Great Britain, British Jews, and the international protection of Romanian Jews, 1900-1914: a study of Jewish diplomacy and minority rights

 
15
right to certain traditions, and property rights.
15
 A large number of treaties 
containing minority provisions were concerned with the relations between 
European Christians and the Ottoman Empire, although some concerned the 
protection of Protestants in Catholic countries and vice versa.
16
 The 1774 Treaty 
of Koutchouk-Kainardji between Russia and Turkey gave Russia the right to act 
as the protector of Orthodox Christians in the Ottoman Empire.
17
  
 
In 1830, Britain, France, and Russia guaranteed the independence of 
Greece, at the same time stipulating that all subjects in Greece were to be 
treated equally irrespective of religion. In this instance, it was the non-Christian 
and non-Orthodox Christian minorities that were thus protected.
18
 The 
Congress of Vienna in 1814-1815 is another significant example dating from the 
early nineteenth century. This time the minority protection clauses did not 
relate to Ottoman or Balkan affairs; Russia, Austria, and Prussia promised to 
permit national institutions for their Polish subjects, thus enabling the Poles to 
gain some degree of self-government, although not similar within each empire. 
The situation of the Poles and the observance of the minority protection 
obligations were monitored by the other Great Powers.
19
  
 
Although expressing a concern for religious and national minorities, the 
terms of minority clauses tended to be vague. It can be argued that minorities 
were tolerated but not encouraged. Even so, there was a tradition of minority 
protection in international law. A major shortcoming of the minority clauses 
was the implementation of treaty provisions. Intervention rights as defined in 
the treaties, referring to the right to make representations, were usually limited. 
Special recognition clauses, on the other hand, strengthened intervention 
rights.
20
 These considerations also became important in the Romanian situation. 
 
Research on the history of minority rights has tended to concentrate on the 
minority problems of the late twentieth century. In addition, it has largely been 
conducted by social scientists and legal scholars. Some researchers have, 
however, attempted to trace the longer historical roots of minority protection. 
Two studies that cover a long time period and a wide variety of issues can be 
mentioned and recommended here. Patrick Thornberry’s International Law and 
the Rights of Minorities (1991) is essential reading on minority rights in the light 
of international law. Jennifer Jackson Preece’s National Minorities and the 
European Nation-States System (1998) is somewhat more detailed on the pre-First 
World War period. Both Thornberry and Jackson Preece do mention the 
minority rights of Romanian Jews, but neither discusses the matter in detail. 
                                                           
15
  
Thornberry 1991, 25-26.  
16
  
Capotorti 1979, 1-2.  
17
  
Dadrian 1995, 8, 13,19.  
18
  
Capotorti 1979, 2.  
19
  
Capotorti 1979, 2; Jackson Preece 1998, 60-61. The Congress of Vienna is often 
emphasised as the first occasion in which ‘national’ minorities as opposed to 
religious minorities were protected.  
20
  
Claude 1955, 8-9; Thornberry 1991, 32-35.  

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16 
 
Some attempts have been made to study Jewish minority rights in 
Romania from a Zionist or Jewish nationalist standpoint. However, this 
approach is not very productive. Oscar Janowsky, in his 1933 study on Jewish 
nationalism and national minority rights, accurately remarked that there really 
was no important Zionist movement in Romania or in other Balkan states 
before the First World War. The Romanian Jews were focused on the struggle 
for civil and political rights within the context of the Romanian state.
21
  
 
The most rewarding perspective for this present study is the one applied 
by Carole Fink in her book Defending the Rights of Others: The Great Powers, the 
Jews, and International Minority Protection. Fink has studied international 
minority protection, and especially the minority question in Eastern Europe, 
from 1878 to 1938. She is therefore one of few historians to have related the 
Romanian Jewish question to the wider framework of minority protection — 
although she has not discussed the Romanian situation exclusively. Fink has 
argued that ‘the quest for international minority protection in Eastern Europe 
involved the fusing of two powerful opposites: the attainment and maintenance 
of full national independence versus the expansion of outside control’. The 
Congress of Berlin in the 1870s and, subsequently, the League of Nations 
between the world wars, created cautiously worded compromise agreements 
on minority rights as well as limited measures to enforce the minority clauses.
22
 
 
In a somewhat similar vein, Jennifer Jackson Preece has emphasised the 
relationship between national minority questions and the nation-states system: 
the nation-states system makes national minorities a subject of international 
politics. According to Jackson Preece, issues concerning the status of minorities 
came to the fore at those moments when a ‘new international order’ was 
established, such as in 1878 when the Treaty of Berlin was signed. It was 
precisely at the Congress of Berlin that the independence of the Romanian state 
and the rights of Romanian Jews were deliberated. On occasions in which a new 
order has been set in place, minorities have been granted certain rights in order 
to maintain stability. Jackson Preece believes, therefore, that minority rights 
protection can be understood as an attempt to secure peace and order by 
minimising the possibility of ethnic conflicts.
23
 
 
According to Carole Fink, the history of minority protection in 1878-1938 
involves five interacting factions: 
 
1. The Great Powers, which dictated minority obligations to Eastern 
 
European states.  
 
2. The revisionist states, which used minority protection for irredentist 
 purposes. 
 
 
3. The successor states, which had to submit to dictated terms. They tried 
 
to contest  the international tutelage of their internal affairs. 
 
4. The Jews, who were the main nongovernmental proponents of 
 
international   minority protection. 
                                                           
21
  
Janowsky 1933, 155. 
22
  
Fink 2004, 359-360. 
23
  
Jackson Preece 1998, 4, 11. 

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