Debt. Art. XLII. As Servia is to bear a portion of the Ottoman Public Debt for the new territories assigned to her by the present Treaty, the Representatives at Constantinople shall fix the amount of it in concert with the Sublime Porte on an equitable basis.
Roumania, 43−51[1]
Independence. Art. XLIII. The High Contracting Parties recognize the independence of Roumania[2], subject to the conditions set forth in the two following Articles.
Conditions; religion. Art. XLIV. In Roumania the difference of religious creeds and confessions shall not be alleged against any person as a ground for exclusion or incapacity in matters relating to the enjoyment of civil and political rights, admission to public employments, functions, and honours, or the exercise of the various professions and industries in any locality whatsoever.
The freedom and outward exercise of all forms of worship shall be assured to all persons belonging to the Roumanian State, as well as to foreigners, and no hindrance shall be offered either to the hierarchical organization of the different communions, or to their relations with their spiritual chiefs.
The subjects and citizens of all the Powers, traders or others, shall be treated in Roumania, without distinction of creed, on a footing of perfect equality[3].- ↑ Cf. supra, p. 233; Treaty of Paris, Arts. 22−27; Treaty of 19th June, 1857.
- ↑ Cf. supra, p. 236. Roumania had proclaimed its independence on 22nd May, 1877. The Prince assumed the title of Royal Highness in September, 1878, and of King on 26th March, 1881. He was crowned on 22nd May, 1881.
- ↑ In August, 1879, the Powers had nearly agreed to employ coercion to obtain the performance of these conditions (on the stringent nature of which, see Tanoviceano, La Question Juive en Roumanie, 1882), but the Chambers having in November repealed Art. 7 of the Constitution of 1866 (Lég. Ottom. ii. 96) which excluded non-Christians from naturalisation, identical notes were presented, on 20th February, 1880, to the Roumanian Minister for Foreign Affairs by the agents of Germany, France, and Great Britain, announcing the intention of their Governments to enter into diplomatic relations with the country. Austria, Italy, and Russia had previously taken this step. The large number of Jews in Roumania (400,000, it is said, in a total population of 4,500,000) has however continued to give rise to difficulties. Individual naturalisation is required before full political rights can be acquired, and foreigners are incapable of holding land.
