Minorities in Egypt
Crabitès, Pierre
October 23, 1929 THE COMMONWEAL 641 MINORITIES IN EGYPT By PIERRE CRABITES MERICAN Catholics are interested in the Anglo-Egyptian draft agreement elaborated on August 3, 1929,...
...America was granted her charter something like a hundred years ago...
...Just as Catholic churches, organized by a local clergy and conducted under Egyptian leadership, have been the fruit brought to maturity by the Catholic teaching orders and missionary fathers, so also has this Protestant effort been rewarded by the coming into being of native Egyptian Protestant churches technically known as Evangelical churches...
...At present the subject is once again of importance because of a change in the relationship between the government of Egypt and "'minorities" which dwell under its jurisdiction...
...The Capitulations have been for many years the Ark of the Covenant of these useful institutions...
...In addition to these Catholic Copts, to give them their Egyptian name, there are also some 20,000 Syrians and other local subjects who are likewise true to Rome...
...These local Egyptians have no legal right to invoke the aid of Washington...
...To American Catholics, whose school system is the brightest jewel in the crown of American Catholic achievement, it is shocking to think of America accepting protection for her nationals when the wards of the Occident are not granted similar treatment...
...All of these "Capitulations" specifically declare that foreigners are not amenable to Ottoman laws...
...It, therefore, became known as "the Capitulations...
...I shall not go into details as to what I mean when I speak of "the capitulatory rights of the United States...
...This mark of imperial favor was divided into capitulae or articles...
...In their wake Catholicism has made many converts in the country where Saint Mark first planted the seed of Christianity...
...When England, on February 28, I922, abolished the British protectorate over Egypt, Britain specifically reserved to herself, among other matters, "the protection of foreign interests and of minorities...
...It does not lie in the mouth of an American to criticize London...
...It should be made clear that Americans want no protection for their bank accounts or their homes which is withheld from "minorities" which trusted them when they left the religion of their forbears to become Catholic Copts or members of the Evangelical church...
...The Henderson-Mahmoud Pasha agreement has an article which husbands the interests of foreigners...
...There has been, in a word, what the French so aptly call a volte face and what sportsmen so accurately describe as a reversal of form...
...I shall abstain from so doing because I discussed the matter, at some length, in a paper which The Commonweal published over my signature in its issue of April 4, 1928- My article bore the title, Christian Patriarchs of Islam...
...These annexes make this point perfectly clear...
...This fact accentuates their position inasmuch as Moslem sentiment, in seeking to get the local Christian reaction to a given measure, will naturally tend to follow the Orthodox or Jacobite point of view, and thus, perhaps, do untold harm to the moral wards of the Occident while sincerely endeavoring to deal fairly with the Christian minority taken as a whole...
...England, on account of her special position in Egypt, has political interests in the latter country which transcend those granted to her by the old Ottoman Capitulations...
...In due course, Christians from abroad carried their work to the shores dominated by the elect of Mohammed...
...In those days foreign interests had not percolated into Islam...
...In other words, the controversy which the enlightened statesmanship of Mr...
...This good work is under the moral guardianship of the American flag...
...In I854 , American Presbyterians entered Egypt...
...All of this took place as early as the seventh century of our era...
...There are in Egypt something over 800,000 Jacobite or Orthodox Copts...
...They have nobly performed their duty...
...They therefore repose upon a foundation which finds its bedrock in the conscience of the Occident...
...His Britannic Majesty accordingly undertakes to use all his influence with the powers possessing capitulatory rights in Egypt to obtain, in conditions which will safeguard the legitimate interests of foreigners, the transfer to the Mixed Tribunals of the jurisdiction of the existing Consular Courts and the application of Egyptian legislation to foreigners...
...We may add that the author has sent his manuscript from Gairo.--The Editor...
...It is likewise true that Egyptian Nationalists have given no evidence of any unfriendliness to Catholic Copts or to Egyptian Protestants...
...I shall, however, refer incidentally, and by way of illustration, to the issue which is presented to American Presbyterians...
...Their educational work now has an average daily enrolment of some 20,000 boys and girls, young men and young women...
...It is also true that Catholic Copts and Egyptian Protestants are high in the councils of Egyptian Nationalism, and with their lips spurn any desire for special protection...
...In it I sought to explain that the Levant was divided into water-tight, non-communicating communities or legal entities, because it suited the polity of the Moslem overlord to segregate Mohammedans from Christians and Jews, and to subdivide the two latter peoples into non-interlocklng segments wherever sects or rites sprang up among them...
...In a minor The rights of nationals ~or of minorities have often been a topic for discussion...
...The pact which will be submitted to the British Parliament and to the Egyptian electorate will not bind the United States unless approved by Washington...
...In 1535, Suleiman the Magnificent systematized these earlier practices by issuing to Francis I of France a patent or diploma regulating the conditions under which Frenchmen were allowed to inhabit the Ottoman domains...
...But according to standards which are ethically and fundamentally and morally higher than those sanctioned by wax and parchment, those Catholic Coptic churches and those Evangelical churches rest upon the moral bulwark of the Capitulations...
...The Christians and Jews referred to in the preceding paragraph were, therefore, subjects of the Moslem caliph...
...But does that fact weigh in the balance...
...It should not be said that American Capitulations are the sheet anchor of capital or of the privileged foreigners who enjoy Egyptian hospitality...
...It is true that the Egyptian constitution guarantees freedom of worship...
...The first decade of the twentieth century had ended before Egypt ceased officially to form part of the Ottoman empire...
...In respect of this "special position," London and Cairo may contract without the concurrence of Washington...
...These cultural centres spread the doctrine of love and symbolize the highest type of God-fearing scholarship...
...Arthur Henderson, and the Egyptian Prime Minister, Mohammed Mahmoud Pasha...
...In I922 Britain put minorities and foreigners upon a footing of equality...
...They state in so many words that: It is recognized that this question [that of minorities] will in future be the exclusive concern of the Egyptian government...
...The Sacred Heart, M&re de Dieu and Franciscan nuns have large convents and prosperous schools...
...It behooves him, if he be in touch with the facts, to point out the duty of the United States...
...The Catholic and Protestant native Egyptians, therefore, constitute a minority within a minority...
...This omission was not accidental...
...Its meaning is made less nebulous by certain correspondence annexed to the draft agreement...
...The followers of the Prophet tolerated the presence of these intruders, but would not allow such uncircumcised non-believers to be amenable to Moslem law, which, as is well known, degree the proposed treaty likewise affects all American Protestants and Jews...
...So are American Presbyterians...
...The Jesuit Fathers and the Christian Brothers have flourishing and expanding colleges...
...That duty consists in maintaining in I9~ 9 the parity between foreigners and minorities as it was defined in I922...
...They have no legal connection with the American legation...
...They have taught the Gospel...
...springs from the Turan...
...In 1535, Christians and Jews were not good enough to be allowed to have the statutes and customs of a Moslem state apply to them...
...Times have changed...
...This clause is not a model of pellucid clearness of expression...
...October 23, 1929 THE COMMONWEAL 641 MINORITIES IN EGYPT By PIERRE CRABITES MERICAN Catholics are interested in the Anglo-Egyptian draft agreement elaborated on August 3, 1929, by the British Foreign Secretary, Mr...
...The all-powerful Arab rulers therefore vouchsafed to foreigners the privilege of locating within Islamic territory on condition that such traders should be housed in ghettoes and kept in order by their consuls...
...But these considerations cannot wipe out the deadly parallel or blot away the significance of that i922 reservation...
...They have opened schools...
...Egypt has a population of I4,oo%ooo, of whom x3,ooo,ooo are Mohammedans...
...No such power is vested in that body or in any other authority to enjoin the execution of an Egyptian law which may discriminate against minorities or impose an unfair burden upon them...
...A few years later England obtained a similar franchise...
...In law they are Egyptian and not American institutions, just as the Catholic Coptic churches are likewise Egyptian and neither French nor Italian...
...In I929 she safeguards the purse, the life, liberty and pursuit of happiness of foreigners and abandons minorities...
...But unless the United States sees fit to relinquish the American Capitulations, they will remain in force, regardless of any decision taken by the British Parliament or by the Egyptian electorate...
...Here are its terms: Article XI...
...Britain may, however, do away with her capitulatory prerogatives without consulting America...
...His Britannic Majesty recognizes that the capitulatory r6gime now existing in Egypt is no longer in accordance with the spirit of the times and with the present state of Egypt...
...Arthur Henderson and of Mohammed Mahmoud Pasha has sought to solve, bears upon, among points, the capitulatory rights of eleven powers, including Great Britain and the United States...
...I shall concentrate my attention upon the message directed to American Catholics...
...Christians, Moslems and Jews crowd their portals...
...By this Anglo-Egyptian accord of August, 1929, Egyptians are seeking to force Americans to accept conditions which in 1832 they were deemed to be unworthy of enjoying...
...Under the aegis of French and Italian Capitulations, the Catholic Church has prospered in Egypt...
...They do not do so...
...There are approximately IOO,OOO native Egyptians who today are in spiritual commun64z THE COMMONWEAL October 23, I9z9 ion with the Holy See...
...It is for this reason that these Turkish grants apply to the land of the Pharaohs...
...It was intentional...
...It results from the terms of this Article XI and of the letters which amplify its scope that the Mixed or International Courts of Egypt may declare unconstitutional and inoperative as against foreigners any Egyptian law which unfairly burdens foreigners or which discriminates against them...
...Crabit~s studies the situation in the following paper, comments upon the significant differences between the old order and the new, and concludes that it is the duty of the United States to maintain in Egypt "'the parity between foreigners and minorities defined in ~922...
Vol. 10 • October 1929 • No. 25
