Nation-Building and Contested Identities - MEK

“The California of the Romanians”a stipulation of the Treaty of Berlin, which conditioned the recognition ofRomania’s independence on granting access to citizenship to non-Christianinhabitants, in 1879, Article 7 of the Constitution was revised as follows:“In Romania, the difference of religious belief and confession canprevent neither the accession to civil and political rights, nor the exerciseof these rights.” 23 But the acquisition of Dobrogea created an unprecedentedcategory of non-Christian citizens in Romania, by annexation.Although the emerging international law did not provide clear codes ofconduct in such a situation, the Romanian state was expected to assure therepresentation of the Dobrogeans in the political institutions of the country,protecting and providing them with favorable conditions for practicingtheir religion.The decisive political confrontation between “pro” and “anti-Dobrogea”politicians occurred during an extraordinary session of the RomanianParliament convoked between 28-30 September 1878 in order to decideupon Romania’s official position with regard to the decision of the BerlinCongress. Mihail Kogãlniceanu and Ion C. Brãtianu used all their rhetoricalskills in order to convince the Romanian Parliament to accept the annexationof Dobrogea. In two memorable speeches, Kogãlniceanu highlightedthe economic and geo-political advantages posed by a land with “animmense seacoast and three harbors,” and recommended that Romaniainvested in “expanding the harbors for developing the wealth of Dobrogea.”24 Most importantly, as a trained historian, 25 Kogãlniceanu crystallizedthe Romanian nationalist discourse about Dobrogea, by stressing Romania’shistorical rights to the province, by setting the nationalist priorities ofthe Romanian administration – ”the only works that we will do in Dobrogeawill be schools and roads” – and by downplaying the danger of Bulgarianresentment. 26 In sharp contrast to his early position on the issue, PrimeMinister Brãtianu associated himself with Kogãlniceanu’s pro-annexationcampaign. In an eloquent speech, Brãtianu underlined the geo-political andeconomic advantages offered by possession over Dobrogea, rejectedunequivocally Bulgaria’s historical rights to the province, and urged parliamentariansto overcome their fears and to trust Romania’s ability to assimilateDobrogea:You fear that we will not be able to Romanianize a province that was previouslyin our possession? You want to reject a land between the sea andthe greatest river in Europe? But other nations would look at it as a hungryman looks at fresh caviar. Every people tends naturally to possess asmuch sea as it can, and you are refusing it? ... Do you want us today ... tosuffocate our breath, and to lose the sea and the mouth of the Danube? 27127