ABSTRACT
The Czechoslovaks had not only to build their own state in a sick world, without the help of any benevolent neighbors, but they had also, as it turned out, to help in the rehabilitation of surrounding states weaker than themselves—all this with very little practice in the world of affairs. In the proclamation of Czechoslovak independence by the National Council in Paris on October 18, 1918, the general features of the projected democratic state were briefly summarized—universal suffrage, minority rights, proportional representation, land and broad social reforms. The co-operative movement, begun in the middle of the nineteenth century, was congenial to the democratic Czech and Slovak temperament and, encouraged by the state, went forward by great strides under the republic. Most of the pig-iron produced in Czechoslovakia was used for domestic purposes precisely because of the great demand in the rest of the world for the manufactured iron and steel goods produced by Czechoslovak heavy industry.
