Sultan Abdul Hamid II’s repressive regime had stifled the Ottoman empire’s political life for thirty years, but by 1908, resistance and reform groups had nevertheless been activated, and their membership was even increasing. Foremost among these subversive reformist groups was the Committee for Union and Progress (CUP), a group of military officers, medical professionals, and intellectuals who advocated for the Ottoman empire to return to a constitutional government. The CUP was founded on February 6, 1889, by five physicians—Ibrahim Temo, Abdullah Cevdet, Kerim Sebati, Mehmed Reshid, and Ishak Sukuti— as a middle class, liberal-secularist organization that sought to reestablish the Ottoman government as a parliamentary democracy. Under persecution by the Sultan, the leaders went underground or into exile, and the CUP was subsumed into, then took leadership of, the Young Turk movement. The term “Young Turk” was loosely applied to individuals who generally favored reinstatement of the 1876 constitution and wanted to stop the empire’s decline through internal reform. The Young Turks gradually formed secret cells throughout the empire. As a result of blending in with the Young Turk movement, the CUP itself became more charged with Turkish nationalism and favored a dominant position for Turks and the Turkish language within the framework of constitutional reform. This movement was led by Ahmed Riza (1858–1930) and had many cells of support from within the Ottoman military, particularly the junior officer corps.