Since the non-Muslims in the Ottoman Empire weren’t doing too badly under their “protected” status, some of them resisted the equality introduced by the Tanzimat and Islahat edicts. Equality ended the extra tax that the non-Muslims had to pay, but it also made them eligible to serve in the armed forces. It soon became obvious that most Christians preferred to pay the extra tax rather than be drafted. Besides, the leaders of the non-Muslim communities also did not want to lose control over their people. When the Tanzimat edict was read publicly in 1839 and then returned to its red satin pouch, the Greek Orthodox patriarch did not look happy. “God grant,” he reportedly said, “that it not be taken out of this bag again!”
Balkan Christians, too, were uninspired by the reforms, because they sought independence, not equal citizenship. That’s why, despite legal guarantees, equality for the empire’s Christians and Muslims would not be fully realized—“not because of bad faith on the part of leading Ottoman statesmen but because many of the Christians wanted it [equality] to fail.”
