On July 22 Polish discontent was increased by the arrest of Pilsudski. On Aug. 25 the diet, now discredited with the people, resigned. On Sept. 12 Germany and Austria-Hungary introduced a new project of a regency of three, a cabinet and premier and council of State, chosen by the regency, and enjoying limited powers, the German and Austrian military governments retaining the right of veto. The regency was appointed on Oct. 15; it con sisted of the Archbishop of Warsaw, Dr. Kakowski, Prince Lubomirski, and J6zef Ostrowski, a large landowner. The first prime minister, Jan Kucharzewski, was appointed on Nov. 26 and formed his first ministry on Dec. 7.
While Polish affairs were taking this course under Austro German occupation, Dmowski was making propaganda for the Polish cause in France and England, and Paderewski was working tirelessly in America. In Nov. 1916, a great Polish National De partment in Chicago had united all the organizations of the 4,000,00o Poles in America; and under Paderewski's influence, President Wilson, in his tentative peace message of Jan. 22, 1917, alluded to a "united, independent and autonomous Poland." In the course of 1917, a Polish corps was organized by General Dow bor-Municki in Russia, and a Polish army, afterwards known as General Hailer's Army, began to be formed in France. The Polish National committee, founded at Lausanne in Aug. 1917, and since established in Paris, was gaining increasing influence in the coun cils of the Allies. Between Sept. 20 and Dec. 1, 1917, France, Great Britain, Italy and the United States had recognized it as the official representative of the Polish people. The thirteenth of President Wilson's Fourteen Points (Jan. 8, 1918) declared that a Polish State should be erected which should include the terri tories inhabited by indisputably Polish population "with an outlet to the sea and an international guarantee of its independence and integrity." In the meantime, the utter collapse of the Russian army had led to peace negotiations between the Central Powers and the Bolsheviks. The Bolshevik delegates who arrived at Brest Litovsk (q.v.) in Dec. 1917, recognized, in theory, the right of the Polish people to self-determination; but Polish delegates were not admitted to the deliberations. By the treaty as concluded on March 3, 1918, Soviet Russia renounced all claims over Poland; but the treaty (Feb. 9, 1918) between the Central Powers and the Ukraine allotted to the Ukraine the disputed province of Chelm, while Austria-Hungary further pledged herself in a secret clause to form East Galicia and the Bukovina into a separate Crownland.
These clauses became known ; Polish opinion was infuriated be yond measure; the Polish Cabinet resigned; the Polish club in the Austrian Reichsrat went over to the Opposition ; the remnant of Pilsudski's legions still fighting for the Central Powers mutinied.
Some were interned, some fought their way to the coast and joined the new Polish army in France. The elections for the council of State in Poland were held in April and it was opened in Warsaw on June 22. Little interest was taken in the elections, and general feeling in Poland tended to ignore this body in favour of the National ccmmittee in Paris. Even before the breakdown of the German offensive in July 1918, the prime ministers of Great Britain, France and Italy had declared in favour of an independent and united Poland at Versailles on June 3, 1918.