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No. 7. Vienna, 15 February 1901. Fifth Year

The Fable of the 400 Millions.

"And they made a golden calf.
And they said:
"These are thy gods, Israel . . ."

The Roumanian Prime Minister P. P. Carp has been obliged to quit his post, which according to the latest reports Cantacuzene will take, though he indeed has little prospect of remaining Prime Minister for long. It is no secret what it was that actually brought about Carp's fall. Carp assuredly belongs among the most gifted, the most high-minded and the most steadfast in character of Roumania's statesmen. But what he lacked was the talent to open the golden heart of the European haute finance for a bankrupt country. One may not reproach Herr Carp with having been idle. Whatever there was in the country to pledge, he has tried to dispose of. With the cigarette paper he still succeeded. The well-known "Judaised" consortium in Berlin helped him with a few millions out of one of his most pressing embarrassments. Yet what do ten millions signify for a country with finances so routed as the Roumanian? Herr Carp saw himself compelled to undertake a journey through Europe from capital to capital, in order to make a last attempt at tapping the European financial world. There is talk of a fabulous sum which the bankrupt country had the good intention of taking up. 400 million francs! That, namely, was the figure which Prime Minister Carp himself named. Of the manner in which this loan was launched it is worth speaking a little. It is known that business undertakings of a larger style, and State loans in particular, are preceded by a wooing. This love-play shaped itself uncommonly interestingly in the case of the Roumanian financial operation lately attempted. Prime Minister Carp was convinced from the outset that the Christian financial circles could not be won at all for a loan so ill-founded. They must needs be particular amateurs who would enter into more intimate relations with Roumania. In the Jewish financial world Herr Carp presupposed such a predilection for Roumanian bonds. The advantages which Roumania had to offer the Jewish haute finance were not to consist in material securities; still more than higher percentages, "ethical considerations" were to allure the Jewish financial circles. Prime Minister Carp let it be seen publicly and in an interview that, in return for a loan of fabulous magnitude, he was inclined to grant political rights to the Jews of Roumania. To be sure, he clothed his wish — as with a moderately adroit diplomatist is a matter of course — in a concrete form, declaring that a Jewish offer already lay before him, upon the acceptance of which he had to decide. Another time, in pursuit of similar designs, he spoke of the introduction of a law of public worship which should ease the situation of the Roumanian Jews.

In the "Frankfurter Zeitung" there followed an answer to Carp's delicate hints, of which one may indeed surmise that it too was launched from Roumania, but which might also really have proceeded from the Jewish financial circles. In this communication the following classic passage is to be found:

"The momentary presence of the Roumanian Finance Minister Carp in Berlin might now give the Berlin haute finance the not easily recurring opportunity, on occasion of the financial discussions with him, of making the grant of civilised conditions of life for the Roumanian Jews and their equality with those of other faiths a conditio sine qua non. Even though out of regard for competition the Berlin financial world has in its business taken less account of ethical considerations, this time the regards of competition do fall away, for the eagerness to take over Roumanian State paper is likely to be a very minimal one."

Carp's journey to Canossa-Berlin was in vain. The credit-worthiness of Roumania was weighed and found too light, and the "ethical considerations" did not fall heavily enough into the scale. With the failure of his mission Carp's fate was sealed. From the one statesman of whom it could be believed and hoped that he would set Roumania on her feet and better the situation of the Jews, the helm of State has been wrested. It is impossible that a better man should follow.

But we must for good reasons return once more to the financial operation planned by Carp. This operation has shown us yet again what a childish and withal dangerous attitude the Jewish-