UPPER SILESIA : A NEW ERA

END OF 15-YEAR AGREEMENT The Position of Germans and Poles
From Our Central European Correspondent Fifteen years, but a short period in the life of a nation, have passed since the Inter-Allied Commission withdrew from Upper Silesia and the Poles took possession of the part allotted to Poland.
The special agreement governing the respective positions of the Germans in Polish Upper Silesia and the Poles in German Upper Silesia has lapsed. And. despite periods of grave tension in past years and gloomy predictions of trouble to come. Upper Silesia enters upon a new period of its history in complete calm.
After the Great War Poland claimed Upper Silesia from Germany, basing itself upon the figures of the German census of 1910. According to this there were 1,245,000 Poles and 672,000 Germans in the area at that time and it was therefore only reasonable for Poland to claim this valuable industrial area.
Two-Year Interval Two years' interval, however, elapsed before a plebiscite was taken. The Germans had taken advantage of the period to strengthen their position and on the day over a hundred thousand German outvoters came from the interior.
The result showed 707,605 votes for Germany and 479,359 for Poland, the majority of the Pales being in the eastern part and the Germans in the west.
Various difficulties arose as regards a frontier. Germany contended that the area was indivisible and indeed it was extremely difficult to draw a frontier line.
Finally, however, a line was drawn and the Katowice-Krolewska Huta district went to Poland, while Beuthen and Gleiwitz remained German. The economic unity of the area, with certain special arrangements, which now expire. was prolonged for fifteen years and the problem was thus settled.
Minorities Remained
It is, of course, obvious that both areas contained large minorities.
Indeed, German propaganda has made great play with this fact in past years and only recently Dr. Schacht made a fire-eating speech on the subject.
It is well, however, to remember that, according to the last Polish census, there were.only 7.7 per cent. Germans in Polish Upper Silesia, about a hundred thousand in all. Both in Poznan (Posen) and Pomorze (the Corridor) there are more, and they form a somewhat larger percentage while it is noteworthy that the previously Russian city of Lodz has a far larger German population than any former German area!
Immediatel% after the partition a Silesian Seym or Diet was set up and a large measure of local autonomy was granted. German schools were set up, German was admitted as an official language and, apart from a few regrettable incidents, the German minority were treated—and continue to be treated—very fairly.
German Propaganda
In 1924 difficulties arose over the treatment of the minority and the granting of claims to Polish nationality. Again in 1928 difficulties loomed up and it became clear that Germany was supporting an Irredentist organisation called the Volksbund, which was carrying on subversive activity.
Finally its leader, Ulitz. a deputy in the Silesian Seym, was arrested and sentenced for his activities. but the sentence was suspended and eventually quashed.
A very large Polish minority was left in German Silesia. This minority is estimated at 7-800,000 and some reckon it as high as a million.
They, too, have had occasion to make bitter complaints about their treatment in the past, notably in 1929 and again in 1934, when it was stated that Herr Hitler's promises were not being carried out.
Polish Seat Majorities In 1922 the elections to the local Silesian Seym, which sits in Katowice, gave the Poles 34 seats and the Germans 14, but at the last elections in 1930 the Poles had 39 mandates to the Germans' 14. Thus it may be seen that the Germans are not numerically on the increase in Polish Upper Silesia.
Now the various special arrangements made by the League of Nations for the preservation of Polish Upper Silesia have expired.
These facilities, the product of an abnormal state of affairs are in principle a thing of the past, but there is little doubt that a modus vivendi incorporating these and other facilities will be devised. The new situation has been received with complete calm on both sides or the frontier and for the moment there is no reason to anticipate trouble.
Indeed, a pleasing sign of the times was an appeal by Herr Ulitz through the Kattowitzer Zeitung, the leading German paper in Polish Upper Silesia, to take up their duties as loyal and conscientious Polish citizens.
What About the Jews ?
The one black spot is the fate of the 8,000 Jews of German Upper Silesia.
They will no longer enjoy the special rights accorded hitherto and will be submitted to the same treatment as other Jews in Germany.
Their outlook is dark indeed and already Streicher. the notorious Jewbaiter of Nuremburg, has been in the (Continued an page 12).