Paris Peace Conf.184.01102/478
Professor A. C. Coolidge to the Commission to Negotiate Peace
[Received May 17.]
Sirs: I have the honor to report that the increasing disintegration of the Austrian provinces to which I have adverted several times is one of the important phenomena in political life here today. The most striking example of this is the election that has just taken place in the district of Vorarlberg. The question before the people was whether they wished the province to remain a part of Austria, with which it has been connected for many centuries, or whether they preferred to enter into negotiations for union with Switzerland or with Germany. According to the accounts so far received, four-fifths of the inhabitants voted to enter into negotiations with Switzerland. Most of the other fifth, many of whom were Socialists, preferred Germany. There seems to have been almost no desire at all for maintenance of the former connection. This is a striking fact and a symptom of the times. Although Vorarlberg is geographically more closely connected with either Switzerland or Germany than with Austria, its historical union has lasted for centuries. The inhabitants have had no particular grievance to complain of, and have never shown especial disaffection. They are influenced by several motives at the present time: the general break-up of Austria; the desire to escape having to pay a share in any, either Austrian or German, war indemnity; the recent movement to set up an independent Tyrolese republic, to which they do not care to belong; their close geographical and commercial connection with Switzerland, and the feeling that Switzerland is a good country to tie to. We may soon expect the beginning of negotiations.
The loss of Vorarlberg would mean little for Austria. That of the Tyrol might well be followed by Salzburg, and even the movement [Page 312] for a Carinthian republic is once more on foot. It is hard to say where all this will end and how permanent is its character, but it unquestionably presents one of the many extremely difficult questions with which the government of Vienna will have to deal and which the Allied Powers should take into account in their policy towards Austria.
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