[38] “We take over the ownership of the Sarre mines, and in order not to be inconvenienced in the exploitation of these coal deposits, we constitute a distinct little estate for the 600,000 Germans who inhabit this coal basin, and in fifteen years we shall endeavor by a plebiscite to bring them to declare that they want to be French.  We know what that means.  During fifteen years we are going to work on them, to attack them from every point, till we obtain from them a declaration of love.  It is evidently a less brutal proceeding than the coup de force which detached from us our Alsatians and Lorrainers.  But if less brutal, it is more hypocritical.  We know quite well between ourselves that it is an attempt to annex these 600,000 Germans.  One can understand very well the reasons of an economic nature which have led Clemenceau to wish to give us these Sarre coal deposits, but in order to acquire them must we give ourselves the appearance of wanting to juggle with 600,000 Germans in order to make Frenchmen of them in fifteen years?” (M.  Herve in La Victorie, May 31, 1919).

[39] This plebiscite is the most important of the concessions accorded to Germany in the Allies’ Final Note, and one for which Mr. Lloyd George, who never approved the Allies’ policy on the Eastern frontiers of Germany, can claim the chief credit.  The vote cannot take place before the spring of 1920, and may be postponed until 1921.  In the meantime the province will be governed by an Allied Commission.  The vote will be taken by communes, and the final frontiers will be determined by the Allies, who shall have regard, partly to the results of the vote in each commune, and partly “to the geographical and economic conditions of the locality.”  It would require great local knowledge to predict the result.  By voting Polish, a locality can escape liability for the indemnity, and for the crushing taxation consequent on voting German, a factor not to be neglected.  On the other hand, the bankruptcy and incompetence of the new Polish State might deter those who were disposed to vote on economic rather than on racial grounds.  It has also been stated that the conditions of life in such matters as sanitation and social legislation are incomparably better in Upper Silesia than in the adjacent districts of Poland, where similar legislation is in its infancy.  The argument in the text assumes that Upper Silesia will cease to be German.  But much may happen in a year, and the assumption is not certain.  To the extent that it proves erroneous the conclusions must be modified.

[40] German authorities claim, not without contradiction, that to judge from the votes cast at elections, one-third of the population would elect in the Polish interest, and two-thirds in the German.