On Wednesday and Friday week there was a characteristic debate
in the Prussian Diet on what is known as the " Katto- witz affair" in Prussian Poland. The Government recently took action against a number of petty officials, chiefly (the Mimes correspondent says) school-teachers and postmen, because they had voted for the Polish candidates in the recent municipal elections. Dr. Porscb, who attacked the Govern- ment as spokesman for the Centre and the Poles, naturally declared that electoral freedom was imperilled. Herr 1■011 Bethmann-Hollweg in reply said that at Kattowits there was a distinct "Polish movement," and the Government, recog- nising its dangers, bad warned officials after the first ballots against voting for Poles and thereby "acting in a manner not in accordance with their official oath." In spite of the warning, the officials had voted for Poles at the second ballots, and they had therefore been removed to other districts. But the measures taken against them were in no sense disciplinary; they had suffered neither in position nor in pay. The Government merely claimed the right to remove officials from posts for which they were "unsuitable." Herr von Bethmann-Hollweg is evidently determined to pursue the policy of Bismarck and Prince Billow in Prussian Poland.
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