an underground organization opposed to the state provided ammunition for a new campaign in which the government began liquidating the temporary ecclesiastical administration in the western (former German) territories and removed apostolic administrators from these areas. The Vatican began to appoint Polish bishops to these bishoprics after this point. In May 1951 the clergy and government signed the "National Charter for Peace Plebiscite", following which subsequent trials were conducted, including notably against the Jesuit Order and St Bernard Order (leading to two death sentences). Three Salesian bishops, who were under heavy fire in the official propaganda, disappeared in 1952; in the same year several priests in Kraków were arrested on charges of espionage and sabotage. In January 1953, five dignitaries, including Archbishop Baziak in Kraków were arrested; public protests in Kraków were suppressed with violence. In February 1953, four priests and three laymen were charged with espionage and put on trial. The government announced that, under the supposed pressure of public opinion aroused by the trial, they had to take control of the Church. Therefore, the government required all ecclesiastical posts to receive government approval. The government used this power, as well as other measures aimed at controlling the Church's activities in these years, to weaken the Church in order to aid in helping to remove it from society. Cardinal Primate of Poland, Stefan Wyszyński, attempted to manoeuvre around this obstacle by gaining permission from the Vatican to relax canonical rules in order to appoint parish administrators instead of pastors, since parish administrators were not subject to this government veto. The government claimed that it seldom used its power of veto, although Cardinal Wyszyński in his role in appointing bishops reported that he found himself largely obstructed. Wyszyński attempted to publish a letter protesting the government's treatment of the Church, and he was secretly arrested and put under house arrest (confined to a convent) in 1953; this followed from the arrest of a number of other bishops prior to his arrest (including the primate, 11 bishops were arrested in that year) including the trial of Bishop of Kielce Kaczmarek before the military tribunal in Warsaw (on charges of espionage). After this, the free bishops agreed to cooperate with the government's decree in February. This arrest later became public knowledge; the government offered to release him in 1955 if he stepped down from resuming his post as cardinal-primate. The state tried