REPRESENTATION AND JUSTICE
In order that the full scope of Magyarisation may be understood, a
short summary of the principal Magyarising provisions of the laws of
Hungary is given. This summary is by no means complete, but it is
sufficient to give some idea of the legal aspect of the industry.
Paragraph 7 of the law of 1792 states that the Magyar language will
form a branch of study regularly taught in the schools, and that every
Hungarian subject must learn Magyar, as in the future only those
knowing this language will be employed in the public services.
Paragraph 14 of the law of 1805 introduces Magyar as the official
language of the Royal Hungarian Chancery, and ordains that the
political authorities are to make use of it in their dealings with the
municipalities. Only the departmental (local) bodies are left to decide
for themselves whether they wish to use it in their own affairs and
before the courts and Government authorities.
Paragraph 8 of the law of 1830 decides that the Prefectures are to use
Magyar. The provision that candidates for the public services must know
Magyar is repeated.
Paragraph 3 of the law of 1836 proclaims the Magyar wording and version
of the laws as authoritative. This language becomes the official one in
the Royal tribunals, and ecclesiastical authorities are instructed to
keep the parish registers in Magyar.
Paragraph 6 of the law of 1840 declares Magyar to be the official
language to be used in representations made by the Houses of Parliament
to the Crown, in the law courts, in the business of the prefectures
and in parish registers throughout the country. All priests must know
Magyar. A knowledge of Magyar must extend to military matters.
Paragraph 2 of the law of 1844 prescribes that all decrees and
regulations of the Royal Chancery and all legislation are to be drawn
up in Magyar, and that all parliamentary debates are to be carried on
in Magyar, except in the case of speeches by Croatian deputies ignorant
of the language. This latter concession, however, is to hold good only
for a period of six years.
Paragraph 5 of the law of 1848 proclaims Magyar as the sole diplomatic
and legislative language in Hungary. By virtue of this proclamation,
nobody who is ignorant of Magyar can become a deputy. Paragraph 16 of
the same law declares that Magyar is the official language for all
parts of the country.
Paragraph 42 of the law of 1870 relating to the establishment of
municipalities decides that one-half of the departmental (county)
assemblies is to consist of those who, being entitled to a personal
vote, pay the most taxes. In order that the non-Magyars, however they
may be qualified, should be effectively barred from office, it is
stipulated that for the committee of candidature, consisting of six
members, the assembly itself should nominate three members and the
prefect the other three; further, that on this committee the president,
who shall be the prefect himself, shall have the casting vote in case
the voting should be equal. It is thus assured that the committee
cannot nominate any individual as a candidate against the will of the
prefect.
Paragraph 18 of the law of 1886 grants the president of a local area,
in his capacity as presiding officer at municipal elections, the right
of submitting as candidate for mayor, district attorney and medical
officer “anyone whom he regards as worthy” of these offices. As only
one candidate may be submitted for any vacancy, the submission of a
candidate is equivalent to his election.
The law of 1874 relating to the changes introduced into the regulations
for parliamentary elections entrusts the committee drawing up the lists
of voters with the task of fixing the rating limit which is to be the
qualification of the vote.
Paragraph 18 of the law of 1879 relating to elementary schools declares
Magyar to be a compulsory subject throughout the elementary schools of
Hungary.
The law of 1898 decrees the Magyarisation of all place names in Hungary.
We may deal with the various methods of Magyarisation suggested by the
above summary in turn, considering first the means employed by the
Magyars to prevent adequate representation of the non-Magyar races in
the county assemblies and the national parliament.
The basis of the local government of the country has always been the
county system. Under this system, which was introduced by St. Stephen
and endures in all essentials to the present day, the county, municipal
and communal assemblies were entrusted with a very large share in the
administration. In 1886 the laws governing the election and duties were
revised. The membership of the county assemblies varied according to
the population of the county from 120 to 600, only half of whom were
elected. Half of the seats on the assembly were awarded automatically
to those members of the community who paid most taxes, in other words
to the great landowners, whose support for the Magyar nation and ideal
could be taken for granted. In the nature of things they were Magyars
themselves, and opposed to any measures which might alleviate the lot
of the peasant class or the nationalities. Having thus secured the
adequate representation of the oligarchical party, the law proceeded
to announce a so-called democratic franchise for the election of the
remainder of the members. But this franchise was no more than the
absurd and complicated parliamentary franchise of Hungary.
But in order to assure that the privileged class should in all cases
have a clear majority, it was ordained that the county officials should
be ex-officio members of the assembly. These officials were indeed
elected by the assembly itself, if the word election can be applied to
their appointment. The candidates for these posts are nominated by the
president of the assembly, who was, of course, invariably a faithful
Magyar, and the members of the assembly, as the elective body, were
only permitted to record votes in favour of the candidates. Further,
no opposition candidates might be nominated, so that nomination of
a candidate was equivalent to his election. The result was that the
privileged members with the support of the officials were always
assured of a majority in the assembly. Few better examples of the
undemocratic nature of the Magyar administration could be supplied.
The same principles were applied in the case of municipal and communal
assemblies. The Magyar working and peasant classes as well as the
members of the nationalities were thus denied all participation in
the government of the country, and it was easy to pass any oppressive
measures which might be indicated from the Magyar circles of the
central Government. The system had the further advantage from the
Magyar point of view that it ensured that all local officials should
be of Magyar birth and proclivities, or else Magyarised members of
the racial minorities. So effective was it in this direction that one
of the most serious problems of the new States after the War was the
disposal of the Magyar officials with which their new territories were
littered.
The parliamentary franchise has already been touched upon. According to
the law of 1874, the qualification for the vote was as follows:--
(_a_) Property qualification. 1. In free towns, owners of houses which
contain three dwellings paying house tax, and owners of land paying
taxes on a direct income of 32 crowns. 2. In country districts, owners
of a quarter urbarial session (about 14 acres) or its equivalent.
Owing to special provisions of the law, this qualification varies in
different counties. 3. Owners of houses whose house tax was imposed on
a basis of 210 crowns of clear income.
(_b_) Taxation qualification. 1. Merchants, manufacturers or town
artisans, paying taxes on income of at least 210 crowns. 2. In
boroughs, those who pay taxes for at least one apprentice. 3. Those
paying State taxes on a direct income of at least 210 crowns. 4. Those
paying income tax on 210 crowns income in Class I, on 1,400 crowns in
Class II, or in the case of officials on 1,000 crowns in Class II.
(_c_) Professional and official qualification. All members of the
Hungarian Academy, academy artists, professors, doctors, veterinary
surgeons, engineers, chemists, foresters, public and communal notaries,
advocates, clergy, schoolmasters.
(_d_) Ancestral qualification. All those possessing the franchise
previous to 1848. (In 1905, 32,712 persons still voted by right of
ancient privileges.)
Remarkable as this franchise was, it contains even more remarkable
exceptions. For instance, not only are servants in the widest sense of
the word excepted, but also all apprentices and agricultural labourers.
“The proletariat has no share in political life, and if it has not
been found possible to exclude the non-Magyar races entirely from the
franchise, numerous devices have been successfully employed for the
past forty years to keep them from the polls or to prevent them from
electing men of their own nationality.... The constituencies have
been cut up in the most arbitrary fashion, in defiance of geography,
population and nationality, but with the one great object of favouring
the Magyar element.”[15]
In consequence of the agreement between the Hapsburgs and the Magyars,
the latter, although forming a minority upon the territory which
they occupied, contrived to become the sole possessors of State
authority. In practice the non-Magyar nationalities were excluded
from any appreciable share in Hungarian legislation. In Hungary the
nobility alone had the power of decision, and from the beginning
of the “constitutional” era they made it impossible, with the help
of armed power, to elect representatives of the non-Magyar peoples
to parliament. How the Slovaks were represented in the Hungarian
parliament can be judged by the following figures: In the 58 electoral
areas of Hungary, inhabited almost entirely or for the greater part by
Slovaks, there were elected:--
Date. Magyar Deputies. Slovak Deputies.
1865 58 0
1869 58 0
1872 56 2
1875 58 0
1878 58 0
1881 58 0
From the latter year onwards the Slovak political parties, seeing that
their efforts were useless against the electoral machinations of the
Magyars, adopted an attitude of passivity, which they maintained until
1901, making till then no attempt to secure the election of candidates.
From then the numbers elected were as follows:--
Date. Magyar Deputies. Slovak Deputies.
1901 54 4
Of these four deputies, two were sentenced to one year’s imprisonment
each for having advocated an unauthorised policy in his election
speeches.
Date. Magyar Deputies. Slovak Deputies.
1905 56 2
1907 51 7
Of these seven deputies, one was forced to resign his seat by the
ecclesiastical authorities, another was deprived of his seat for
having advocated an unauthorised policy in his election addresses, and
two others were sentenced to a year’s imprisonment each for the same
offence.
Date. Magyar Deputies. Slovak Deputies.
1910 56 2
During the elections which took place after the Slovak parties had
decided to resume their activities, the list of the candidates and
voters sentenced for “crimes” in connection with these elections is
most instructive. In 1904 a candidate of the name of Veselovsky was
sent to prison for a year and fined 1,000 crowns for alleged incitement
to revolt in his election addresses. One of his supporters was sent to
prison for five days for shouting “Long live our candidate Veselovsky!”
In the previous year a candidate was sentenced to a year’s imprisonment
and a fine of 1,000 crowns for “incitement to revolt,” another to five
months and 500 crowns for the same offence. The brother of the latter,
a doctor, was imprisoned for two months and fined 200 crowns _for the
crime of “political activity at election meetings by recommending his
brother to the voters!”_ Another supporter, a Protestant clergyman, was
sentenced at the same time to three months and 300 crowns, also for
“_political activity at election meetings_.”
“Violence or excesses during elections” is another favourite crime with
which non-Magyar voters were charged. In 1905, 31 farmers were awarded
sentences aggregating a year and ten months for this offence. In the
next year the figure rose to 56 and the aggregate sentences to five and
a half years. In 1907 the figures were about the same.
The utmost endeavours were made by the authorities to prevent the
non-Magyar electors recording their votes. The constituencies and
polling stations were so arranged that the Magyar communities were
assured of easy access to the poll, while the non-Magyar communities
had to travel great distances. It was no uncommon trick for the local
authorities to declare roads and bridges unsafe for traffic on the day
of the election, or for all the horses in non-Magyar districts to be
placed under veterinary supervision and forbidden to move outside the
commune. As soon as the elections were safely over, these restrictions
were removed. There was no time fixed for the closing of the poll;
this was left to the discretion of the returning officer, who was
always an official of safe Magyar views. This was most convenient,
for if the Magyars voted early, the poll could be closed before the
non-Magyars had a chance of arriving, whilst if any important section
of the Magyars were delayed, the poll could be held open until they
had arrived. In order to silence complaints, the Magyar newspapers
published alarming stories of intimidation by groups of non-Magyar
voters, which had rendered it necessary for the returning officer to
protect the Magyars. This in spite of the fact that an election was the
signal for what was practically a mobilisation of the Austro-Hungarian
Army, which was called in to maintain order, and naturally maintained
it in the direction indicated by the authorities. In the elections of
1910, according to an official report _only_ 194 battalions of infantry
and 114 squadrons of cavalry were employed for this purpose!
The famous “Memorandum” which the Rumanian party in Transylvania
attempted to present to the Emperor in 1892, and for which it was
persecuted in typically Magyar fashion, contained a reference to
the methods by which elections were conducted. It asserted that a
non-Magyar citizen could only take part in an election at the peril
of his personal safety, and that his attempts to record his vote
practically resulted in a civil war against the nationalities. The
troops and gendarmerie used every means of force and injustice to
keep the non-Magyar electors from the polls, and instances of their
brutality during the elections were so frequent as almost to pass
without remark.
It was the endeavour of the officials in charge of the registers to
manipulate them in such a way that even when the opposition voter
reached the polling booth he more often than not discovered that
he was disqualified. The voting lists were drawn up exclusively in
Magyar, which made it easy to insert false particulars without the
knowledge of voters of subject nationalities. For instance, the
voter’s age, address or calling might be incorrectly entered, so that
when he appeared he did not answer to the description entered on the
list. Further, there was no secret ballot; voters were compelled to
declare aloud before the returning officer, and incidentally before
various other officials seated with him in the booth, the name of the
candidate for whom they wished to vote. If they voted thus for the
opposition candidate they became at once marked men, upon whom the eyes
of the local officials were directed, and the latter took the first
opportunity of trumping up against them some charge which involved
a fine or imprisonment. It thus required considerable courage for a
Slovak or Rumanian voter to vote for a non-Magyar candidate, or even
for a Magyar peasant to vote against the wishes discreetly conveyed to
him by the representatives of the Government party.
The voter could not even be sure that the returning officer would
record his vote correctly. A nominee of each candidate was present in
the polling booth, but the returning officer had power to eject any
of these representatives on the most trivial excuse. In such cases,
while a substitute was being procured the returning officer had ample
leisure to transfer votes from the candidate he represented to the
one officially favoured. Again, it is the Magyar custom to describe
an individual by his surname followed by his Christian name. Should
a voter declare his intention to vote for John Smith, to anglicise
the position, he was promptly told there was no such candidate, and
sent away before he had time to correct his mistake and describe the
candidate as Smith, John.
Complaint was worse than useless, as it merely branded the originator
of the complaint as disaffected and opposed to the Magyar nation.
The officials whose duty it was to deal with the complaint were those
in whose hands the control of the election lay. The following letter,
written by a departmental returning officer to his subordinate at
Ipolysag, a district of mixed Magyars and Slovaks, during the elections
of 1881, explains the official attitude.
“I am sending you the 400 florins asked for; I know that you need them.
But in order that I may be able to keep my accounts in order, I ask you
to make a detailed note of it, and always to sign receipts. In matters
of this sort I like to be methodical, for I have seen and I still see
what harm has been done by the contrary procedure. _Keep a careful list
of the opposing side, and admit only 10 out of every 100 of them to the
urns. That is the chief thing. Those who do not like it can complain.
But no concessions!_”
The letter was signed by the prefect himself, and his reference to
complaints is interesting, seeing that he himself administered the
appeal tribunal which heard such complaints.
Björnson published an article dealing with the electoral conditions in
Hungary in the _Courrier Européen_ of February 25, 1908, part of which
is well worthy of translation here.
“I belong to a free and independent nation, and in Norway no more than
in any other secondary nation is electoral fraud known. To falsify the
votes of the people would be in our eyes as grave a crime as to poison
the water they drank. Falsify votes! What sort of chambers could be
thus elected? And what laws would these chambers pass? And what sort of
morality would those who carried out these laws possess? Yet that which
we look upon in our political life as the worst of calamities is the
constant practice of the Hungarian aristocracy.
“It is impossible for me to explain in a few words the electoral
system of Hungary. It is involved in inextricable confusion. But I can
safely affirm that the electoral law of Hungary of 1848, partially
recast in 1874, is an unjust act committed for an unjust end. If
this be thought too severe, let us no longer consider the law, but
the electoral organisations which result from it. According to these
arrangements, 5,161 electors in Hungarian Rumania are distributed
in twelve districts, to elect twelve--12--Magyar representatives,
but 5,275 electors are concentrated in a single district to elect a
single--1--Rumanian representative!
“As though this unjust organisation did not sufficiently assure the
end aimed at, the law contains a provision by which a candidate can be
proposed by ten electors and elected by acclamation before the mass of
the electors have had time to arrive. This is how things happen. The
poll is set up in a place to which access is as convenient as possible
for the Magyars, and as inconvenient as possible for the Rumanians.
Voting begins at 9 o’clock, and within the space of half an hour there
is time to propose a candidate and to elect him by acclamation. The law
contains other similar provisions which are nothing but traps. I shall
not mention them, I shall merely state that Magyars alone are appointed
to supervise the elections!
“And the elections themselves! I think of the districts where the
Magyar aristocracy is afraid of not securing a majority. I have been
sent a description of the elections in a country where the great
majority of the electors were German. But for all that the deputy
elected was a Magyar. People were so far from daring to go and vote
that they barricaded their doors.”
The representation of non-Magyar nationalities in Hungary before the
War has been shown to have been farcical. The Magyar system was
completely oligarchical and utterly opposed to any idea of democracy.
Its tendency was to treat the non-Magyar as a foreigner, and as far as
possible to deny him any facility for the expression of his rights. It
would be possible to quote instance after instance of corruption in
elections and of the disqualification and imprisonment of deputies once
they were elected, but space will not permit of it. The way in which
the electoral system was made to serve the interests of Magyarisation
has been described first, for representation is the first principle
of a democratic nation. It will now be necessary to investigate the
prostitution of justice for the same ends.
Under sections 7 and 8 of the Law of Nationalities, every Hungarian
subject is permitted to employ his mother-tongue before his local
courts, and has a choice of languages in those courts where his own is
not officially employed. But in the latter case the judge is compelled
to take the necessary measures, including the use of an interpreter
if necessary, to ensure that the parties concerned can follow the
proceedings, particularly the verdict. But these provisions were flatly
disregarded. Summonses were issued, trials conducted, and verdicts
issued in Magyar, even in districts where hardly any of the general
population, and certainly none of the litigants, understood that
language. This was merely another means of compulsion used towards the
racial minorities to employ Magyar as their natural language. A Slovak
or a Rumanian who remained ignorant of Magyar found himself to all
intents and purposes an outlaw; he was at the mercy of anyone who chose
to proceed against him on the flimsiest excuse. He could understand
neither the basis of the charge nor the case against him, nor would the
court listen to his defence. Finally, when the case had gone against
him by default, he was ignorant of the sentence inflicted upon him. The
judge entirely disregarded his right to an interpreter; if he wished
for such a luxury, he was compelled to pay the man’s fees himself,
which in a trial of any length were entirely beyond the means of a man
of the peasant or labouring class.
Nor was the language question the only slur upon Hungarian so-called
justice. The judges themselves were the constant recipients of
communications from the central Government on the subject of the
conduct of the cases before them. They were very carefully selected
from that class of the community which could be trusted to employ
its influence in favour of the Magyar ruling class and against the
lower classes and the nationalities. They were bidden to employ every
resource of justice to suppress “class war,” which in Hungary meant
any protest by the nationalities or the Magyar peasant or labouring
classes against the intolerant rule of the landed classes. In the
eyes of the Magyar rulers justice was merely a convenient handmaiden
to the sacred principles of oligarchy, and the purveyors of this
justice were expected to act in accordance with this idea. In the
rare cases where judges were non-Magyar, care was taken to appoint
them to courts distant from the districts inhabited by their fellow
nationals. In 1910, of 2,633 judges and official lawyers in Hungary,
2,601 were Magyar, 31 were German, and 1 was Slovak. The latter was
kept in Budapest, well under the eye of the Minister of Justice. This
practice ensured that the judge would be unable to conduct a case in
the language of the racial minorities, even had he wished to do so.
There was yet another means by which judicial procedure could be used
as an instrument against those who had become unpopular with the
authorities, either from their democratic tendencies or because they
sympathised with the aspirations of the nationalities. They had only to
be accused of inciting to class war or of conduct to the prejudice of
the Magyar nation and arrested. There was no difficulty in delaying the
trial for a year or more; it was rare in Hungary for a trial to follow
an offence with less delay. Then, even if by some carelessness the
accused was eventually acquitted, he or she had served quite a useful
term of imprisonment, which would act as a salutary warning against the
holding of similar views in the future.
It can now be realised how admirably the Magyars had contrived the
judicial procedure of Hungary to suit their own ends. The length to
which political persecution was carried was so great that any complete
description of it would require a book to itself. Echoes of the more
sensational political trials even reached the outside world, as,
for instance, the trial of Father Hlinka, the Agram trials and the
“Memorandum” trial, directed respectively against the Slovak, the
Croat and the Rumanian races of Hungary. The most impartial method of
obtaining some idea of political persecution in Hungary is to take
the leading cases for a single year. This summary was published in a
slightly different form by Björnson in _März_ of December 1907.
The year in question extends from the end of August 1906 to the end
of August 1907. It must be realised that at that time there was no
suggestion of sedition on the part of the non-Magyar nationalities.
It has been urged that the Magyars have been engaged in a justifiable
attempt to put down smouldering rebellion against the State, that
they were taking steps similar to those which must be taken by every
nation faced with rebellion. This is utterly untrue. It has even
been represented that the non-Magyar nationalities were at this
period in the same state of revolution against the State as were the
Irish Sinn Feiners against the British power in 1920. Nothing could
be further from the truth. It would be far more correct to describe
the nationalities as being as peaceful as the Welsh. The political
persecution carried out by the Magyars was just as unjustifiable as
a similar persecution would have been if carried out by the English
against the Welsh, just because they were Welsh.
On August 27, 1906, a master carpenter was sentenced to three months’
imprisonment and a fine of 50 crowns for incitement to disturbance.
He had criticised the new amendments to the Education Act, and had
declared that it was unreasonable to martyrise the children of
non-Magyar parents by forcing them to learn Magyar. On September 24th
the Supreme Court of Budapest confirmed the sentence of the editor of
a Slovak paper to a month’s imprisonment and a fine of 200 crowns. On
October 20th his successor was sentenced to a fine of 500 crowns for
defamation of character, which was incurred by his publication of a
letter blaming the violence of a Magyar official.
On September 16th two citizens were sentenced to three months’
imprisonment and fines amounting to 1,100 crowns for having
ostentatiously left church when a schoolmaster, who had been appointed
against the wishes of the parish, began to play the organ.
On November 16th the Slovak deputy and priest, Ferdis Juriga, whose
election had been particularly obnoxious to the authorities, was
condemned to two years’ imprisonment and a fine of 1,200 crowns for the
crime of incitement against the Magyar nationality. He had published
two newspaper articles in which he had attacked the Jingoism of the
Magyars and had defended himself against charges of unpatriotism. The
offence was, of course, merely an excuse; he was less of a menace to
the policy of Magyarisation in prison than in parliament.
On December 6th the famous Hlinka sentences were pronounced. As the
result of his advocacy of the Slovak cause, Father Hlinka had become a
popular figure, and on the occasion of his arrival in the village of
Rozsahegy a crowd assembled to meet him. It was dispersed by gendarmes
without disorder, but a week later Father Hlinka and a number of other
Slovaks were arrested and left for five months in prison without
trial. The accused were charged with instigation against the Magyar
nationality. Ninety-seven witnesses were summoned for the prosecution
and close upon forty for the defence, but of the latter all save four
were disallowed by the court. Father Hlinka was sentenced to two years’
imprisonment and a fine of 1,500 crowns. One of the other defendants
was sentenced to a year and 900 crowns; one to four months and 300
crowns; three to a total of sixteen months and 800 crowns, and the
remaining six to three months each and a total of 5,500 crowns.
On January 31, 1907, a man was sentenced to five days’ detention and
a fine of 60 crowns for threatening to disturb the peace during an
election.
On February 11th the manager of a Slovak paper was sentenced to
a year’s imprisonment and a fine of 80 crowns for the crimes of
incitement against the Magyar nation and of approval of acts contrary
to law. His offence was the publication of an article inviting the
prayers of the populace for Juriga, Hlinka and other condemned
Slovaks. On the 19th of the same month a contributor to the same paper
was sentenced to a year’s imprisonment and a fine of 400 crowns in
connection with the same offence. On February 28th and March 27th two
other Slovak editors who had ventured to criticise the actions of the
Magyars were sentenced, one to two months and 400 crowns, the other to
a year and 1,200 crowns.
On April 12th a man was sentenced to fourteen days and 50 crowns for
words used in the course of his election speeches.
On April 8th six Slovaks were fined 50 crowns each for having organised
a collection to pay the fine of deputy Juriga. On the 19th a man was
sentenced to three months and 100 crowns for inciting the people
against the Magyars in an article contributed to a Slovak paper.
On April 24th four citizens were sentenced to 34 days’ imprisonment for
daring to offer opposition to Magyars who were trying to wreck Slovak
political meetings.
On May 1st Hlinka was awarded an additional sentence of one month’s
imprisonment and a fine of 500 crowns for criticism of the actions of a
Magyar official.
On May 2nd a man and twenty-three women of Zohor were sentenced to
imprisonment totalling three years and ten months. They had requested
that a priest of the name of Zak should be appointed to the parish.
The ecclesiastical authorities had overridden the expressed desire and
the right of the parishioners and appointed a well-known advocate of
Magyarisation, Imrich Hojsik. No sooner had he been appointed than the
women of Zohor drove him out of the commune.
On June 17th four men of Lab were sentenced to three months’
imprisonment each for having shown in their windows, on the occasion of
a religious fête, portraits of Juriga.
On June 9th and 10th the local school examinations took place at a
Slovak village. The school children decorated the school with flags
of the Slav colours in honour of the event. This was interpreted by
the Magyar authorities as an attack against the independence of the
Hungarian State, and the three masters in charge of the school were
sentenced to fifteen days’ imprisonment and a fine of 200 crowns each.
During the same month a printer was sentenced to detention for fourteen
days for an article discovered in a newspaper which was printed by him
but which circulated entirely beyond Hungarian territory.
On July 15th a man was sentenced to three months’ imprisonment and a
fine of 50 crowns for having criticised in public the actions of a
Magyarising priest who had denounced certain Slovak journalists from
the pulpit.
On July 21st three Czechs were arrested in the village of Lucky, having
been denounced by the public notary for the crimes of speaking to the
women and children of the place and making inquiries as to the methods
of Magyarisation employed in the schools. One of them was detained in
custody for four weeks, and was only released on the intervention of
the Austrian Minister of Justice.
This extraordinary list will serve to show the measures taken by the
Magyar authorities against the men of the non-Magyar nationalities in
the name of justice.
But it must be borne in mind that the Magyar system of representation
bore hardly on the Magyar lower classes as well as upon the non-Magyar
nationalities. Although the lower class Magyar was not submitted to
the persecution which was the lot of his non-Magyar neighbours, he was
almost equally disenfranchised. Oscar Jaszi, an enlightened and liberal
Magyar, in a book written in 1912, said: “The pressure of agrarian
feudalism weighs as completely upon the other nationalities as upon
the Magyars themselves, and the pressure consists in _an Asiatic
administration, unjust taxation, bad schools and economic usury of
every description_. But the oppression of the nationalities is much
more serious than that of the Magyars. The Magyar Junker, maddened by
nationalist hatred, sees in the non-Magyar peasant even less of a man
than in the Magyar peasant.”
The spirit of the Magyar oligarchy has not changed; as will be shown
later, it is as opposed to the principle of democracy as it has ever
been. The Hungarian Republic of to-day hides the germ of reaction
within the husk of hypocritical pretence. To permit any extension
of its boundaries would be to surrender anew to despotism nations
which after years of suffering have at length escaped from its toils.
Sympathy with the tortuous policy of Hungary means sympathy with the
forces of reaction and of a feudalism which has long been extinct
in all enlightened countries. The Magyar trades upon the revulsion
of feeling which all generous nations experience towards a beaten
enemy, in order to secure the consent of the world to his schemes for
imperilling the existence of the non-Magyar nationalities.
FOOTNOTES:
[15] _Racial Problems in Hungary._