Eugene Schuyler and the Bulgarian Constitution of 1876 Patricia Herlihy “I am fearfully busy. Just now I am getting up a Constitution for Bulgaria.” Ô#QCAJA1?DQUHANPK#RAHUJ1?DQUHAN1?D=AɳAN ,KRAI>AN.)1 Schuyler and His Mission to Bulgaria Nation building has become a subject of international interest and do- mestic debate in the United States.2 Unintentionally, the United States was involved in the mapping and constructing of Bulgaria in the 1870s through the activities of a minor American diplomat, Eugene Schuyler. The American Government did not initiate Schuyler’s participation in the making of the Bulgarian Constitution and in the end disciplined him for his unauthorized actions.3 Nonetheless, Schuyler can be credited in large measure for the emergence of an autonomous Bulgaria and for the shape it ultimately assumed. There are two parts in the drama leading to the liberation of Bulgaria EJSDE?D1?DQUHANLH=UA@=NKHA 2DA­NOPEOPDA?D=JCAEJ NEPEODBKNAECJ policy from supporting the Ottoman Turks to closer relations with Rus- sia, which his reports in the spring of 1876 on the massacres of Bulgarian !DNEOPE=JODAHLA@PKAɳA?P 'J 1?DQUHAN=J@PDA0QOOE=J@ELHKI=P N.A. Ignatiev, devised a Constitution for Bulgaria. When the Porte refused to adopt it and other reforms proposed by the European Powers, Russia 1 Eugene Schuyler, Eugene Schuyler: Selected Essays: With a Memoir by Evelyn Schuyler 1?D=AɳAN, New York, NY 1901, 88. In her memoir of her brother, Evelyn Schuyler 1?D=AɳANEJ?HQ@AOAT?ANLPOBNKI#QCAJA¥OHAPPANO 2DAH=PA$N=JG% 1EO?KA SDK@E@ not live to complete his biography of Eugene Schuyler, collected many of Schuyler’s letters. I am indebted to his widow Anne, his son John and his wife Carolyn, for allowing me to consult these letters, hereinafter cited as “Schuyler Papers”. 2 See, for example, James Dobbins et al., America’s Role in Nation-building: From Germany to Iraq, Santa Monica, CA 2003. 3 Osvobozhdenie Bolgarii ot Turetskogo iga: Dokumenty v trekh tomakh, Moscow 1961, Vol. 1, 341 n. 1: “Schuyler and MacGahan and even Schneider in their reports and correspondence gave a correct picture of the bloody massacres by the Turks and the desolation of Bulgaria, for which Schuyler later received censure from the War Minister of the USA.” The author probably meant the State Department instead of the War Department. See Michael B. Petrovich, “Eugene Schuyler and Bulgaria, 1876-1878”, 7 Bulgarian Historical Review 1979 No.1, 65. Ferdinand Feldbrugge, ed. Russia, Europe, and the Rule of Law, 165-184 © Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, 2007 166 Patricia Herlihy declared war in 1877 against the Turks.4 Victory for the Russians led to the acknowledgment by Europe of an autonomous Bulgaria.5 Eugene Schuyler was born in Ithaca, New York, in 1840, of a promi- nent old Dutch-American family. He held a doctoral degree from Yale College and a law degree from Columbia College. After practicing law for a couple of years in New York City, he entered the American Foreign 1ANRE?A &AOANRA@EJ0QOOE=BNKIPK ­NOP=O!KJOQHEJ+KO?KS PDAJEJ0AR=HÓ2=HHEJJÔ=J@ ­J=HHU EJ1P .APANO>QNC 6 His second post was in Constantinople, beginning in 1876 as Consul General and Secretary to the United States Legation. He had only been in Constantinople a few days, when he asked the American Minister Horace Maynard to help him enter Bulgaria to investigate reports by American missionaries of mass murders of Christians.7 As Maynard wrote the American Secretary of State, Hamilton Fish, on 21 November 1876: “Mr. Schuyler, the newly-appointed secretary of legation and consul-general, arrived PDAKB(QHU BNKI#JCH=J@ EJPDAIE@OPKBPDA@EO?QOOEKJÕKBPDAI=OO=?NAOÖ &=REJC learned the state of it, and moved by a desire to ascertain the truth, he decided to visit Bulgaria in person and make inquiries on the ground. In a note to his excellency Safvet Pasha, I informed him of Mr. Schuyler’s intended trip and procured for him =PN=RAHEJC­NI=J £8 He went to Bulgaria with a Bulgarian interpreter, Peter Dimitrov, and two assistants. En route he met up with Januarius MacGahan, an Ameri- can war correspondent for the London Daily News, and Carl Schneider, a reporter for the Kölnische Zeitung.9 Schuyler informed the State Depart- 4 1?DQUHAN¥OOEOPAN #RAHUJ1?DQUHAN1?D=AɳAN SNKPAEJDANIAIKENO ¢1QJNEOAPK1QJOAP£ ¢2DANAI=UD=RA>AAJOKIABKQJ@=PEKJPKPDA>AHEABPD=PDAÕ#QCAJA1?DQUHANÖ was largely instrumental in bringing on the Russo-Turkish War.” The typescript is located at the Cornell University Division of Rare Books and Manuscripts. 5 See Ronald J. Jensen, “Eugene Schuyler and the Balkan Crisis”, Diplomatic History, Vol.V, Winter 1981 No.1 , 23-37. Also Dale L. Walker, Januarius MacGahan: The Life and Campaigns of an American War Correspondent, Athens, OH 1988, 166-191. 6 $KN>EKCN=LDE?=HEJBKNI=PEKJ OAA1?D=AɳAN¥OIAIKENKBDAN>NKPDANEJSelected Essays, op.cit. note 1, 3-204 and “From Sunrise to Sunset”, 85-95. 7 Eugene Schuyler, “United Bulgaria”, North American Review November 1885 No.141, 464. 8 David Harris, Britain and the Bulgarian Horrors of 1876, Chicago, IL 1939, 403. Although Maynard clearly states it was Schuyler’s idea to go to Bulgaria, Schuyler implies otherwise: “Under these circumstances the American Minister, Mr. Maynard, deputed me, although I had arrived in Constantinople only a few days before, to proceed to the interior of Bulgaria, and to ascertain, if possible, the exact truth of the case.” Schuyler, op.cit. note 7, 464. 9 See Howard J. Kerner, “Turco-American Diplomatic Relations 1860-1880”, unpub-.