THE GROWTH OF THE MODERN NATION 5has been espoused both by noble idealists and also by scoundrels for whom the
means is an end in itself. There can be democratic nationalists and undemoc-
ratic nationalists, magnanimous nationalists and mean nationalists, nationalist
moderates and nationalist fanatics. The only thing that they have in common
is the conviction that their nations have an inalienable right to control their
own destiny. For the historian, Nationalism, and the nations which
Nationalism has brought into being, are objective phenomena whose doings
have to be logged and described. Their ultimate morality must be left for oth-
ers to decide. In this, the history of Polish Nationalism, and of the Polish
nation, is no exception.
For most of the 150 years, from the abdication of Stanistaw-August on
25 November 1795 to the retreat of the German Army from Warsaw on
17 January 1945, 'Poland' was little more than a name. Like Armenia or
Macedonia today, names redolent of ancient kings and empires, it often had no
practical significance beyond that of a cultural, linguistic, or administrative area
lying in the territories of three separate states. None of the states which were
constructed on the lands of the former Polish—Lithuanian Republic could claim
to be its successor. Few included even the greater part of the people who might
have called themselves 'Poles'. The Duchy of Warsaw (1807-15) barely dis-
guised the reality of Napoleonic occupation. The Grand Duchy of Posen in
Prussia (1815-49) and the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria (1772-1918) in
Austria gave fine titles to imperial provinces. The former was suppressed for
demanding the fully autonomous status which the latter did not receive till
1868-75. The Kingdom of Poland, the Kongresowka or Krolestwo Kongresowe
(1815—74), and the Republic of Cracow (1815—46), were both abolished in
defiance of the international statutes which had brought them into existence.
The revival of the 'Kingdom of Poland' under German auspices in November
1916 was entirely embryonic, and that, too, miscarried. Like most of the other
experiments in Polish statehood over the previous century, it mocked the intel-
ligence of those it sought to satisfy. In this light, the Second Republic (1918—39)
of the inter-war period, must be viewed as a brief interlude in an over-all stream
of statelessness. Its government, which was driven into exile in September 1939,
was still in existence in London nearly forty years later, and might still have been
regarded in terms of Polish law as the repository of constitutional legality. But
it had never regained control of its territory, and in June 1945 lost the formal
recognition of most foreign powers. Even the 'People's Republic' of Poland
(founded in 1945, formally constituted in 1952) which exercised effective
authority since the Second World War, bore serious limitations on its sover-
eignty. Thus, for the greater part of modern history, statelessness was the Poles'
normal condition. Until 1990, genuine independence was rarely much more than
a pipe-dream. (See Diagram A.)