International Law and Justice Working Papers - IILJ

colonies through their connection and independence, so it remained a duty to the colonizers to
defend their most dear goods.” 106
In other words, the Baltic Germans had to fight for their national self-rule and autonomy on their
own. The next centuries were difficult from the point of view of the Baltic German self-rule.
Bulmerincq recounted how Poland started in the early 17 th century to implement its plans for the
destruction of the German religious and linguistic autonomy of the provinces. 107 Similarly
disappointing was in Bulmerincq’s interpretation the Swedish rule since it was ultimately
directed towards the destruction of the “uniqueness of the country” (i.e. autonomy). 108
Bulmerincq further recounted that when Estonia and Livonia were finally conquered by Russia
from Sweden in the course of the Nordic war (1700-1721), the Baltic Germans and the cities
presented to the Russian tsar their conditions of subjugation (Accord Punkten). The Baltic
German nobility wanted its earlier rights and privileges, ultimately its political, linguistic and
religious autonomy to be confirmed. Peter the Great accepted those conditions through an act of
grace on 30 September 1710. 109
And now was 1865: “The colonies established at the Baltic Sea have started their life with a
fight, lost independence in a fight but have notwithstanding all fights preserved their Lutheran
religion, their German language, their German education, their German law and their unique
administration.” 110 Nevertheless, Bulmerincq held the view that under the Emperor Alexander II,
106 P. 10.
107 P. 10-11.
108 P. 13.
109 P. 15.
110 P. 19.