Le Nord : revue internationale des Pays de Nord - 01.06.1938, Blaðsíða 179

THE BIRTH OF A NATION
169
of the Russian Governor-General had disappeared without legal
successors, as the military governors who attempted to assume
the position of despots were not recognised as such even in Fin-
land. In this way, Finland had actually become separated from
Russia by the force of revolutionary circumstances. The »supreme
power« had unexpectedly returned to the Finnish nation and
had automatically come into the hands of the legislative body,
viz., the Diet, without a theoretical solution having been found
to the problem. No side issues or explanations could alter this
great main fact.
The simple, natural laws of history had issued their decree.
A thousand years of development had forged the Finnish people
into an internally independent, civilized nation. While the joints
of the European States had been loosened by the War, there was
here a completely modern nation with finished political institu-
tions, although tied to a large country in a lower stage of develop-
ment. The will and energy to achieve independence had made
their appearance in many different ways. The final achievement
of the status of a sovereign state no longer required anything but
a lucky chance, an external impetus, to break the fetters. This
impetus had now come, not as a freak of fortune, a bountiful
gift or the achievement of individuals, but as a result of a develop-
ment, a result absolutely logical, although on many counts dif-
ficult to grasp and explain.
Realising its opportunity, the Finnish Diet after heated de-
bates decided temporarily to assume the Grand Ducal power,
and at the end of November, 1917, appointed a government
(»Svinhufvud’s Senate«). In order that regular political life should
be organised as expeditiously as possible, the government without
delay drafted a bill for a new constitution based on the republican
principle and informed the Diet that it was taking immediate
steps for the recognition of the Republic of Finland by the other
Powers.
On the 6th December, the Diet approved the following declara-
tion of independence: »In view of the Government having sub-
mitted a proposal to the Diet for a new form of government,
established on the foundation that Finland is an independent Re-
public, the Diet, as the holder of the supreme authority in the
State, resolves to approve this principle and also to approve that
the Government, in order to secure the acknowledgement of Fin-
land’s political independence, should institute such measures as