 What's up guys, EvilD here and today I wanted to present another historical aspect of the Esperanto community I want to talk about the French campaign against Esperanto at the League of Nations Now I've decided to do another one of these videos where I look at some historical aspect simply because I enjoy doing them I enjoy talking about these topics and it appears to me that you guys enjoy watching these videos because they've actually got a fair few Views compared to my normal vlogs. Anyway, I will do more vlogs in the future But I'm probably gonna do a lot more of these because I just enjoy doing them. Before I go into this I just want to say that I got a lot of this information from this book La Dunjera l'Invo Which speaks about this and also other events during the Esperanto history But you can actually find this information outside of this book in particular I think also this books in English if you don't speak Esperanto You can find this information in Wikipedia and in other pages even in like official records from the League of Nations But you would have to kind of put it together yourself So if you just wanted to get like something that just looked at this one aspect watch this video or get this book Highly recommend it. So I guess first up before I go into what happened I've got to give you like a little rundown of what the League of Nations is So the League of Nations was like the precursor of the United Nations It was founded on the 10th of January 1920 and it basically Dissolved after World War II. So the League of Nations existed during World War II But during World War II it basically just was like the shell of an organization that had really no power and basically did nothing But it's still like legally existed now the mission of the League of Nations was basically world peace Was created after World War one and it was basically created to Stop any more future wars. So obviously it was not very successful in that regard Interesting little fact note about this are the United States although they signed on to the League of Nations Like they signed the original declaration for it They never actually joined the League of Nations and the Soviet Union also didn't really join the League of Nations Except for like a very short period of time, which is basically why the League of Nations failed in essence because two of the greatest Like powers of the day weren't part of the League of Nations Now the working languages of the League of Nations was French and English and this isn't important for later So I just wanted to show you what a map of like the member states of the League of Nations was in 1920 as you can see here There's actually a fair few East Asian countries that were part of the League of Nations And you'll notice that Germany is not there and if we continue down to 1945 which is around about the time that it actually dissolved you can see that a whole heap of members had dropped out of the League of Nations So that's it previously. That's it like at the end We're going to go into the Esperanto aspect of the League of Nations Remember that I stated that the goal of League of Nations was world peace So this was straight after World War one. There's a lot of idealism about let's not do the mistakes of a parents type of thing In comes this guy Edmund privet. I think that's how you pronounce it. If not, sorry guys Anyway, he was an Esperanto speaker historian university professor author journalist and peace activist and he was actually for a period of time member of for quite a long time he was a I think it was I think it was like a board member or something Of the Universal Esperanto Association someone's gonna correct me in the comments by the way I just want to state now although these videos have a lot of information You actually find even more information in the comments people love to add just extra little bits of information So an interesting thing was he was actually an interpreter at the League of Nations for a period of time And he became a vice delegate of Iran at the League of Nations I don't know why I couldn't find out why because he was a Swiss Esperanto speaker So there's probably like a really interesting story behind that So we'll hopefully find out through the comments but he also became the chief editor of the main magazine for the Universal Esperanto Association Esperanto That's the name of the magazine. So this is our main guy This is the guy who basically started the whole thing of Esperanto at the League of Nations in December 1920 he managed to get 11 delegates together from Belgium Brazil Czechoslovakia Chile China You can see the list there on the screen and he convinced them to put forward a resolution basically Proposing Esperanto at the League of Nations and this was during the first assembly of the League of Nations This is the full resolution that was put forward I'm not going to read the whole thing you can pause the video and look at it But I'm going to point out basically the main parts of it The resolution was a saying or proposing that they start the official teaching of the international language Esperanto and public schools of some members of the League It wasn't like all members it was some members and the idea was we'll get it going in some states if it goes Well, then as you can see in the second part They wanted that everyone would have their mother tongue and then also Esperanto as like a tool of communication So that's the full thing that was a full proposal that was put forward when they put this proposal forward Remember, these were the delegates here. You can see them. There was no French delegate in there So he'd spoken to a Hoipa delegates got them on board and then put this proposal this resolution forward So the resolution was put forward at the second commission on the 18th of December 1920 and for some reason I've written the word second commission there twice the French delegate I'm not going to try to pronounce his surname Gabriel was a member of the French Academy So the French Academy was basic always it's kind of like the Academy of Esperanto The goal is to try and push the evolution of Esperanto in certain ways, etc He had this thought process because you can see through the other books that he written that he was worried that French was losing It's prestigious position as the international language of diplomacy anyway at this time French and English were basically You know equal in this position and soon as this proposal was put forward He basically stood up and demanded that the proposal not be discussed And he was very loud about it and the president of the commission basically went oh Okay, and he just basically put down his stamp and said let's skip this. Let's not discuss it This annoyed the other delegates They were quite angry about this but French or the French government were quite powerful So they didn't want to really like get into a full on argument with the French In fact, it was so annoying for some of the delegates such as the Japanese delegates that it was like all through the newspapers in Japan Now this is kind of what he said and I put it in red here And it's an Esperanto because I can't find the original French and even if I could I couldn't read it anyway So I'm going to read I'm going to give you an English translation of the Esperanto I found now remember this might be like a Propaganda version of it might not be exactly what he said so he said that the French language has its history It's beauty and it's used by the greatest writers who are known in the entire world and it's also like the admired Tool of spreading ideas around the world. So he was basically saying, you know French is the language of the elite It's the language that people use if you want to spread ideas. We're gonna use French It's not gonna be Esperanto. Priviate or privat this dude privat He basically was not expecting this he kind of went into this like really idealistic He got a whole heap of nation-states on board and he was like wow, you know going so well and then the French Just came in like steamrolled him. What happened after this is that Maurice who was actually a Esperanto speaker for the Society of the Promotion of Esperanto wrote to privat in December 1920 and he said this is what he said I'm surprised that you were kind of like shocked about the Unfriendliness because we have for some time received quite a Unfavorable welcome from a quite dare or a say which is basically the reference to where the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs was located So basically the French president of the Esperanto promotion society, whatever wrote to him and said look I'm not surprised because you know for quite some time the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs has not given us any favor So you shouldn't have been like expecting them to be in any way favorable to your proposal anyway He did not give up the second attempt So he proposed again this time he organized that the League of Nations would actually send a Delegate an official delegate to go to an Esperanto Congress and see what actually happens at the Esperanto Congress So they sent a Netobi in Azo and you can see that he's a Japanese delegate He was not an Esperanto speaker He wasn't in any way related to Esperanto and he went to the 13th World Congress of Esperanto and Prague as the official Delegate of the League of Nations and this was like the first objective report of Esperanto by a high-ranking official at the time He actually when he went there Like spoke with people saw the actual event in progress and decided quite favorably that you know Esperanto is quite a good thing. This is what he said in Esperanto I can't find the original if it was French for its Japanese whatever So if someone can actually find the original post in the comments that would be great But what he said is that I'm during Sorry, I'm gonna try to translate this to English while the rich and the well educated enjoy the literature and Scientific works in the original form the poor and the people you know who aren't as well off they utilize Esperanto is like a International language for the exchange of ideas So because of this Esperanto is kind of like a motor of international democracy and it's a really a good tool for linking people together So he said it's necessary to take a consideration of interest from The masses in the rational and favorable like spirit basically what he was saying is like You know although the rich can enjoy languages Enjoy literature and science and all that type stuff in their original language The poor have kind of taken it upon themselves to look at Esperanto So he's looking at this quite favorably So obviously he brought this back and the second assembly in September 1921 formed and 11 delegates again proposed Esperanto and the proposal was accepted this time I don't know why the French didn't veto it Maybe they weren't even there at the time but at that point the French weren't happy So they started a campaign and in January 1922 the general secretary Started asking state members to provide an update on the instruction of Esperanto in their schools or what they're doing Because he was going to put together a proper proposal and send this out So the original proposal that was accepted wasn't kind of like the finalized proposal So the French government instantly started a campaign against Esperanto French officials were barred Officially from going to any Esperanto event or even engaging an event where an Esperanto was in any form used and provet himself was barred from entering France in 1921 Apparently there was a lot of other things done, but I couldn't find any proof of those things For instance this book states that the French government even started funding Ido Which was another created language kind of to counteract Esperanto But I couldn't find anything about that external to Esperanto sources So I didn't want to include it But there was other things that was mentioned But these are kind of like the only things that I could find official references to on the third of June 1922 Leon who was the Minister of Public Instruction Instructed all French schools to no longer provide any information on Esperanto or about Esperanto So basically they officially denied Esperanto's use in France within schools Now I don't know if they went to the extent of like denying associations or anything But they went to the extent of denying its instruction at schools So this is what he said again It's an Esperanto car finder French even if I could couldn't speak it So you can copy that in the comments if you can the French language Will be for always the language of civilization at the same time the best tool for the dissemination of Literature which is not comparable to anything else And it also is like in following it serves to the expansion of the French thinking So you can see this is quite a colonist thought process He's saying yeah French is always going to be the international language And no other language can even compare to its literature And it also helps in the expansion of French our thought processes in this modern age of a politician said that They'd probably get like smashed on social media He protested to the League of Nations stating that Esperanto speakers Were actually presenting a negative opinion of French now I could probably imagine that some Esperanto speakers were not happy with French speakers at that stage probably because they felt You know that they'll being attacked by the French and maybe there was actually some of this going on Who knows but it's just kind of funny and ironic anyway after this on August of 1922 the French delegate Georges or I don't have to pronounce his name stated that he had received a Directive from his government to veto any attempt to introduce a world language other than French So this stage the French government's now putting vetoes in place to stop Esperanto and it's kind of funny I did not know about this before until I started my research But the Brazilian delegate Raul actually condemned Esperanto during the meeting in a really long speech Stating that Esperanto is a language of the poor and of the communists with no tradition no literature and without intellectual value So he was basically stating that because the intellects didn't like Esperanto and the poor liked Esperanto Well, then Esperanto is of no use finally enough. I didn't expect this but a British lawmaker Lord Robert Cecil Rebutted stating that people needed to remember that a world language was needed by everyone not just the intellect So it was kind of cool to see that like the British stepped up here now The question of Esperanto was causing so much chaos within the League of Nations that they'll basically just handballing it to different departments Different commissions different communities. So it was just passed around eventually ended up at the International Committee of Intellectual Corporation And are constantly vetoed by the French now finally enough if you look at you got to read this book But if you look at each person who vetoed it or voted against it They stated different reasons at the League for why they were against it Maybe they said they they thought the Esperanto had no merits had no literature But if you look at their private correspondence or what they even said in their own books later on about Esperanto Or just publicly stated elsewhere. Most of the time their biggest fear was not that Esperanto was supplanted French The biggest fear was providing an international language that the poor could use to communicate across International boundaries. So I thought that was quite fascinating I thought it was mainly because French were worried that Esperanto would replace it But they were more worried different countries would be able to speak to each other the poor of different countries So basically after that in September 1923 the commission just decided look we're no longer going to look into this matter of an International language Nitobe the Japanese guy who was sent to actually to the 13th world Esperanto Congress His response to this whole situation was the League lacked wisdom now the French weren't finished Although they managed to veto Esperanto and stop discussion on the matter. They wanted to take it further They actually put a proposal Esperanto and any other artificial language or created language Should not be recommended as a tool for teaching in any school or any state So they wanted to completely bar Esperanto everywhere funnily enough the member states finally pushed back against the French and said although They didn't want to support the proposal because you know the French didn't like it that Esperanto be taught They also didn't want to bar Esperanto from being taught now There was one short lived victory at the same time while the French were like videoing Esperanto over here The 5th assembly actually recommended that Esperanto be used for the language of telegraphery Which is interesting and also not really that important because as we all know the telegraph basically died Now at this point that was basically the end of the story of Esperanto at the League But it was also kind of the end of the League itself because the League was losing power basically every year and It basically came down to everyone was just supporting what they wanted And they weren't actually trying to make anything that would support world peace And as you know and as history has proven World War two eventually happened the League became the shell of an organization World War two after World War two ended The League had one last meeting basically that meeting happened just to Disband itself and to send the finances it had back to its different member states and then found the United Nations So that's the end of the video if you like this topic and if you've got any information on this or if you notice if I made any mistakes I'm not a professional historian kind of like just amateur Leave comments below if you like this video like it share it around sub to the channel And I'll see you all in next video and if you're not there well, then I hope you're reading la dunjada ling vol