alaska were little different than procedures for disbursing $150 for the purchase of a desk. On July 28 Secretary of State Seward signed a requisition for a warrant, #4217, for $7.2 million in gold from the Treasury Department. On July 29, L. L. Smith, the first auditor of the treasury, established an account, #165,615, and signed a report approving the payment of $7.2 million to the Emperor of Russia and sent it to the comptroller of the treasury. The comptroller and the register of the Treasury Department, the government's chief bookkeeping official, then certified the report. The register of the treasury wrote an order on the U.S. treasurer, an appropriation warrant. The treasurer, in turn, authorized the transfer of the funds to a departmental disbursing agent, who was accountable for the proper use of the money. On August 1 the agent wrote a draft in that amount, a pay warrant, payable to Edward de Stoeckl. Stoeckl endorsed the draft over to Riggs Bank with instructions to Riggs to pay the money to Russia's bank for foreign accounts, the London office of Baring Brothers and Company. Riggs, who charged a fee of $3,600 for his services, sent only $7,035,000 to the Baring office in New York. Stoeckl authorized Riggs to pay Robert J. Walker $26,000 in gold for his lobbying services. What happened to the remaining $139,000?

A single newspaper reporter, Uriah H. Painter, Washington correspondent for the Philadelphia Inquirer and New York Sun, stirred the pot. Painter's articles opposed both the treaty and the appropriation, but reportedly he offered to change sides and support the appropriation for a price (the offer was rejected). Painter discovered that Robert J. Walker went to New York, presumably to cash a check drawn on Riggs's New York bank, and thieves robbed him of $16,000 in gold treasury notes. Although quickly apprehended, only $11,000 was recovered, and Walker refused to press charges.

In December 1868 the House of Representatives decided to investigate. Francis Spinner, the treasurer of the United States, George Riggs of Riggs Bank, Secretary of State Seward, Robert Walker, and eight other lobbyists and journalists all testified, but the final conclusion of the House Committee on Public Expenditures was "barren of affirmative or satisfactorily negative results." Stoeckl had returned to Russia, and the chargé d'affaires, Waldemar Bodisco, refused to testify. Russian archives reveal no names, but Stoeckl secretly reported that he had disbursed almost $200,000. It seems likely that some of the money was paid to other lobbyists, besides Walker, and to congressmen. Since $1 in gold was worth $1.50 in greenbacks, paying people with greenbacks added to the confusion evident in the House report.

There are two contemporary accounts of payments. President Andrew Johnson wrote an undated note stating that Seward told him that John W. Forney, the editor of the Daily Morning Chronicle, received $30,000 in gold, that Walker and Stanton received $20,000, Banks got $8,000, and Stevens got $10,000. John Bigelow, former minister to France and a friend of Seward, reported in his diary that Seward told him that ten members of Congress got $10,000, Walker got $20,000, Stanton got $10,000, J. W. Forney got $20,000, and "$10,000 more were to be given to poor Thad Stevens, but no one would undertake to give that to him so I undertook it myself. The poor fellow died and I have it now."

A few days after the House committee issued its report, the Johnson administration ended, and William Seward resigned as secretary of state. In his retirement, Seward traveled across the country in a railroad "hotel" car furnished by George Pullman. After reaching San Francisco, he sailed to Sitka, Alaska, and there, in a speech on August 12, 1869, he predicted that with its scenery, weather, and resources, one day Alaska would become a state in the Union. Ninety years later his prediction came true.

NOTES

© 1994 by Milton O. Gustafson

1. The State Department occupied this building until July 1875; in 1927 the Orphan Asylum moved, and the building was enlarged and became the Merchandise Building; later it was razed, and the site is now occupied by townhouses.

2. Professor Ronald J. Jenson of George Mason University, author of The Alaska Purchase and Russian American Relations (1975), concludes that the money was distributed as follows:

$7,035,000 to Baring Brothers

26,000 to Robert J. Walker and Frederick P. Stanton

3,000 to D. C. Forney

1,000 to M. M. Noah

10,000 for the cost of the treaty telegram to St. Petersburg

30,000 to John Forney

21,667 to Stoeckl and Bodisco

73,333 converted to greenbacks (see below)

__________

$7,200,000 Total in Gold
Payments in Greenbacks
$100,000 to ten congressmen (including Banks)

$10,000 to Stevens (kept by Seward because Stevens died)

________

$110,000 Total in greenbacks = $73,333 in gold

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Seward's Bargain: The Alaska Purchase from Russia

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Winter 1994, Vol. 26, No. 4 When Russia's provocative nationalist Vladimir Zhirinovsky announced last year [1993] that he wanted Alaska back, it inspired cartoonist Jim Borgman of the Cincinnati Inquirer to depict a worried President Clinton asking the National Archives to find the receipt for the purchase of Alaska.

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Though Cold War rivalry endures as an image of Russo-American relations, the two great nations have a history of pragmatic deal-making, which reached its zenith with the sale of Russia's Alaskan Peninsula to America. The deal was born not of the Russian Empire's rivalry with the United States, but through both countries' competition with Britain, whose Empire made it the most powerful nation of the age, one with a truly global presence.

Russia and Britain had already faced off in the Crimean War, which had begun in October 1853, and saw Anglo-French forces lined up against a Russian and Ottoman alliance. Though, as the name suggests, the conflict was concentrated on Russia's south-west flank, it also spread to the Pacific, when a fleet of Russian cruisers based in Siberian ports threatened Britain's trading links with California. A combined British and French squadron was assembled at Honolulu and on July 25th, 1854 it set sail in pursuit of the Russian ships. Having taken the weakly defended port of Sitka in Alaska, they then headed south for Petropavlovsk, which ended in catastrophe for the allies.

Even so, Russia remained fearful of British ambitions in the Pacific. Vancouver Island, just off the mainland of western Canada, was already a British Crown Colony and the population of neighbouring British Columbia was increasing rapidly, as gold prospectors rushed west. Plans were advanced to incorporate the territory formally into the Empire. This meant that Britain's possessions in North America would now share a land border with Russia.

Alaska was difficult to defend, given the awesome supply lines, and so Tsar Alexander II decided to sell up. In 1859 he approached both Britain and the US as potential buyers. The former showed little interest, while the latter was too distracted by the impending Civil War to give it enough thought. When that war came to an end in 1865, interest was rekindled and the tsar instructed his ambassador to the US, Edward de Stoeckl, to begin formal negotiations with Secretary of State, William Seward. Not only did the potential deal offer a considerable expansion of US territory - at more than 600,000 square miles it is twice the size of Texas - and a strategic location between Russia and British North America, but it was also a useful distraction from the fraught issue of post-Civil War Reconstruction.

After an all-night negotiating session, the treaty was signed at 4am on March 30th, 1867. The agreed price was $7.2 million, equivalent to around $120 million today, which works out at about two cents an acre.

Captain Alexei Peschkurov handed over the territory to his opposite number with the words:

B y authority from his Majesty, the Emperor of Russia, I transfer to the United States the territory of Alaska.

Just a few Russian fur traders and Orthodox priests remained behind and it was not until the Klondike gold rush of 1896 that Alaska attracted new settlers in numbers.

A myth arose that the purchase of Alaska was unpopular with the US public and the deal was certainly criticised by some commentators as 'Seward's Folly'. Today, its reputation for eccentricity and rugged individualism endears and unnerves in equal measures.

Alaska became the 49th state of the US on January 3rd, 1959. Despite its barely tapped mineral riches, it is claimed by some economists that Alaska's tax revenues and resource royalties have never exceeded the cost to the federal government of governing a largely untamed territory of this size.

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Though Cold War rivalry endures as an image of Russo-American relations, the two great nations have a history of pragmatic deal-making, which reached its zenith with the sale of Russia's Alaskan Peninsula to America.

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NOTE TO READERS
"Milestones in the History of U.S. Foreign Relations" has been retired and is no longer maintained. For more information, please see the full notice.

Introduction

The Kellogg-Briand Pact was an agreement to outlaw war signed on . Sometimes called the Pact of Paris for the city in which it was signed, the pact was one of many international efforts to prevent another World War, but it had little effect in stopping the rising militarism of the 1930s or preventing World War II.

Photograph with representatives who signed the Kellogg-Briand Pact in the White House

U.S. Peace Advocates

In the wake of World War I, U.S. officials and private citizens made significant efforts to guarantee that the nation would not be drawn into another war. Some focused on disarmament, such as the series of naval conferences that began in Washington in 1921, and some focused on cooperation with the League of Nations and the newly formed World Court. Others initiated a movement to try to outlaw war outright. Peace advocates Nicholas Murray Butler and James T. Shotwell were part of this movement. Both men were affiliated with the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, an organization dedicated to promoting internationalism that was established in 1910 by leading American industrialist Andrew Carnegie.

French Involvement

With the influence and assistance of Shotwell and Butler, French Minister of Foreign Affairs Aristide Briand proposed a peace pact as a bilateral agreement between the United States and France to outlaw war between them. Particularly hard hit by World War I, France faced continuing insecurity from its German neighbor and sought alliances to shore up its defenses. Briand published an open letter in April of 1927 containing the proposal. Though the suggestion had the enthusiastic support of some members of the American peace movement, U.S. President Calvin Coolidge and Secretary of State Frank B. Kellogg were less eager than Briand to enter into a bilateral arrangement. They worried that the agreement against war could be interpreted as a bilateral alliance and require the United States to intervene if France was ever threatened. To avoid this, they suggested that the two nations take the lead in inviting all nations to join them in outlawing war.

Secretary of State Frank B. Kellogg

The extension of the pact to include other nations was well-received internationally. After the severe losses of the First World War, the idea of declaring war to be illegal was immensely popular in international public opinion. Because the language of the pact established the important point that only wars of aggression - not military acts of self-defense - would be covered under the pact, many nations had no objections to signing it. If the pact served to limit conflicts, then everyone would benefit; if it did not, there were no legal consequences. In early 1928, negotiations over the agreement expanded to include all of the initial signatories. In the final version of the pact, they agreed upon two clauses: the first outlawed war as an instrument of national policy and the second called upon signatories to settle their disputes by peaceful means.

On August 27, 1928, fifteen nations signed the pact at Paris. Signatories included France, the United States, the United Kingdom, Ireland, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa, India, Belgium, Poland, Czechoslovakia, Germany, Italy and Japan. Later, an additional forty-seven nations followed suit, so the pact was eventually signed by most of the established nations in the world. The U.S. Senate ratified the agreement by a vote of 85-1, though it did so only after making reservations to note that U.S. participation did not limit its right to self-defense or require it to act against signatories breaking the agreement.

Mukden Incident

The first major test of the pact came just a few years later in 1931, when the Mukden Incident led to the Japanese invasion of Manchuria. Though Japan had signed the pact, the combination of the worldwide depression and a limited desire to go to war to preserve China prevented the League of Nations or the United States from taking any action to enforce it. Further threats to the Peace Agreement also came from fellow signatories Germany, Austria and Italy. It soon became clear that there was no way to enforce the pact or sanction those who broke it; it also never fully defined what constituted "self-defense," so there were many ways around its terms. In the end, the Kellogg-Briand Pact did little to prevent World War II or any of the conflicts that followed. Its legacy remains as a statement of the idealism expressed by advocates for peace in the interwar period. Frank Kellogg earned the Nobel Peace Prize in 1929 for his work on the Peace Pact.

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Milestones: 1921-1936 - Office of the Historian

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August 27, 1928: Treaty To End War Signed (Kellogg-Briand Pact)

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Treaty between the United States and other Powers providing for the renunciation of war as an instrument of national policy. Signed at Paris, August 27, 1928; ratification advised by the Senate, January 16, 1929; ratified by the President, January 17, 1929; instruments of ratification deposited at Washington by the United States of America, Australia, Dominion of Canada, Czechoslovkia, Germany, Great Britain, India, Irish Free State, Italy, New Zealand, and Union of South Africa, March 2, 1929: By Poland, March 26, 1929; by Belgium, March 27 1929; by France, April 22, 1929; by Japan, July 24, 1929; proclaimed, July 24, 1929.

BY THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA.
A PROCLAMATION.

WHEREAS a Treaty between the President of the United States Of America, the President of the German Reich, His Majesty the King of the Belgians, the President of the French Republic, His Majesty the King of Great Britain, Ireland and the British Dominions beyond the Seas, Emperor of India, His Majesty the King of Italy, His Majesty the Emperor of Japan, the President of the Republic of Poland, and the President of the Czechoslovak Republic, providing for the renunciation of war as an instrument of national policy, was concluded and signed by their respective Plenipotontiaries at Paris on the twenty-seventh day of August, one thousand nine hundred and twenty-eight, the original of which Treaty, being in the English and

the French languages, is word for word as follows:

THE PRESIDENT OF THE GERMAN REICH, THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA, HIS MAJESTY THE KING OF THE BELGIANS, THE PRESIDENT OF THE FRENCH REPUBLIC, HIS MAJESTY THE KING OF GREAT BRITAIN IRELAND AND THE BRITISH DOMINIONS BEYOND THE SEAS, EMPEROR OF INDIA, HIS MAJESTY THE KING OF ITALY, HIS MAJESTY THE EMPEROR OF JAPAN, THE PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF POLAND THE PRESIDENT OF THE CZECHOSLOVAK REPUBLIC,

Deeply sensible of their solemn duty to promote the welfare of mankind;

Persuaded that the time has, come when a frank renunciation of war as an instrument of na tional policy should be made to the end that the peaceful and friendly relations now existing between their peoples may be perpetuated;

Convinced that all changes in their relations with one another should be sought only by pacific means and be the result of a peaceful and orderly process, and that any signatory Power which shall hereafter seek to promote its ts national interests by resort to war a should be denied the benefits furnished by this Treaty;

Hopeful that, encouraged by their example, all the other nations of the world will join in this humane endeavor and by adhering to the present Treaty as soon as it comes into force bring their peoples within the scope of its beneficent provisions, thus uniting the civilized nations of the world in a common renunciation of war as an instrument of their national policy;

Have decided to conclude a Treaty and for that purpose have appointed as their respective

Plenipotentiaries:
THE PRESIDENT OF THE GERMAN REICH:
Dr Gustav STRESEMANN, Minister of Foreign Affairs;
THE PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA:
The Honorable Frank B. KELLOGG, Secretary of State;
HIS MAJESTY THE KING OF THE BELGIANS:
Mr Paul HYMANS, Minister for Foreign Affairs, Minister of State;
THE PRESIDENT OF THE FRENCH REPUBLIC:
Mr. Aristide BRIAND Minister for Foreign Affairs;
HIS MAJESTY THE KING OF GREAT BRITAIN, IRELAND AND THE BRITISH DOMINIONS BEYOND THE SEAS, EMPEROR OF INDIA:
For GREAT BRITAIN and NORTHERN IBELAND and all parts of the British Empire which are not separate Members of the League of Nations:
The Right Honourable Lord CUSHENDUN, Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, Acting-Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs;
For the DOMINION OF CANADA:
The Right Honourable William Lyon MACKENZIE KING, Prime Minister and Minister for External Affairs;
For the COMMONWEALTH of AUSTRLIA:
The Honourable Alexander John McLACHLAN, Member of the Executive Federal Council;
For the DOMINION OF NEW ZEALAND:
The Honourable Sir Christopher James PARR High Commissioner for New Zealand in Great Britain;
For the UNION OF SOUTH AFRICA:
The Honourable Jacobus Stephanus SMIT, High Commissioner for the Union of South Africa in Great Britain;
For the IRISH FREE STATE:
Mr. William Thomas COSGRAVE, President of the Executive Council;
For INDIA:
The Right Honourable Lord CUSHENDUN, Chancellor of the Duchy of Lancaster, Acting Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs;
HIS MAJESTY THE KING OF ITALY:
Count Gaetano MANZONI, his Ambassador Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary at Paris.
HIS MAJESTY THE EMPEROR OF JAPAN:
Count UCHIDA, Privy Councillor;
THE PRESIDENT OF THE REPUBLIC OF POLAND:
Mr. A. ZALESKI, Minister for Foreign Affairs;
THE PRESIDENT OF THE CZECHOSLOVAK REPUBLIC:
Dr Eduard BENES, Minister for Foreign Affairs;

who, having communicated to one another their full powers found in good and due form have agreed upon the following articles:

The High Contracting Parties solemly declare in the names of their respective peoples that they condemn recourse to war for the solution of international controversies, and renounce it, as an instrument of national policy in their relations with one another.

The High Contracting Parties agree that the settlement or solution of all disputes or conflicts of whatever nature or of whatever origin they may be, which may arise among them, shall never be sought except by pacific means.

The present Treaty shall be ratified by the High Contracting Parties named in the Preamble in accordance with their respective constitutional requirements, and shall take effect as between them as soon as all their several instruments of ratification shall have been deposited at Washington.

This Treaty shall, when it has come into effect as prescribed in the preceding paragraph, remain open as long as may be necessary for adherence by all the other Powers of the world. Every instrument evidencing the adherence of a Power shall be deposited at Washington and the Treaty shall immediately upon such deposit become effective as; between the Power thus adhering and the other Powers parties hereto.

It shall be the duty of the Government of the United States to furnish each Government named in the Preamble and every Government subsequently adhering to this Treaty with a certified copy of the Treaty and of every instrument of ratification or adherence. It shall also be the duty of the Government of the United States telegraphically to notify such Governments immediately upon the deposit with it of each instrument of ratification or adherence.

IN FAITH WHEREOF the respective Plenipotentiaries have signed this Treaty in the French and English languages both texts having equal force, and hereunto affix their seals.

DONE at Paris, the twenty seventh day of August in the year one thousand nine hundred and twenty-eight.

[SEAL] GUSTAV STRESEMANN
[SEAL] FRANK B KELLOGG
[SEAL] PAUL HYMANS
[SEAL] ARI BRIAND
[SEAL] CUSHENDUN
[SEAL] W. L. MACKENZIE KING
[SEAL] A J MCLACHLAN
[SEAL] C. J. PARR
[SEAL] J S. SMIT
[SEAL] LIAM T.MACCOSGAIR
[SEAL] CUSHENDUN
[SEAL] G. MANZONI
[SEAL] UCHIDA
[SEAL] AUGUST ZALESKI
[SEAL] DR EDWARD BENES

Certified to be a true copy of the signed original deposited with the Government of the United States of America.

FRANK B. KELLOGG
Secretary of State of the United States of America

AND WHEREAS it is stipulated in the said Treaty that it shall take effect as between the High Contracting Parties as soon as all the several instruments of ratification shall have been deposited at Washington;

AND WHEREAS the said Treaty has been duly ratified on the parts of all the High Contracting Parties and their several instruments of ratification have been deposited with the Government of the United States of America, the last on July 24, 1929;

NOW TIIEREFORE, be it known that I, Herbert Hoover, President of the United States of America, have caused the said Treaty to be made public, to the end that the same and every article and clause thereof may be observed and fulfilled with good faith by the United States and the citizens thereof.

IN TESTIMONY WHEREOF, I have hereunto set my hand and caused the seal of the United States to be affixed.

DONE at the city of Washington this twenty-fourth day of July in the year of our Lord one thousand nine hundred and twenty-nine, and of the Independence of the United States of America the one hundred and fifty-fourth

HERBERT HOOVER
By the President:
HENRY L STIMSON
Secretary of State

NOTE BY THE DEPARTMENT OF STATE

ADHERING COUNTRIES

When this Treaty became effective on July 24, 1929, the instruments of ratification of all of the signatory powers having been deposited at Washington, the following countries, having deposited instruments of definitive adherence, became parties to it:

Additional adhesions deposited subsequent to July 24, 1929. Persia, July 2, 1929; Greece, August 3, 1929; Honduras, August 6, 1929; Chile, August 12, 1929; Luxemburg August 14, 1929; Danzig, September 11, 1929; Costa Rica, October 1, 1929; Venezuela, October 24, 1929.

Source:
United States Statutes at Large
Vol 46 Part 2 Page 2343

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The Avalon Project : Kellogg-Briand Pact 1929

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Treaty between the United States and other Powers providing for the renunciation of war as an instrument of national policy.

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Vital British interest

The Suez Canal provided Britain with a shorter sea route to its empire and, as the 20th century dawned and oil grew in importance, it provided a short sea route to the oilfields of the Persian Gulf. Britain was therefore committed to protect the canal.

During the two World Wars, the Suez Canal came under attack. Soon after the outbreak of World War One, Britain declared Egypt a protectorate and British and Indian forces were sent to protect the canal. Turkey, which had entered the war as Germany's ally in 1914, sent troops to seize the canal in February 1915. This attack was beaten back and by 1916 British defensive lines had been driven deep into the Sinai desert to prevent any further attempt.

The defeat of Turkey in 1918 resulted in much of the Ottoman (Turkish) empire being divided between Britain and France, leaving Britain in control of the oilfields of what is now Iraq.

In 1922, Britain gave nominal independence to Egypt, but it was some years before an agreement was reached. The Anglo-Egyptian Treaty signed in London in 1936 proclaimed Egypt to be an independent sovereign state, but allowed for British troops to continue to be stationed in the Suez Canal zone to protect Britain's financial and strategic interest in the canal until 1956, at which time the need for their presence would be re-examined and, if necessary, renegotiated.

Soon after the outbreak of World War Two, Italy, Germany's ally, sent forces to invade Egypt from Libya. A British and Commonwealth counter-offensive in December 1940 drove the Italians out of Egypt, but in March 1941 the Italians, reinforced by the German Afrika Korps, attacked again and pushed the Allied forces back.

The fighting ebbed and flowed along the North African coast until the summer of 1942, when the Axis forces seemed poised to break through to the Suez Canal and beyond.

Their new offensive, launched on 1 July, lasted most of the month, but the Allied lines held. In August, Lieutenant General Bernard Montgomery was appointed commander of the British Eighth Army. On 23 October 1942, he launched a major offensive from El Alamein which forced the German-Italian Panzer Army into retreat.

Subsequent Anglo-American landings in Morocco and Algeria on 8 November cut off the Axis forces in Tunisia, and on 13 May 1943 they surrendered. The canal was safe once more.

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The Suez Canal provided Britain with a shorter sea route to its empire and, as the 20th century dawned and oil grew in importance, it provided a short sea route to the oilfields of the Persian Gulf. Britain was therefore committed to protect the canal.

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This article was most recently revised and updated by

Suez Crisis, (1956), international crisis in the Middle East, precipitated on July 26, 1956, when the Egyptian president, Gamal Abdel Nasser, nationalized the Suez Canal. The canal had been owned by the Suez Canal Company, which was controlled by French and British interests.

Egypt: Suez Canal Encyclopædia Britannica, Inc.

The Suez Crisis was provoked by an American and British decision not to finance Egypt's construction of the Aswan High Dam, as they had promised, in response to Egypt's growing ties with communist Czechoslovakia and the Soviet Union. Nasser reacted to the American and British decision by declaring martial law in the canal zone and seizing control of the Suez Canal Company, predicting that the tolls collected from ships passing through the canal would pay for the dam's construction within five years. Britain and France feared that Nasser might close the canal and cut off shipments of petroleum flowing from the Persian Gulf to western Europe. When diplomatic efforts to settle the crisis failed, Britain and France secretly prepared military action to regain control of the canal and, if possible, to depose Nasser. They found a ready ally in Israel, whose hostility toward Egypt had been exacerbated by Nasser's blockage of the Straits of Tīrān (at the mouth of the Gulf of Aqaba) and the numerous raids by Egyptian-supported commandos into Israel during 1955-56.

On October 29, 1956, 10 Israeli brigades invaded Egypt and advanced toward the canal, routing Egyptian forces. Britain and France, following their plan, demanded that Israeli and Egyptian troops withdraw from the canal, and they announced that they would intervene to enforce a cease-fire ordered by the United Nations. On November 5 and 6, British and French forces landed at Port Said and Port Fuad and began occupying the canal zone. This move was soon met by growing opposition at home and by U.S.-sponsored resolutions in the UN (made in part to counter Soviet threats of intervention), which quickly put a stop to the Anglo-French action. On December 22 the UN evacuated British and French troops, and Israeli forces withdrew in March 1957.

Suez Crisis: British occupation of Port Said© Fox Photos-Hulton Archive/Getty Images

Nasser emerged from the Suez Crisis a victor and a hero for the cause of Arab and Egyptian nationalism. Israel did not win freedom to use the canal, but it did regain shipping rights in the Straits of Tīrān. Britain and France, less fortunate, lost most of their influence in the Middle East as a result of the episode.

The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica Adam Augustyn, Managing Editor, Reference Content.

20th-century international relations: The Suez Crisis

The Arab states, after their defeat in 1948, passed through a period of political unrest. The most critical change occurred in Egypt, where in 1952 a cabal of young army officers backed by the Muslim Brotherhood forced the dissolute King Farouk into exile....

United States: Eisenhower's second term

...to regain control of the Suez Canal and, perhaps, to destroy Egypt's president, Gamal Abdel Nasser, who had nationalized the canal in July. Eisenhower handled both crises deftly, forcing the invaders to withdraw from Egypt and preventing events in Hungary from triggering a confrontation between the superpowers. Owing in part...

United Kingdom: Conservative government (1951-64)

...retreat from empire by a reoccupation of the Suez Canal Zone after the nationalization of the canal by the Egyptian president, Gamal Abdel Nasser, in the summer of 1956. This belated experiment in imperial adventure drew wide criticism from the United States, the British dominions, and indeed within Britain itself....

date

July 26, 1956 - March 1957

participants

key people

related topics

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Suez Crisis | Definition, Summary, Location, History, Dates, Significance, & Facts

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Suez Crisis, international crisis in the Middle East, precipitated on July 26, 1956, when the Egyptian president, Gamal Abdel Nasser, nationalized the Suez Canal. The canal had been owned by the Suez Canal Company, which was controlled by French and British interests.

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Table of Contents

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Tet Offensive, attacks staged by North Vietnamese forces beginning in the early hours of January 31, 1968, during the Vietnam War. The Tet Offensive consisted of simultaneous attacks by some 85,000 troops under the direction of the North Vietnamese government. The attacks were carried out against five major South Vietnamese cities, dozens of military installations, and scores of towns and villages throughout South Vietnam. The offensive was a crushing tactical defeat for the North, but it struck a sharp psychological blow that eroded support for the war among the American public and political establishment. The offensive derives its name from the Vietnamese New Year holiday, during which the attacks occurred.

The North Vietnamese attack

In July 1967 North Vietnam's communist leaders decided to gamble upon a course of action that would ideally break the stalemate between North Vietnam and U.S.-backed South Vietnam. For the North Vietnamese government, the best result would be a galvanizing of discontent in the South that would, in turn, force the collapse of the government and army of South Vietnamese leader Nguyen Van Thieu. Alternatively, the offensive could convince the United States that it could not win the war.

By December 1967 there were indications to U.S. military commanders in the South Vietnamese capital of Saigon (now Ho Chi Minh City) that the Viet Cong and the North Vietnamese were preparing for a major military campaign. The offensive was preceded by broadcasts from the clandestine "Liberation Radio" network, in which the Alliance of National, Democratic, and Peace Forces-an urban front group established by the Viet Cong-exhorted the South Vietnamese people to rise in open revolt against the Saigon government. Citizens were called on "to side with the ranks of the people and to give their arms and ammunition to the revolutionary armed forces." In the event, this cooperation largely failed to materialize.

Despite these advance warnings, when the North Vietnamese offensive began in the early morning hours of January 30-31, 1968, it was larger and more intense than U.S. intelligence had anticipated. In sudden attacks on urban areas throughout South Vietnam, North Vietnamese forces struck and briefly held portions of Saigon and 36 of the country's 44 provincial capitals. In Saigon, attackers penetrated both the presidential palace and the compound of the U.S. embassy. North Vietnamese units in Cho Lon, a historically Chinese district west of Saigon, were blasted out in prolonged fighting that demolished large portions of the area. Viet Cong and North Vietnamese troops occupied the walled fortress of Hue, Vietnam's ancient capital, until they were finally driven out by U.S. and South Vietnamese forces on February 24. It was estimated that only 7,000 of Hue's 17,000 homes were left standing after the battle for the city.

Outcome and casualties

The North Vietnamese and Viet Cong paid dearly for their deviation from the guerrilla warfare strategy that had so frustrated U.S. commanders. Initial United States Information Agency estimates placed the number of communists dead at 60,000 (a figure that was subsequently revised down), with 24,000 weapons captured. Never before had the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong suffered such casualties. Moreover, the South Vietnamese people rejected the North's call to rebellion.

U.S. and South Vietnamese casualties numbered 12,727, including more than 2,600 fatalities. Although U.S. commanders generally held a low opinion of the Army of the Republic of South Vietnam (ARVN), South Vietnamese soldiers fought with bravery and tenacity during the Tet Offensive. This was especially true during the battle for Hue, where ARVN troops and U.S. Marines liberated the city after engaging in some of the fiercest close-quarters combat of the war. The South Vietnamese government reported that 7,721 civilians were killed in the fighting during the offensive, while an additional 18,516 were wounded. Throughout the country, some 75,000 homes were damaged or destroyed. More than 670,000 people were declared refugees, raising the total number of internally displaced persons in South Vietnam to some 1.5 million.

U.S. and South Vietnamese officials declared that the communists had suffered a resounding military defeat, and this was certainly the case. Communist leadership in Hanoi had gambled on a conventional assault that they thought would sweep aside ARVN forces and topple the "puppet" government in Saigon. Instead, the North Vietnamese and Viet Cong advance was checked by surprisingly resilient ARVN defenders, and most cities-with the notable exception of Hue-were liberated within days of the initial attack. In addition, the widespread loss of life and destruction of property triggered a decline in support for the Viet Cong among the South Vietnamese populace.

The American response

During the initial phase of the offensive, the U.S. death toll in Vietnam increased to more than 500 per week, and, as the casualty numbers rose, U.S. public support for the war effort declined. Much of the American public viewed the Tet Offensive as a sign of the undying North Vietnamese aggression and will. The role of the U.S. media in fostering and furthering this belief in North Vietnamese strength during that period has been a topic of study and argument, and the Tet Offensive certainly produced some of the most enduring images of the war. Associated Press photographer Eddie Adams captured the summary execution of a suspected Viet Cong officer by South Vietnamese Gen. Nguyen Ngoc Loan on the streets of Saigon, and his photo would bring the brutality of the war to the front page of newspapers around the world. Whatever the impetus, the American public grew increasingly vehement in its opposition to the continued presence of U.S. soldiers in Vietnam, and the gulf between the inevitably politically driven administration and what the military saw as the most effective means of fighting the war became even larger.

On March 10, 1968, The New York Times ran a story under the headline "Westmoreland Requests 206,000 More Men, Stirring Debate in Administration." This request galvanized the public and convinced them that, rather than a Vietnamization of the conflict, America's involvement was increasing at the cost of American lives in the face of an unfaltering and seemingly unbeatable enemy.

The U.S. military, however, had grown more optimistic following the Tet Offensive. They saw in the successful rebuke of their enemies' attacks an undeniable weakening of communist forces and strength. By departing from classical guerrilla tactics and assaulting southern cities, the North Vietnamese had unwittingly pitted themselves against their opponents' greatest strengths. American organizational, material, and logistical superiority was quickly demonstrated in the early hours of the offensive, and the traditionally unreliable South Vietnamese infantry fought with surprising effectiveness. U.S. commander Gen. William C. Westmoreland viewed the post-Tet situation as an opportunity for an American offensive that would further debilitate the enemy and deny any future resurgence. With the encouragement of Joint Chiefs of Staff chairman Gen. Earle Wheeler, Westmoreland renewed an earlier request for more troops. His request was initially denied, however, as Pres. Lyndon B. Johnson did not desire any expansion of the ground war.

Increasingly vocal antagonism against any escalation of U.S. involvement in Vietnam put greater pressure on the Johnson administration and the U.S. Congress. In mid-March 1968, 139 members of the House of Representatives sponsored a resolution asking for congressional review of U.S. policy in Vietnam. Secretary of State Dean Rusk was called before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee and questioned for 11 hours. On March 22 Johnson approved only a small increase of troops. At the same time, he announced that Westmoreland would be recalled to the United States to become chief of staff of the army. Westmoreland was replaced by Gen. Creighton Abrams, who aggressively pursued the Vietnamization program and oversaw the reduction of the U.S. presence in Vietnam to fewer than 30,000 troops.
The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
Michael Ray.

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Tet Offensive | Facts, Casualties, Videos, & Significance

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Tet Offensive, attacks staged by North Vietnamese forces beginning in the early hours of January 31, 1968, during the Vietnam War. The attacks were carried out by some 85,000 troops against five major South Vietnamese cities, dozens of military installations, and scores of towns and villages throughout South Vietnam.

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NOTE TO READERS
"Milestones in the History of U.S. Foreign Relations" has been retired and is no longer maintained. For more information, please see the full notice.

In late January, 1968, during the lunar new year (or "Tet") holiday, North Vietnamese and communist Viet Cong forces launched a coordinated attack against a number of targets in South Vietnam. The U.S. and South Vietnamese militaries sustained heavy losses before finally repelling the communist assault. The Tet Offensive played an important role in weakening U.S. public support for the war in Vietnam.

U.S. Captain Franklin Eller coordinates with military command during the Tet Offensive

Ho Chi Minh and leaders in Hanoi planned the Tet Offensive in the hopes of achieving a decisive victory that would end the grinding conflict that frustrated military leaders on both sides. A successful attack on major cities might force the United States to negotiate or perhaps even to withdraw. At the very least, the North Vietnamese hoped it would serve to stop the ongoing escalation of guerilla attacks and bombing in the North. Hanoi selected the Tet holiday to strike because it was traditionally a time of truce, and because Vietnamese traveling to spend the festival with their relatives provided cover for the movement of South Vietnamese National Liberation Forces (NLF) who supported the communist forces.

The first phase of the assault began on January 30 and 31, when NLF forces simultaneously attacked a number of targets, mostly populated areas and places with heavy U.S. troop presence. The strikes on the major cities of Huế and Saigon had a strong psychological impact, as they showed that the NLF troops were not as weak as the Johnson Administration had previously claimed. The NLF even managed to breach the outer walls of the U.S. Embassy in Saigon. Although the first phase of the offensive became the most famous, a second phase also launched simultaneous assaults on smaller cities and towns on May 4 and stretched into June. A third phase began in August and lasted six weeks. In the months that followed, U.S. and South Vietnamese forces retook the towns that the NLF had secured over the course of the offensive, but they incurred heavy military and civilian casualties in the process.

At the end of the Tet Offensive, both sides had endured losses, and both sides claimed victory. The U.S. and South Vietnamese military response almost completely eliminated the NLF forces and regained all of the lost territory. At the same time, the Tet Offensive weakened domestic support for the Johnson Administration as the vivid reporting on the Tet Offensive by the U.S. media made clear to the American public that an overall victory in Vietnam was not imminent.

The aftermath of Tet brought public discussions about de-escalation, but not before U.S. generals asked for additional troops for a wide-scale "accelerated pacification program." Believing that the U.S. was in a position to defeat the North, these military leaders sought to press for a U.S.-South Vietnam offensive. Johnson and others, however, read the situation differently. Johnson announced that the bombing of North Vietnam would cease above the 20th parallel and placed a limit on U.S. troops in South Vietnam. Johnson also attempted to set parameters for peace talks, but it would be several more years before these came to fruition. Within the United States, protests against continued involvement in Vietnam intensified. On March 31, 1968, Johnson announced that he would not seek a second term as president. The job of finding a way out of Vietnam was left to the next U.S. president, Richard Nixon.

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Milestones: 1961-1968 - Office of the Historian

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Camp David Accords, agreements between Israel and Egypt signed on September 17, 1978, that led in the following year to a peace treaty between those two countries, the first such treaty between Israel and any of its Arab neighbours. Brokered by U.S. Pres. Jimmy Carter (this author) between Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Egyptian Pres. Anwar Sadat and officially titled the "Framework for Peace in the Middle East," the agreements became known as the Camp David Accords because the negotiations took place at the U.S. presidential retreat at Camp David, Maryland. Sadat and Begin were awarded the Nobel Prize for Peace in 1978 for their contributions to the agreements.
(Read Britannica's interview with Jimmy Carter, author of this entry.)

Background

The United Nations (UN) voted in 1947 to partition Great Britain's Palestine mandate-to be established were a Jewish state, an Arab state, and an independent Jerusalem under a UN trusteeship. Arabs opposed partition. When the mandate ended on May 15, 1948, and Israel proclaimed its independence, the first Arab-Israeli war erupted. No separate state for Arab Palestinians (i.e., Palestinians) was established. Egypt took control of the Gaza Strip along the Mediterranean Sea, and Jordan assumed sovereignty over the territory between Israel's eastern border and the Jordan River (the West Bank), including East Jerusalem. During the Six-Day War of June 1967, Israel occupied those territories as well as the Golan Heights-a patch of Syrian land on Israel's northeastern border-and Egypt's Sinai Peninsula. Following his election as U.S. president, Carter committed himself to working toward a comprehensive Middle East peace settlement based on UN Resolution 242 (November 1967), which called for the withdrawal of Israel from the occupied territories, Arab recognition of and peace with Israel (stipulations that the Arab states had refused to agree to), and a just settlement to the problem of Palestinian refugees displaced by the establishment of Israel and the 1967 war.

Early in his presidency, Carter met with leaders of the Middle East and was especially encouraged by President Sadat. Sadat wanted the Israeli-occupied Sinai returned to Egypt, as well as peace for his people and a stronger relationship with the United States. The U.S. president also met with Begin, who had only recently become prime minister, and found him willing to consider the measures that Carter had discussed with Sadat.

In November 1977 Sadat initiated direct contacts with Israel and made a dramatic visit to Jerusalem, where he spoke to the Israeli Knesset (parliament). However, a reciprocal visit by Begin was unsuccessful, and no progress was made toward peace. Rosalynn Carter, the U.S. first lady, then suggested to her husband that he invite Sadat and Begin to Camp David, in rural Maryland, where the relative privacy and seclusion might provide a setting for a breakthrough.
(Read Britannica's 1980 interview with Anwar Sadat.)

The summit

The two leaders accepted Carter's invitation, and the summit began on September 5, 1978, and lasted for 13 days. It was extremely unusual for heads of state to engage in a summit meeting at which the outcome was so much in doubt. Not only had Egypt and Israel been at war for decades, but the personality differences of the leaders promised to complicate the dialogue. Begin, always formal in dress and manner, was extremely detail-oriented and careful about the possible ramifications of any agreements. He was pessimistic about what he believed could be achieved at Camp David and insisted that the objective be limited to developing an agenda for future meetings. By contrast, Sadat wore fashionable sports clothes, was relaxed and forthcoming, and was willing to join in comprehensive negotiations aimed at settling all controversial issues during the few days of the summit.

All three men were accompanied by their leading foreign policy advisers, but Carter preferred that the three men work together in private sessions in a small office at Aspen, his cabin at Camp David. He also insisted that there be no direct press coverage of the meetings, fearing it would have a negative effect on negotiations. A humorous situation arose right before the first meeting, an awkward moment that nonetheless shed light on the personalities involved. After President Carter and the first lady entered the cabin, Begin and Sadat hesitated over who should follow through the doorway. Both men laughed, and Begin insisted that Sadat proceed first. As the first lady noted later, "Jimmy said to me that Begin would never go ahead of Sadat, being perfectly proper according to protocol-president above prime minister."

After three days of negotiations, the heated discussions reached an impasse, and direct discourse between Sadat and Begin became impossible. Carter then compiled a single document that encompassed a resolution of the major issues, presented the proposals to each leader in separate meetings, assessed their comments, and redrafted the manuscript some two dozen times, shuttling the manuscript back and forth for their review. (This single-document method became a mainstay of Carter's post-presidency work at the Carter Center to resolve international disputes.)

As the days passed, prospects for a settlement at Camp David appeared so bleak that Sadat threatened to leave, and Carter began planning to return to the White House and suffer the likely political consequences of failure. An agreement was reached on the final day, however, when, at the last minute, Begin agreed to allow the Knesset to decide the fate of the settlements Israelis had established on the Sinai Peninsula (which Sadat had required dismantled and Begin had sworn not to abandon).

A framework for peace

The eventual outcome of these talks, the "Framework for Peace in the Middle East," had three parts: (1) a process for Palestinian self-government in the West Bank and Gaza, (2) a framework for the conclusion of a peace treaty between Egypt and Israel, and (3) a similar framework for peace treaties between Israel and its other neighbours. The prime minister and the Israeli Knesset agreed that a transitional self-governing Palestinian authority was to be elected to replace Israeli political and military forces in the occupied territories.

The peace treaty that Israel and Egypt signed in March 1979 closely reflected President Carter's proposals at Camp David and formally ended the state of war that had existed between the two countries. Israel agreed to withdraw from Sinai, and Egypt promised to establish normal diplomatic relations between the two countries and open the Suez Canal to Israeli ships (which until then had been banned from the waterway). These provisions were duly carried out. However, most Arab countries, rather than following Egypt's lead, ostracized Egypt and expelled it from the Arab League. The Palestine Liberation Organization (PLO), professing to speak for the Palestinian people, also rejected the accords. Nonetheless, the next major advance in Middle East peace negotiations, the Oslo Accords signed by Israel and the PLO in 1993, included provisions with regard to the West Bank and Gaza that were similar to those in the Camp David Accords. These included a transitional period, an elected self-governing Palestinian authority, withdrawal of the Israeli military government and redeployment of Israeli troops, the establishment of a local police force, and a plan to move ahead with negotiations on the final status of the occupied territories.
Jimmy Carter

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Camp David Accords | Summary, History, & Facts

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The Camp David Accords are agreements between Israel and Egypt signed on September 17, 1978, that led in 1979 to a peace treaty between the two countries, the first such treaty between Israel and any of its Arab neighbors. Israeli Prime Minister Menachem Begin and Egyptian President Anwar Sadat won the 1978 Nobel Peace Prize.

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Grade Level:

Middle School: Sixth Grade through Eighth Grade

Subject:

Literacy and Language Arts,Social Studies

Lesson Duration:

90 Minutes

Additional Standards:

Era 10-Contemporary United States (1968 to the present)
Standard 1: Understands developments in foreign policy and domestic politics between the Nixon and Clinton presidencies

Thinking Skills:

Remembering: Recalling or recognizing information ideas, and principles. Understanding: Understand the main idea of material heard, viewed, or read. Interpret or summarize the ideas in own words. Applying: Apply an abstract idea in a concrete situation to solve a problem or relate it to a prior experience. Analyzing: Break down a concept or idea into parts and show the relationships among the parts.

Essential Question

How do nations resolve conflict and develop peaceful solutions?

Objective

Students will be able to:

o describe reasons for conflicts between nations and possible ways to resolve those conflicts

o identify causes of past conflict between Israel and Egypt

o identify the three leaders who met at Camp David in September 1978

o explain why President Carter wanted to negotiate peace between Israel and Egypt

o analyze the difficulties and tensions that made an agreement difficult to reach

Background

Students will be able to:

o describe reasons for conflicts between nations and possible ways to resolve those conflicts

o identify causes of past conflict between Israel and Egypt

o identify the three leaders who met at Camp David in September 1978

o explain why President Carter wanted to negotiate peace between Israel and Egypt

o analyze the difficulties and tensions that made an agreement difficult to reach

o compare and contrast the positions of Israel and Egypt as the Camp David summit began

o analyze and interpret primary source documents related to the Camp David Accords, including photos, political cartoons, handwritten notes, personal correspondence, audio clips, and video clips.

o create an informative and effective essay, timeline, cartoon, news reports, or advice column that reflects knowledge and understanding of the Camp David Accords

Preparation

Students will use a variety of resources from the Jimmy Carter National Historic Site and the Jimmy Carter Library.These include photographs, political cartoons, handwritten notes by President Carter, correspondence between President Carter and President Sadat and between Carter and Prime Minister Begin, audio clips of President Carter's reflections upon the Camp David Accords, and video clips related to the negotiations and the treaty signing.

Procedure
Day 3:
Vocabulary

compromise, negotiation, conflict, accords, treaty, Sinai peninsula, Six Day War, Yom Kippur (or 1973) War, Menachem Begin, Anwar Sadat, Camp David, shuttle diplomacy, Middle East, settlements

Assessment Materials

Teacher will have many opportunities for formative assessment in this unit, including observation of student brainstorming and collaboration during Day One's activities, observation of completion of primary source analysis sheets, completion of related handouts, and through question-and-answer sessions during discussion. The summative assessment comes with the student-chosen final performance task.

Enrichment Activities

There are many ways to differentiate for this unit, including the incorporation of more complex texts and documents for students who need enrichment. Students who are particularly interested in more information related to the Camp David Accords might read some of Rosalynn Carter's reflections on that September in First Lady from Plains. Further research can be done into the efforts of other presidents in achieving peace in the Middle East, particularly Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, and Bill Clinton. Students could even research the current administration's efforts in the region and assess their effectiveness. Students might analyze President Carter's Nobel Prize acceptance speech from December 2002 for further insights into his view of how and why we must accomplish peace in the world.

Additional Resources

Many of the primary source documents (photos, written documents, etc.) are available onsite through the education program at the Jimmy Carter National Historic Site. Classroom sets of Keeping Faith and other publications by President Carter are also available for us onsite at the park or for loan to schools from the park. Students visiting the park will have an opportunity to view and discuss the Nobel Peace Prize from 2002 and the connections between that prize and Carter's efforts at Camp David as well as in his post-presidency throughout the world.

o First Lady from Plains by Rosalynn Carter (c) 1982

o The Blood of Abraham by Jimmy Carter (c) 1993

o Palestine: Peace not Apartheid by Jimmy Carter (c) 2006

Contact Information
Email us about this lesson plan

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A Pathway to Peace - Jimmy Carter and the Camp David Accords - Teachers (U.S. National Park Service)

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Grade Level: Middle School: Sixth Grade through Eighth Grade Subject: Literacy and Language Arts,Social Studies Lesson Duration: 90 Minutes Additional Standards: Era 10-Contemporary United States (1968 to the present)Standard 1: Understands developments in foreign policy and domestic politics between the Nixon and Clinton presidencies Thinking Skills: Remembering: Recalling or recognizing information ideas, and principles.

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The Hostage Crisis in Iran

On November 4, 1979, Iranian militants stormed the United States Embassy in Tehran and took approximately seventy Americans captive. This terrorist act triggered the most profound crisis of the Carter presidency and began a personal ordeal for Jimmy Carter and the American people that lasted 444 days.

President Carter committed himself to the safe return of the hostages while protecting America's interests and prestige. He pursued a policy of restraint that put a higher value on the lives of the hostages than on American retaliatory power or protecting his own political future.

The toll of patient diplomacy was great, but President Carter's actions brought freedom for the hostages with America's honor preserved.

Mohammed Reza Pahlavi, Shah of Iran, began his reign in 1941, succeeding his father, Reza Khan, to the throne. In a 1953 power struggle with his prime minister, the Shah gained American support to prevent nationalization of Iran's oil industry. In return for assuring the U.S. a steady supply of oil, the Shah received economic and military aid from eight American presidents.

Early in the 1960s, the Shah announced social and economic reforms but refused to grant broad political freedom. Iranian nationalists condemned his U.S. supported regime and his "westernizing" of Iran. During rioting in 1963, the Shah cracked down, suppressing his opposition. Among those arrested and exiled was a popular religious nationalist and bitter foe of the United States, the Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini.

Between 1963 and 1979, the Shah spent billions of oil dollars on military weapons. The real price of military strength was the loss of popular support. Unable to sustain economic progress and unwilling to expand democratic freedoms, the Shah's regime collapsed in revolution. On January 16, 1979, the Shah fled Iran, never to return.

The exiled Ayatollah Khomeini returned to Tehran in February 1979 and whipped popular discontent into rabid anti-Americanism. When the Shah came to America for cancer treatment in October, the Ayatollah incited Iranian militants to attack the U.S. On November 4, the American Embassy in Tehran was overrun and its employees taken captive. The hostage crisis had begun.

The Hostages and The Casualties
This list was adapted from information in Free At Last by Doyle McManus.

Iran Hostage's Diary
A prison journal was kept by Robert C. Ode after being taken captive by Iranian student terrorists at the American embassy in Tehran. Ode donated the diary and other correspondence to the Carter archives.

Rescue Mission Report
Instructions on retrieving the Iranian Hostage Crisis "Rescue Mission Report" from the Lloyd Norton Cutler Files.

The Tehran Six
Select documents related to the "Canadian Caper" and the "Tehran Six".

Select Records at the Jimmy Carter Library Related to the Iran Hostage Crisis
Additional select documents regarding the Iran hostage crisis are described in this curated list. You can contact the Library for information on these records and additional records on this topic available in our holdings.

Top

The Jimmy Carter Presidential Library is part of the presidential libraries system administered by the National Archives and Records Administration, a federal agency.

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The Hostage Crisis in Iran On November 4, 1979, Iranian militants stormed the United States Embassy in Tehran and took approximately seventy Americans captive. This terrorist act triggered the most profound crisis of the Carter presidency and began a personal ordeal for Jimmy Carter and the American people that lasted 444 days.

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Historical Background and Timeline

The Iran Hostage Crisis was a major international crisis caused by the seizure of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and its employees by revolutionary Iranian students, who then held the Embassy employees as hostages, in direct violation of international law. The revolutionary government of Iran, under the Ayatollah Khomeini, supported the hostage undertaking. The crisis ended with the release of the hostages after a captivity of 444 days, from November 4, 1979 to January 20, 1981.

Since the release of the hostages, a large body of literature has been written about this event. A timeline of significant events might, however, provide a historical framework for understanding the records in this web release of newly declassified records.

January 1978 - February 1979 - The Iranian Revolution developed gradually from modest beginnings into a nation-wide movement of protest against the government of the Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi (b.1919 - d.1980).

16 January 1979 - The Shah of Iran went into exile, never to return to Iran.

1 February 1979 - The spiritual leader of the Iranian revolutionaries, Ayatollah Khomeini, returned from exile to Iran amid a tumultuous public reception.

11 February 1979 - The Iranian monarchy was dissolved and the Ayatollah Khomeini was granted supreme power. This day later became a new national holiday in Iran.

1 April 1979 - Following massive approval in a national referendum, the Islamic Republic of Iran was proclaimed.

22 October 1979 - The ailing Shah was admitted for medical treatment in the United States.

4 November 1979 - A group of 300-500 Iranian students, citing the Shah's entry into the U.S. as a justification, seized the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and held its employees as hostages. This action received the official approval of the Khomeini government, in part to unite the Iranian people behind the new, proposed constitution, over which the Iranian people were to vote in a referendum the following month.

19-20 November - The Iranian students released 13 of the hostages, including all of the females and the African-Americans.

20 November 1979 - A force of several hundred Muslim fundamentalists seized the Grand Mosque of Mecca. The pro-American government of Saudi Arabia sent in special forces to clear the mosque, a military operation that took until December 4th to be completed, leaving hundreds of dead.

2-3 December 1979 - A referendum in Iran overwhelmingly approved the new, theocratic constitution for Iran, which made Khomeini the dictator of Iran.

28 January 1980 - Six of the U.S. employees at the Embassy, who had evaded capture by hiding in the Canadian Embassy, flew out of Tehran using fake Canadian passports.

24 April 1980 - A surprise U.S. military expedition to rescue the hostages was mounted, but it was aborted due to equipment failure of three of the eight helicopters. However, one of the retreating helicopters collided with a C-130 transport plane, killing eight U.S. servicemen.

11 July 1980 - Release of the American hostage Richard Queen, who was suffering from multiple sclerosis. This reduced the final number of U.S. hostages to 52.

27 July 1980 - Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi died of cancer in Egypt, where he had flown after being urged to leave the United States. He was buried in Cairo.

22 September 1980 - Saddam Hussein, the ruler of Iraq, sent his army into Iran, in part to settle long-standing border disputes with Iran, in part to seize oil-rich lands in southern Iran, and also in part because of fears of the potentially corrosive effect of Iran's revolutionary propaganda on Iraq's Shiite Muslim majority. Hussein's army was quickly halted by the Iranian armed forces. The war was to continue for almost eight years and ended with the deaths of perhaps one million people on both sides, while the boundaries of the two countries remained exactly as before the war.

4 November 1980 - U.S. President Jimmy Carter was defeated in the U.S. Presidential Election.

19 January 1981 - The Algiers Accords were signed, constituting the final U.S.-Iran deal to end the hostage crisis.

20 January 1981 - The 52 U.S. hostages were released minutes after Ronald Reagan was sworn in as the 40th U.S. president.

Project Background

The approach of the 35th anniversary of the end of the Iran Hostage Crisis in January 2016 led the National Declassification Center (NDC) to begin reviewing certain records series related to the Crisis and prepare them for release. A majority of the records came from the Department of State and documented the work done by various Department of State officials and working groups in trying to bring about a diplomatic end to the crisis. The NDC was specifically interested in records which had not been released before by the National Archives and Records Administration (NARA) and which would thus be likely to provide additional information on the Crisis. The NDC was also interested in working with other divisions of NARA that would be able to provide additional records chronicling the Hostage Crisis. Working in tandem with the NDC, staff at the Jimmy Carter Presidential Library and Museum were able to release additional records related to the Hostage Crisis that had not been previously available. These records were then included as part of this special project for a total of approximately 7200 pages of newly declassified records from several series.

Introduction to the Records

1. Records of Sheldon J. Krys Relating to Iran Hostages, 10/12/1977 - 5/14/1985. Record Group 59 (Department of State), National Archives Identifier: 21969537
At the time of the Iran Hostage Crisis, Mr. Sheldon J. Krys served as the Executive Director of Near East Affairs (NEA), which was the unit within the Department of State that oversaw policy and operations of the State Department in that part of the world. Mr. Krys's collection of records from this crisis form the greatest part of the newly declassified records series, which totals about 6,500 pages.

2. Records Relating to Hostages in Iran, 11/4/1979 - 4/13/1981. Record Group 353 (Department of State), National Archives Identifier: 22337708
This is a small body of records, which originated with the Operations Center at the Department of State. The Center provided round-the-clock monitoring of the crisis. Although these records are generally from November-December 1979, they include a number of Situation Reports (Sitreps) that were not found in the Sheldon J. Krys series.

3. Records of the Office of the National Security Advisor (Carter Administration), 1977 - 1981, National Archives Identifier: 560131.
This collection contains the following select series of documents related specifically to the Iran Hostage Crisis.See details on select documents featured

Zbigniew Brzezinski Material - CIA President's Daily Brief Files (NSA 2)
(National Archives Identifier:560144)

Zbigniew Brzezinski Material - Country Files (NSA 6)
(National Archives Identifier:560151)

Zbigniew Brzezinski Material - Office Files (NSA 15)
(National Archives Identifier:560164)

Zbigniew Brzezinski Material - Cables Files (NSA 16)
(National Archives Identifier:560165)

4. Walter Mondale Papers
This collection from the Jimmy Carter Presidential Library and Museum has the series Foreign Countries Files (National Archives Identifier:623728) that contains select documents from January 14, 1980 - April 7, 1980, related to the Hostage Crisis.See details on select documents featured

This Web Release

The images scanned for this release are a sampling of the records, about 1000 pages from a total of 7200 pages. The scanned records indicate the kind of information available in these records, but it is hoped also that they will provide some basis for research into this significant historical episode.

See list of records

Situation Reports (Sitreps)

The Situation Reports (Sitreps) were up-to-the-minute, informational reports about developments of the hostage crisis. The first one was issued on the day the hostages were taken, November 4th, 1979; the last one, Sitrep No. 561, was issued on January 19th, 1981, the day before the hostages were released. Generally, there was one Sitrep issued each day, and on some days, especially early in the crisis, several were issued per day. The Sitreps were created by an informal organization within the Department of State called the Iran Working Group (IWG).

Additional Records at the Jimmy Carter Presidential Library and Museum (Atlanta, GA)

Other archival holdings of this institution will complement more fully the records described in this web release. In addition, the Library is an excellent resource for primary source documents about the Hostage Crisis in general. The Carter Library has a web page dedicated to the topic, " The Hostage Crisis in Iran".

Other Resources

1. Ronald Reagan Presidential Library and Museum (Simi Valley, CA). The Library has series related to the Hostage Crisis. For more information, check "Research at the Ronald Reagan Presidential Library"

2. Minnesota Historical Society (Minneapolis, MN). It has a collection of items related to the Hostage Crisis from hostage Bruce Laingen and vice-president Walter Mondale.http://collections.mnhs.org/mondale/ andhttp://www2.mnhs.org/library/findaids/00685.xml

3. Purdue University (West Lafayette, IN)
It has acollection of Congressional materials relating to the Hostage Crisis ---primarily copies of legislation.

4. Penn State University (State College, PA)
It has acollection of Congressional materials relating to the Hostage Crisis, including copies of legislation.

5. Richard B. Russell Library for Political Research and Studies (Athens, GA)
It has a collection of political cartoons from the Atlanta Journal-Constitution related to the Hostage Crisis.

6. The Digital National Security Archive. Available throughProQuest, it has over 120 declassified government documents related to the Hostage Crisis, in addition to chronologies, glossaries, and bibliographies dealing with the subject. It has over 400 documents dealing with the Iranian Revolution itself.The National Security Archive also maintains a large, unpublished collection of declassified materials that includes numerous files pertaining to both the Iranian revolution and hostage crisis. Although it is subscription-only, it is available for free through research rooms at National Archives facilities, local libraries (emailnsarchiv@gwu.edu for information on specific local libraries) or through visiting the Smith Bagley Reading Room at the National Security Archive in Washington D.C.

7. Foreign Relations of the United States (FRUS). This series of published records by the Department of State will eventually include two volumes on the topic of Iran, one of which will deal specifically with the Hostage Crisis. They are currently under declassification review and are planned for publication in 2017 and later.

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444 Days: Selected Records Concerning the Iran Hostage Crisis 1979-1981

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Enlarge Poster produced for the 444 Days records release project. Historical Background and Timeline The Iran Hostage Crisis was a major international crisis caused by the seizure of the U.S. Embassy in Tehran and its employees by revolutionary Iranian students, who then held the Embassy employees as hostages, in direct violation of international law.

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Table of Contents

When did the Chernobyl disaster occur?

What happened in the Chernobyl disaster?

How many people died as a result of the Chernobyl disaster?

How big was the exclusion zone created after the Chernobyl disaster?

What effects did the Chernobyl disaster have?

This article was most recently revised and updated by

Chernobyl disaster, accident in 1986 at the Chernobyl nuclear power station in the Soviet Union, the worst disaster in the history of nuclear power generation. The Chernobyl power station was situated at the settlement of Pryp'yat, 10 miles (16 km) northwest of the city of Chernobyl (Ukrainian: Chornobyl) and 65 miles (104 km) north of Kyiv, Ukraine. The station consisted of four reactors, each capable of producing 1,000 megawatts of electric power; it had come online in 1977-83.

The explosion at Unit 4 and initial containment efforts

The disaster occurred on April 25-26, 1986, when technicians at reactor Unit 4 attempted a poorly designed experiment. Workers shut down the reactor's power-regulating system and its emergency safety systems, and they withdrew most of the control rods from its core while allowing the reactor to continue running at 7 percent power. These mistakes were compounded by others, and at 1:23 am on April 26 the chain reaction in the core went out of control. Several explosions triggered a large fireball and blew off the heavy steel and concrete lid of the reactor. This and the ensuing fire in the graphite reactor core released large amounts of radioactive material into the atmosphere, where it was carried great distances by air currents. A partial meltdown of the core also occurred.

Disasters of Historic Proportion

On April 27 the 30,000 inhabitants of Pryp'yat began to be evacuated. A cover-up was attempted, but on April 28 Swedish monitoring stations reported abnormally high levels of wind-transported radioactivity and pressed for an explanation. The Soviet government admitted there had been an accident at Chernobyl, thus setting off an international outcry over the dangers posed by the radioactive emissions. By May 4 both the heat and the radioactivity leaking from the reactor core were being contained, albeit at great risk to workers. Radioactive debris was buried at some 800 temporary sites, and later in the year the highly radioactive reactor core was enclosed in a concrete-and-steel sarcophagus (which was later deemed structurally unsound).

Deaths, radioactivity, and the creation of the Chernobyl Exclusion Zone

Some sources state that two people were killed in the initial explosions, whereas others report that the figure was closer to 50. Dozens more people contracted serious radiation sickness; some of them later died. Between 50 and 185 million curies of radionuclides (radioactive forms of chemical elements) escaped into the atmosphere-several times more radioactivity than that created by the atomic bombs dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki, Japan. This radioactivity was spread by the wind over Belarus, Russia, and Ukraine and soon reached as far west as France and Italy. Millions of acres of forest and farmland were contaminated, and, although many thousands of people were evacuated, hundreds of thousands more remained in contaminated areas. In addition, in subsequent years many livestock were born deformed, and among humans several thousand radiation-induced illnesses and cancer deaths were expected in the long term. The Chernobyl disaster sparked criticism of unsafe procedures and design flaws in Soviet reactors, and it heightened resistance to the building of more such plants. Chernobyl Unit 2 was shut down after a 1991 fire, and Unit 1 remained on-line until 1996. Chernobyl Unit 3 continued to operate until 2000, when the nuclear power station was officially decommissioned.

Following the disaster, the Soviet Union created a circle-shaped exclusion zone with a radius of about 18.6 miles (30 km) centred on the nuclear power plant. The exclusion zone covered an area of about 1,017 square miles (2,634 square km) around the plant. However, it was later expanded to 1,600 square miles (4,143 square km) to include heavily radiated areas outside the initial zone. Although no people actually live in the exclusion zone, scientists, scavengers, and others may file for permits that allow them to enter for limited amounts of time. With the dissolution of the Soviet Union in 1991, control of the site passed to Ukraine. In 2011 the Ukrainian government opened parts of the exclusion zone to organized tour groups, and Chernobyl and the abandoned city of Pryp'yat became popular destinations for so-called "dark tourists." During the Russian invasion of Ukraine in 2022, Russian forces attacking from Belarus captured Chernobyl after a brief but pitched battle. Combat at the site of the world's worst nuclear disaster led to concerns about damage to the containment structure and the possibility of widespread radioactive contamination.

The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica Michael Ray.

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Chernobyl disaster | Causes, Effects, Deaths, Videos, Location, & Facts

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Chernobyl disaster, accident at the Chernobyl nuclear power station in the Soviet Union in 1986, the worst disaster in nuclear power generation history. Between 2 and 50 people were killed in the initial explosions, and dozens more contracted serious radiation sickness, some of whom later died.

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On April 25 and 26, 1986, the worst nuclear accident in history unfolded in what is now northern Ukraine as a reactor at a nuclear power plant exploded and burned. Shrouded in secrecy, the incident was a watershed moment in both the Cold War and the history of nuclear power. More than 30 years on, scientists estimate the zone around the former plant will not be habitable for up to 20,000 years.

The disaster took place near the city of Chernobyl in the former USSR, which invested heavily in nuclear power after World War II. Starting in 1977, Soviet scientists installed four RBMK nuclear reactors at the power plant, which is located just south of what is now Ukraine's border with Belarus.

On April 25, 1986, routine maintenance was scheduled at V.I. Lenin Nuclear Power Station's fourth reactor, and workers planned to use the downtime to test whether the reactor could still be cooled if the plant lost power. During the test, however, workers violated safety protocols and power surged inside the plant. Despite attempts to shut down the reactor entirely, another power surge caused a chain reaction of explosions inside. Finally, the nuclear core itself was exposed, spewing radioactive material into the atmosphere.

Firefighters attempted to put out a series of blazes at the plant, and eventually helicopters dumped sand and other materials in an attempt to squelch the fires and contain the contamination. Despite the death of two people in the explosions, the hospitalization of workers and firefighters, and the danger from fallout and fire, no one in the surrounding areas-including the nearby city of Pripyat, which was built in the 1970s to house workers at the plant-was evacuated until about 36 hours after the disaster began.

Publicizing a nuclear accident was considered a significant political risk, but by then it was too late: The meltdown had already spread radiation as far as Sweden, where officials at another nuclear plant began to ask about what was happening in the USSR. After first denying any accident, the Soviets finally made a brief announcement on April 28.

Historic disaster

Soon, the world realized that it was witnessing a historic event. Up to 30 percent of Chernobyl's 190 metric tons of uranium was now in the atmosphere, and the Soviet Union eventually evacuated 335,000 people, establishing a 19-mile-wide "exclusion zone" around the reactor.

At least 28 people initially died as a result of the accident, while more than 100 were injured. The United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Atomic Radiation has reported that more than 6,000 children and adolescents developed thyroid cancer after being exposed to radiation from the incident, although some experts have challenged that claim.

International researchers have predicted that ultimately, around 4,000 people exposed to high levels of radiation could succumb to radiation-related cancer, while about 5,000 people exposed to lower levels of radiation may suffer the same fate. Yet the full consequences of the accident, including impacts on mental health and even subsequent generations, remain highly debated and under study.

What remains of the reactor is now inside a massive steel containment structure deployed in late 2016. Containment efforts and monitoring continue and cleanup is expected to last until at least 2065.

Long-term impacts

The impact of the disaster on the surrounding forest and wildlife also remains an area of active research. In the immediate aftermath of the accident, an area of about four square miles became known as the "Red Forest" because so many trees turned reddish-brown and died after absorbing high levels of radiation.

Today, the exclusion zone is eerily quiet, yet full of life. Though many trees have regrown, scientists have found evidence of elevated levels of cataracts and albinism, and lower rates of beneficial bacteria, among some wildlife species in the area in recent years. Yet, due to the exclusion of human activity around the shuttered power plant, the numbers of some wildlife, from lynxes to elk, have increased. In 2015, scientists estimated there were seven times more wolves in the exclusion zone than in nearby comparable reserves, thanks to humans' absence.

The Chernobyl disaster had other fallout: The economic and political toll hastened the end of the USSR and fueled a global anti-nuclear movement. The disaster has been estimated to cost some $235 billion in damages. What is now Belarus, which saw 23 percent of its territory contaminated by the accident, lost about a fifth of its agricultural land. At the height of disaster response efforts, in 1991, Belarus spent 22 percent of its total budget dealing with Chernobyl.

Today, Chernobyl beckons to tourists who are intrigued by its history and its danger. But though Chernobyl symbolizes the potential devastation of nuclear power, Russia never quite moved beyond its legacy-or its technology. As of 2019, there are still 11 operational RBMK reactors in Russia.

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Chernobyl disaster facts and information

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The accident at a nuclear power plant in Ukraine shocked the world, permanently altered a region, and leaves many questions unanswered.

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The three pillars: disarmament; nonproliferation; and peaceful uses of nuclear energy

The basic bargain at the core of the NPT is sound:

Countries with nuclear weapons will move towards disarmament;

countries without nuclear weapons will not acquire them;

and all countries can access peaceful nuclear technology.

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Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty - United States Department of State

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The three pillars: disarmament; nonproliferation; and peaceful uses of nuclear energy The basic bargain at the core of the NPT is sound: Countries with nuclear weapons will move towards disarmament; countries without nuclear weapons will not acquire them; and all countries can access peaceful nuclear technology.

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Milestones: 1961–1968 - Office of the Historian

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Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, also called Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty, agreement of July 1, 1968, signed by the United Kingdom, the United States, the Soviet Union, and 59 other states, under which the three major signatories, which possessed nuclear weapons, agreed not to assist other states in obtaining or producing them. The treaty became effective in March 1970 and was to remain so for a 25-year period. Additional countries later ratified the treaty; as of 2007 only three countries (India, Israel, and Pakistan) have refused to sign the treaty, and one country ( North Korea) has signed and then withdrawn from the treaty. The treaty was extended indefinitely and without conditions in 1995 by a consensus vote of 174 countries at the United Nations headquarters in New York City.

The Non-Proliferation Treaty is uniquely unequal, as it obliges nonnuclear states to forgo development of nuclear weapons while allowing the established nuclear states to keep theirs. Nevertheless, it has been accepted because, especially at the time of signing, most nonnuclear states had neither the capacity nor the inclination to follow the nuclear path, and they were well aware of the dangers of proliferation for their security. In addition, it was understood in 1968 that, in return for their special status, the nuclear states would help the nonnuclear states in the development of civilian nuclear power (although in the event the distinction between civilian and military nuclear technology was not so straightforward) and also that the nuclear states would make their best efforts to agree on measures of disarmament. In the 2005 Review Conference of the Parties to the Treaty on Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, this inequality was a major complaint against the established nuclear powers. The treaty continues to play an important role in sustaining the international norm against proliferation, but it has been challenged by a number of events, including (1) North Korea's withdrawal from the treaty in 2003 as it sought to acquire nuclear weapons, (2) evidence of the progress Iraq made in the 1980s on its nuclear program despite being a signatory to the treaty, and (3) allegations about uranium enrichment facilities in Iran, yet another signatory to the treaty. The credibility of the nonproliferation norm has also been undermined by the ability of India and Pakistan to become declared nuclear powers in 1998 without any serious international penalty-and indeed by India establishing its own special arrangements as part of a bilateral deal with the United States in 2008.

Lawrence D. Freedman

Learn More in these related Britannica articles:

20th-century international relations: Renewed U.S.-Soviet cooperation

-Soviet draft Non-proliferation Treaty was also adopted by the UN in June 1968. (Once again, France, China, India, Pakistan, and Israel refused to sign.) None of the arms-control instruments of the 1960s, however, put a cap on the arms race or restrained the signatories from doing anything...

20th-century international relations: Three tests

...had agreed to sign the Nuclear Non-proliferation Treaty (NPT) in 1985 as the price for receiving Soviet technical aid for its civilian nuclear program. When communism collapsed in Europe, the North Koreans also gave signs of wanting to shed their pariah status. In December 1991 they joined South Korea in...

...became a signatory to the Treaty on the Non-proliferation of Nuclear Weapons. Ukraine also launched what was billed as the world's largest demilitarization project, the goal of which was the destruction of more than 1,000,000 small arms, 3,000,000 antipersonnel mines, more than 100,000 tons of ammunition, and 1,000 shoulder-mounted surface-to-air...

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treaty on the non-proliferation of nuclear weapons

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Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons | international agreement

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Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, agreement of July 1, 1968, signed by the United Kingdom, the United States, the Soviet Union, and 59 other states, under which the three major signatories, which possessed nuclear weapons, agreed not to assist other states in obtaining or

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Nonproliferation of Nuclear Weapons (1968)

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The swift and unexpected downfall of the German Democratic Republic was triggered by the decay of the other communist regimes in eastern Europe and the Soviet Union. The liberalizing reforms of President Mikhail Gorbachev in the Soviet Union appalled the Honecker regime, which in desperation was by 1988 forbidding the circulation within East Germany of Soviet publications that it viewed as dangerously subversive. The Berlin Wall was in effect breached in the summer of 1989 when a reformist Hungarian government began allowing East Germans to escape to the West through Hungary's newly opened border with Austria. By the fall, thousands of East Germans had followed this route, while thousands of others sought asylum in the West German embassies in Prague and Warsaw, demanding that they be allowed to emigrate to West Germany. At the end of September, Genscher, still West Germany's foreign minister, arranged for their passage to West Germany, but another wave of refugees from East Germany soon took their place. Mass demonstrations in the streets of Leipzig and other East German cities defied the authorities and demanded reforms.

In an effort to halt the deterioration of its position, the SED Politburo deposed Honecker in mid-October and replaced him with another hard-line communist, Egon Krenz. Under Krenz the Politburo sought to eliminate the embarrassment occasioned by the flow of refugees to the West through Hungary, Czechoslovakia, and Poland. On the evening of November 9, Günter Schabowski, a communist functionary, mistakenly announced at a televised news conference that the government would allow East Germans unlimited passage to West Germany, effective "immediately." While the government had in fact meant to require East Germans to apply for exit visas during normal working hours, this was widely interpreted as a decision to open the Berlin Wall that evening, so crowds gathered and demanded to pass into West Berlin. Unprepared, the border guards let them go. In a night of revelry tens of thousands of East Germans poured through the crossing points in the wall and celebrated their new freedom with rejoicing West Berliners.

The opening of the Berlin Wall proved fatal for the German Democratic Republic. Ever-larger demonstrations demanded a voice in government for the people, and in mid-November Krenz was replaced by a reform-minded communist, Hans Modrow, who promised free, multiparty elections. When the balloting took place in March 1990 the SED, now renamed the Party of Democratic Socialism (PDS), suffered a crushing defeat. The eastern counterpart of Kohl's CDU, which had pledged a speedy reunification of Germany, emerged as the largest political party in East Germany's first democratically elected People's Chamber. A new East German government headed by Lothar de Maizière, a long-time member of the eastern Christian Democratic Union, and backed initially by a broad coalition, including the eastern counterparts of the Social Democrats and Free Democrats, began negotiations for a treaty of unification. A surging tide of refugees from East to West Germany that threatened to cripple East Germany added urgency to those negotiations. In July that tide was somewhat stemmed by a monetary union of the two Germanys that gave East Germans the hard currency of the Federal Republic.

The final barrier to reunification fell in July 1990 when Kohl prevailed upon Gorbachev to drop his objections to a unified Germany within the NATO alliance in return for sizable (West) German financial aid to the Soviet Union. A unification treaty was ratified by the Bundestag and the People's Chamber in September and went into effect on October 3, 1990. The German Democratic Republic joined the Federal Republic as five additional Länder, and the two parts of divided Berlin became one Land. (The five new Länder were Brandenburg, Mecklenburg-West Pomerania, Saxony, Saxony-Anhalt, and Thuringia.)

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Germany - Reunification, Berlin Wall, Cold War

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Germany - Reunification, Berlin Wall, Cold War: The swift and unexpected downfall of the German Democratic Republic was triggered by the decay of the other communist regimes in eastern Europe and the Soviet Union.

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German reunification

On 3 October, the Federal Republic of Germany celebrates German Unity Day.

For 45 years, Germany was split in two. Several generations of Germans were traumatised and still remember life as it was then: the East administered by the Soviet Union and the West by the Western Allies.

In 1945, Allied forces partitioned the defeated Third Reich into four military occupation zones. France, the United Kingdom and the United States occupied the West, which became the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) when the three zones merged on 23 May 1949; and the Soviet Union occupied the East, which became the German Democratic Republic (GDR) on 7 October 1949.

Berlin suffered the same fate. It was split in two and despite lying deep in the soviet-dominated East, West Berlin remained an enclave of the western Allies.

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The reunification of Germany on 3 October 1990 was a step forward for the country and for all of Europe. In the words of NATO's Secretary General: "Today we put nearly half a century of confrontation and frustration behind us."

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GERMAN REUNIFICATION *LIVE*  CNN,CBS 1990

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The Lincoln-Douglas Debates of 1858 - Lincoln Home National Historic Site (U.S. National Park Service)

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The Lincoln-Douglas debates were a series of formal political debates between the challenger, Abraham Lincoln, and the incumbent, Stephen A. Douglas, in a campaign for one of Illinois' two United States Senate seats. Although Lincoln lost the election, these debates launched him into national prominence which eventually led to his election as President of the United States.

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If there was ever a single-issue candidate for high office, it was Abraham Lincoln. In 1854, slavery, specifically the threatened spread of slavery into the Western territories, dominated his thoughts, and the issue set him afire. His voice took on new urgency, his message greater clarity, and he would entertain no compromise. Lincoln considered Illinois Senator Stephen A. Douglas's concept of "popular sovereignty"-allowing the territories to determine their own policy on slavery-a denial of the responsibility of the Congress to uphold the United States Constitution. Lincoln's guiding beacon was the statement in the Declaration of Independence that "all men are created equal." By upholding that principle, with all of its implications, Abraham Lincoln set the course for his own destiny and that of the United States.

Kansas/Nebraska Act

The passage of this Act in 1854 negated the Missouri Compromise of 1820 and made it possible for voters in Kansas and Nebraska to decide whether or not slavery would exist in their respective territories. Opponents of slavery were outraged. Abraham Lincoln clearly saw the threat that such legislation presented to a government founded on the ideals and principles set forth in the Declaration of Independence and the United States Constitution. In a brilliant speech at Peoria, Illinois, on October 16, 1854, he laid out his objections to the Kansas-Nebraska Act. The speech revived his political career.

Broadside Against Slavery

After the passage of the Kansas-Nebraska Act, Eli Thayer, a "Free-Stater," crusaded to bring the Kansas Territory into the Union as a state that banned slavery. Through broadsides and other means, he attempted to block the extension of slavery into the Western territories. Thayer also organized the New England Emigrant Aid Company, which brought 2,000 anti-slavery settlers to Kansas.

Lincoln and Douglas in Peoria, 1854

Sixty-one years after the event, William H. Pierce penned this brief account of the encounter between Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas. Pierce was living on a small farm about twenty miles outside Peoria in October 1854, and not wanting to miss a verbal duel between two of the state's leading politicians, he drove his wagon to town the preceding day, positioning it some fifty feet from the veranda of the courthouse where the speeches were to take place. Obviously a Lincoln man, Pierce had little complimentary to say about Douglas other than to compare the Democratic senator's voice to the roar of a lion. Lincoln, by contrast, speaking in what Pierce described as a "head tone," was both forceful and factual, making few if any gestures.
Read the transcript
President Pierce's Support for the Kansas-Nebraska Act

The Kansas-Nebraska Act raised the sectional controversy over slavery to a level that precluded reconciliation. Most controversial was the provision for a principle of government called "popular sovereignty," which provided that settlers in the new territories could decide the issue of slavery for themselves. Not only did President Franklin Pierce lend his support to the provocative measure, he also declared his support for the South. Naturally timid, and plagued by alcoholism, Pierce yielded power over his administration's policies to Secretary of War Jefferson Davis and other Southern leaders.
Read the transcript
Finding His Voice

Compelled by conscience to attack both the Kansas-Nebraska Act and its principal author and defender, Illinois Senator Stephen A. Douglas, Abraham Lincoln found his true voice. In Peoria, he spoke immediately after Douglas, who was touring Illinois to defend the Kansas-Nebraska Act. From that moment on, abolitionists, Free-Soilers, and members of the new Republican Party began to think of Lincoln as their spokesman. Drafted in 1855 to run for the U.S. Senate, Lincoln began with a majority vote in the legislature in a very complicated contest, but could not reach the necessary number of votes to secure his election.

"Can we, as a nation, continue together permanently-forever-half slave, and half free?"

Judge George Robertson, a professor of law at Transylvania College in Lexington, Kentucky, called at the office of Lincoln and Herndon during a visit to Springfield in July 1855. Lincoln was in court in Chicago at the time, so Robertson left an inscribed copy of his published speeches and writings: Scrap Book on Law and Politics. In this polite letter of appreciation, Lincoln takes issue only with Robertson's belief in the peaceful extinction of slavery. Three years later Lincoln would repeat his closing remarks to great effect in his "House Divided" speech.

Horace Greeley to Joseph Medill

As editor of the New York Tribune, Horace Greeley wielded considerable political influence. His fervent abolitionism drew him quickly into the Republican ranks. However, Eastern Republicans, such as Greeley, supported Democrat Stephen A. Douglas in the 1858 Senate campaign. In this letter to Joseph Medill, editor of the Chicago Press and Tribune, Greeley complains about the lack of enthusiasm for Douglas among Republicans in Illinois. Medill promptly forwarded Greeley's letter to Lincoln, who made this personal copy.

Lincoln and Douglas

During the 1858 campaign for a seat in the U.S. Senate from the state of Illinois, Abraham Lincoln and Stephen A. Douglas engaged in a series of debates that, in effect, changed the course of the nation's history. The main issue was slavery, and the two candidates voiced two of the major opinions of the country. At the time of the debates, Douglas was by far the better known of the two men.

This ambrotype photograph of Lincoln was made on October 1, 1858, in Pittsfield, Illinois, six days before his fifth joint debate with Douglas at Galesburg, Illinois. It is one of the earliest portraits of Lincoln that can still be located in original format. Mathew Brady took the daguerreotype of Douglas sometime between 1844 and 1860.

Douglas Sets the Places and Dates

The initial suggestion for the series of debates between Senator Stephen A. Douglas and Abraham Lincoln seems to have come from the Chicago Press and Tribune, or more specifically, the paper's chief editor, Joseph Medill. However, Lincoln was quick to pick up on the idea. The sites proposed for the debates were part of Douglas's strategy to reach swing voters, but neither candidate was interested in campaigning in areas where they could expect little support.

Lincoln Prepares for the Debates

William H. Herndon stated that his law partner created this commonplace book as a reference in preparation for his debates with Stephen A. Douglas. The clippings and notations found in the book are germane to the primary subject of the debates-slavery and popular sovereignty.

Lincoln-Douglas Debates Scrapbook, 1858

Lincoln prepared this scrapbook of newspaper clippings of his debates with Stephen A. Douglas shortly after the close of the 1858 Senate campaign. The scrapbook begins with a clipping of Lincoln's famous "House Divided" speech, which he gave at the close of the Republican state convention when he had been nominated to run for the U.S. Senate. He deliberately selected debate texts taken from politically friendly newspapers. The clippings of his own speeches were from the Republican Chicago Press & Tribune, and Douglas's from the Democratic Chicago Times. Lincoln occasionally made notes in the margins when he felt the reporting required changes or comment.

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With Malice Toward None: The Abraham Lincoln Bicentennial Exhibition The New Lincoln

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If there was ever a single-issue candidate for high office, it was Abraham Lincoln. In 1854, slavery, specifically the threatened spread of slavery into the Western territories, dominated his thoughts, and the issue set him afire. His voice took on new urgency, his message greater clarity, and he would entertain no compromise.

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First Kennedy-Nixon Debate, 26 September 1960

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CBS (Columbia Broadcasting System) motion picture of the first presidential debate between Senator John F. Kennedy and Vice President Richard M. Nixon from CBS studios, Chicago, Illinois. During the debate, Senator Kennedy states, "I don't believe in big government, but I believe in effective governmental action."

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History

View Gallery

Written By: Ben Cosgrove

America's first televised presidential debates-four TV showdowns between Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy in the fall of 1960-immediately showed how they could change the course of politics.

The details of the debates have been recounted innumerable times in the subsequent decades. The stories, meanwhile, of how Nixon showed up to the very first debate looking pale and glistening with sweat beneath the glare of the studio lights, while JFK looked (literally) tanned and rested, haven't lost any of their power simply because they're true.

The photos here back up those stories: Nixon did look like death warmed over; Kennedy did look like a movie star. And while pundits and armchair historians like to assert that Kennedy's media savvy won him the election while Nixon won the debates, no data exists anywhere that positively proves either point.

The fact is, both men were formidable candidates. Each had a strong grasp of the major issues facing the country-the Space Race with the Soviets; America's role in an increasingly complex global economy; the Civil Right Movement-and each man had very little trouble articulating his and his party's position on them. But it's remarkable now, however, to recall that Nixon was just four years older than Kennedy. By the look of the two men in these photographs by Paul Schutzer, they might as well have been from different generations.

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Kennedy-Nixon Debates, 1960: Photos From a Landmark TV Phenomenon

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History View Gallery Written By: Ben Cosgrove America's first televised presidential debates-four TV showdowns between Richard Nixon and John F. Kennedy in the fall of 1960-immediately showed how they could change the course of politics. The details of the debates have been recounted innumerable times in the subsequent decades.

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Decision to Drop the Atomic Bomb | Harry S. Truman

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Alonzo Hamby considers Harry Truman's First World War experiences and explores the dilemmas that influenced his decision to drop atom bombs on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

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President Truman and the Decision to Drop the Atomic Bomb (1945)

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For thirteen days in October 1962 the world waited-seemingly on the brink of nuclear war-and hoped for a peaceful resolution to the Cuban Missile Crisis.

In October 1962, an American U-2 spy plane secretly photographed nuclear missile sites being built by the Soviet Union on the island of Cuba. President Kennedy did not want the Soviet Union and Cuba to know that he had discovered the missiles. He met in secret with his advisors for several days to discuss the problem.

After many long and difficult meetings, Kennedy decided to place a naval blockade, or a ring of ships, around Cuba. The aim of this "quarantine," as he called it, was to prevent the Soviets from bringing in more military supplies. He demanded the removal of the missiles already there and the destruction of the sites. On October 22, President Kennedy spoke to the nation about the crisis in a televised address.

Click here to listen to the Address in the Digital Archives (JFKWHA-142-001)

No one was sure how Soviet leader Nikita Khrushchev would respond to the naval blockade and US demands. But the leaders of both superpowers recognized the devastating possibility of a nuclear war and publicly agreed to a deal in which the Soviets would dismantle the weapon sites in exchange for a pledge from the United States not to invade Cuba. In a separate deal, which remained secret for more than twenty-five years, the United States also agreed to remove its nuclear missiles from Turkey. Although the Soviets removed their missiles from Cuba, they escalated the building of their military arsenal; the missile crisis was over, the arms race was not.

Click here to listen to the Remarks in the Digital Archives (JFKWHA-143-004)

In 1963, there were signs of a lessening of tensions between the Soviet Union and the United States. In his commencement address at American University, President Kennedy urged Americans to reexamine Cold War stereotypes and myths and called for a strategy of peace that would make the world safe for diversity. Two actions also signaled a warming in relations between the superpowers: the establishment of a teletype "Hotline" between the Kremlin and the White House and the signing of the Limited Nuclear Test Ban Treaty on July 25, 1963.

In language very different from his inaugural address, President Kennedy told Americans in June 1963, "For, in the final analysis, our most basic common link is that we all inhabit this small planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children's future. And we are all mortal."
Visit our online exhibit: World on the Brink: John F. Kennedy and the Cuban Missile Crisis

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In October 1962, an American U2 spy plane secretly photographed nuclear missile sites being built by the Soviet Union on the island of Cuba. Because he did not want Cuba and the Soviet Union to know that he had discovered the missiles, Kennedy met in secret with his advisors for several days to discuss the problem.

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Fall 2002, Vol. 34, No. 3
Kennedy Library Observes Fortieth Anniversary of Missile Crisis
The week of October 7, 1962, saw bad weather in the Caribbean, preventing American U-2 surveillance planes from making more reconnaissance flights over Fidel Castro's Cuba, just ninety miles off the Florida coast.

But Sunday morning, October 14, was cloudless, and the U-2 flight got some good photos-pictures that, over the next few days, were analyzed and reanalyzed. They provided positive proof of what the United States had for months suspected: that the Soviet Union was installing medium-range nuclear weapons in Castro's Cuba, capable of striking major U.S. cities and killing tens of millions of Americans within minutes.

Faced with this dramatic documentation, President John F. Kennedy immediately decided that the missiles would have to be removed and called his most trusted advisers together to serve as an Executive Committee of the National Security Council, or ExComm. Its job was to develop possible responses to the buildup of missiles and the consequences the buildup represented.

Forty years later, what is now known as the "Cuban Missile Crisis," which lasted for several weeks, is remembered as the hottest moment in the Cold War between East and West and a defining moment in Kennedy's presidency.

U.S. forces around the world were placed on alert. Four tactical air squadrons were readied for air strikes over Cuba, with missile sites, airfields, ports, and gun emplacements as their potential targets. More than 100,000 troops were sent to Florida for a possible invasion of Cuba. The navy dispatched 180 vessels into the Caribbean for a planned amphibious exercise involving 40,000 marines. B-52s loaded with nuclear weapons were in the air at all times.

With the October 14 photographs, the United States had caught the Soviet Union building offensive nuclear missile bases in its backyard, and the two superpowers were now joined in the first direct nuclear confrontation in history.

Throughout 1962, the movement of Soviet personnel and equipment to Cuba had aroused suspicions in the American intelligence community. In response, U.S. ships and planes began photographing every Cuba-bound Soviet vessel, and U-2 spy planes began regular reconnaissance flights over the island.

The first evidence of the arrival in Cuba of surface-to-air missiles, missile-equipped torpedo boats for coastal defense, and large numbers of Soviet military personnel came in photographs taken in late August. But these pictures provided no evidence of offensive ballistic missiles. In September, Kennedy delivered two explicit warnings to Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev regarding the buildup of what were being called "defensive" Soviet arms in Cuba.

On September 13, Kennedy wrote: "If at any time the Communist build-up in Cuba were to endanger or interfere with our security in any way . . . or if Cuba should ever . . . become an offensive military base of significant capacity for the Soviet Union, then this country will do whatever must be done to protect its own security and that of its allies."

Despite Kennedy's warnings, the Soviets continued to construct the bases, and the United States continued to monitor their activities and take pictures. The October 14 photographs, however, changed the nature of the game and set in motion a series of extraordinary events.

The ExComm was to consider how to respond to the Soviet actions. Members discussed a number of possible responses: do nothing; take the issue to the United Nations and the Organization of American States; offer to remove U.S. missiles in Turkey if the Soviets removed the missiles in Cuba; send secret envoys to negotiate with Castro; blockade Cuba; strike Cuba by air; or invade Cuba.

As the ExComm discussions proceeded, the idea of a naval blockade emerged as the response of choice.

Meanwhile, Kennedy met on October 18 for several hours with Soviet Foreign Minister Andrei Gromyko, who stressed that the Soviet Union's weapons in Cuba were "by no means offensive." Kennedy read Gromyko his previous statement that warned against offensive missiles in Cuba.

Later that day, preparations for the naval blockade began, but the Joint Chiefs of Staff continued to push for an air strike and invasion. The President, wanting to appear to be conducting normal business, flew to the Midwest for campaign appearances in connection with the upcoming congressional elections. He returned Saturday, October 20, to read the draft of a speech announcing the blockade. Although the blockade, which Kennedy preferred to call a "quarantine," represented only "limited action" against Cuba and the Soviets, Kennedy felt that "limited action" was the best way to start; he could always opt for broader action, such as an invasion or air strikes, if the blockade did not work.

While the ExComm met officially as the National Security Council, Kennedy decided that in his speech, the United States should not be on the diplomatic defensive but should instead indict the Soviets for duplicity and for threatening world peace. He wanted to speak on Sunday evening but was persuaded to delay the address until Monday, so the State Department could brief leaders of allied countries and congressional leaders could be informed.

On Monday evening, October 22, Kennedy addressed the nation. He was clear and direct:

To halt this offensive buildup, a strict quarantine on all offensive military equipment under shipment to Cuba is being initiated. All ships of any kind bound for Cuba, from whatever nation or port, will, if found to contain cargoes of offensive weapons, be turned back. . . .

It shall be the policy of this nation to regard any nuclear missile launched from Cuba against any nation in the Western Hemisphere as an attack by the Soviet Union on the United States requiring a full retaliatory response upon the Soviet Union. . . .

I call upon Chairman Khrushchev to halt and eliminate this clandestine, reckless and provocative threat to world peace and to stable relations between our two nations. . . . He has an opportunity now to move the world back from the abyss of destruction. . . .

My fellow citizens: let no one doubt that this is a difficult and dangerous effort on which we have set out. No one can foresee precisely what course it will take or what costs or casualties will be incurred. Many months of sacrifice and self-discipline lie ahead-months in which both our will and our patience will be tested-months in which many threats and denunciations will keep us aware of our danger. But the greatest danger of all would be to do nothing.

Tensions mounted over the next few days as the world wondered if there could be a peaceful resolution to the crisis. Kennedy's speech drew wide support in Latin America and among U.S. allies. But the Pentagon continued plans for air strikes and a land invasion. Several Soviet vessels turned back from the quarantine line, and the United States presented in the United Nations photographic proof of the missiles during a televised confrontation with the Soviet Union. But construction of the missile launch sites in Cuba continued.

On October 26, Kennedy received a letter from Khrushchev suggesting that "if assurances were given that the President of the United States would not participate in an attack on Cuba and the blockade lifted, then the question of the removal or destruction of the missile sites in Cuba would then be an entirely different question." The same day, a Washington journalist received a clarification of Khrushchev's proposal from an important official at the Soviet embassy in Washington: The Soviets would remove the missiles under United Nations supervision and inspection, and the United States would lift the blockade and pledge not to invade Cuba.

Kennedy got another letter from Khrushchev, demanding removal of U.S. missiles in Turkey, the Soviet Union's neighbor, in exchange for removal of Soviet missiles in Cuba. The implicit message was if the United States invaded Cuba, the Soviets would invade Turkey, and the conflict could escalate. Kennedy decided to ignore this letter and respond to the first one. On Sunday, October 28, the Soviets agreed to remove the missiles from Cuba.

Negotiations for final settlement of the crisis continued for several days, but the immediate threat of nuclear war had been averted.

On November 20, Kennedy announced, "I have today been informed by Chairman Khrushchev that all of the IL-28 bombers in Cuba will be withdrawn in thirty days. . . . I have this afternoon instructed the Secretary of Defense to lift our naval quarantine." Subsequently, the United States dismantled several of its obsolete air and missile bases in Turkey.

The Cuban missile crisis was perhaps the greatest test of John F. Kennedy's presidency, and while he and Khrushchev were able to achieve a peaceful resolution, the crisis had a number of far-reaching historical consequences. Within a year, Kennedy and Khrushchev signed the Nuclear Test Ban Treaty, the first disarmament agreement of the nuclear age. Also in 1963, the first "hotline" between Washington and Moscow was installed.

This article was adapted from The Cuban Missile Crisis: President Kennedy's Address to the Nation, published by NARA in 1988 as part of its "Milestone Documents in the National Archives" series.

Articles published in Prologue do not necessarily represent the views of NARA or of any other agency of the United States Government.

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Forty Years Ago: The Cuban Missile Crisis

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Fall 2002, Vol. 34, No. 3 Kennedy Library Observes Fortieth Anniversary of Missile Crisis In a televised address on October 22, 1962, President Kennedy informed the American people of the presence of missile sites in Cuba. (NARA, John F.

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Table of Contents

What was the Cuban missile crisis?

When did the Cuban missile crisis take place?

What was the outcome of the Cuban missile crisis?

This article was most recently revised and updated by

Cuban missile crisis, (October 1962), major confrontation that brought the United States and the Soviet Union close to war over the presence of Soviet nuclear-armed missiles in Cuba.

Having promised in May 1960 to defend Cuba with Soviet arms, the Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev assumed that the United States would take no steps to prevent the installation of Soviet medium- and intermediate-range ballistic missiles in Cuba. Such missiles could hit much of the eastern United States within a few minutes if launched from Cuba. The United States learned in July 1962 that the Soviet Union had begun missile shipments to Cuba. By August 29 new military construction and the presence of Soviet technicians had been reported by U.S. U-2 spy planes flying over the island, and on October 14 the presence of a ballistic missile on a launching site was reported.

After carefully considering the alternatives of an immediate U.S. invasion of Cuba (or air strikes of the missile sites), a blockade of the island, or further diplomatic maneuvers, U.S. Pres. John F. Kennedy decided to place a naval "quarantine," or blockade, on Cuba to prevent further Soviet shipments of missiles. Kennedy announced the quarantine on October 22 and warned that U.S. forces would seize "offensive weapons and associated matériel" that Soviet vessels might attempt to deliver to Cuba. During the following days, Soviet ships bound for Cuba altered course away from the quarantined zone. As the two superpowers hovered close to the brink of nuclear war, messages were exchanged between Kennedy and Khrushchev amidst extreme tension on both sides. On October 28 Khrushchev capitulated, informing Kennedy that work on the missile sites would be halted and that the missiles already in Cuba would be returned to the Soviet Union. In return, Kennedy committed the United States to never invading Cuba. Kennedy also secretly promised to withdraw the nuclear-armed missiles that the United States had stationed in Turkey in previous years. In the following weeks both superpowers began fulfilling their promises, and the crisis was over by late November. Cuba's communist leader, Fidel Castro, was infuriated by the Soviets' retreat in the face of the U.S. ultimatum but was powerless to act.

The Cuban missile crisis marked the climax of an acutely antagonistic period in U.S.-Soviet relations. The crisis also marked the closest point that the world had ever come to global nuclear war. It is generally believed that the Soviets' humiliation in Cuba played an important part in Khrushchev's fall from power in October 1964 and in the Soviet Union's determination to achieve, at the least, a nuclear parity with the United States.

The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica Adam Augustyn.

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Cuban missile crisis | History, Facts, & Significance

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Cuban missile crisis, (October 1962), major confrontation that brought the United States and the Soviet Union close to war over the presence of Soviet nuclear-armed missiles in Cuba. Having promised in May 1960 to defend Cuba with Soviet arms, the Soviet premier Nikita Khrushchev assumed that the United States would take no steps to prevent the installation of Soviet medium- and intermediate-range ballistic missiles in Cuba.

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As early as 1836, Texans had voted for annexation by the United States, but the proposition was rejected by the Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren administrations. Great Britain favoured continued independence for Texas in order to block further westward expansion of the United States, but this attitude only helped to swing Americans toward annexation. Annexation was approved by the Texas and U.S. congresses in 1845, and the transfer of authority from the republic to the state of Texas took place in 1846. One unique feature of the annexation agreements was a provision permitting Texas to retain title to its public lands.

The U.S. annexation of Texas and a dispute over the area between the Rio Grande and the Nueces River brought about the Mexican-American War. U.S. troops invaded Mexico in February 1847, and Winfield Scott captured Mexico City on September 14, 1847. In the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, signed on February 2, 1848, Mexico gave up its claim to Texas and also ceded area now in the U.S. states of New Mexico, Utah, Nevada, Arizona, California, and western Colorado. Texas claimed most of this additional area but later relinquished it in the Compromise of 1850.

The American Civil War brought disruption to the state. Texas had seceded from the Union on January 28, 1861. Gov. Sam Houston had strongly opposed secession, and, after refusing to take the oath of allegiance to the Confederacy, he was removed from office. During the war Texans had to defend themselves from attacks by Native Americans, from Mexican encroachments, and from federal gunboats and invading soldiers. Federal forces ultimately gained control of the lower Gulf Coast but were unable to move far inland.

The modern period

During the last three decades of the 19th century, there were rapid developments in the population and economy of Texas. The state was readmitted to the Union under a new constitution in 1870. By 1875 the Comanche had been forced onto a reservation in present-day Oklahoma. With the arrival of immigrants, towns were established, farming spread throughout the central areas of the state, and the cattle industry began to thrive on the plains of West Texas. Railroad building and increased shipping fashioned new links with the rest of the world. Manufacturing, encouraged by the Civil War years, continued to grow. By 1900 the population had grown to more than three million.

The enormous oil gusher that blew in at Spindletop (Beaumont) in 1901 opened a new economic era for the state. Oil companies were formed; oilmen began to search for and find new deposits in the state; and refining and marketing activities provided new jobs and incomes for Texas. Texas suffered throughout the Great Depression of the 1930s but later benefited from the tremendous industrial expansion that took place during World War II.

Economic and population growth continued in the postwar era. Oil refining, chemicals, and petrochemicals continued to dominate, but electronics, aerospace components, and other high-technology items became increasingly important in the last quarter of the 20th century. The population of Texas increased fourfold between 1900 and 1980, when one-third of all Texans were either African American or Hispanic. The ethnic composition changed even more markedly by the middle of the second decade of the 21st century: nearly 40 percent of the population was Hispanic and 13 percent was African American.

Since the mid-20th century, Texans have played an increasingly important role in national politics. Sam Rayburn, of Bonham, served as speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives for 17 years, a tenure longer than that of any other person. Lyndon B. Johnson, who earlier had served as a Texas congressman, was majority leader of the U.S. Senate in the late 1950s, vice president of the United States from 1961 to 1963, and president from 1963 to 1969. In 1988 George H.W. Bush of Houston, who had served as vice president of the United States from 1981 to 1989, was elected president, and he served until 1993. His son George W. Bush served two terms as governor of Texas and was president of the United States from 2001 to 2009.
DeWitt C. Reddick Ralph A. Wooster Gregory Lewis McNamee

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As early as 1836, Texans had voted for annexation by the United States, but the proposition was rejected by the Andrew Jackson and Martin Van Buren administrations. Great Britain favoured continued independence for Texas in order to block further westward expansion of the United States, but this attitude only helped to swing Americans toward annexation.

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Glorious Revolution, also called Revolution of 1688 or Bloodless Revolution, in English history, the events of 1688-89 that resulted in the deposition of James II and the accession of his daughter Mary II and her husband, William III, prince of Orange and stadholder of the United Provinces of the Netherlands.

After the accession of James II in 1685, his overt Roman Catholicism alienated the majority of the population. In 1687 he issued a Declaration of Indulgence, suspending the penal laws against Nonconformists and recusants, and in April 1688 ordered that a second Declaration of Indulgence be read from every pulpit on two successive Sundays. William Sancroft, the archbishop of Canterbury, and six other bishops petitioned him against this and were prosecuted for seditious libel. Their acquittal almost coincided with the birth of a son to James's Roman Catholic queen, Mary of Modena (June). This event promised an indefinite continuance of his policy and brought discontent to a head. Seven eminent Englishmen, including one bishop and six prominent politicians of both Whig and Tory persuasions, wrote to William of Orange, inviting him to come over with an army to redress the nation's grievances.

William was both James's nephew and his son-in-law, and, until the birth of James's son, William's wife, Mary, was heir apparent. William's chief concern was to check the overgrowth of French power in Europe. Between 1679 and 1684, England's impotence and the emperor Leopold I's preoccupation with a Turkish advance to Vienna had allowed Louis XIV to seize Luxembourg, Strasbourg, Casale Monferrato, and other places vital to the defense of the Spanish Netherlands, the German Rhineland, and northern Italy. By 1688, however, a great European coalition had begun to form to call for a halt to aggressions. Its prospects depended partly upon England. Thus, having been in close touch with the leading English malcontents for more than a year, William accepted their invitation. Landing at Brixham on Tor Bay (November 5), he advanced slowly on London as support fell away from James II. James's daughter Anne and his best general, John Churchill, were among the deserters to William's camp. Thereupon, James fled to France.

William was now asked to carry on the government and summon a Parliament. When this Convention Parliament met (January 22, 1689), it agreed, after some debate, to treat James's flight as an abdication and to offer the crown, with an accompanying Declaration of Rights, to William and Mary jointly. Both gift and conditions were accepted. Thereupon, the convention turned itself into a proper Parliament and large parts of the Declaration into a Bill of Rights. This bill gave the succession to Mary's sister, Anne, in default of issue from Mary, barred Roman Catholics from the throne, abolished the crown's power to suspend laws, condemned the power of dispensing with laws "as it hath been exercised and used of late," and declared a standing army illegal in time of peace.

The settlement marked a considerable triumph for Whig views. If no Roman Catholic could be king, then no kingship could be unconditional. The adoption of the exclusionist solution lent support to John Locke's contention that government was in the nature of a social contract between the king and his people represented in Parliament. The revolution permanently established Parliament as the ruling power of England.

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Glorious Revolution | Summary, Significance, Causes, & Facts

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Glorious Revolution, events of 1688-89 that resulted in the deposition of English King James II and the accession of his daughter Mary II and her husband, William III, prince of Orange and stadholder of the Netherlands. Both Whig and Tory politicians invited William to bring an army to England to redress the nation's grievances.

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Fear of Catholic tyranny

The Glorious Revolution of 1688-1689 replaced the reigning king, James II, with the joint monarchy of his protestant daughter Mary and her Dutch husband, William of Orange. It was the keystone of the Whig (those opposed to a Catholic succession) history of Britain.

According to the Whig account, the events of the revolution were bloodless and the revolution settlement established the supremacy of parliament over the crown, setting Britain on the path towards constitutional monarchy and parliamentary democracy.

But it ignores the extent to which the events of 1688 constituted a foreign invasion of England by another European power, the Dutch Republic.

Although bloodshed in England was limited, the revolution was only secured in Ireland and Scotland by force and with much loss of life.

Moreover, the British causes of the revolution were as much religious as political. Indeed, the immediate constitutional impact of the revolution settlement was minimal. Nonetheless, over the course of the reign of William III (1689-1702) society underwent significant and long-lasting changes.

To understand why James II's most powerful subjects eventually rose up in revolt against him we need to understand the deep-seated fear of 'popery' in Stuart England.

'Popery' meant more than just a fear or hatred of Catholics and the Catholic church. It reflected a widely-held belief in an elaborate conspiracy theory, that Catholics were actively plotting the overthrow of church and state.

In their place would be established a Catholic tyranny, with England becoming merely a satellite state, under the control of an all-powerful Catholic monarch, (in the era of the Glorious Revolution, identified with Louis XIV of France). This conspiracy theory was given credibility by the existence of some genuine catholic subterfuge, most notably the Gunpowder Plot of 1605.

A new crisis of 'popery and arbitrary government' erupted in the late 1670s.

Public anxieties were raised by the issue of the royal succession. Charles II fathered no legitimate offspring. This meant that the crown would pass to his brother, James, Duke of York, whose conversion to Catholicism had become public knowledge in 1673.

Public concern about the succession reached fever pitch in the years 1678-1681. The so-called 'exclusion crisis' was provoked by allegations made by Titus Oates, a former Jesuit novice, of a popish plot to assassinate Charles II and place his brother on the throne. The fantastical plot was given credibility by the mysterious death of Sir Edmund Bury Godfrey, the magistrate who first investigated Oates' claims.

Whig politicians within parliament, led by the earl of Shaftesbury, promoted exclusion bills which would have prevented James from succeeding to the throne.

But the radical tactics deployed by the king's opponents, including mass petitions and demonstrations, gradually alienated some initial supporters of exclusion.

Charles's hand was strengthened further by an agreement with France reached in March 1681, by which the king received £385,000 over three years.

With this financial support, and with public opinion turning against his critics, Charles was able to dissolve parliament on 28 March 1681.

Rebellion and revolt

James II's authority appeared to be secure when he succeeded to the throne in February 1685.

The king's initial promises to defend the existing government in church and state reassured many of those worried by his personal faith.

James was well-off financially, with a tax revenue over £1,200,000. The manipulation of borough charters in the last years of Charles II's reign ensured that James' first parliament was dominated by loyal Tories.

Parliament also voted James considerable emergency sums to suppress the rebellion raised by Charles II's eldest illegitimate son, the duke of Monmouth in June 1685. James' army of professional soldiers easily crushed the 3,000 to 4,000 rebels who joined Monmouth's cause.

Initial support for the king ebbed away as it became clear that he wished to secure not only freedom of worship for Catholics, but also the removal of the Test and Corporation Acts so that they could occupy public office.

Unease at the king's appointment of Catholic officers to the army forced him to prorogue parliament on 20 November 1685.

James then attempted to secure his religious objectives through the use of his prerogative powers. The test case of Godden vs Hales (1686) established James' right to suspend the provisions of the Test Acts, thereby allowing the king to appoint a number of Catholic peers to his Privy Council.

In April 1687, James issued a declaration of indulgence, suspending penal laws against Catholics and granting toleration to some Protestant dissenters.

In the summer of 1687, James formally dissolved his parliament and began canvassing officials across the country regarding their support for the formal repeal of the Test Acts. The information was used to begin a purge of corporations, aimed at producing a pliable parliament which would agree to the king's wishes.

These measures met with increasing opposition from the Anglican-Tory establishment.

In July, members of Magdalen College, Oxford were stripped of their fellowships for refusing to appoint the king's choice, Samuel Parker, a bishop who supported the repeal of the Test Acts, as their college president.

In May of 1688, seven leading bishops, including William Sancroft, Archbishop of Canterbury, refused to follow the order to read the king's second declaration of indulgence from their pulpits. James responded by having them arrested for seditious libel and taken to the Tower of London. Their acquittal at trial was met with widespread public rejoicing.

Dutch invasion

The Anglican campaign against James II's religious policies went no further than passive resistance. But a number of English peers including the earls of Danby and Halifax, and Henry Compton, Bishop of London, went further, making contact with the Dutch leader, William of Orange.

Two factors moved James II's opponents to urge William to intervene militarily. Firstly, after years of trying, James' Catholic second wife finally fell pregnant. The birth of a healthy male heir, James Edward Stuart, on 10 June 1688, dashed hopes that the crown would soon pass to James's protestant daughter Mary.

Secondly, William's co-conspirators believed that the parliament James planned to summon in the autumn would repeal the Test Acts.

The grave danger posed to the Protestant succession and the Anglican establishment led seven peers to write to William on 30 June 1688, pledging their support to the prince if he brought a force into England against James.

William had already begun making military preparations for an invasion of England before this letter was sent. Indeed, the letter itself mainly served a propaganda purpose, to allow the prince of Orange to present his intervention as a mercy mission.

In fact, William's main reason for interfering in English affairs was essentially pragmatic - he wished to bring England into his war against Louis XIV's France and a free parliament was seen as more likely to support this.

The forces that the prince of Orange amassed for his invasion were vast, the flotilla consisting of 43 men-of-war, four light frigates and 10 fireships protecting over 400 flyboats capable of carrying 21,000 soldiers. All in all, it was an armada four times the size of that launched by the Spanish in 1588.

Revolution

Aided by the so-called 'Protestant wind' which prevented James' navy from intercepting the Dutch fleet, William landed at Torbay, Devon, on 5 November 1688, the exact timing of his landfall neatly fitting with the anniversary of another celebrated moment when the nation was delivered from popery.

James had made military preparations for the defence of England over the summer and autumn of 1688 and his army encamped on Hounslow Heath was, at about 25,000 men, numerically larger than the force brought over by William. For the first time since the 1640s, England was faced with the prospect of civil war.

News of the prince's arrival had sparked off waves of anti-Catholic rioting in towns and cities across England. The civil unrest convinced James to leave London and bring out his forces to meet the invading army in a pitched battle.

But the Orangist conspiracy against James had been maturing for years and had infiltrated James' own army, with the king's nephew, Lord Cornbury, one of the first to defect to William. At this point, James' health also deserted him. He was frequently debilitated by heavy nosebleeds.

Having reached Salisbury on 19 November with the intention of resisting William's advance, James had by the 23 November resolved to retreat back to London.

The desertions continued, with the defection of John Churchill, later Duke of Marlborough, and James' son-in-law, the Prince of Denmark on 24 November.

The final betrayal came on the king's return to his capital on the 26 November when he discovered that his daughter, Princess Anne had also absconded to join the Orangist side.

James now announced that he was willing to agree to William's main demand - to call a 'free' parliament. However, the king was now convinced that his own life was in danger and was making preparations to flee the country.

Meanwhile, William's advance upon the capital had met with some resistance - a bloody skirmish at Reading on 7 December with over 50 killed.

On 11 December, in the wake of renewed anti-Catholic rioting in London, James made his first attempt to escape, but was captured by Kent fishermen near Sheerness.

The king's capture was an inconvenience for William, who was now looked upon as the only individual capable of restoring order to the country, and on 23 December, with the prince's connivance, James successfully fled the country.

The 'convention parliament', made up of members from Charles II's last parliament, convened on 22 January 1689.

After considerable pressure from William himself, parliament agreed that he would rule as joint monarch with Mary, rather than act merely as her consort, and on 13 February William and Mary formally accepted the throne.

Before they were offered the crown, William and Mary were presented with a document called the Declaration of Rights, later enshrined in law as the Bill of Rights, which affirmed a number of constitutional principles, such as the illegality of prerogative suspending and dispensing powers, the prohibition of taxation without parliamentary consent and the need for regular parliaments.

In reality, the Bill of Rights placed few real restrictions on the crown. It was not until 1694 that the call for regular parliaments was backed up by the Triennial Act.

Pressure from William also ensured the passage in May 1689 of the Toleration Act, granting many Protestant groups, but not Catholics, freedom of worship. This toleration was, however, considerably more limited than that envisaged by James II.

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The Glorious Revolution of 1688-1689 replaced the reigning king, James II, with the joint monarchy of his protestant daughter Mary and her Dutch husband, William of Orange. It was the keystone of the Whig (those opposed to a Catholic succession) history of Britain.

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What was the French Revolution?

Why did the French Revolution happen?

Why did the French Revolution lead to war with other nations?

How did the French Revolution succeed?

French Revolution, revolutionary movement that shook France between 1787 and 1799 and reached its first climax there in 1789-hence the conventional term "Revolution of 1789," denoting the end of the ancien régime in France and serving also to distinguish that event from the later French revolutions of 1830 and 1848.

Origins of the Revolution

The French Revolution had general causes common to all the revolutions of the West at the end of the 18th century and particular causes that explain why it was by far the most violent and the most universally significant of these revolutions. The first of the general causes was the social structure of the West. The feudal regime had been weakened step-by-step and had already disappeared in parts of Europe. The increasingly numerous and prosperous elite of wealthy commoners-merchants, manufacturers, and professionals, often called the bourgeoisie-aspired to political power in those countries where it did not already possess it. The peasants, many of whom owned land, had attained an improved standard of living and education and wanted to get rid of the last vestiges of feudalism so as to acquire the full rights of landowners and to be free to increase their holdings. Furthermore, from about 1730, higher standards of living had reduced the mortality rate among adults considerably. This, together with other factors, had led to an increase in the population of Europe unprecedented for several centuries: it doubled between 1715 and 1800. For France, which with 26 million inhabitants in 1789 was the most populated country of Europe, the problem was most acute.

A larger population created a greater demand for food and consumer goods. The discovery of new gold mines in Brazil had led to a general rise in prices throughout the West from about 1730, indicating a prosperous economic situation. From about 1770, this trend slackened, and economic crises, provoking alarm and even revolt, became frequent. Arguments for social reform began to be advanced. The philosophes-intellectuals whose writings inspired these arguments-were certainly influenced by 17th-century theorists such as René Descartes, Benedict de Spinoza and John Locke, but they came to very different conclusions about political, social, and economic matters. A revolution seemed necessary to apply the ideas of Montesquieu, Voltaire, or Jean-Jacques Rousseau. This Enlightenment was spread among the educated classes by the many "societies of thought" that were founded at that time: masonic lodges, agricultural societies, and reading rooms.

It is uncertain, however, whether revolution would have come without the added presence of a political crisis. Faced with the heavy expenditure that the wars of the 18th century entailed, the rulers of Europe sought to raise money by taxing the nobles and clergy, who in most countries had hitherto been exempt, To justify this, the rulers likewise invoked the arguments of advanced thinkers by adopting the role of " enlightened despots." This provoked reaction throughout Europe from the privileged bodies, diets. and estates. In North America this backlash caused the American Revolution, which began with the refusal to pay a tax imposed by the king of Great Britain. Monarchs tried to stop this reaction of the aristocracy, and both rulers and the privileged classes sought allies among the nonprivileged bourgeois and the peasants.

Plots and Revolutions Quiz

Although scholarly debate continues about the exact causes of the Revolution, the following reasons are commonly adduced: (1) the bourgeoisie resented its exclusion from political power and positions of honour; (2) the peasants were acutely aware of their situation and were less and less willing to support the anachronistic and burdensome feudal system; (3) the philosophes had been read more widely in France than anywhere else; (4) French participation in the American Revolution had driven the government to the brink of bankruptcy; (5) France was the most populous country in Europe, and crop failures in much of the country in 1788, coming on top of a long period of economic difficulties, compounded existing restlessness; and (6) the French monarchy, no longer seen as divinely ordained, was unable to adapt to the political and societal pressures that were being exerted on it.

Aristocratic revolt, 1787-89

The Revolution took shape in France when the controller general of finances, Charles-Alexandre de Calonne, arranged the summoning of an assembly of "notables" (prelates, great noblemen, and a few representatives of the bourgeoisie) in February 1787 to propose reforms designed to eliminate the budget deficit by increasing the taxation of the privileged classes. The assembly refused to take responsibility for the reforms and suggested the calling of the Estates-General, which represented the clergy, the aristocracy, and the Third Estate (the commoners) and which had not met since 1614. The efforts made by Calonne's successors to enforce fiscal reforms in spite of resistance by the privileged classes led to the so-called revolt of the "aristocratic bodies," notably that of the parlements (the most important courts of justice), whose powers were curtailed by the edict of May 1788.

During the spring and summer of 1788, there was unrest among the populace in Paris, Grenoble, Dijon, Toulouse, Pau, and Rennes. The king, Louis XVI, had to yield. He reappointed reform-minded Jacques Necker as the finance minister and promised to convene the Estates-General on May 5, 1789. He also, in practice, granted freedom of the press, and France was flooded with pamphlets addressing the reconstruction of the state. The elections to the Estates-General, held between January and April 1789, coincided with further disturbances, as the harvest of 1788 had been a bad one. There were practically no exclusions from the voting; and the electors drew up cahiers de doléances, which listed their grievances and hopes. They elected 600 deputies for the Third Estate, 300 for the nobility, and 300 for the clergy.

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French Revolution | History, Summary, Timeline, Causes, & Facts

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French Revolution, revolutionary movement that shook France between 1787 and 1799 and reached its first climax there in 1789-hence the conventional term 'Revolution of 1789,' denoting the end of the ancien regime in France and serving also to distinguish that event from the later French revolutions of 1830 and 1848.

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Causes of the French Revolution

As the 18th century drew to a close, France's costly involvement in the American Revolution, combined with extravagant spending by King Louis XVI, had left France on the brink of bankruptcy.

Not only were the royal coffers depleted, but several years of poor harvests, drought, cattle disease and skyrocketing bread prices had kindled unrest among peasants and the urban poor. Many expressed their desperation and resentment toward a regime that imposed heavy taxes-yet failed to provide any relief-by rioting, looting and striking.

In the fall of 1786, Louis XVI's controller general, Charles Alexandre de Calonne, proposed a financial reform package that included a universal land tax from which the aristocratic classes would no longer be exempt.

Estates General

To garner support for these measures and forestall a growing aristocratic revolt, the king summoned the Estates General ( les états généraux) - an assembly representing France's clergy, nobility and middle class - for the first time since 1614.

The meeting was scheduled for May 5, 1789; in the meantime, delegates of the three estates from each locality would compile lists of grievances ( cahiers de doléances) to present to the king.

Rise of the Third Estate

France's population, of course, had changed considerably since 1614. The non-aristocratic, middle-class members of the Third Estate now represented 98 percent of the people but could still be outvoted by the other two bodies.

In the lead-up to the May 5 meeting, the Third Estate began to mobilize support for equal representation and the abolishment of the noble veto-in other words, they wanted voting by head and not by status.

While all of the orders shared a common desire for fiscal and judicial reform as well as a more representative form of government, the nobles in particular were loath to give up the privileges they had long enjoyed under the traditional system.

Tennis Court Oath

By the time the Estates General convened at Versailles, the highly public debate over its voting process had erupted into open hostility between the three orders, eclipsing the original purpose of the meeting and the authority of the man who had convened it - the king himself.

On June 17, with talks over procedure stalled, the Third Estate met alone and formally adopted the title of National Assembly; three days later, they met in a nearby indoor tennis court and took the so-called Tennis Court Oath (serment du jeu de paume), vowing not to disperse until constitutional reform had been achieved.

Within a week, most of the clerical deputies and 47 liberal nobles had joined them, and on June 27 Louis XVI grudgingly absorbed all three orders into the new National Assembly.

The Bastille

On June 12, as the National Assembly (known as the National Constituent Assembly during its work on a constitution) continued to meet at Versailles, fear and violence consumed the capital.

Though enthusiastic about the recent breakdown of royal power, Parisians grew panicked as rumors of an impending military coup began to circulate. A popular insurgency culminated on July 14 when rioters stormed the Bastille fortress in an attempt to secure gunpowder and weapons; many consider this event, now commemorated in France as a national holiday, as the start of the French Revolution.

The wave of revolutionary fervor and widespread hysteria quickly swept the entire country. Revolting against years of exploitation, peasants looted and burned the homes of tax collectors, landlords and the aristocratic elite.

Known as the Great Fear ( la Grande peur), the agrarian insurrection hastened the growing exodus of nobles from France and inspired the National Constituent Assembly to abolish feudalism on August 4, 1789, signing what historian Georges Lefebvre later called the "death certificate of the old order."

Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen

IIn late August, the Assembly adopted the Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen ( Déclaration des droits de l'homme et du citoyen), a statement of democratic principles grounded in the philosophical and political ideas of Enlightenment thinkers like Jean-Jacques Rousseau.

The document proclaimed the Assembly's commitment to replace the ancien régime with a system based on equal opportunity, freedom of speech, popular sovereignty and representative government.

Drafting a formal constitution proved much more of a challenge for the National Constituent Assembly, which had the added burden of functioning as a legislature during harsh economic times.

For months, its members wrestled with fundamental questions about the shape and expanse of France's new political landscape. For instance, who would be responsible for electing delegates? Would the clergy owe allegiance to the Roman Catholic Church or the French government? Perhaps most importantly, how much authority would the king, his public image further weakened after a failed attempt to flee the country in June 1791, retain?

Adopted on September 3, 1791, France's first written constitution echoed the more moderate voices in the Assembly, establishing a constitutional monarchy in which the king enjoyed royal veto power and the ability to appoint ministers. This compromise did not sit well with influential radicals like Maximilien de Robespierre, Camille Desmoulins and Georges Danton, who began drumming up popular support for a more republican form of government and for the trial of Louis XVI.

French Revolution Turns Radical

In April 1792, the newly elected Legislative Assembly declared war on Austria and Prussia, where it believed that French émigrés were building counterrevolutionary alliances; it also hoped to spread its revolutionary ideals across Europe through warfare.

On the domestic front, meanwhile, the political crisis took a radical turn when a group of insurgents led by the extremist Jacobins attacked the royal residence in Paris and arrested the king on August 10, 1792.

The following month, amid a wave of violence in which Parisian insurrectionists massacred hundreds of accused counterrevolutionaries, the Legislative Assembly was replaced by the National Convention, which proclaimed the abolition of the monarchy and the establishment of the French republic.

On January 21, 1793, it sent King Louis XVI, condemned to death for high treason and crimes against the state, to the guillotine; his wife Marie-Antoinette suffered the same fate nine months later.

Reign of Terror

Following the king's execution, war with various European powers and intense divisions within the National Convention brought the French Revolution to its most violent and turbulent phase.

In June 1793, the Jacobins seized control of the National Convention from the more moderate Girondins and instituted a series of radical measures, including the establishment of a new calendar and the eradication of Christianity.

They also unleashed the bloody Reign of Terror (la Terreur), a 10-month period in which suspected enemies of the revolution were guillotined by the thousands. Many of the killings were carried out under orders from Robespierre, who dominated the draconian Committee of Public Safety until his own execution on July 28, 1794.

Did you know? Over 17,000 people were officially tried and executed during the Reign of Terror, and an unknown number of others died in prison or without trial.

Thermidorian Reaction

The death of Robespierre marked the beginning of the Thermidorian Reaction, a moderate phase in which the French people revolted against the Reign of Terror's excesses.

On August 22, 1795, the National Convention, composed largely of Girondins who had survived the Reign of Terror, approved a new constitution that created France's first bicameral legislature.

Executive power would lie in the hands of a five-member Directory ( Directoire) appointed by parliament. Royalists and Jacobins protested the new regime but were swiftly silenced by the army, now led by a young and successful general named Napoleon Bonaparte.

French Revolution Ends: Napoleon's Rise

The Directory's four years in power were riddled with financial crises, popular discontent, inefficiency and, above all, political corruption. By the late 1790s, the directors relied almost entirely on the military to maintain their authority and had ceded much of their power to the generals in the field.

On November 9, 1799, as frustration with their leadership reached a fever pitch, Napoleon Bonaparte staged a coup d'état, abolishing the Directory and appointing himself France's " first consul." The event marked the end of the French Revolution and the beginning of the Napoleonic era, during which France would come to dominate much of continental Europe.

Photo Gallery

Sources

French Revolution. The National Archives (U.K.)
The United States and the French Revolution, 1789-1799. Office of the Historian. U.S. Department of State.
Versailles, from the French Revolution to the Interwar Period. Chateau de Versailles.
French Revolution. Monticello.org.
Individuals, institutions, and innovation in the debates of the French Revolution. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

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French Revolution: Timeline, Causes & Dates | HISTORY

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The French Revolution began in 1789. Soon, the Bastille was stormed and the monarchy eliminated. After the Reign of Terror, France established a new government.

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The 'long 19th century' was a period of relative peace that began arguably with the Congress of Vienna in September 1814 and lasted until the outbreak of the First World War in July 1914.

Emperor Napoleon was defeated in May 1814 and Cossacks marched along the Champs-Elysées into Paris. The victorious Great Powers (Russia, Great Britain, Austria and Prussia) invited the other states of Europe to send plenipotentiaries to Vienna for a peace conference. At the end of the summer, emperors, kings, princes, ministers and representatives converged on the Austrian capital, crowding the walled city. The first priority of the Congress of Vienna was to deal with territorial issues: a new configuration of German states, the reorganisation of central Europe, the borders of central Italy and territorial transfers in Scandinavia. Though the allies came close to blows over the partition of Poland, by February 1815 they had averted a new war thanks to a series of adroit compromises. There had been other pressing matters to settle: the rights of German Jews, the abolition of the slave trade and navigation on European rivers, not to mention the restoration of the Bourbon royal family in France, Spain and Naples, the constitution of Switzerland, issues of diplomatic precedence and, last but not least, the foundation of a new German confederation to replace the defunct Holy Roman Empire.

In March 1815, in the midst of all these feverish negotiations, the unthinkable happened: Napoleon escaped from his place of exile on Elba and re-occupied the throne of France, starting the adventure known as the Hundred Days. The allies banded together once again and defeated him decisively at Waterloo on June 18th, 1815, nine days after having signed the Final Act of the Congress of Vienna. To prevent France from ever again becoming a threat to Europe, they briefly entertained the idea of dismembering it, just as they had Poland a few decades earlier. In the end, however, the French got away with a foreign military occupation and heavy war reparations. Napoleon was shipped to St Helena, a forlorn British possession in the South Atlantic, where he stayed out of mischief until his death.

Settling the consequences of the war was difficult enough, but the Great Powers had a broader agenda: creating a new political system in Europe. The previous one had been established a century earlier, in 1713, at the Peace of Utrecht. Based on the principle of the balance of power, it required two opposing military alliances (initially led respectively by France and Austria). By contrast, the victors over Napoleon aimed for a 'System of Peace': there was to be only one political bloc of powers in Europe. This led to the creation of a cycle of regular multilateral conferences in various European cities, the so-called Congress System, which functioned at least from 1815 to 1822. It was the first attempt in history to build a peaceful Continental order based on the active co-operation of major states.

From Utrecht to Vienna

Why did the participants at Vienna want to reform the Utrecht system? Why had active cooperation become so necessary in 1814 and not before? The explanation is rather obvious: the previous equilibrium was broken. During the 18th century the military strengths had been evenly divided between the two major alliances, but Napoleon had tipped the scales. With a powerful army, he had managed to crush all his opponents except Britain and Russia, creating a continental empire. Defeating him had required a massive joint effort from the other powers. The turning point was the battle of Leipzig in October 1813, in which more than half a million soldiers took part.

Worse still, the Napoleonic wars had shattered borders and broken political institutions in several parts of the Continent, especially in Germany. In order to heal its wounds, Europe needed peace. Hence the first priority was to preserve it from two of its chronic problems: hegemonic adventures (so there would never again be a Napoleonic empire) and internecine wars (so there would be no reasons to fight each other).

Interestingly, the Congress System was the combination of distinct antidotes proposed by the Great Powers. The British Cabinet and its diplomats, led by Viscount Castlereagh, still believed in its earlier formula, 'the balance of power'. Traditionally, British strategy had been anti-hegemonic and forward-looking. At Vienna, just as at Utrecht a century before, Britain considered it essential to contain France against a possible military resurgence. Indeed, in 1815, Britain supported a similar scenario of buffer states around France as it had done in 1713, comprised, north to south, of the Dutch kingdom, Switzerland and Savoy. The British went a little further this time: they wanted a new European order that was sympathetic to their own interests, which were mostly about sea trade. If that could be obtained by parley, rather than by military competition, so much the better - and within those limits, Britain would be willing to maintain frequent diplomatic relations with the other European powers. Indeed, its envoys actively participated in the Congress System in the years to follow.

As for Austria, Prince Klemens von Metternich also relied on a form of 'balance of power', though his application was more down-to-earth. In 1813, when the victorious Russian army marched into Germany and liberated Berlin, joining a coalition against France had become a life or death proposition for Austria. It thus joined in the battle of Leipzig and the following campaigns. After Napoleon was defeated Austria had a further thorny issue to solve: how to manage its powerful and burdensome Russian ally? It had no option other than to go along with Russia and to enter into a 'balance of negotiation', playing off the allies of the same bloc against each other.

Surprisingly, the Russian view on peace in Europe proved by far the most elaborate. Three months after the final act of the Congress, Tsar Alexander proposed a treaty to his partners, the Holy Alliance. This short and unusual document, with Christian overtones, was signed in Paris on September 1815 by the monarchs of Austria, Prussia and Russia. There is a polarised interpretation, especially in France, that the 'Holy Alliance' (in a broad sense) had only been a regression, both social and political. Castlereagh joked that it was a 'piece of sublime mysticism and nonsense', even though he recommended Britain to undersign it. Correctly interpreting this document is key to understanding the European order after 1815.

While there was undoubtedly a mystical air to the zeitgeist, we should not stop at the religious resonances of the treaty of the Holy Alliance, because it also contained some realpolitik. The three signatory monarchs (the tsar of Russia, the emperor of Austria and the king of Prussia) were putting their respective Orthodox, Catholic and Protestant faiths on an equal footing. This was nothing short of a backstage revolution, since they relieved de facto the pope from his political role of arbiter of the Continent, which he had held since the Middle Ages. It is thus ironic that the 'religious' treaty of the Holy Alliance liberated European politics from ecclesiastical influence, making it a founding act of the secular era of 'international relations'.

There was, furthermore, a second twist to the idea of 'Christian' Europe. Since the sultan of the Ottoman Empire was a Muslim, the tsar could conveniently have it both ways: either he could consider the sultan as a legitimate monarch and be his friend; or else think of him as a non-Christian and become his enemy. As a matter of course, Russia still had territorial ambitions south, in the direction of Constantinople. In this ambiguity lies the prelude to the Eastern Question, the struggle between the Great Powers over the fate of the Ottoman Empire (the 'sick man of Europe'), as well as the control of the straits connecting the Black Sea to the Mediterranean. Much to his credit, Tsar Alexander did not profit from that ambiguity, but his brother and successor Nicholas soon started a new Russo-Turkish war (1828-29).

Astonishingly, the Holy Alliance was also imbued with an idea inspired by the Enlightenment: that of perpetual peace. A French abbot, Saint-Pierre, had published a book in 1713 (the same year as the Peace of Utrecht), where he criticised the balance of power as being merely an armed truce. By contrast, he proposed that European states should co-exist, while retaining their freedom, within a federation, complete with a court and a common army. The Holy Alliance certainly came short of that purpose, since it was merely a declaration of intentions. It was nevertheless a multilateral compact, not for making peace in Europe, but for maintaining peace among sovereign European states. Eventually, most of them, with the exception of Britain and the Holy See, signed the Holy Alliance.

Appointed by Providence

Alexander had been a man of fairly liberal disposition, as far as Russia was concerned. He had appointed a Polish patriot, Adam Czartoryski, as his chef de cabinet from 1804 to 1806, had upheld the parliamentary system of Finland, granted a constitution to Poland in 1815 and later supported a constitutional monarchy in France. However, the Holy Alliance and the Congress System that followed degenerated into what is termed the 'Reaction', as the formerly threatened European aristocracies concentrated power and wealth back into their own hands.

The cause can again be found in the Holy Alliance, since it stated that the three contracting monarchs were appointed by Providence; in other words, that they had divine legitimacy. It thus reaffirmed the traditional top-down view of society, where power stemmed from God to the people and not from the people to their sovereign. In practice, the monarchs refused to answer the increasing demands for political representation by the cultured elites. This proved ill advised, since the latter started voicing critical opinions in the press and parliaments. Failing to be heard, protesters took to the streets, as in student riots in Germany in 1817. The first 'reaction' on the part of the Great Powers was to silence parliaments and censor the press. Italy also ignited with popular uprisings and further troubles in Spain spilled over to Mexico and South America.

To make things worse, the monarchs soon started borrowing each other's armies to put down rebellions. Since the term 'peace' had also, at the time, a connotation of 'law and order', it was justifiable under the Holy Alliance. 'Peace' became synonymous with repression of popular discontent. In 1830 Czartoryski, who found himself on the wrong side of a Polish rebellion against Russia, lamented that even though perpetual peace had become the conception of the most powerful monarchs of the Continent (he referred in particular to Tsar Alexander), diplomacy had corrupted it and turned it into venom. The Congress System rapidly became a directorial system: a syndicate of monarchs who supported each other against internal political competitors, especially their parliaments.

Outward success, internal failure

How effective was this 'system of peace'? This is part of the age-old debate between 'pacifists' and 'securitarians', the former believing that peace leads to security, the latter considering that security should be the sine qua non for peace ('if you want peace, prepare for war').

The political doctrine applied by Tsar Alexander in the post-Napoleonic era was definitely pacifist. In that case, however, pacifism was not meekness. In 1815 the tsar had not only won the Great Patriotic War against Napoleon in Russia. His army, by far the most powerful in Europe, had marched into the heart of Europe to liberate both Prussia and Austria. Having little left to prove, he could afford to champion peace, including being seen to do so in the eyes of his own subjects. In this respect, he rather applied the principle that 'peace is for the strong and war is for the weak'. In terms of international relations, the doctrine of the Great Powers was a resounding success, but in terms of internal policy, it was an unmitigated failure.

The Congress System formally ended in 1823, when the Great Powers stopped meeting regularly. Yet the one-bloc system went on for three decades. It survived the wave of European-wide revolutions of 1848, when the monarchs of Austria, Prussia and Russia duly assisted each other to crush the insurgents. The entente between the great powers finally broke down only five years later. In 1853 Russia decided to go for the jugular of the Ottoman Empire and threatened Constantinople. Britain and France countered by sending an expeditionary force, starting the Crimean War. The root of the crisis could, again, be found in a flaw of the Congress System (and again in the Holy Alliance): the omission of the Ottoman Empire from the European peace. The Concert of Europe endured until 1914, but the dream of perpetual peace in Europe died at the siege of Sevastopol (1854-55), during the Crimean War.

Stella Ghervas is a visiting scholar at Harvard University's Center for European Studies. She is currently completing a book entitled Conquering Peace: From the Enlightenment to the European Union for Harvard University Press.

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The 'long 19th century' was a period of relative peace that began arguably with the Congress of Vienna in September 1814 and lasted until the outbreak of the First World War in July 1914. Emperor Napoleon was defeated in May 1814 and Cossacks marched along the Champs-Elysées into Paris.

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Congress of Vienna | Goals, Significance, Definition, & Map

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Congress of Vienna: Congress of Vienna, assembly in 1814-15 that reorganized Europe after the Napoleonic Wars.

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Franco-German War, (July 19, 1870-May 10, 1871), war in which a coalition of German states led by Prussia defeated France. The war marked the end of French hegemony in continental Europe and resulted in the creation of a unified Germany.

Origins of the war

Prussia's defeat of Austria in the Seven Weeks' War in 1866 had confirmed Prussian leadership of the German states and threatened France's position as the dominant power in Europe. The immediate cause of the Franco-German War, however, was the candidacy of Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen (who was related to the Prussian royal house) for the Spanish throne, which had been left vacant when Queen Isabella II had been deposed in 1868. The Prussian chancellor, Otto von Bismarck, and Spain's de facto leader, Juan Prim, persuaded the reluctant Leopold to accept the Spanish throne in June 1870. This move greatly alarmed France, who felt threatened by a possible combination of Prussia and Spain directed against it. Leopold's candidacy was withdrawn under French diplomatic pressure, but Prussian King William I was unwilling to bow to the French ambassador's demands that he promise to never again allow Leopold to be a candidate for the Spanish throne. Bismarck edited William's telegraphed description of this interview, and on July 14 he published this provocative message (the Ems telegram), which accomplished his purposes of infuriating the French government and provoking it into a declaration of war.

The French emperor, Napoleon III, declared war on Prussia on July 19, 1870, because his military advisers told him that the French army could defeat Prussia and that such a victory would restore his declining popularity in France. The French were convinced that the reorganization of their army in 1866 had made it superior to the German armies. They also had great faith in two recently introduced technical innovations: the breech-loading chassepot rifle, with which the entire army was now equipped; and the newly invented mitrailleuse, an early machine gun. The French generals, blinded by national pride, were confident of victory.

Bismarck, for his part, saw war with France as an opportunity to bring the South German states into unity with the Prussian-led North German Confederation and build a strong German Empire. The Germans had superiority of numbers, since, true to Bismarck's hopes, the South German states ( Bavaria, Württemberg, and Baden) regarded France as the aggressor in the conflict and had thus sided with Prussia. An equally important asset was the Prussian army's general staff, which planned the rapid, orderly movement of large numbers of troops to the battle zones. This superior organization and mobility enabled the chief of the general staff, Gen. Helmuth von Moltke, to exploit German superiority in numbers in most of the war's battles.

The French collapse and the siege of Paris

The efficient German mobilization contrasted with confusion and delay on the French side. Germany was able to deliver 380,000 troops to the forward zone within 18 days of the start (July 14) of mobilization, while many French units reached the front either late or with inadequate supplies. The vast German and French armies that then confronted each other were each grouped into right and left wings. After suffering a check at the Battle of Wörth on August 6, 1870, the commander of the French right (south) wing, Marshal Patrice Mac-Mahon, retreated westward. That same day, about 40 miles (65 km) to the northeast, the commander of the French left wing, Marshal Achille Bazaine, was dislodged from near Saarbrücken and fell back westward to the fortress of Metz. His further retreat was checked by the German right wing in the blundering Battles of Mars-la-Tour and Gravelotte on August 16 and 18, respectively, and he then took refuge behind the defenses of Metz indefinitely.

The French right wing, commanded by Mac-Mahon and accompanied by Napoleon himself, attempted to relieve Bazaine but was itself encircled and trapped by the Germans at Sedan on August 31. The following day, the Germans on the surrounding heights poured deadly artillery fire down on them. The Battle of Sedan was a disaster for the French. Trapped against the Belgian frontier, the French lost 17,000 men and were compelled to surrender on September 2. About 104,000 officers and men were taken prisoner, including both Napoleon and Mac-Mahon. German losses numbered 460 officers and 8,500 men. Since Bazaine's army was still bottled up in Metz, the result of the war was virtually decided by this surrender.

French resistance was carried on against desperate odds by a new government of national defense, which assumed power in Paris on September 4, 1870, and proclaimed the deposition of the emperor and the establishment of the Third Republic. On September 19 the Germans began to besiege Paris. Jules Favre, foreign minister in the new government, went to negotiate with Bismarck, but the negotiations were broken off when he found that Germany demanded Alsace and Lorraine. Léon Gambetta, the leading figure in the provisional government, organized new French armies in the countryside after escaping from besieged Paris in a balloon. These engaged but could not defeat the German forces. Bazaine capitulated at Metz with his 140,000 troops intact on October 27, and Paris surrendered on January 28, 1871.

Armistice and consequences

The armistice of January 28 included a provision for the election of a French National Assembly, which would have the authority to conclude a definite peace. This settlement was finally negotiated by Adolphe Thiers and Favre and was signed February 26 and ratified March 1. Between then and the conclusion of the formal Treaty of Frankfurt on May 10, 1871, the republican government was threatened by an insurrection in Paris, in which radicals established their own short-lived government, the Paris Commune. The Commune was suppressed after two months, and the harsh provisions of the Treaty of Frankfurt were then implemented: Germany annexed Alsace and half of Lorraine, with Metz. Furthermore, France had to pay an indemnity of five billion francs and cover the costs of the German occupation of France's northern provinces until the indemnity was paid. The culminating triumph of Bismarck's plans came on January 18, 1871, when King William I of Prussia was proclaimed German emperor at Versailles, the former palace of the kings of France.

The Franco-German War had far-reaching consequences. It established both the German Empire and the French Third Republic. With Napoleon III no longer in power to protect them, the Papal States were annexed by Italy (September 20, 1870), thereby completing that nation's unification. The Germans' crushing victory over France in the war consolidated their faith in Prussian militarism, which would remain a dominant force in German society until 1945. (Additionally, the Prussian system of conscript armies controlled by a highly trained general staff was soon adopted by the other great powers.) Most importantly, Germany's annexation of Alsace-Lorraine aroused a deep longing for revenge in the French people. The years from 1871 to 1914 were marked by an extremely unstable peace, since France's determination to recover Alsace-Lorraine and Germany's mounting imperialist ambitions kept the two nations constantly poised for conflict. Their mutual animosity proved to be the driving force behind the prolonged slaughter on the Western Front in World War I.
The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica
Michael Ray.

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Franco-German War | History, Causes, & Results

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Franco-German War (July 19, 1870-May 10, 1871), war in which a coalition of German states led by Prussia defeated France. The war marked the end of French hegemony in continental Europe and resulted in the creation of a unified Germany. Superior numbers, organization, and mobility contributed to the German victory.

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WHEN war was declared between France and Germany in the early summer of 1870, I was sent by a London paper to act as special correspondent with MacMahon's corps d'armee, and, leaving the town at twenty-four hours' notice, arrived at Strasburg with by no means too much time to spare. On arriving at Strasburg, I managed to be introduced, in an informal manner, to the gallant officer who commanded the army there assembled, and was not a little pleased when the marshal recognized me, as having met me in Algeria some years before. Frenchmen, and more particularly French military men, are somewhat backward, or shy, of fraternizing with new acquaintances; but when the latter show any desire to know them, and more particularly, as was the case with me, when they show anything like a genuine admiration of the many soldier-like qualities which are to be found among those who compose their armies, they will always come more than half-way to meet foreigners in the bond of good-fellowship.

When we reached Worth it was evident that something very like a decisive engagement would take place, and that either the French or the German army would be badly beaten before many hours were over. I got away from the lines and, with the help of a little of that gold which is a key to most doors, managed to get up to the flat top of the tower which forms part of the village church, and there witnessed what proved to be the beginning of the end of the war, so far as the French army and nation were concerned. To me, as well as to my friends, the day proved most unfortunate. I felt so certain that MacMahon's troops would rally and eventually beat their enemy, that I delayed coming down from the tower until it was too late. By the time I got back to where I had left an old britschka with two screws of horses that I owned, the French army was in full retreat for the Vosges, the Germans were in possession of the village, and my conveyance, together with my servant who drove it, and all the clothes I had in the world, had vanished. As a matter of course, not being able to speak German, I was made a prisoner, and taken before the officer commanding the brigade that held the place. Of the treatment I received from them I had nothing whatever to complain. An officer who could speak English was sent for, and when he had read my Foreign Office passport, as well as my credentials for the paper I represented, I was at once released, on condition of giving my parole that I would not rejoin the French army for at least seven days. I was then given a free pass, which would prevent my being made prisoner by any of the German troops, and was told I might go where I liked.

But where to go and how to do so, was now the question. My carriage and all my kit having been looted, as I afterwards found out, by the German camp-followers, I had, in the way of clothes, what I stood in. Most fortunately my circular letter of credit had not shared the fate of the rest of my property. I had kept it in my breast pocket, and was not a little glad that I had done so. If I could only reach Karlsruhe I should be able to get whatever money I wanted. But how to get there was the question. It was some thirty or forty English miles from Worth; there was no conveyance of any sort to be had; and even if the latter had been favorable, my whole worldly wealth consisted, with the exception of the letter of credit, of something less than twenty francs. If I could manage to walk all the way, that very modest sum would suffice me for a very humble lodging each night, and for a moderate amount of indifferent food.

I had, however, no choice. Walk I must, if I did not want to be left to starve at Worth. The journey to Karlsruhe would help to pass away the seven days, or, at any rate, a large portion of them, during which I was under parole not to rejoin the French army. To remain where I was, or to follow the French through the Vosges, was equally impossible. So I made up my mind, and started upon what promised to be, and what certainly proved, a journey that was anything but pleasant.

Whatever other drawbacks the road between Worth and Karlsruhe had, it was by no means a solitary or lonely route. It would be difficult to say whether the wagons and other conveyances going towards Germany or those coming into France, were more numerous. The former were filled with French prisoners and wounded soldiers; the latter with fresh German troops en route for the seat of war, doctors and sisters of charity on their way to tend the sick of the German army, and every sort of war stores and supplies it is possible to imagine. There were three villages in the thirty miles of road where I found it possible to rest at night. There was nothing in the shape of a bedroom, or even of a bed, to be had, except at prices which my very limited amount of cash rendered impossible for me. I was obliged to make the best of things, and to sleep, as well as eat, as best I could. Under such circumstances personal cleanliness was almost impossible. When I arrived, on the morning of the fourth day, at Karlsruhe, I was very far from being respectable in appearance. At Grosse's Hotel the clerk in the bureau evidently did not like to admit me, and it was only after I had shown him my passport that he ordered a room to be got ready for me. I went at once to the bank named in my letter of credit, got what money I required, bought a suit of ready-made clothes; and after a hot bath, and using plenty of soap, began to feel as if it were possible to be clean and comfortable again; although it took two or three days before I could realize that I had got rid of the dirt and discomfort brought about by my vagabond-like pedestrian journey. On the third day after my arrival at Karlsruhe I started for Baden, thence went over the Swiss frontier to Basle; and by that time the seven days having elapsed, I crossed the French frontier and made my way to Laon, following, as well as I could, the direction in which public report gave out that the army under MacMahon was marching.

At Laon I learned that Marshal MacMahon had, with the army he commanded, made his way to Rheims, whence he intended to try to afford assistance to Bazaine, who was already surrounded at Metz. The rail from Laon towards Rheims had been cut by order of the French military authorities, so that I had no means whatever of pushing on, except by purchasing an old rattle-trap of a carriage to supply the place of the one that had been taken by the German camp-followers at Worth. I was, however, fortunate enough to procure two active and fast horses which, as will be seen presently, proved, in a great measure, the means by which I afterwards was able to effect the very narrow escape that saved my life.

Between Laon and Rheims I passed through Chalons and Epernay, at which places I saw, for the first time, the francs-tireurs, or free-shooters. The corps was, in the most comprehensive possible meaning of the word, irregular. The men who composed it were not only irregular in everything they did, but appeared to glory in their irregularity. They seemed to have very few officers, and the few they had were seldom, if ever, to be seen on duty with the men. The latter had evidently souls above obedience, for they did very much what they liked, and in the manner they liked. They evidently hated the regular army, and the latter returned the compliment with interest.

I was very anxious to let my employers in London know the exact state of affairs in regard to the intended advance of MacMahon towards Metz, and how the attempt to relieve Bazaine had utterly failed. To telegraph the news was impossible, as all the wires had been cut by the enemy. I had prepared a long letter which gave many details that had not yet been published in England, and I felt sure that if I could only manage to get what I had written to London it would do me no little credit. As yet Sedan was not even threatened by the Germans. I knew the officers who commanded there very well, and I resolved to push on by myself, and see what could be done in the way of forwarding my letter thence over the Belgian frontier, whence it would be safe to reach London in twenty-four hours. It took the best part of three days to reach Sedan. At Sedan I was able to procure a horse, and rode some ten miles over the Belgian frontier to Buiony, where there were neither wars nor rumors of wars. Here my letter was posted, registered, and sent off to London. I then returned to Sedan, and, having the horses harnessed to the wretched old conveyance of which I was the owner, set off on my return to the headquarters of MacMahon's army, wherever they might be.

The colonel in command at Sedan was very kind to me, gave me the best of food, and the most reliable of information, advising me, if I wanted to rejoin MacMahon's army, to make the best of my way to a small town called Mouson, some fifteen or twenty miles off, situated in the valley of the Meuse, whence, as he said, I should be pretty sure of finding the headquarters of the army. My coachman, a Swiss whom I had engaged when I bought the trap at Laon, told me that the drive from Sedan to Mouson would occupy about four hours, going at a comparatively slow pace which could not knock up the horses. It was agreed that we were to hills for an hour or so, after we had been a couple of hours on the road. I was very tired and sleepy when we left, and therefore made myself comfortable to enjoy a good sleep, thinking I should have at least two hours in which I could do so.

To my amazement, we had not gone more than a couple or three miles from Sedan when the carriage came to a sudden halt, and I heard more than one rough voice ordering the driver not to move, unless he wished to he shot then and there. I drew back the leather curtains and looked out, when I found that some thirty or more armed men had surrounded the vehicle, and two of them, opening the door, ordered me in the most brutal manner to get out. At first I thought they were soldiers, and that they were laboring under some mistake, having taken me to be somebody else. But I soon discovered that they belonged to the franc-tireurs; and that they fully intended to make me a prisoner. I still thought there must be some mistake, and asked them what they wanted, telling them that I was an English newspaper correspondent who had accompanied MacMahon all through the campaign, and was now on my way to rejoin him. AVous mentez" (You lie) was the polite answer I got; and, as one of them cocked his rifle and swore he would shoot me dead if I did not get out, I thought that discretion was the better part of valor, and got out upon the dusty road. I asked where their officers were; but they replied that there were none present, and that Frenchmen knew how to deal with Prussian spies without being controlled by officers. I asked them what I had done that I should be made a prisoner. They answerd that I was a Prussian spy, and that they intended to try me by court-martial and shoot me. I told them that if they would only come back to Sedan with me, the commandant of the garrison would satisfy them that I was not a Prussian, still less a spy, but an Englishman who was going about his lawful work. They said that the commandant at Sedan was, like most of the French army, a traitor to his country; that they would not believe a word he said, but had determined to make me a prisoner and kill me. Anything so brutal as they were in their words and manner it has never been my lot to witness in any part of the world.

At last they decided to begin what they were pleased to call a conseil de guerre, or court-martial, in order that they might try me for being, as they asserted, a Prussian spy on French soil. I question whether, in the history of the world, a greater farce or a more entirely one-sided affair was ever enacted than on this occasion. I was accused, as I said before, of being a Prussian spy; but what I came to spy upon, or in whose employment I was, my accusers, who were also my judges, did not say. A couple of dozen times at least I was told that I was what they said; and when I denied it, and said I was an Englishman, I was told"Vous locates" (You lie). Of the twenty-five or thirty men present, twelve resolved themselves into what they called a court, a thirteenth individual acting as president. I offered to show them---in fact held out for their inspection---my Foreign Office passport, as well as a pass I had received from MacMahon's chief-of-staff when I joined the army at Strasburg. But the first they would not even look at; and the second they said was given by a man---Marshal MacMahon---who was himself a traitor to France. They did not seem to think it requisite that I should be put upon my defense. One of them was called forward by the rest, asked whether he could speak English, and whether he would know an Englishman by sight when he saw him. To both questions he answered in the affirmative. He was then told to speak to me in English, and to look at me, and say if I was an Englishman. He came up to me and muttered some gibberish which contained a few words that might, by persons of a very strong imagination, be called English. I endeavored to say a few words to him in my own tongue; but he stopped me by shouting out that I was a Prussian, that I spoke German, and did not understand a word of English.

This seemed quite enough for those who were trying me. After consulting together for a few minutes one of them announced in a loud voice that I had been found guilty of being a Prussian spy, and that as such I was condemned to be shot. He then told me---looking at his watch and letting me look at mine---that I had a quarter of an hour given me to live, and, as a proof that he meant what he said, orders were given to twelve of the party to load their rifles, and two others were told off to give me the coup de grace, in the event of my not being killed by the firing party. In a word, my lease of life seemed to be very near its termination, and I felt very certain that I had not more than the fifteen minutes the fellow named in which to live.

To analyze one's feelings or thoughts under such circumstances is impossible. For about five minutes, a third of the time that was left me, I felt utterly stunned, and kept wondering whether those I had left behind in England would ever learn what my fate had been. At last an idea, a sort of forlorn hope, came to me, and I lost no time before trying whether or not I could put it in execution. I called to one of the men, who seemed to be a leader among his fellows, and told him that I wished, before being shot, to see a priest, which was a privilege invariably granted to even the greatest culprits in France, and asked him to find out the cure, or parish priest, of the nearest village, and bring him to me. My idea was that by making this request I should, at any rate, gain a little time, and that if this priest did come to see me it was possible, although I feared not very probable, he might have some influence with these men, and might get them to send me to some military post, where I should have justice done me. My request did not seem to annoy my judges in the least. On the contrary, they approved of it, and at once sent off a couple of messengers in different directions to look for this curé.

In the meantime my feelings and surroundings were by no means happy. It is true that since they had sentenced me to be shot the men had---most fortunately, as it afterwards turned out---unbound my hands and feet. I was allowed to sit on the ground, close to a wall, a sentry with a loaded ride being within a dozen yards of me, and due notice was given that if I attempted to get away this man had orders to shoot me at once. I was covered with dirt and dust, the result of having been knocked down more than once when I was made a prisoner. What the ultimate result of my reprieve might be, or what the priest could do if they found him, which seemed far from likely, was, I need hardly say, utterly uncertain. I kept on hoping for the very improbable best but fearing in my heart that the more than probable worst would be my fate.

At last what turned out to be my guardian angel appeared. The messengers who had gone in search of the priest had been absent some little time, and my captors were beginning to grumble and say that it was time to finish the business and shoot me offhand, when all at once an old man, a garde champêtre, appeared on the scene, his fowling-piece over his shoulder, and the red ribbon in the buttonhole of his blouse, showing that he had served, and served with honor, in the French army. He asked what was the matter, and turning to me, inquired whether I really was an Englishman. I told him my story, and showed him the different documents I had by me, commencing with the pass given me by the chief of MacMahon's staff. He read it carefully, and I could see by his face that he was convinced I was telling the truth. He then looked at my Foreign Office passport, but did not seem able to make out what it meant. All at once he left me, and I saw him go to where my carriage was, and while examining the vehicle and horses,---the latter, most providentially, as it turned out, having never been unharnessed,---he spoke a few words to the coachman. He then came back to where I was, asked me to show him again my different papers, and then, turning to some of the francs-tireurs who were standing near, said, in a loud voice, "Messieurs, you have made a great mistake. This person," pointing to me, "is not a Prussian. He is an English officer of rank, who has come to France in order that he may see and admire how Frenchmen defend their country. Even now French officers are expecting him at the headquarters of the army." And then, turning to me, he said,"Allons, monsieur, en route; he perdez pas on moment." With that he caught hold of my arm, hurried me away, and before my enemies had time, or anything like time, to realize what he was doing, we were not only inside the carriage, but were tearing along at a smart hand-gallop on the road to Mouson. The anger and vexation of my captors may be imagined. They had not the means of pursuing us; but they fired several shots after us, one of which went through the crown of my billycock hat. However, I was saved; and if ever one man saved the life of another, that old garde champêtre saved mine. When we arrived at Mouson I got five hundred francs (twenty pounds) on my letter of credit, and made it a present to the old fellow who had behaved with such pluck, and who had certainly risked his life to save me. Had we been caught before we reached the carriage, nothing could have saved him from suffering with me the death to which I had been condemned.

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WHEN war was declared between France and Germany in the early summer of 1870, I was sent by a London paper to act as special correspondent with MacMahon's corps d'armee, and, leaving the town at twenty-four hours' notice, arrived at Strasburg with by no means too much time to spare.

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Internet Modern History Sourcebook

Documents of German Unification, 1848-1871

Johann Gustav Droysen: Speech to the Frankfurt Assembly, 1848
We cannot conceal the fact that the whole German question is a simple alternative between Prussia and Austria. In these states German life has its positive and negative poles--in the former, all the interests which are national and reformative, in the latter, all that are dynastic and destructive. The German question is not a constitutional question, but a question of power; and the Prussian monarchy is now wholly German, while that of Austria cannot be. . . .We need a powerful ruling house. Austria's power meant lack of power for us, whereas Prussia desired German unity in order to supply the deficiencies of her own power. Already Prussia is Germany in embryo. She will "merge" with Germany. . .

Friedrich Wilhelm IV, King of Prussia: Proclamation of 1849

I am not able to return a favorable reply to the offer of a crown on the part of the German National Assembly [meeting in Frankfurt], because the Assembly has not the right, without the consent of the German governments, to bestow the crown which they tendered me, and moreover because they offered the crown upon condition that I would accept a constitution which could not be reconciled with the rights of the German states.

Otto von Bismarck: Letter to Minister von Manteuffel, 1856

Because of the policy of Vienna [the Congress of Vienna, 1815], Germany is clearly too small for us both [Prussia and Austria]; as long as an honorable arrangement concerning the influence of each in Germany cannot be concluded and carried out, we will both plough the same disputed acre, and Austria will remain the only state to whom we can permanently lose or from whom we can permanently gain. . . .I wish only to express my conviction that, in the not too distant future, we shall have to fight for our existence against Austria and that it is not within our power to avoid that, since the course of events in Germany has no other solution.

Field Marshal Helmuth von Moltke: 1866

The war of 1866 [between Prussia and Austria] was entered on not because the existence of Prussia was threatened, nor was it caused by public opinion and the voice of the people; it was a struggle, long foreseen and calmly prepared for, recognized as a necessity by the Cabinet, not for territorial aggrandizement, for an extension of our domain, or for material advantage, but for an ideal end--the establishment of power. Not a foot of land was exacted from Austria, but she had to renounce all part in the hegemony of Germany. . . Austria had exhausted her strength in conquests south of the Alps, and left the western German provinces unprotected, instead of following the road pointed out by the Danube. Its center of gravity lay out of Germany; Prussia's lay within it. Prussia felt itself called upon and strong enough to assume the leadership of the German races.

Otto von Bismarck: 1866

We had to avoid wounding Austria too severely; we had to avoid leaving behind in her any unnecessary bitterness of feeling or desire for revenge; we ought rather to reserve the possibility of becoming friends again with our adversary of the moment, and in any case to regard the Austrian state as a piece on the European chessboard. If Austria were severely injured, she would become the ally of France and of every other opponent of ours; she would even sacrifice her anti-Russian interests for the sake of revenge on Prussia. . . .The acquisition of provinces like Austria Silesia and portions of Bohemia could not strengthen the Prussian state; it would not lead to an amalgamation of German Austria with Prussia, and Vienna could not be governed from Berlin as a mere dependency. . . .Austria's conflict and rivalry with us was no more culpable than ours with her; our task was the establishment or foundation of German national unity under the leadership of the King of Prussia.

The Imperial Proclamation, January 18, 1871

Whereas the German princes and the free cities have unanimously called upon us to renew and to assume, with the restoration of the German Empire, the German imperial office, which has been empty for more than sixty years; and Whereas adequate arrangements have been provided for this in the constitution of the German Confederation;

We, Wilhelm, by the grace of God King of Prussia, do herewith declare that we have considered it a duty to our common fatherland to answer the summons of the united German princes and cities and to accept the German imperial title. In consequence, we and our successors on the throne of Prussia will henceforth bear the imperial title in all our relations and in all the business of the German Empire, and we hope to God that the German nation will be granted the ability to fashion a propitious future for the fatherland under the symbol of its ancient glory. We assume the imperial title, conscious of the duty of protecting, with German loyalty, the rights of the Empire and of its members, of keeping the peace, and of protecting the independence of Germany, which depends in its turn upon the united strength of the people. We assume the title in the hope that the German people will be granted the ability to enjoy the reward of its ardent and self-sacrificing wars in lasting peace, within boundaries which afford the fatherland a security against renewed French aggression which has been lost for centuries. And may God grant that We and our successors on the imperial throne may at all times increase the wealth of the German Empire, not by military conquests, but by the blessings and the gifts of peace, in the realm of national prosperity, liberty, and morality. Wilhelm I, Kaiser und König.

Source:

From: James Harvey Robinson, ed., Readings in European History, 2 Vols., (Boston: Ginn and Co., 1904-1905), II:571-575; Otto von Bismarck, The Man and Statesman, (New York, 1899), II:48-51

Scanned by: J. S. Arkenberg, Dept. of History, Cal. State Fullerton.

This text is part of the Internet Modern History Sourcebook. The Sourcebook is a collection of public domain and copy-permitted texts for introductory level classes in modern European and World history.

Unless otherwise indicated the specific electronic form of the document is copyright. Permission is granted for electronic copying, distribution in print form for educational purposes and personal use. If you do reduplicate the document, indicate the source. No permission is granted for commercial use of the Sourcebook.

© Paul Halsall, July 1998

The Site Concept and Design: created 26 Jan 1996: latest revision 6 October 2023 [ Internet History Sourcebooks Project is located at the History Department of Fordham University, New York. The Internet Medieval Sourcebook, and other medieval components of the project, are located at the Fordham University Center for Medieval Studies.The IHSP recognizes the contribution of Fordham University, the Fordham University History Department, and the Fordham Center for Medieval Studies in providing web space and server support for the project. The IHSP is a project independent of Fordham University. Although the IHSP seeks to follow all applicable copyright law, Fordham University is not the institutional owner, and is not liable as the result of any legal action. Paul Halsall CV]

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Internet History Sourcebooks: Modern History

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Summary

For many centuries, the Italian peninsula was a politically fragmented conglomeration of states. This was the case when the United States announced its independence from Great Britain in 1776. When war broke out between Austria and the Revolutionary French Government in 1792, the French invaded the Italian peninsula, consolidated many of the Italian states, and established them as republics. In 1799 the Austrian and Russian armies pushed the French out of the Italian peninsula, which led to the demise of the fledgling republics.

After Napoleon's rise to power, the Italian peninsula was once again conquered by the French. Under Napoleon, the peninsula was divided into three entities: the northern parts which were annexed to the French Empire (Piedmont, Liguria, Parma, Piacenza, Tuscany, and Rome), the newly created Kingdom of Italy (Lombardy, Venice, Reggio, Modena, Romagna, and the Marshes) ruled by Napoleon himself, and the Kingdom of Naples, which was first ruled by Napoleon's brother Joseph Bonaparte, but then passed to Napoleon's brother-in-law Joachim Murat.

The period of French invasion and occupation was important in many ways. It introduced revolutionary ideas about government and society, resulting in an overthrow of the old established ruling orders and the destruction of the last vestiges of feudalism. The ideals of freedom and equality were very influential. Also of consequence, the concept of nationalism was introduced, thus sowing the seeds of Italian nationalism throughout most parts of the northern and central Italian peninsula.

With the downfall of Napoleon in 1814 and the redistribution of territory by the Congress of Vienna (1814-15), most of the Italian states were reconstituted: the Kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia (often referred to as Sardinia), the Grand Duchy of Tuscany, the Duchy of Parma, the Papal States, and the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies (fused together from the old Kingdom of Naples and Kingdom of Sicily). These were largely conservative regimes, presided over by the old social orders.

Although the Italian peninsula remained fragmented through the mid-1800s, the concept of a united Italy began to take root. Secret societies formed to oppose the conservative regimes. Several of these societies also promoted Italian nationalism and the idea of a unified Italian political state. One such society was the group Young Italy, founded in 1831 by Guiseppe Mazzini. Mazzini was an ardent advocate of the necessity for Italian unification through the desires and actions of the Italian people. Thus, the movement of Italian unification, a process referred to as the Risorgimento (resurgence) proliferated by mid-century.

The revolutions of 1848 ignited nationalist sentiment throughout the Italian peninsula. There were widespread uprisings in several Italian cities that year, mostly by the professional classes (such as doctors, lawyers, shopkeepers) as well as students. Lombardy-Venetia and Milan tried to rise up against Austrian rule. Although the Kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia sent troops to aid the revolt, it was crushed by the Austrians at Custoza in July 1848. The Italian uprisings were unsuccessful and by 1849 the old regimes were once again in place.

Yet, the idea of the Risorgimento continued to gain adherents after 1848. The final push for Italian unification came in 1859, led by the Kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia (then the wealthiest and most liberal of the Italian states), and orchestrated by Piedmont-Sardinia's Prime Minister, Count Camillo di Cavour. A skilled diplomat, Cavour secured an alliance with France. The Franco-Austrian War of 1859 was the agent that began the physical process of Italian unification. The Austrians were defeated by the French and Piedmontese at Magenta and Solferino, and thus relinquished Lombardy. By the end of the year Lombardy was added to the holdings of Piedmont-Sardinia.

The northern Italian states held elections in 1859 and 1860 and voted to join the Kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia, a major step towards unification, while Piedmont-Sardinia ceded Savoy and Nice to France. Giuseppi Garibaldi, a native of Piedmont-Sardinia, was instrumental in bringing the southern Italian states into the unification process. In 1860, Garibaldi cobbled together an army (referred to as the "Thousand") to march into the southern part of the peninsula. Landing first in Sicily and then moving onwards into Naples, Garibaldi and his men overthrew the Bourbon monarchy and turned over the southern territories to Victor Emmanuel II, King of Piedmont-Sardinia. In early 1861 a national parliament convened and proclaimed the Kingdom of Italy, with Victor Emmanuel II as its king. At this point, there were only two major territories outside of the parameters of the new Kingdom of Italy: Rome and Venetia.

In 1866 Italy joined Prussia in a campaign against Austria (the 1866 Austro-Prussian War) and thus won Venetia. In 1870, taking advantage of the fact that France (the country responsible at the time for guarding the Papal States) was distracted by involvement in the Franco-Prussian War (1870-71), the Italian army entered Rome. That year, Rome and the Papal States were incorporated into Italy and the Risorgimento completed. During the summer of 1871, the Italian capital moved to Rome from Florence (it was moved from Turin to Florence in 1865).

Major Events

Overall Impact upon U.S. Foreign Policy

The history of recognitions (and the establishment of relations, where applicable) between the United States and the Italian states impacted several different areas of U.S. policy, including:

Trade and Commerce. The industrialization process that swept through the northern United States in the early nineteenth century spread through the northern and central Italian states in the mid-nineteenth century. As a result, the Italian states (and after 1861, the Kingdom of Italy) and the United States both sought to cultivate trade and commercial ties for mutual benefit.

Immigration and Citizenship. By the 1870s Italian immigration to the New World (both to the United States as well as to Argentina, amongst other South American countries) began to increase. Indeed, some of the "fathers" of modern Italy spent time in the United States. Garibaldi spent enough time in the U.S. to gain a U.S. passport, and was offered a commission in the U.S. Army during the Civil War.

U.S. Civil War. The unification of the Italian states impacted the foreign policy of the United States in numerous ways. Perhaps the issue that had the most immediate impact upon U.S. foreign policy in the early 1860s was over the question of recognition of the U.S. Confederacy. The Kingdom of Italy was proclaimed just as the U.S. Civil War began. U.S. President Abraham Lincoln wanted to ensure that the new Italian state did not recognize the U.S. Confederacy. Washington also worried that, with Italy's long coastline, Confederate ships might seek shelter in Italian waters. With this in mind, the Italian government gave "strong assurances that no Confederate ship would be admitted to Italian ports unless it was a question of adverse weather conditions or other vis major."

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Unification of Italian States - Countries - Office of the Historian

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The role of Piedmont

In Piedmont Victor Emmanuel II governed with a parliament whose democratic majority refused to ratify the peace treaty with Austria. This was an exception to the general course of reaction. The skillfully worded Proclamation of Moncalieri (November 20, 1849) favourably contrasted Victor Emmanuel's policies with those of other Italian rulers and permitted elections. The victorious Liberals installed a new cabinet under Massimo d'Azeglio, a moderate trusted by the king. D'Azeglio introduced the Siccardi law, which curtailed the power of ecclesiastical courts. In October 1850 another prominent moderate, Camillo Benso di Cavour, entered the cabinet and directed a laissez-faire economic policy. He formulated international commercial treaties and drew on foreign capital to reduce the public debt, stimulate economic growth, and develop a railroad system. Cavour's dynamism alarmed conservatives and even d'Azeglio. In 1852, through an alliance with centre-left deputies that became known as the connubio ("marriage"), Cavour displaced d'Azeglio as head of the cabinet. Despite disagreements with the king (who favoured the clerical party and occasionally displayed absolutist tendencies), Cavour introduced various ecclesiastical, judicial, and fiscal reforms.

A number of events promoted Piedmont's prestige in Italy and abroad. In March 1854 France and England intervened in support of the Ottoman Empire against Russia in the Crimean War. To obtain Austrian support, they were prepared to guarantee the status quo in Italy. Only Piedmont was in a position to disrupt it at that time, and Cavour negotiated an alliance with the Western powers. In May he sent to Crimea an army that performed brilliantly. As a result, Piedmont was able to assume a place among the victors at the Congress of Paris (February 1856). From this platform Cavour, achieving a diplomatic coup for Piedmont and Italy, declared that the only threat to peace in Italy, and the root cause of subversive plots, was the burdensome Austrian overlordship. Cavour's pronouncements at the congress increased the standing of Piedmont among nationalists.

Meanwhile, Mazzini's democratic and republican movement was crumbling. In February 1853 an insurrection against the Austrians failed in Milan. The discovery and execution at Belfiore (1852-53) of the leaders of a conspiracy in Mantua, as well as abortive insurrections in Cadore and Lunigiana, discredited the democratic movement and discouraged its most dedicated adherents. Mazzini faced complete isolation for his support of an expedition to the southern mainland to incite insurrection, known as the Sapri expedition (June-July 1857), in which the Neapolitan republican and socialist Carlo Pisacane and some 300 companions lost their lives. The democrats were divided and unable to carry on the revolutionary struggle; nothing was to be expected from the restored governments. In Lombardy-Venetia, Austria carried out stern repressive measures. Pius IX, now under the influence of the reactionary Giacomo Cardinal Antonelli, refused to grant any reforms in Rome. Liberal Catholicism could not remain viable without reforms in the Papal States. In Naples and the duchies, reaction became pervasive, although the grand duke of Tuscany sought to make his subjects forget that he owed his throne to Austrian military intervention. Only in Piedmont was there any hope left for the reformers.

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Italy - Unification, Risorgimento, Nation-State

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Italy - Unification, Risorgimento, Nation-State: In Piedmont Victor Emmanuel II governed with a parliament whose democratic majority refused to ratify the peace treaty with Austria. This was an exception to the general course of reaction. The skillfully worded Proclamation of Moncalieri (November 20, 1849) favourably contrasted Victor Emmanuel's policies with those of other Italian rulers and permitted elections.

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Giuseppe Garibaldi, (born July 4, 1807, Nice, French Empire [now in France]-died June 2, 1882, Caprera, Italy), Italian patriot and soldier of the Risorgimento, a republican who, through his conquest of Sicily and Naples with his guerrilla Redshirts, contributed to the achievement of Italian unification under the royal house of Savoy.

Early life

Garibaldi's family was one of fishermen and coastal traders, and for more than 10 years he himself was a sailor. In 1832 he acquired a master's certificate as a merchant captain. By 1833-34, when he served in the navy of the kingdom of Piedmont-Sardinia, he had come under the influence of Giuseppe Mazzini, the great prophet of Italian nationalism, and the French socialist thinker the comte de Saint-Simon. Garibaldi, in 1834, took part in a mutiny intended to provoke a republican revolution in Piedmont, but the plot failed; he escaped to France and in his absence was condemned to death by a Genoese court.

Exile in South America

From 1836 to 1848, Garibaldi lived in South America as an exile, and these years of turmoil and revolution in that continent strongly influenced his career. He volunteered as a naval captain for the Rio Grande do Sul republic during that small state's unsuccessful attempt to break free from the Brazilian Empire. Actually, he did little more than prey on Brazilian shipping. In the course of often harrowing adventures on land and sea, he managed to elope with Anna Maria Ribeiro da Silva (Anita), a married woman, who remained his companion in arms until her death. After a succession of victories by the Brazilians in 1839-40, Garibaldi finally decided to leave the service of Rio Grande. Driving a herd of cattle, he made the long trek to Montevideo with Anita and their son. There he tried his hand as commercial traveler and teacher but could not accustom himself to civilian life. In 1842 he was put in charge of the Uruguayan navy in another war of liberation-this time against Juan Manuel de Rosas, the dictator of Argentina. The following year, again in the service of Uruguay, Garibaldi took command of a newly formed Italian Legion at Montevideo, the first of the Redshirts, with whom his name became so closely associated. After he won a small but heroic engagement at the Battle of Sant'Antonio in 1846, his fame reached even to Europe, and in Italy a sword of honour, paid for by subscriptions, was donated to him.

He was in charge of the defense of Montevideo for a short time in 1847, when he first came to the attention of Alexandre Dumas père, who later did much to foster his reputation. Garibaldi also greatly impressed other foreign observers as an honest and able man. His South American experiences gave him invaluable training in the techniques of guerrilla warfare that he later used with great effect against French and Austrian armies, which had not been taught how to counter them. These first exploits in the cause of freedom cast him in the mold of a professional rebel, an indomitable individualist who all his life continued to wear the gaucho costume of the pampas and to act as if life were a perpetual battle for liberty.

War of liberation

In April 1848 Garibaldi led 60 members of his Italian Legion back to Italy to fight for the Risorgimento, or resurrection, of Italy in the war of independence against the Austrians. He first offered to fight for Pope Pius IX, then-when his offer was refused-for Charles Albert, the king of Piedmont-Sardinia. The king, too, rebuffed him, for Garibaldi's conviction as a rebel in 1834 was still remembered; moreover, the regular army despised the self-taught guerrilla leader. Therefore, Garibaldi went to the aid of the city of Milan, where Mazzini had already arrived and had given the war of liberation a more republican and radical turn. Charles Albert, after his defeat at the hands of the Austrians at Custoza, agreed to an armistice, but Garibaldi continued in the name of Milan what had become his private war and emerged creditably from two engagements with the Austrians at Luino and Morazzone. But at the end of August, heavily outnumbered, he had to retreat across the frontier to Switzerland.

For a time Garibaldi settled down in Nice with Anita (whom he had married in 1842) and their three children, but his resolve to help free Italy from foreign rule was stronger than ever. He was confirmed in his purpose by his belief-which he and only a handful of others shared with Mazzini-that the many Italian states, though often engaged in internecine warfare, could nonetheless be unified into a single state. When Pius IX, threatened by liberal forces within the Papal States, fled from Rome toward the end of 1848, Garibaldi led a group of volunteers to that city. There, in February 1849, he was elected a deputy in the Roman Assembly, and it was he who proposed that Rome should become an independent republic. In April a French army arrived to restore papal government, and Garibaldi was the chief inspiration of a spirited defense that repulsed a French attack on the Janiculum Hill. In May he defeated a Neapolitan army outside Rome at Velletri, and in June he was the leading figure in the defense of Rome against a French siege. There was no chance at all of holding the city, but the gallantry of the resistance became one of the most inspiring stories of the Risorgimento. Refusing to accept defeat, Garibaldi led a few thousand men out of Rome and through central Italy in July 1849, maneuvering to avoid French and Austrian armies, until he reached the neutral republic of San Marino.

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Giuseppe Garibaldi | Biography, Redshirts, Significance, & Facts

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Giuseppe Garibaldi, Italian patriot and soldier of the Risorgimento, a republican who, through his conquest of Sicily and Naples with his guerrilla Redshirts, contributed to the achievement of Italian unification under the royal house of Savoy. Learn more about Garibaldi in this article.

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Date:

November 6, 1917 - November 7, 1917 October 24, 1917 - October 25, 1917(Anniversary in 3 days)

What caused the Russian Revolution of 1917?

Why is it called the October Revolution if it took place in November?

How did the revolution lead to the Russian Civil War?

What happened to the tsar and his family?

Russian Revolution, also called Russian Revolution of 1917, two revolutions in 1917, the first of which, in February (March, New Style), overthrew the imperial government and the second of which, in October (November), placed the Bolsheviks in power.
(Read Leon Trotsky's 1926 Britannica essay on Lenin.)

World War I and the decline of the Russian Empire

Centuries of virtually unchecked Russian expansion in Asia ended with an embarrassing defeat in the Russo-Japanese War (1904-05). This military reverse shattered Russia's dreams of establishing hegemony over the whole of Asia, but it also contributed to a wave of domestic unrest. The Revolution of 1905 compelled Nicholas II to issue the October Manifesto, which ostensibly transformed Russia from an unlimited autocracy into a constitutional monarchy. The tsar's reactionary policies, including the occasional dissolution of the Duma, or Russian parliament, the chief fruit of the 1905 revolution, had spread dissatisfaction even to moderate elements of the nobility. The Russian Empire 's many ethnic minorities grew increasingly restive under Russian domination.

Despite some reforms that followed the Russo-Japanese War, the Russian army in 1914 was ill-equipped to fight a major war, and neither the political nor the military leadership was up to the standard required. Nevertheless the army fought bravely in World War I, and both soldiers and junior officers showed remarkable qualities. The Russian invasion of East Prussia in August 1914 was defeated by Paul von Hindenburg and Erich Ludendorff at Tannenberg, but it required the Germans to send reinforcements from the Western Front and so saved France from defeat and made possible the victory on the Marne. The campaigns of 1915 and 1916 on the Eastern Front brought terrible casualties to the Russian forces, which at times did not even have sufficient rifles. As late as July 1916, however, the Russian army was capable of making a successful offensive under Gen. Aleksey Brusilov in Volhynia and Bukovina.

Plots and Revolutions Quiz

The Russian people did not respond to the war with real enthusiasm. The government could not overcome its traditional distrust of any public initiative, even in the organization of medical supplies or munitions for the forces at the front. In the Fourth Duma a majority of the centre and moderate right formed a Progressive bloc and proposed the creation of a national coalition government "possessing the confidence of the country" and a program of reforms which could be carried out even in wartime. The emperor rejected the proposal and prorogued the Duma on September 3 (September 16, New Style), 1915. Eleven days earlier Nicholas had decided to assume personal command of the armies in the field. The result was that in Petrograd (as the capital had been renamed at the beginning of the war, in place of the German-sounding St. Petersburg) the empress Alexandra was in fact in control. She herself was under the influence of the self-styled "holy man" Grigori Rasputin, whose hold over her was because of his ability to arrest the bleeding of the hemophiliac tsarevich, Alexis. Thus to the massive casualties at the front, the retreat of the armies, and the growing economic hardships was added the knowledge, widespread in the capital and among the upper classes, that the government was in the hands of incompetents. Rumours of treason in high places were widely believed, though the historical evidence does not suggest that they were true. On the night of December 16-17 (December 29-30, New Style), 1916, Rasputin was murdered by a group of conservative nobles, but by then the system was beyond salvation. There was no hand at the helm, and the ship was drifting onto the rocks.

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Russian Revolution | Definition, Causes, Summary, History, & Facts

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Russian Revolution, two revolutions in 1917, the first of which, in February (March, New Style), overthrew the imperial government and the second of which, in October (November), placed the Bolsheviks in power, leading to the creation of the Soviet Union. Learn more about the Russian Revolution in this article.

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EuroDocs > History of Russia: Primary Documents > Russian Revolution, Civil War and USSR 1917-1991

Before the 1917 Revolution

Documents, images, audio and videos from Russian-Soviet history.

Project of Osteuropäische Geschichte der Friedrich-Alexander Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg and the Institut für Allgemeine Geschichte der Russischen Akademie der Wissenschaften (Moskau)

(20th century; Russian transcriptions; German translation)

Russia in Early Photographs

"A number of albums include portraits of the Tsar or the imperial family; state occasions, military maneuvers, and relaxation at the imperial hunting lodge are all depicted."
The Russian Revolution

From the New York Public Library

(late 19th-early 20th century; photos)

Includes records of Stalin.

Also includes images of Stalin.

(1902-2005; Russian facsimiles, English interface)

General Census of Soviet Union

A Day that Shook the World

Historical Footage: "A Day That Shook the World recalls the days of the 20th century that proved to be era-defining and pivotal in the course of modern history. These are the days on which political revolutions, technological breakthroughs, and sporting triumphs took place, and whose effects were felt the world-over."

Abdication of Tsar Nikolas 1917

Big 3 Meet at Yalta to Carve Up Post-War World 1945

Khrushchev Denounces Stalin 1956

Soviets Crush Hungarian Revolt 1956

Yuri Gagarin Becomes The First Man In Space 1961

Soviets Put Down Prague Spring 1968

Official End of the Cold War 1989

Soviet Coup Failed 1991

Yeltsin Crushes Political Rebels 1993

Coproduction of British Pathe and BBC

(20th century; English; videos)

"Russian-language interviews with civilians, scientists, writers, church people or immigrants... [revealing life] for political prisoners in forced labor camps; for dissidents in psychiatric hospitals; for Catholics or Jews wishing to practice their faith" in the Soviet Union.

From the OSA Digital Repository.

Broadcasted by Radio Free Europe (Radio Svoboda).

(1917-1989; Russian, English, Lavtian, Lithuanian, and German audio)

Hanover Historical Texts - American Telegrams Regarding the Revolution

Telegram from the American Consulate in Sweden to the U.S. Secretary of State, March 17, 1917

Telegram from the American Consulate in Petrograd to the U.S. Secretary of State, March 20, 1917

Telegram from the American Consulate in Moscow to the U.S. Secretary of State, March 20, 1917

(English transcription)

Lists political repression victims from the USSR.

Ability to browse by name alphabetically using alphabet on top of page.

Database includes over 2.6 million people. Data comes from regional memory books, copyright databases, state archives, and Memorial's archive materials.

Data includes name and name variants, birth date and place, occupation, arrest date, sentence, sentence date, verdict, and if applicable, dismissal date and dismissal reason.

From Memorial society, an NGO and nonprofit.

Raw data for the project found here.

(1917-1991; Russian interface)

Lists victims of state terror killed in Moscow during the Soviet Union (USSR).

Data arranged by place of residence person was taken from and killed (viewable on this map), rather than place of burial.

Database includes about 12,000 people, which Memorial estimates is only one third of the total number of people shot in Moscow on political charges.

This data is incomplete as there is no information about several thousand Muscovites shot and subsequently rehabilitated. Streets and addresses have also changed, especially after 1960 which has also contributed to this incompleteness.

From Memorial society, an NGO and nonprofit.

Victims sorted by burial site found here.

(1917-1991; Russian interface)

Organized by region of burial.

Includes name, birth date and place, number of children, occupation, arrest date, conviction date, death date, and rehabilitation date.

From Memorial society, an NGO and nonprofit.

(1917-1991; Russian interface)

Includes a library with writings of leaders such as Lenin, Trotsky, and Stalin.

Also includes audio from speeches of communist leaders.

(1917-1953; Russian transcriptions and audio)

Search and browse the Immortal Barracks here.

Includes facsimiles of photos, letters, and memories of victims of Soviet political oppression.

(1917-1991; photos, Russian facsimiles and interface)

Lenin's decree on peace ending Russia's involvement in WWI. Published in Известие.

(English translation; 27 October 1917)

Memoirs of the Kornilov Affair/Coup

Posters designed by V. Lebedev for the windows of ROSTA, the state news agency of Soviet Russia.

From Dartmouth Digital Library Initiatives.
(1917-1922; color facsimiles and brief descriptions)

Includes documents from 1st Congress of 1919 to its dissolution in 1943. Also includes records from the Sino-Soviet split of 1956-1966.

Includes records of proceedings and speeches by party leaders.

(1919-1966; English transcriptions)

Russian transcription here.

English translation [2] (also see agreement supplement here).

(16 April 1922; Russian facsimile, transcription, English translation)

Part of the JDC archives.

Includes memos and minutes from meetings.

(1926-1937; English facsimiles)

From Leon Trotsky's memoir My Life. He recounts 1917 and his meeting with Lenin, his political friendship with Muralov, and the way ministers viewed soldiers as "so much soft clay to be moulded as they pleased."

From Marxists Internet Archive

(1930; English translation)

By Leon Trotsky, a Russian revolutionary and important Soviet politician.

(1930; English translation)

Records from Stalin's attempt to create an alternative to Palestine.

Includes a map, an authorization document, propaganda posters, and video clips.

Click the number on the bottom right-hand corner to flip through panels of the exhibition.

(1934; images, English interface, Russian and Yiddish facsimiles)

The prosecution against Zinoviev, Kamenev, Evdokimov, Bakayev and others. A union took place between the Trotskyite and Zinovievite underground counter-revolutionary groups which formed a "united centre."

From the Marxist Internet Archive

(23 August 1936)

The Great Patriotic War (World War II)

Васильчикова Мария Илларионовна - Берлинский дневник 1940-1945

Diary of a White Russian princess who fled to Germany and was later in close association with those who attempted to assassinate Hitler. The diaries also give a rare glimpse at Hitler's destruction of European aristocracy.

English version available to purchase HERE

(1940-1945; Russian transcription)

Most documents related to World War II (WWII), also called the Great Patriotic War.

Collections of digitized documents

Includes exhibits with digitized documents.

(1941-present; Russian facsimiles)

Important Soviet Directives for the Battle of Krasniy Bor

Foreign relations between the USSR and the US

Documents on the international relations and foreign policy of the Soviet Union.

See also United States-Soviet Relations and the Warsaw Pact.

From the Wilson Center Digital Archive

(1946-2010; English and Russian; facsimiles or transcriptions)

Stalin Continued

Central Intelligence Agency Reports During the Cold War

CIA Analysis of the Soviet Navy

CIA Analysis of the Warsaw Pact Forces

Intelligence Warning of the 1957 Launch of Sputnik

Soviet and Warsaw Pact Military Journals

What was the Missile Gap?

In cooperation with Central Intelligence Agency

(1945-1960's; English facsimiles)

This is a collection of primary source documents focusing on the difficult road to the establishment of the alliance between the People's Republic of China and the Soviet Union.

See also:

Sino-Soviet Alliance, 1950-1959

Sino-Soviet Split, 1960-1984

Sino-Soviet Border Conflict, 1969

Sino-Soviet Rapprochement, 1985-1989

From the Wilson Center Digital Archive

(1947-1958; English)

Khrushchev

Central Intelligence Agency Reports During the Cold War

CIA Analysis of the Soviet Navy

CIA Analysis of the Warsaw Pact Forces

Intelligence Warning of the 1957 Launch of Sputnik

Soviet and Warsaw Pact Military Journals

What was the Missile Gap?

In cooperation with Central Intelligence Agency

(1945-1960's; English facsimiles)

See also, Making of the Sino-Soviet Alliance, 1945-1950; Sino-Soviet Split, 1960-1984; Sino-Soviet Border Conflict, 1969; and Sino-Soviet Rapprochement, 1985-1989.

(1950-1960; English)

Documents about the Cuban Missile Crisis and resulting Soviet-American relations.

Part of the Wilson Center's Digital Archive of the Cold War.

See also Cuban Foreign Relations

(August 1961 to January 1968, mainly October 1962; English transcriptions, facsimiles)

Stagnation: Brezhnev, Andropov, Chernenko

A Day that Shook the World

Historical Footage: "A Day That Shook the World recalls the days of the 20th century that proved to be era-defining and pivotal in the course of modern history. These are the days on which political revolutions, technological breakthroughs, and sporting triumphs took place, and whose effects were felt the world-over."

Abdication of Tsar Nikolas 1917

Big 3 Meet at Yalta to Carve Up Post-War World 1945

Khrushchev Denounces Stalin 1956

Soviets Crush Hungarian Revolt 1956

Yuri Gagarin Becomes The First Man In Space 1961

Soviets Put Down Prague Spring 1968

Official End of the Cold War 1989

Soviet Coup Failed 1991

Yeltsin Crushes Political Rebels 1993

Coproduction of British Pathe and BBC

(20th century; English; videos)

Central Intelligence Agency Reports During the Cold War

CIA Analysis of the Soviet Navy

CIA Analysis of the Warsaw Pact Forces

Intelligence Warning of the 1957 Launch of Sputnik

Soviet and Warsaw Pact Military Journals

What was the Missile Gap?

In cooperation with Central Intelligence Agency

(1945-1960's; English facsimiles)

The Diary of Anatoly Chernyaev (1972-1991)

The 1983 War Scare - "The Last Paroxysm" of the Cold War

Letters between Reagan and Gorbachev

Records from the US-Soviet Geneva Summit

Preparations for the US-Soviet Reykjavik Summit

Records from the US-Soviet Reykjavik Summit

The Aftermath of the US-Soviet Reykjavik Summit

State Department briefing papers for various negotiations with the Soviet Union

Records from the US-Soviet Washington Summit

The Aftermath of the US-Soviet Washington Summit

Summary of Shultz's briefing about the Washington Summit to the North Atlantic Council

Telegram says Washington summit "has taken us a gigantic step forward" on strategic arms.

(12 December 1987; English facsimile)

Chernyaev's memo to Gorbachev about the Washington Summit

(16 December 1987; English translation)

Gorbachev's presentation of the Washington Summit to Politburo

Gorbachev says that the Washington Summit built US-Soviet understanding more than than Geneva or Reykjavik summits.

(17 December 1987; English translation)

Records from the US-Soviet Moscow Summit

Footage: Gorbachev and US Politics

Video documentation of the conventions between the USSR and USA leaders

Gorbachev & Reagan Summit: Washington DC 1987

Gorbachev & Reagan Summit: Moscow 1988

Gorbachev & Bush Summit: Washington DC 1990

From AP Archive

(1988-1989; English; videos)

Documents from the National Security Archives

Soviet Origins of Helmut Kohl's 10 Points

Prague Communists Called for Wall to Open on November 8, 1989

Conversation between James Baker and Eduard Shevardnadze

Conversation between Mikhail Gorbachev and James Baker

conversation between Robert Gates and Vladimir Kryuchkov

conversation between Mikhail Gorbachev and Helmut Kohl

Multiple similar documents found HERE

(1989; English facsimiles)

Gorbachev

EuroDocs > History of Russia: Primary Documents > Russian Revolution, Civil War and USSR 1917-1991

EuroDocs Creator: Richard Hacken, European Studies Librarian,
Harold B. Lee Library, Brigham Young University, Provo, Utah, USA.
Feel free to get in touch: Hacken @ byu.edu
With special thanks to Natalya Georgiyeva and Marren Haneberg for their help with this webpage.

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Russian Revolution, Civil War and USSR 1917-1991 - EuroDocs

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EuroDocs > History of Russia: Primary Documents > Russian Revolution, Civil War and USSR 1917-1991 Documents, images, audio and videos from Russian-Soviet history.

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Internet Modern History Sourcebook

Russian Revolution

See Main Page for a guide to all contents of all sections.
General The Tsarist State Back to Index
The Russian Revolution

WEB History of Russia and the former USSR [At Internet Archive]

WEB The Vladimir Ilyich Lenin Internet Archive [At Marxists.org]

WEB The Leon Trotsky Internet Archive [At Marxists.org]

WEB The Josef Marxists [At Marxists.org]

Summary: The Russian Revolution

The Development of the Opposition

Lenin

1905

Workers' Petition, January 9th 1905 (Bloody Sunday) [At SHU] [Internet Archive version here]

Manifesto of 17 October 1905 [At SHU] [Internet Archive version here]

The Russian Fundamental Law of 23 April 1906 [Was At Durham, now Internet Archive]

The Stolypin Agrarian Reform: On Peasants Leaving the Land Commune (obshchina), Ukaz of 9 November 1906 [Was At Durham, now Internet Archive]

Manifesto of June 3rd 1907 (Dissolution of the Second Duma) [At SHU] [Internet Archive version here]

1905 Party Programs

Program of the Socialist Revolutionary Party, 1905 [Was At Durham, now Internet Archive]

Program of the Russian Constitutional Democratic (Kadet) Party, 1905 [Was At Durham, now Internet Archive]

The Octobrists [Was At Durham, now Internet Archive]

The Nationalists [Was At Durham, now Internet Archive]

Programme of the Union of the Russian People, 1905 [Was At Durham, now Internet Archive]

The Bolsheviks, Russian SDP Program, 1 Aug 1903 [Was At Durham, now Internet Archive]

The Menscheviks: On the Seizure of Power and Participation in a Provisional Government, April 1905 [Was At Durham, now Internet Archive]

1917

WEB The October Revolution [At Marxists]
Timeline and many primary source documents.

Telegram from the American Consulate in Sweden to the U.S. Secretary of State March 17, 1917 [At Hanover]

Telegram from the American Consulate in Petrograd to the U.S. Secretary of State March 20, 1917 [At Hanover]

Telegram from the American Consulate in Moscow to the U.S. Secretary of State March 20, 1917 [At Hanover]

Tsar Nicholas II, Abdication March 15, 1917 [Was At Durham, now Internet Archive]

The First Provisional Government Izvestiia, 3 March 1917 [Was At Durham, now Internet Archive]

Resolutions adopted by the First All-Russian Congress of Soviets June 1917 [Was At Durham, now Internet Archive]

Vladmir Illyich Lenin (1870-1924): On His April Theses [Was At Durham, now Internet Archive]

Vladmir Illyich Lenin (1870-1924): Call to Power Oct 24, 1917 [At this Site]

Declaration of the Rights of the Toilng and Exploited Peoples 1917(?) [Was At Durham, now Internet Archive]

Vladmir Illyich Lenin (1870-1924): On the Organization of and Extraordinary Commission to Fight Counter Revolution, Letter to Dzerzhinskii, December 19, 1917 [Was At Durham, now Internet Archive]
The origins of the Cheka, NKVD, and KGB.

Anatoly Vasilievich Lunacharsky: Leo Trotsky, from Revolutionary Silhouttes [At Marxists.org]

Louise Bryant (1885-1939): Six Red Months in Russia: An Observers Account of Russia Before and During the Proletarian Dictatorship 1918, full text [At Marxists.org]

John Reed (1887-1920): Ten Days that Shook the World 1919, full text [At Marxists.org]

YouTube: The Russian Revolution, from the film Reds 1981, based on the experiences of Louise Bryant and her husband John Reed [YouTube links are subject to change.]
The entire October Revolution takes place during a singing of theThe Internationale.

Back to Index
Bolshevik Rule to 1924
Back to Index
Stalinism

WEB Revelations From the Russian Archives [At Library of Congress]
A tremendous resource from an exhibition in 1992.

WEB The Great Terror 1939-1939 [At Marxists]
Timeline and many primary source documents.

Josef Stalin (1879-1953): Marxism and the National Question 1913 [At Marxists]

Josef Stalin (1879-1953): Trotskyism or Leninism? 1924 [At Marxists]

Josef Stalin (1879-1953): Industrialization of the Country 1928 [At this Site]

Josef Stalin (1879-1953): Dialectical and Historical Materialism 1938 [At Marxists]

Dizzy With Success: Concerning Questions of the Collective Farm Movement from Pravda, March 2, 1930. [Was At Durham, now Internet Archive]

Collective Farms of the Union 1929-1940 [Was At Durham, now Internet Archive]

Memorandum on the Grain Problem 1932 [At Library of Congress]
The memo which indicates the deliberate start of the Ukrainian famine.

Joseph Stalin: Dialectical and Historical Materialism (September 1938) [At Artbin] [Internet Archive version here]

Hymn to Stalin [At this Site]
The cult of personality.

Osip Mandelstam (1934?), and Yevgeny Yevtushenko (1962): Poems on Stalin [At this Site]

The Soviet Purges: Official Explanation, 1936, excerpts [At this Site]

The Case of the Trotskyite-Zinovievite Terrorist Centre, Heard before the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court of the U.S.S.R., Moscow, August 19-24, 1936" (Overview) [Divided into 10 files][At Artbin] [Internet Archive versionhere]

N.I. Bukharin: Last Plea, from "The case of the Anti-Soviet 'Bloc of Rights and Trotskyites', Heard before the Military Colegium of the Supreme Court of the U.S.S.R., Moscow, March 2-13, 1938 [At Artbin] [Internet Archive versionhere]

Rapprochement between The Orthodox Church and Soviet Government. Speech of M. G. Karpov at Council of the Orthodox Church, 1945. [Was At Durham, now Internet Archive]

Back to Index
NOTES:

The Internet Modern Sourcebook is part of the Internet History Sourcebooks Project. The date of inception was 9/22/1997. Links to files at other site are indicated by [At some indication of the site name or location]. Locally available texts are marked by [At this Site]. WEB indicates a link to one of small number of high quality web sites which provide either more texts or an especially valuable overview.

The Site Concept and Design: created 26 Jan 1996: latest revision 20 November 2023 [ Internet History Sourcebooks Project is located at the History Department of Fordham University, New York. The Internet Medieval Sourcebook, and other medieval components of the project, are located at the Fordham University Center for Medieval Studies.The IHSP recognizes the contribution of Fordham University, the Fordham University History Department, and the Fordham Center for Medieval Studies in providing web space and server support for the project. The IHSP is a project independent of Fordham University. Although the IHSP seeks to follow all applicable copyright law, Fordham University is not the institutional owner, and is not liable as the result of any legal action. Paul Halsall CV]

©

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Internet History Sourcebooks: Modern History

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Internet Modern History Sourcebook Russian Revolution See Main Page for a guide to all contents of all sections.

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NOTES: Dates of accession of material added since July 1998 can be seen in the

French Revolution

See Main Page for a guide to all contents of all sections.
The French Revolution

WEB Livre des sources médiévales
Contains considerable materialin French on the Ancien Regime and the Revolution.

WEB French Revolution Links [At Portsmouth]

Lead-Up

Marie Antoinette: Letter to Her Mother, 1773 [At this Site]

Madame Campan: Memoirs of the Private Life of Marie Antoinette, 1818 [At this Site]

Arthur Young (1741-1820): Travels During the Years 1787, 1788 and 1789 [At Then Again]

Arthur Young (1741-1820): Travels in France, 1792. excerpts [At Hanover]

Anne-Robert-Jacques Turgot (1727-1781): Reflections on the Formation and Distribution of Wealth by M. Turgot, Comptroller General of the Finances of France, In 1774, 1775 and 1776. or in French [At McMaster]

Cahier of 1789: The Clergy of Blois and Romorantin [At Hanover]

Cahiers of 1789: The Nobility of Blois [At Hanover]

Cahiers of 1789: The Third Estate of Versailles [At Hanover]

Cahiers of 1789: The Third Estate of Carcassonne [At Hanover]

Cahier of the Third Estate of Dourdan, March 29, 1789 [At History Guide]

Jean-Marie Roland de la Platière: The State of the French Economy, 1789 [At this Site]

Liberal Revolution

Radical Revolution

Documents of the National Convention, c. 1792 [At Hanover]

Proclamation of the Duke of Brunswick, 1792 [At Hanover]
The threat that lead to the onset of the French Revolutionary wars.

Ça Ira [At this Site]
The most popular of the revolutionary songs

The Marseillaise [At this Site]

The Leveé en Masse, August 23, 1793 [At this Site]

The Doctrine of Graccus Babeufh, 1795 [At Internet Archive, from Clinch Valley College]

Conversion of French revolutionary and Common Era Dates [At gefrance]

Edmund Burke (1729-1797): The Death of Marie Antoinette [At this Site]

St. Just (d.1794): Republican Institutes [At Hanover]

Maximilian Robespierre (1758-94): On the Festival of the Supreme Being,, 1794 [At this Site]

Maximilien Robespierre (1758-94): On the Principles of Political Morality, 1794, excerpts [At this Site]

Maximilian Robespierre (1758-94): Terror and Virtue, 1794 [At this Site]
RG Reading Guide

2ND Gwynne Lewis: The People and the French Revolution [At Internet Archive, from Warwick]

Back to Index
Responses to Revolution

Olympe de Gouges: Declaration of the Rights of Women, 1791, excerpts [At this Site]

Edmund Burke (1729-1797): Reflections on the Revolution in France, 1791, short excerpts [At Internet Archive, from Clinch Valley College]

Edmund Burke (1729-1797): Reflections on the Revolution in France, 1791, moderate length excerpts [At Internet Archive, from Baylor]

Edmund Burke (1729-1797): Reflections on the Revolution in France, 1791, extended excerpts [At this Site]

Edmund Burke (1729-1797): Reflections on The Revolution in France [At ArtBin][Full Text]

Thomas Paine (1737-1809): Rights of Man 1792 [At Yale]
A response to Edmund Burke.

Thomas Paine(1737-1809): The Rights of Man, 1791-1792 [At American Revolution]

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Napoleon I Bonaparte(1769-1821)
Back to Index
Napoleonic Wars
Back to Index New Additions page.. The date of inception was 9/22/1997. Links to files at other site are indicated by [At some indication of the site name or location]. Locally available texts are marked by [At this Site]. WEB indicates a link to one of small number of high quality web sites which provide either more texts or an especially valuable overview.

The Site Concept and Design: created 26 Jan 1996: latest revision 20 January 2021 [ Internet History Sourcebooks Project is located at the History Department of Fordham University, New York. The Internet Medieval Sourcebook, and other medieval components of the project, are located at the Fordham University Center for Medieval Studies.The IHSP recognizes the contribution of Fordham University, the Fordham University History Department, and the Fordham Center for Medieval Studies in providing web space and server support for the project. The IHSP is a project independent of Fordham University. Although the IHSP seeks to follow all applicable copyright law, Fordham University is not the institutional owner, and is not liable as the result of any legal action. Paul Halsall CV]

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NOTES: Dates of accession of material added since July 1998 can be seen in the French Revolution See Main Page for a guide to all contents of all sections. The French Revolution WEB Livre des sources médiévales Contains considerable materialin French on the Ancien Regime and the Revolution.

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English Bill of Rights 1689

An Act Declaring the Rights and Liberties of the Subject and Settling the Succession of the Crown

Whereas the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons assembled at Westminster, lawfully, fully and freely representing all the estates of the people of this realm, did upon the thirteenth day of February in the year of our Lord one thousand six hundred eighty-eight [old style date] present unto their Majesties, then called and known by the names and style of William and Mary, prince and princess of Orange, being present in their proper persons, a certain declaration in writing made by the said Lords and Commons in the words following, viz.:

Whereas the late King James the Second, by the assistance of divers evil counsellors, judges and ministers employed by him, did endeavour to subvert and extirpate the Protestant religion and the laws and liberties of this kingdom;

By assuming and exercising a power of dispensing with and suspending of laws and the execution of laws without consent of Parliament;

By committing and prosecuting divers worthy prelates for humbly petitioning to be excused from concurring to the said assumed power;

By issuing and causing to be executed a commission under the great seal for erecting a court called the Court of Commissioners for Ecclesiastical Causes;

By levying money for and to the use of the Crown by pretence of prerogative for other time and in other manner than the same was granted by Parliament;

By raising and keeping a standing army within this kingdom in time of peace without consent of Parliament, and quartering soldiers contrary to law;

By causing several good subjects being Protestants to be disarmed at the same time when papists were both armed and employed contrary to law;

By violating the freedom of election of members to serve in Parliament;

By prosecutions in the Court of King's Bench for matters and causes cognizable only in Parliament, and by divers other arbitrary and illegal courses;

And whereas of late years partial corrupt and unqualified persons have been returned and served on juries in trials, and particularly divers jurors in trials for high treason which were not freeholders;

And excessive bail hath been required of persons committed in criminal cases to elude the benefit of the laws made for the liberty of the subjects;

And excessive fines have been imposed;

And illegal and cruel punishments inflicted;

And several grants and promises made of fines and forfeitures before any conviction or judgment against the persons upon whom the same were to be levied;

All which are utterly and directly contrary to the known laws and statutes and freedom of this realm;

And whereas the said late King James the Second having abdicated the government and the throne being thereby vacant, his Highness the prince of Orange (whom it hath pleased Almighty God to make the glorious instrument of delivering this kingdom from popery and arbitrary power) did (by the advice of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and divers principal persons of the Commons) cause letters to be written to the Lords Spiritual and Temporal being Protestants, and other letters to the several counties, cities, universities, boroughs and cinque ports, for the choosing of such persons to represent them as were of right to be sent to Parliament, to meet and sit at Westminster upon the two and twentieth day of January in this year one thousand six hundred eighty and eight [old style date], in order to such an establishment as that their religion, laws and liberties might not again be in danger of being subverted, upon which letters elections having been accordingly made;

And thereupon the said Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons, pursuant to their respective letters and elections, being now assembled in a full and free representative of this nation, taking into their most serious consideration the best means for attaining the ends aforesaid, do in the first place (as their ancestors in like case have usually done) for the vindicating and asserting their ancient rights and liberties declare

That the pretended power of suspending the laws or the execution of laws by regal authority without consent of Parliament is illegal;

That the pretended power of dispensing with laws or the execution of laws by regal authority, as it hath been assumed and exercised of late, is illegal;

That the commission for erecting the late Court of Commissioners for Ecclesiastical Causes, and all other commissions and courts of like nature, are illegal and pernicious;

That levying money for or to the use of the Crown by pretence of prerogative, without grant of Parliament, for longer time, or in other manner than the same is or shall be granted, is illegal;

That it is the right of the subjects to petition the king, and all commitments and prosecutions for such petitioning are illegal;

That the raising or keeping a standing army within the kingdom in time of peace, unless it be with consent of Parliament, is against law;

That the subjects which are Protestants may have arms for their defence suitable to their conditions and as allowed by law;

That election of members of Parliament ought to be free;

That the freedom of speech and debates or proceedings in Parliament ought not to be impeached or questioned in any court or place out of Parliament;

That excessive bail ought not to be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted;

That jurors ought to be duly impanelled and returned, and jurors which pass upon men in trials for high treason ought to be freeholders;

That all grants and promises of fines and forfeitures of particular persons before conviction are illegal and void;

And that for redress of all grievances, and for the amending, strengthening and preserving of the laws, Parliaments ought to be held frequently.

And they do claim, demand and insist upon all and singular the premises as their undoubted rights and liberties, and that no declarations, judgments, doings or proceedings to the prejudice of the people in any of the said premises ought in any wise to be drawn hereafter into consequence or example; to which demand of their rights they are particularly encouraged by the declaration of his Highness the prince of Orange as being the only means for obtaining a full redress and remedy therein. Having therefore an entire confidence that his said Highness the prince of Orange will perfect the deliverance so far advanced by him, and will still preserve them from the violation of their rights which they have here asserted, and from all other attempts upon their religion, rights and liberties, the said Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons assembled at Westminster do resolve that William and Mary, prince and princess of Orange, be and be declared king and queen of England, France and Ireland and the dominions thereunto belonging, to hold the crown and royal dignity of the said kingdoms and dominions to them, the said prince and princess, during their lives and the life of the survivor to them, and that the sole and full exercise of the regal power be only in and executed by the said prince of Orange in the names of the said prince and princess during their joint lives, and after their deceases the said crown and royal dignity of the same kingdoms and dominions to be to the heirs of the body of the said princess, and for default of such issue to the Princess Anne of Denmark and the heirs of her body, and for default of such issue to the heirs of the body of the said prince of Orange. And the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons do pray the said prince and princess to accept the same accordingly.

And that the oaths hereafter mentioned be taken by all persons of whom the oaths have allegiance and supremacy might be required by law, instead of them; and that the said oaths of allegiance and supremacy be abrogated.

I, A.B., do sincerely promise and swear that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to their Majesties King William and Queen Mary. So help me God.

I, A.B., do swear that I do from my heart abhor, detest and abjure as impious and heretical this damnable doctrine and position, that princes excommunicated or deprived by the Pope or any authority of the see of Rome may be deposed or murdered by their subjects or any other whatsoever. And I do declare that no foreign prince, person, prelate, state or potentate hath or ought to have any jurisdiction, power, superiority, pre-eminence or authority, ecclesiastical or spiritual, within this realm. So help me God.

Upon which their said Majesties did accept the crown and royal dignity of the kingdoms of England, France and Ireland, and the dominions thereunto belonging, according to the resolution and desire of the said Lords and Commons contained in the said declaration. And thereupon their Majesties were pleased that the said Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons, being the two Houses of Parliament, should continue to sit, and with their Majesties' royal concurrence make effectual provision for the settlement of the religion, laws and liberties of this kingdom, so that the same for the future might not be in danger again of being subverted, to which the said Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons did agree, and proceed to act accordingly. Now in pursuance of the premises the said Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons in Parliament assembled, for the ratifying, confirming and establishing the said declaration and the articles, clauses, matters and things therein contained by the force of law made in due form by authority of Parliament, do pray that it may be declared and enacted that all and singular the rights and liberties asserted and claimed in the said declaration are the true, ancient and indubitable rights and liberties of the people of this kingdom, and so shall be esteemed, allowed, adjudged, deemed and taken to be; and that all and every the particulars aforesaid shall be firmly and strictly holden and observed as they are expressed in the said declaration, and all officers and ministers whatsoever shall serve their Majesties and their successors according to the same in all time to come. And the said Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons, seriously considering how it hath pleased Almighty God in his marvellous providence and merciful goodness to this nation to provide and preserve their said Majesties' royal persons most happily to reign over us upon the throne of their ancestors, for which they render unto him from the bottom of their hearts their humblest thanks and praises, do truly, firmly, assuredly and in the sincerity of their hearts think, and do hereby recognize, acknowledge and declare, that King James the Second having abdicated the government, and their Majesties having accepted the crown and royal dignity as aforesaid, their said Majesties did become, were, are and of right ought to be by the laws of this realm our sovereign liege lord and lady, king and queen of England, France and Ireland and the dominions thereunto belonging, in and to whose princely persons the royal state, crown and dignity of the said realms with all honours, styles, titles, regalities, prerogatives, powers, jurisdictions and authorities to the same belonging and appertaining are most fully, rightfully and entirely invested and incorporated, united and annexed. And for preventing all questions and divisions in this realm by reason of any pretended titles to the crown, and for preserving a certainty in the succession thereof, in and upon which the unity, peace, tranquility and safety of this nation doth under God wholly consist and depend, the said Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons do beseech their Majesties that it may be enacted, established and declared, that the crown and regal government of the said kingdoms and dominions, with all and singular the premises thereunto belonging and appertaining, shall be and continue to their said Majesties and the survivor of them during their lives and the life of the survivor of them, and that the entire, perfect and full exercise of the regal power and government be only in and executed by his Majesty in the names of both their Majesties during their joint lives; and after their deceases the said crown and premises shall be and remain to the heirs of the body of her Majesty, and for default of such issue to her Royal Highness the Princess Anne of Denmark and the heirs of the body of his said Majesty; and thereunto the said Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons do in the name of all the people aforesaid most humbly and faithfully submit themselves, their heirs and posterities for ever, and do faithfully promise that they will stand to, maintain and defend their said Majesties, and also the limitation and succession of the crown herein specified and contained, to the utmost of their powers with their lives and estates against all persons whatsoever that shall attempt anything to the contrary. And whereas it hath been found by experience that it is inconsistent with the safety and welfare of this Protestant kingdom to be governed by a popish prince, or by any king or queen marrying a papist, the said Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons do further pray that it may be enacted, that all and every person and persons that is, are or shall be reconciled to or shall hold communion with the see or Church of Rome, or shall profess the popish religion, or shall marry a papist, shall be excluded and be for ever incapable to inherit, possess or enjoy the crown and government of this realm and Ireland and the dominions thereunto belonging or any part of the same, or to have, use or exercise any regal power, authority or jurisdiction within the same; and in all and every such case or cases the people of these realms shall be and are hereby absolved of their allegiance; and the said crown and government shall from time to time descend to and be enjoyed by such person or persons being Protestants as should have inherited and enjoyed the same in case the said person or persons so reconciled, holding communion or professing or marrying as aforesaid were naturally dead; and that every king and queen of this realm who at any time hereafter shall come to and succeed in the imperial crown of this kingdom shall on the first day of the meeting of the first Parliament next after his or her coming to the crown, sitting in his or her throne in the House of Peers in the presence of the Lords and Commons therein assembled, or at his or her coronation before such person or persons who shall administer the coronation oath to him or her at the time of his or her taking the said oath (which shall first happen), make, subscribe and audibly repeat the declaration mentioned in the statute made in the thirtieth year of the reign of King Charles the Second entitled, _An Act for the more effectual preserving the king's person and government by disabling papists from sitting in either House of Parliament._ But if it shall happen that such king or queen upon his or her succession to the crown of this realm shall be under the age of twelve years, then every such king or queen shall make, subscribe and audibly repeat the same declaration at his or her coronation or the first day of the meeting of the first Parliament as aforesaid which shall first happen after such king or queen shall have attained the said age of twelve years. All which their Majesties are contented and pleased shall be declared, enacted and established by authority of this present Parliament, and shall stand, remain and be the law of this realm for ever; and the same are by their said Majesties, by and with the advice and consent of the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons in Parliament assembled and by the authority of the same, declared, enacted and established accordingly.

II. And be it further declared and enacted by the authority aforesaid, that from and after this present session of Parliament no dispensation by _non obstante_ of or to any statute or any part thereof shall be allowed, but that the same shall be held void and of no effect, except a dispensation be allowed of in such statute, and except in such cases as shall be specially provided for by one or more bill or bills to be passed during this present session of Parliament.

III. Provided that no charter or grant or pardon granted before the three and twentieth day of October in the year of our Lord one thousand six hundred eighty-nine shall be any ways impeached or invalidated by this Act, but that the same shall be and remain of the same force and effect in law and no other than as if this Act had never been made.

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Avalon Project - English Bill of Rights 1689

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English Bill of Rights 1689 Whereas the Lords Spiritual and Temporal and Commons assembled at Westminster, lawfully, fully and freely representing all the estates of the people of this realm, did upon the thirteenth day of February in the year of our Lord one thousand six hundred eighty-eight [old style

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Mahatma Gandhi (born October 2, 1869, Porbandar, India-died January 30, 1948, Delhi) Indian lawyer, politician, social activist, and writer who became the leader of the nationalist movement against the British rule of India. As such, he came to be considered the father of his country. Gandhi is internationally esteemed for his doctrine of nonviolent protest ( satyagraha) to achieve political and social progress.

In the eyes of millions of his fellow Indians, Gandhi was the Mahatma ("Great Soul"). The unthinking adoration of the huge crowds that gathered to see him all along the route of his tours made them a severe ordeal; he could hardly work during the day or rest at night. "The woes of the Mahatmas," he wrote, "are known only to the Mahatmas." His fame spread worldwide during his lifetime and only increased after his death. The name Mahatma Gandhi is now one of the most universally recognized on earth.

Youth

Gandhi was the youngest child of his father's fourth wife. His father-Karamchand Gandhi, who was the dewan (chief minister) of Porbandar, the capital of a small principality in western India (in what is now Gujarat state) under British suzerainty-did not have much in the way of a formal education. He was, however, an able administrator who knew how to steer his way between the capricious princes, their long-suffering subjects, and the headstrong British political officers in power.

Gandhi's mother, Putlibai, was completely absorbed in religion, did not care much for finery or jewelry, divided her time between her home and the temple, fasted frequently, and wore herself out in days and nights of nursing whenever there was sickness in the family. Mohandas grew up in a home steeped in Vaishnavism-worship of the Hindu god Vishnu-with a strong tinge of Jainism, a morally rigorous Indian religion whose chief tenets are nonviolence and the belief that everything in the universe is eternal. Thus, he took for granted ahimsa (noninjury to all living beings), vegetarianism, fasting for self-purification, and mutual tolerance between adherents of various creeds and sects.

The educational facilities at Porbandar were rudimentary; in the primary school that Mohandas attended, the children wrote the alphabet in the dust with their fingers. Luckily for him, his father became dewan of Rajkot, another princely state. Though Mohandas occasionally won prizes and scholarships at the local schools, his record was on the whole mediocre. One of the terminal reports rated him as "good at English, fair in Arithmetic and weak in Geography; conduct very good, bad handwriting." He was married at the age of 13 and thus lost a year at school. A diffident child, he shone neither in the classroom nor on the playing field. He loved to go out on long solitary walks when he was not nursing his by then ailing father (who died soon thereafter) or helping his mother with her household chores.

He had learned, in his words, "to carry out the orders of the elders, not to scan them." With such extreme passivity, it is not surprising that he should have gone through a phase of adolescent rebellion, marked by secret atheism, petty thefts, furtive smoking, and-most shocking of all for a boy born in a Vaishnava family-meat eating. His adolescence was probably no stormier than that of most children of his age and class. What was extraordinary was the way his youthful transgressions ended.

"Never again" was his promise to himself after each escapade. And he kept his promise. Beneath an unprepossessing exterior, he concealed a burning passion for self-improvement that led him to take even the heroes of Hindu mythology, such as Prahlada and Harishcandra-legendary embodiments of truthfulness and sacrifice-as living models.

In 1887 Mohandas scraped through the matriculation examination of the University of Bombay (now University of Mumbai) and joined Samaldas College in Bhavnagar (Bhaunagar). As he had to suddenly switch from his native language- Gujarati -to English, he found it rather difficult to follow the lectures.

Meanwhile, his family was debating his future. Left to himself, he would have liked to have been a doctor. But, besides the Vaishnava prejudice against vivisection, it was clear that, if he was to keep up the family tradition of holding high office in one of the states in Gujarat, he would have to qualify as a barrister. That meant a visit to England, and Mohandas, who was not too happy at Samaldas College, jumped at the proposal. His youthful imagination conceived England as "a land of philosophers and poets, the very centre of civilization." But there were several hurdles to be crossed before the visit to England could be realized. His father had left the family little property; moreover, his mother was reluctant to expose her youngest child to unknown temptations and dangers in a distant land. But Mohandas was determined to visit England. One of his brothers raised the necessary money, and his mother's doubts were allayed when he took a vow that, while away from home, he would not touch wine, women, or meat. Mohandas disregarded the last obstacle-the decree of the leaders of the Modh Bania subcaste ( Vaishya caste), to which the Gandhis belonged, who forbade his trip to England as a violation of the Hindu religion-and sailed in September 1888. Ten days after his arrival, he joined the Inner Temple, one of the four London law colleges ( The Temple).

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Mahatma Gandhi | Biography, Education, Religion, Accomplishments, Death, & Facts

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Mahatma Gandhi, the revered Indian leader and advocate of nonviolent resistance, inspired a nation to fight for independence from British rule through peaceful means, leaving an enduring legacy in history.

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Table of Contents

When is Independence Day in India?

How is Independence Day celebrated in India?

Did the partition of India and Pakistan happen on Independence Day?

How did India gain independence from British rule?

This article was most recently revised and updated by

Independence Day, in India, national holiday celebrated annually on August 15. Independence Day marks the end of British rule in 1947 and the establishment of a free and independent Indian nation. It also marks the anniversary of the partition of the subcontinent into two countries, India and Pakistan, which occurred at midnight on August 14-15, 1947. (In Pakistan, Independence Day is celebrated on August 14.)

British rule in India began in 1757 when, following the British victory at the Battle of Plassey, the English East India Company began exercising control over the country. The East India Company ruled India for 100 years, until it was replaced by direct British rule (often referred to as the British raj) in the wake of the Indian Mutiny in 1857-58. The Indian independence movement began during World War I and was led by Mohandas K. Gandhi, who advocated for a peaceful and nonviolent end to British rule.

This Day in History Quiz: August 15

Independence Day is marked throughout India with flag-raising ceremonies, drills, and the singing of the Indian national anthem. Additionally, various cultural programs are made available in the state capitals. After the prime minister participates in the flag-raising ceremony at the Red Fort historic monument in Old Delhi, a parade ensues with members of the armed forces and police. The prime minister then delivers a televised address to the country, recounting the major accomplishments of India during the previous year and outlining future challenges and goals. Kite flying has also become an Independence Day tradition, with kites of various sizes, shapes, and colours filling the sky. Also, to commemorate the day, government offices in New Delhi remain lit throughout the holiday, even though they are closed.

The Editors of Encyclopaedia Britannica Amy Tikkanen.

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Independence Day (India) | History, Date, & Facts

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Independence Day, in India, national holiday celebrated annually on August 15. Independence Day marks the end of British rule in 1947 and the establishment of a free and independent Indian nation. It also marks the anniversary of the partition of the subcontinent into two countries, India and Pakistan, which occurred at midnight on August 14-15, 1947.

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Internet Indian History Sourcebook

This page is a subset of texts derived from the three major online Sourcebooks listed below, along with added texts and web site indicators. For more contextual information, for instance about Western imperialism, the Islamic world, or the history of a given period, check out these web sites.

In addition to direct links to documents, links are made to a number of other web resources.

2ND

Link to a secondary article, review or discussion on a given topic.

WEB

Link to a website focused on a specific issue.. These are not links to every site on a given topic, but to sites of serious educational value.

Contents
Indus Valley Cultures

General
Indus Valley

Image: Harrapan Seals [At Internet Archive, from CCNY]

Early India:
Harappan (3000 - 1500 BC/BCE)/ Aryan (1500 - 600 BC/BCE)
Links and guide to art objects of the period. [At Internet Archive]

The Vedic Age

General
Aryans
There is now some significant opposition among some writers to the idea that there was ever an Aryan [i.e. Indo-European] movement into India. This opposition seems to derive, at least in part, from nationalist desires to claim "we were always here". The linguistic arguments for some common group which moved into both India, Iran, and Europe remain compelling.

The Laws of Manu, c. 1500 BCE, full text, [At this Site]

The Laws of Manu, c. 1500 BCE, excerpts, [At Internet Archive, from CCNY]

2ND Languages and Vedas [At Friesian.com]
Odd page, with odder organization, but useful maps and data on numbers of language speakers and migrations. Also contains info on the Vedas and Upanishads.

2ND David Frawley: Myth of Aryan Invasion of India [At India Forum], a complete book, andMyth of Aryan Invasion of India [At Hindunet] an article-length discussion.
Frawley attacks 19th-century scholars such as Max Muller for bias, but seems unaware of his own problematic position. His argumentative strategies reek of special pleading.

2ND Richard Hooker: The Arayans [At WSU]
A much more reliable account that the nationalist arguments above.

The Vedas

Rig Veda: Hymn, excerpts, [At WSU]

Rig Veda: Selection [At Mountain Man]

The Purusha Sukta, The Vedic Hymn on the Supreme Being [At Ramanuja]

Varuna, the All-Knowing God ('Rig Veda,' I, 25, 1-3, 7-14) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

King Varuna is there ('Atharva Veda,' IV, 16, 1-6) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

Varuna and Indra (Rigveda) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

'What god shall we adore with our oblation?' (Rigveda) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

'Indra- who as soon as born surpassed the gods in power' ('Rig Veda,' II, 12, 1-5 13) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

A Vedic Hymn to the Goddess Earth ('Atharva-Veda,' XII, I, selections) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

'Loose me from Sin' :A Hymn to Varuna ('Rig Veda,' II, 28) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

'How May I and Varuna be United?' ('Rig Veda,' VII, 86) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

'Make Me Immortal' :A Hymn to Soma Pavamâna ('Rig Veda,' IX, 113, 7-11) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

Hymns to Agni ('Rig Veda,' I, 11, III, VII, selections) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

A Vedic Funerary Hymn ('Rig Veda,' X, I 8) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

The Formation of Religious Traditions
General The Hindu Tradition

Indian Cosmogony ('The Laws of Manu,' 1, 5-16) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

The Creation of the World According to the Upanishads [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

How to Become a Gadharva ('Shatapatha Brahmana,' XI, 5,) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

Diksha, an Indian Initiatory Ritual: Hinduism [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

The Moment of Death as Described by the Upanishads [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

Ramayana c. 1000 BCE
The older of the two Sanskrit poems, the Ramayana is a 50,000 line poem written by Sage Valmiki.

Mahabharata
The most famous Indian text, this epic poem is divided into 18 sections and contains over 220,000 lines. The most famous section is the Bhagavad Gita.

The Bhagavad-Gita, complete text translated by Kashinath Trimbak Telano, 1882, edited and updated by Richard Hooker [At WSU]
Now the most readable version on the net.

The Bhagavad-Gita, c. 400 BCE, full text, translated by Sir Edwin Arnold [in HTML, here]

The Bhagavad-Gita, c. 400 BCE, full text, translated by Ramanand Prasad [in HTML, At EAWC]

The Bhagavad-Gita, Full text, in Sanskrit [At Icon of India]

The Bhagavad-gita As It Is [At Krsna.com]
The full text of the version by A.C. Bhaktivedanta Swami Prabhupada, in which transliterated Sanskrit is followed by a definition of each word, a translation and a commentary.

The Bhagavad-Gita: Recension by William Quan Judge, Combined With His Essays on the Gita, trans. by William Quan Judge [At TUP]

The Bhagavad-Gita, selections [At AOL]

Krishna's Dilemma, [At Internet Archive, from CCNY]

The Mahabarata, excerpts on Kingship [At Internet Archive, from CCNY]

The Upanishads, c. 600 BCE

Vasnaivism

Vishnu, the Cosmic God ('Vishnu Pura-na,' 3, 17,14-34) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

Krishna's Ephipany (Bhagavad-Gita, XI, Selections) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

Perform action, free from attainment to its fruits... ('Bhagavad Gita,' III, 8-9, 19-24, 31, 35) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

Personal Worship: Puja Hinduism [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

The Merits of Building a Temple (Agni-purana,' XXXVIII, 1-50) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

Vidyapati (1352?-1448): Love Songs to Krishna [At WSU]

Shaivism

2ND Stephen F. Teiser, "The Spirits of Chinese Religion", from Donald S. Lopez, Jr , Religions of China in Practice, (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996) [At Brooklyn College]

Images

Devotional Texts Tantrism The Jain Tradition Buddhism

General

The Buddha

Prince Siddhartha Encounters Old Age, Sickness and Death ('Digha-nikaya,' XIV ['Mahapadana suttanta']) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

Gotama's First Masters [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

'I am the Holy One in this world, I am the highest teacher. . .' ('Mahavagga,' I, 7-9) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

Gotama Buddha Ponders ('Majjhima-.nikaya,' XXVI ['Ariya-pariyesana-sutta']) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

Gotama Buddha Remembers His Earlier Existences ('Majjhima-nikaya,' IV ['Bhaya-bherava-sutta]) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

Buddha: First Sermon (c. 6th Century BCE) [At Brooklyn College]

Buddha: The Teaching of Buddha, an early sermon on Nirvana [At Brooklyn College]

Buddha: The Four Noble Truths [At Buddhanet]

Buddha: The Basic Teachings [At Internet Archive, from CCNY]

The Buddha Enters Nirvana (Ashvagosha, 'Buddhacarita,' XXVI, 83-6, 88-106) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

The Tathagata Announces that He has Entered Nirvana ('Saddharmapundarika,' XV, 268-72) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

The Buddha: Sources on His Life and Death

The Story Of Sumedha, Translated from the Introduction to the Jataka (i.3).

The Birth Of the Buddha, Translated from the Introduction to the Jataka (i.4721)

The Attainment Of Buddhaship, Translated from the Introduction to the Jataka (i.685)

First Events After the Attainment, Translated from the Maha-Vagga, and constituting the opening sections. Hail to that Blessed One, that Saint, and Supreme Buddha!

The Buddha's Daily Habits, Translated from the Sumangala-Vilasini (i.4510), Buddhaghosa's Commentary on the Digha-Nikaya

The Death Of the Buddha, Translated from the Maha-Parinibbana-Sutta (v. and vi.) of the Digha-Nikaya

Buddhism in India

Sources on the Buddhist Order

Admission and Ordination Ceremonies, Reprinted from a paper by J.F. Dickson, B.A., in the Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society 1874

Mendicant Ideal, Translated from the Samyutta-Nikaya (xvi. 31)

And Hate Not His Father And Mother, Translated from the Visuddhi-Magga (chap. iii.)

Story Of Visakha, Part I, Translated from the Dhammapada, and from Buddhaghosa's comment

The Vinaya [Buddhist Monastic Code], full text [At Sacred Texts]

Faxian: Account of the Buddhistic Kingdoms. [At Brooklyn College]

Theravada/Hinayana Texts

The Dhammpada [At Brooklyn College]

The Dhammapada extracts, [At WSU]

The Dhammapada, trans. by John Richards [At Coombs-papers]
"An anthology of 423 Buddhist verses embodying ethical and spiritual precepts arranged by subject."

The Dhammapada,Wisdom of the Buddha, translated by Harischandra Kaviratna, Full Text [At Theosophical University Press]

The Buddha Foretells the Gradual Decline of Religion ('Anagatavamsa') [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

Gotama Buddha Talks of his Ascetic Practices ('Majjhima-nikaya,'XII ['Maha-sihanada-sutra']) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

Gotama Buddha Practiced the most Severe form of Ascetism ('Majjhima-nikaya,' XXXVI ['Maha-saccaka-sutra']) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

Sutta Nipata, selections from the Pali text translated by John D. Ireland. [At Purify Mind]

Metta Sutta [At Dharma.net]
Sub-titled "The Buddha's Words on Kindness"

Mahayana Texts

Buddha's Sermon on the No-Self [At Brooklyn College]

The Heart Sutra [At Brooklyn College]

The Heart Sutra: Various Versions [At Coombs-papers]

Mahamangala Sutra (Discourse of the Supreme Blessings) [At Coombs-papers]

The Bodhisattva's Infinite Compassion ('Shikshasamuccaya,' 280-2 ['Vajradhvaha-sutra']) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

Acts and Rewards of Devotion to the Buddha ('Shikshasamuccaya,' 299-301 ['Avalokana-sutra'] [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

The Buddhist Conception of the Intermediate State ('Saddharma-smrityupasthana Sutra,' from chapter XXXIV, via Chinese version) [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

Tibetan Book of the Dead: Death and Intermediate States [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

The Prophecy Concerning Maitreya, the Future Buddha ('Maitreyavyakarana') [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

Milerepa Extols His 'Five Comforts' [At Eliade Page, now Internet Archive]

The Sutra of Forty-Two Chapters [At the Refuge Library]
The first Buddhist text taken to China, c. 67 CE.

WEB Kalavinka
Contains very long excerpts from Nagarjuna's Treatise on The Great Perfection of Wisdom (Mahaapraj~naapaaramitaa Upadesha), "an immense
exegesis to the Mahaapraj~naapaaramitaa Sutra in 25,000
lines. Classically, it is preserved only in a 100-fascicle Chinese edition translated from Sanskrit in 405c.e. by Kumarajiva, the brilliant and prolific translator-monk who was the premier transmitter to the Chinese of the Maadhyamika teachings of Nagarjuna."

Chinese/Japanese Buddhist Texts

Modern Renditions

Medieval India

General The Mauryan Empire (321-185 BCE)

Image: Maurayan Empire Map c. 250 BCE [At WSU]

Kautilya: The Arthashastra, c. 250 BCE [At this Site]
Extensive selections

Kautilya: The Arthashastra - On Gender Issues, c. 250 BCE [At this Site]

Kautilya: The Arthashastra (3rd Cent. BCE) [At WSU]
A treatise on government by the "prime minister" of India's first great emperor, Chandragupta Maurya.

Kautilya: The Arthashastra (3rd Cent. BCE) [At Internet Archive, from CCNY]
Another selection.

Ashoka (c. 265-238 BCE; also given as c. 273-232 BCE)

Gupta Empire (320-550 CE)

Tales From Ancient India [At this Site]

Kalidasa (4th-5th C. CE?): The Recognition of Sakuntala [At WSU]
A text from the "greatest of all ancient Indian playwrights".

Kalidasa (4th-5th C. CE?): Sakuntala Translated by Arthur W. Ryder (1914), full text. [At Sacred Texts]

Kalidasa (4th-5th C. CE?): Meghaduta or Clould Messenger [At Sacred Texts]
Translated by Arthur W. Ryder (1914)

Kama Sutra, translated by Sir Richard Burton, [At Sacred Texts]

Greek and Chinese Sources
General
Greek Sources

Chinese Sources

Muslim Era India
General
The Delhi Sultanate 1206-1526

Mughal India 1526-1761

Culture

The Marathas

Sikhism

The Sikhs are an Indian people, defined by their religion, who emerged in India during the centuries of Muslim political power (which accounts for the placement of these texts in the Sourcebook).
The Western Intrusion General European Imperialism

St. Francis Xavier: Letter from India, to the Society of Jesus at Rome, 1543

England, India, and The East Indies, 1617 [At this Site]
Various sources including a letter from Great Moghul Jahangir to James I, King of England.

Thomas Mun (1571-1641): England's Treasure by Foreign Trade, pub 1664, extracts, [At Then Again] and extracts [At Hanover]

Adam Smith: From The Wealth of Nations, 1776: Of Colonies, and The Cost of Empire [At The American Revolution Site]

Trade Products in Early Modern History [At UMN]

The South Sea Bubble [Modern Report][At History House]

Analyses

British India

Conquest

Government

Clash of Cultures

Duarte Barbosa: Sati in Narsyngua.[At Internet Archive, from CCNY]

An Account of Sati from Vikrama's Adventures [At Internet Archive, from CCNY]

Raja Rammohan Roy: A Second Conference Between an Advocate for, and An Opponent of the Practice of Burning Widows Alive, 1820 [At WSU]

Sir William Bentinck: On Ritual Murder in India , 1829, excerpts

Mountstuart Elphinstone: Indian Customs and Manners, 1840
Includes graphic account of suttee.

Sir Monier Monier-Williams: Camp Life in India, 1850 [At this Site]

Dadabhai Naoroji: The Benefits of British Rule, 1871 [At this Site]

Charles Creighton Hazewell: British India, The Atlantic Monthly, November 1857, [At The Atlantic]

Field Marshal Lord Roberts: When Queen Victoria Became Empress of India, 1877 [At this Site]

Rev. Arthur Male: The Hill of Bones, Afghanistan 1878 [At this Site]

The Mutiny

Indian Cultures

Indian Nationalism

General

The Indian National Congress

Gandhi

Mohandas K. Gandhi (1869-1948): Indian Home Rule, 1909 [At WSU]

Mohandas K. Gandhi (1869-1948): I Shall Be Arrested, 1930, letter written to Nehru.[At Internet Archive, from Letters Magazine]

Jawaharlal Nehru (1889-1964): To His Jailers, 1932 [At Internet Archive, from Letters Magazine]
? letter written by Nehru while in jail for civil disobedience against the British government.

Jawaharlal Nehru (1889-1964): Marxism, Capitalism and Non-Alignment, 1941, 1956, excerpts [At this Site]

2ND Mark Shepard: Mahatma Gandhi and His Myths, the 1990 Annual Gandhi Lecture for the International Association of Gandhian Studies, delivered at the University of Virginia at Charlottesville on October 2 [At Mark Shepard's Nonviolence Page]

2ND Narayan Desai: Gandhi Through a Child's Eyes [At Mark Shepard's Nonviolence Page]

The Muslim League
Independence

Winston Churchill: Announcement to the House Of Commons of Sir Stafford Cripps' Mission to India, March 11, 1942. [At PHA]

Statement And Draft Declaration by His Majesty's Government With Correspondence And Resolutions Connected Therewith (Sir Stafford Cripps' Mission to India), Draft Declaration For Discussion With Indian Leaders Published 30th March, 1942 [At PHA]

Government of India: Text of the Original "Quit India" Resolution Drafted by Gandhi and rejected by the All-India Congress Working Committee in favor of the modified version submitted by Pandit Jawaharlal Nehru, the Gandhi Draft was Presented to the Committee on April 27, 1942 [At PHA]

Sir Stafford Cripps: Review of Negotiations With the All-India Congress, July 26, 1942 [At PHA]

Sir Stafford Cripps: Statement on India, London, August 5, 1942

Mohandas K. Gandhi: Speech to the All-India Congress, Bombay, August 7, 1942 (Excerpts) [At PHA]

Leopold S. Amery, British Secretary of State For India: Broadcast, London, August 9, 1942 [At PHA]

Orders to American Military Forces in India, August 12, 1942 [At PHA]

Winston Churchill: Report to the House of Commons on The Policy of The British Government in India, September 10, 1942 [At PHA]

Mohandas K. Gandhi: Latest Message to America, October 31, 1942 [At PHA]

British Government Statement: Policy in India, 1946 [At this Site]

British Government Statement: Policy in Burma, May 1945 [At this Site]

Jawaharlal Nehru (1889-1964): Speech On the Granting of Indian Independence, August 14, 1947 [At this Site]

India Since Independence
General

WEB Documents Relating to Jammu and Kashmir [At Mt. Holyoke]

WEB Globalization [At Mt. Holyoke]

WEB Multinational Corporations [At Mt. Holyoke]

South Asia: Country Studies
-Prepared for Library of Congress under the Country Studies/Area Handbook Program sponsored by the Department of the Army. These are full descriptions of the countries concerned, in terms of history, geography, economy, etc. There are also useful bibliographies. [At LOC]

South Asia: Constitutions

International Issues India
The Nehru-Gandhi Dynasty

Regionalism

Conor Cruise O'Brien: Holy War Against India, The Atlantic Monthly, August 1998, [At The Atlantic, subscription required]
On Sikh Nationalism.

Pakistan Since Independence
General Pakistan General
The 1971 Conflict
General
Indian Genders and Sexualities
Women Homosexuality: General
It has proved to be extraordinarily difficult to find much information about South Asian homosexuality.

Hindu

Muslim

Richard Burton: Terminal Essay, from his edition of theArabian Nights.
Burton' compilation of data on variety of societies was meant to explain some of the stories inThe Nights. In doing so, he provided first overview of Islamic homosexuality.

Further Resources on Indian History

As in a number of other historical areas, a real problem with much of the online material on South Asian history is that it is presented with manifest nationalist (or other ideological bias). In reviewing many sites for this page, there seem to be a phenomenon of science and engineering graduate students setting up web sites on Indian or Islamic history/culture with virtually no regard for authenticity or historical method. [Imagine if history graduate students began setting up websites on chemical engineering based on their "feelings".] I have tried to indicate which sites are, in my opinion, reliable and which are not.

E-Texts

Web Guides

Academic History/Culture Sites

Nationalist History/Culture Sites

WEB Hindunet: Indian History with its Library of Hindu History and The Hindu Universe
While these linked sites have much of interest, they are not reliable in terms of history, although may be useful in explaining and exploring modern Hindu belief and practice.. Since they come up repeatedly on search engines, there is an effort here to explain what is wrong.
The main problem is that they promote a nationalist view of Indian history and, frankly, nationalists of any sort have proved repeatedly that they are unable to write a history of their own land. The specific problems with this site are as follows:
- It denies the theory of an Arayan invasion [which may indeed be suspect], but allows no countervailing voice. Scholarship will allow more than one voice to be heard.
- It promotes the dogmatic religious idea that the Ramayana and Mahabharata are discussions of real historical periods.
- It seeks to present the Moghul/Islamic period in entirely negative terms, and to promote the idea that Indian resistance to the British Raj was a work of the "Hindu People".
In sum: these sites are unreliable exercises in political propaganda. Use them with this in mind.

WEB Itihaas by Akhilesh Mithal [At Geocities]
Writings about Indian history. While Mr. Mithal presents highly opinionated pieces, he eschews the turgid Hindu/Muslim/Sikh "identity nationalisms" for a more embracing vision of India. It's still nationalism though!.

Other Resources

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The Site Concept and Design: created 26 Jan 1996: latest revision 20 January 2021 [ Internet History Sourcebooks Project is located at the History Department of Fordham University, New York. The Internet Medieval Sourcebook, and other medieval components of the project, are located at the Fordham University Center for Medieval Studies.The IHSP recognizes the contribution of Fordham University, the Fordham University History Department, and the Fordham Center for Medieval Studies in providing web space and server support for the project. The IHSP is a project independent of Fordham University. Although the IHSP seeks to follow all applicable copyright law, Fordham University is not the institutional owner, and is not liable as the result of any legal action. Paul Halsall CV]

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Internet Indian History Sourcebook This page is a subset of texts derived from the three major online Sourcebooks listed below, along with added texts and web site indicators. For more contextual information, for instance about Western imperialism, the Islamic world, or the history of a given period, check out these web sites.