FURTHER OUTRAGES IN BELGIUM.

Press, Volume LII, Issue 15488, 15 January 1916, Page 10

FURTHER OUTRAGES IN BELGIUM.

DEPORTATION OF LEADING BARRISTER. Ik (n>o3l OUR OWN COREESI'ONDEKT.) LONDON, December 3. The Reign of Terror still exists 'a Belgium, states the "Morning Post, ' which paper lias only just received information that M. Leon Theodor, the Batonnier, or Chief of the Order of Advocates of Brussels, has followed so many other distinguished members of the Belgium population into captivity in Germany. It appears that as long ago as September Ist, M. Theodor was summoned to the Kommandatur in Brussels and there kept for a time in solitary confinement. It was not unx-il four days later that his colleague, Henri Botsom, a former Batonnier, was permitted to visit him, and on September 7th the population of Brussels, where M. Theodor is held in the highest possible respect for the courage he has shown in championing their cause since the beginning of the German occupation, learned with consternation that ho had- been deported to Bielfield for the period of the war.

The Tcason given by the notorious Wolff Agency for the measure, was that M. Theodor had forbidden a barrister to plead in the interest of a client the decree, dated November 10th, 1914, of the Governor-General on the subject of leases. That,.of course, was a mere official excuse. M. Theodor's real offence was that ho had shown himself to bo a patriotic Belgian. On the previous occasion his conduct of a case, in which a German firm was concerned, had given rise to an enquiry, as a result of which the German Governor wrote to him and said: —'J l am informed that there is a disinclination on the narb of the Belgian counsel to take up the cases of German subjects in the Courts. If this is the case, the Imperial Government will be under the necessity of safeguarding German interests in some, other way." In his reply, M: Theodor said'that he had nothing to do with the private opinions of his oolleagues, especially as regarded their relations with the Germans, but that he could honestly say that an advocate, worthy of the name who undertook to defend the interests of a German subject in a Court of Law would be bound in honour to do all he oould for the success of his client. "No doubt," he added, "since they have invaded us, the Germans have become our enemies. Menaced as we are,, in our very existence by them, we fight them with all the bitterness of an ingrained national spirit. On the other hand, the individual German who appears as a litigant in our Courts encounters no prejudices, no ill-feeling, no vexatious acts. If his honour, his liberty, or his interests are unjustlv menaced, the Bar will be there to protect him. As to the threat that other measures v?ill be taken—measures the nature and bearing of which I cannot guess—it is superfluous. It will not alter our attitude in tho least. We shall act in the future, as in the past, without pre-occupation of any kind, and with no other motive than that of doing what is right."

THE CLIMAX. , Nothing seems to hare come of the affair, but not long afterwards Al. Theodor was again at. loggerheads with tlio German authorities. In Februarylast ho addressed a letter to\the Go-vernor-General, Baron von Bis Sing, in which he protested against the proceedings of a Tribunal in which a German Judge, without a jury, condemned Belgian people to severe penalties for all sorts of pretended, offences. Ho pointed out that these condemnations were not subject to any sort of appeal, and that those who were sentenced had had no previous opportunity of knowing the state of the law or what was permissible or what was forbidden. The whole thine he: characterised as the neeatura of all principles of law. At tho same time, he protested against the continued occupation of the Palais de Justice by German soldiers as a violation of tho terms of the Hague Convention, and asked whether it was not time that it should be restored to its rightful occupiers, the Bench and Bar of Brussels. Again and again, M. Theodor asserted the rights of tho Belgian lawyers and the Belgian peoplo, with the result that he was a marked man. The climax seems to have come when German police officers broke into the chambers of two members of the Brussels Bar who had been engaged in the litigation ooncerninjT the will of King Leopold II and seized a number of private documents. M. Theodor protested against this arbitrary proceeding, again pointing out that there had been a breach of tho Hague Convention, which enacted that the professions, secrets of doctors and lawyers, were inviolable. Tho answer of the authorities was to arrest him, and. as has already been said, to send him off into confinement in Germany. The whole affair is of profound significance. If a man like Theodor. beloved, and respected by his fellow-countrymen, receives such treatment, one may of the terrible position of several millions of less -prominent Belgians who are.for the time being absolutely at the mercy of a brutal and relentless soldiery.