then said: "I have done one good thing in place of all these bad deeds. I shall tell you:

I opposed this branch of despotism here, which has destroyed everyone's enthusiasm and extinguished their joy, awakened feelings of hatred and partisanship, and given rise to the formation of racialist societies, whose name is constitutionalism and meaning is despotism, and who has besmirched the name of unity and progress... Since I am pledged to true constitutionalism based on the Shari'a, whatever form despotism takes, even if it clothes itself in constitutionalism and calls itself that, I shall strike it wherever I encounter it. I think the enemies of constitutionalism are those who multiply the enemies of mutual consultation by showing constitutionalism to be tyrannical, ugly, and contrary to the Shari'a.

O you who command! I had a good name and I would have served the nation of Islam with it; you have destroyed it. I had an undeserved fame and I used to make my words of advice to the people effective with it; I am pleased to say you have razed it. Now I have a frail life of which I am weary. May I be damned if I begrudge the gallows it. May I not be a man if I do not go laughing to my death. ... You put me to the touchstone. I wonder how many of those you call the pure party would emerge sound if you put them to the touchstone. If constitutionalism consists of one party's despotism, and it acts contrary to the Shari'a, let all the world, men and jinn, bear witness that I am a reactionary. [^192]

[^192]:Ibid., 28-30.

Bediuzzaman also wanted to set the record straight concerning the 31st of March Incident, discipline in the Army, and the Shari'a and its role, which from the start had been misinterpreted and misrepresented by newspapers of both sides. The seven main reasons he put forward for the revolt were substantially the same as those given above. Then saying to the court: "Pashas and officers! Now I want the punishment for my 'crimes' and the answers to my questions", he put to them eleven and a half questions which pointed out that the majority of those involved were not blameworthy and suggested that injustices arising from CUP rule were the cause. These questions resulted in between forty and fifty prisoners being released. [^193]

[^193]:Ibid., 35-7.

Towards the end of his address, he told the court that he was absolutely insistent on everything he had written in all his newspaper articles. Whether he was summoned to a court in the Era of the Prophet, or to one three hundred years hence, his case, "dressed according to how the fashion