From October 1849 to July 1850 Hungary was governed by martial law
administered by "the butcher" Haynau. This was a period of military
tribunals, dragooning, wholesale confiscation and all manner of
brutalities.[40] From 1851 to 1860 pure terrorism was succeeded by the
"Bach System," which derives its name from the imperial minister of the
interior, Baron Alexander von Bach. The Bach System did not recognize
historical Hungary. It postulated the existence of one common
indivisible state of which mutilated Hungary[41] formed an important
section. The supreme government was entrusted to an imperial council
responsible to the emperor alone. The counties were administered by
imperial officials, Germans, Czechs and Galicians, who did not
understand the Magyar tongue. German was the official language. But
though reaction was the motive power of this new machinery of
government, it could not do away with many of the practical and obvious
improvements of 1848, and it was not blind to some of the indispensable
requirements of a modern state. The material welfare of the nation was
certainly promoted by it. Modern roads were made, the first railways
were laid down, the regulation of the river Theiss was taken in hand, a
new and better scheme of finance was inaugurated. But the whole system,
so to speak, hung in the air. It took no root in the soil. The Magyar
nation stood aloof from it. It was plain that at the first revolutionary
blast from without, or the first insurrectionary outburst from within,
the "Bach System" would vanish like a mirage.
The October Diploma, 1860.
Meanwhile the new Austrian empire had failed to stand the test of
international complications. The Crimean War had isolated it in Europe.
The Italian war of 1859 had revealed its essential instability. It was
felt at court that some concessions were now due to the subject
nationalities. Hence the October Diploma (Oct. 20, 1860) which proposed
to prop up the crazy common state with the shadow of a constitution and
to grant some measure of local autonomy to Hungary, subject always to
the supervision of the imperial council (Reichsrath).[42] This project
was favoured by the Magyar conservative magnates who had never broken
with the court, but was steadily opposed by the Liberal leader Ferencz
Deak whose upright and tenacious character made him at this crisis the
oracle and the buttress of the national cause. Deak's standpoint was as
simple as it was unchangeable. He demanded the re-establishment of the
constitution of 1848 in its entirety, the whole constitution and nothing
but the constitution.
The February Patent, 1861.
The October Diploma was followed by the February Patent (Feb. 26, 1861),
which proposed to convert the Reichsrath into a constitutional
representative assembly, with two chambers, to which all the provinces
of the empire were to send deputies. The project, elaborated by Anton
von Schmerling, was submitted to a Hungarian diet which assembled at
Pest on the 2nd of April 1861. After long and violent debates, the diet,
on the 8th of August, unanimously adopted an address to the crown, drawn
up by Deak, praying for the restoration of the political and territorial
integrity of Hungary, for the public coronation of the king with all its
accompaniments, and the full restitution of the fundamental laws. The
executive retorted by dissolving the diet on the 21st of August and
levying the taxes by military execution. The so-called _Provisorium_ had
begun.
The Austro-Prussian War of 1866.
The Compromise of 1867.
But the politicians of Vienna had neither the power nor the time to
realize their intentions. The question of Italian unity had no sooner
been settled than the question of German unity arose, and fresh
international difficulties once more inclined the Austrian government
towards moderation and concession. In the beginning of June 1865,
Francis Joseph came to Buda; on the 26th a provisional Hungarian
government was formed, on the 20th of September the February
constitution was suspended, and on the 14th of December a diet was
summoned to Buda-Pest. The great majority of the nation naturally
desired a composition with its ruler and with Austria, and this general
desire was unerringly interpreted and directed by Deak, who carried
two-thirds of the deputies along with him. The session was interrupted
by the outbreak of the Austro-Prussian War, but not before a committee
had been formed to draft the new constitution. The peace of Prague (Aug.
20, 1866), excluding Austria from Italy and Germany, made the fate of
the Habsburg monarchy absolutely dependent upon a compromise with the
Magyars. (For the Compromise or _Ausgleich_, see AUSTRIA-HUNGARY:
_History_.) On the 7th of November 1866, the diet reassembled. On the
17th of February 1867 a responsible independent ministry was formed
under Count Gyula Andrassy. On the 29th of May the new constitution was
adopted by 209 votes to 89. Practically it was an amplification of the
March Laws of 1848. The coronation took place on the 8th of June, on
which occasion the king solemnly declared that he wished "a veil to be
drawn over the past." The usual coronation gifts he devoted to the
benefit of the Honved invalids who had fought in the War of
Independence. The reconciliation between monarch and people was assured.
Parties in Independent Hungary.
Andrassy.
Kalman Tisza.
Hungary was now a free and independent modern state; but the very
completeness and suddenness of her constitutional victory made it
impossible for the strongly flowing current of political life to keep
within due bounds. The circumstance that the formation of political
parties had not come about naturally, was an additional difficulty.
Broadly speaking, there have been in Hungary since 1867 two parties:
those who accept the compromise with Austria, and affirm that under it
Hungary, so far from having surrendered any of her rights, has acquired
an influence which she previously did not actually possess, and
secondly, those who see in the compromise an abandonment of the
essentials of independence and aim at the restoration of the conditions
established in 1848. Within this broad division, however, have appeared
from time to time political groups in bewildering variety, each adopting
a party designation according to the exigencies of the moment, but each
basing its programme on one or other of the theoretical foundations
above mentioned. Thus, at the outset, the most heterogeneous elements
were to be found both on the Left and Right. The Extreme Left was
infected by the fanaticism of Kossuth, who condemned the compromise and
refused to take the benefit of the amnesty, while the prelates and
magnates who had originally opposed the compromise were now to be found
by the side of Deak and Andrassy. The Deak party preserved its majority
at the elections of 1869, but the Left Centre and Extreme Left returned
to the diet considerably reinforced. The outbreak of the Franco-German
War of 1870 turned the attention of the Magyars to foreign affairs.
Andrassy never rendered a greater service to his country than when he
prevented the imperial chancellor and joint foreign minister, Count
Beust,[43] from intervening in favour of France. On the retirement of
Beust in 1871, Andrassy was appointed his successor, the first instance,
since Hungary came beneath the dominion of the Habsburgs, of an
Hungarian statesman being entrusted with the conduct of foreign affairs.
But, however gratifying such an elevation might be, it was distinctly
prejudicial, at first, to Hungary's domestic affairs, for no one else at
this time, in Hungary, possessed either the prestige or the popularity
of Andrassy. Within the next five years ministry followed ministry in
rapid succession. A hopeless political confusion ensued. Few measures
could be passed. The finances fell into disorder. The national credit
was so seriously impaired abroad that foreign loans could only be
obtained at ruinous rates of interest. During this period Deak had
almost entirely withdrawn from public life. His last great speech was
delivered on the 28th of June 1873, and he died on the 29th of January
1876. Fortunately, in Kalman Tisza, the leader of the Liberal
(_Szabadelmu_, i.e. "Free Principle") party, he left behind him a
statesman of the first rank, who for the next eighteen years was to rule
Hungary uninterruptedly. From the first, Tisza was exposed to the
violent attacks of the opposition, which embraced, not only the party of
Independence, champions of the principles of 1848, but the so-called
National party, led by the brilliant orator Count Albert Apponyi, which
aimed at much the same ends but looked upon the Compromise of 1867 as a
convenient substructure on which to build up the Magyar state. Neither
could forgive Tisza for repudiating his earlier Radical policy, the
so-called Bihar Programme (March 6, 1868), which went far beyond the
Compromise in the direction of independence, and both attacked him with
a violence which his unyielding temper, and the ruthless methods by
which he always knew how to secure victory, tended ever to fan into
fury. Yet Tisza's aim also was to convert the old polyglot Hungarian
kingdom into a homogeneous Magyar state, and the methods which he
employed--notably the enforced magyarization of the subject races, which
formed part of the reformed educational system introduced by
him--certainly did not err on the side of moderation.[44] Whatever view
may be held of Tisza's policy in this respect, or of the corrupt methods
by which he maintained his party in power,[45] there can be no doubt
that during his long tenure of office--which practically amounted to a
dictatorship--he did much to promote the astonishing progress of his
country, which ran a risk of being stifled in the strife of factions.
Himself a Calvinist, he succeeded in putting an end to the old quarrel
of Catholic and Protestant and uniting them in a common enthusiasm for a
race ideal; nominally a Liberal, he trampled on every Liberal principle
in order to secure the means for governing with a firm hand; and if the
political corruption of modern Hungary is largely his work,[46] to him
also belongs the credit for the measures which have placed the country
on a sound economic basis and the statesmanlike temper which made
Hungary a power in the affairs of Europe. In this latter respect Tisza
rendered substantial aid to the joint minister for foreign affairs by
repressing the anti-Russian ardour of the Magyars on the outbreak of the
Russo-Turkish war of 1877-78, and by supporting Andrassy's execution of
the mandate from the Berlin Congress to Austria-Hungary for the
occupation of Bosnia, against which the Hungarian opposition agitated
for reasons ostensibly financial. Tisza's policy on both these occasions
increased his unpopularity in Hungary, but in the highest circles at
Vienna he was now regarded as indispensable.
Material progress.
The following nine years mark the financial and commercial
rehabilitation of Hungary, the establishment of a vast and original
railway system which won the admiration of Europe, the liberation and
expansion of her over-sea trade, the conversion of her national debt
under the most favourable conditions and the consequent equilibrium of
her finances. These benefits the nation owed for the most part to Gabor
Baross, Hungary's greatest finance minister, who entered the cabinet in
1886 and greatly strengthened it. But the opposition, while unable to
deny the recuperation of Hungary, shut their eyes to everything but
Tisza's "tyranny," and their attacks were never so savage and
unscrupulous as during the session of 1889, when threats of a revolution
were uttered by the opposition leaders and the premier could only enter
or leave the House under police protection. The tragic death of the
crown prince Rudolph hushed for a time the strife of tongues, and in the
meantime Tisza brought into the ministry Dezso Szilagyi, the most
powerful debater in the House, and Sandor Wekerle, whose solid talents
had hitherto been hidden beneath the bushel of an under-secretaryship.
But in 1890, during the debates on the Kossuth Repatriation Bill, the
attacks on the premier were renewed, and on the 13th of March he placed
his resignation in the king's hands.
First Wekerle Ministry, 1892. The religious question.
Banffy Ministry, 1894.
Szell Ministry, 1899.
The army language question.
The withdrawal of Tisza scarcely changed the situation, but the period of
brief ministries now began. Tisza's successor, Count Gyula Szapary,
formerly minister of agriculture, held office for eighteen months, and
was succeeded (Nov. 21, 1892) by Wekerle. Wekerle, essentially a business
man, had taken office for the express purpose of equilibrating the
finances, but the religious question aroused by the encroachments of the
Catholic clergy, and notably their insistence on the baptism of the
children of mixed marriages, had by this time (1893-1894) excluded all
others, and the government were forced to postpone their financial
programme to its consideration. The Obligatory Civil Marriage Bill, the
State Registries Bill and the Religion of Children of Mixed Marriages
Bill, were finally adopted on the 21st of June 1894, after fierce debates
and a ministerial interregnum of ten days (June 10-20); but on the 25th
of December, Wekerle, who no longer possessed the king's confidence,[47]
resigned a second time, and was succeeded by Baron Dezso (Desiderius)
Banffy. The various parties meanwhile had split up into some half a dozen
sub-sections; but the expected fusion of the party of independence and
the government fell through, and the barren struggle continued till the
celebration of the millennium of the foundation of the monarchy produced
for some months a lull in politics. Subsequently, Banffy still further
exasperated the opposition by exercising undue influence during the
elections of 1896. The majority he obtained on this occasion enabled him,
however, to carry through the Army Education Bill, which tended to
magyarize the Hungarian portion of the joint army; and another period of
comparative calm ensued, during which Banffy attempted to adjust various
outstanding financial and economical differences with Austria. But in
November 1898, on the occasion of the renewal of the commercial
convention with Austria, the attack on the ministry was renewed with
unprecedented virulence, obstruction being systematically practised with
the object of goading the government into committing illegalities, till
Banffy, finding the situation impossible, resigned on the 17th of
February 1899. His successor, Kalman Szell, obtained an immense but
artificial majority by a fresh fusion of parties, and the minority
pledged itself to grant an indemnity for the extra-parliamentary
financial decrees rendered necessary by Hungary's understanding with
Austria, as well as to cease from obstruction. As a result of this
compromise the budget of 1899 was passed in little more than a month, and
the commercial and tariff treaty with Austria were renewed till 1903.[48]
But the government had to pay for this complacency with a so-called
"pactum," which bound its hands in several directions, much to the profit
of the opposition during the "pure" elections of 1901. On the
reassembling of the diet, Count Albert Apponyi was elected speaker, and
the minority seemed disposed to let the government try to govern. But the
proposed raising of the contingent of recruits by 15,000 men (Oct. 1902)
once more brought up the question of the common army, the parliament
refusing to pass the bill, except in return for the introduction of the
Hungarian national flag into the Hungarian regiments and the substitution
of Magyar for German in the words of command. The king refusing to yield
an inch of his rights under clause ii. of Law XII. of the Compromise of
1867, the opposition once more took to obstruction, and on the 1st of May
1903 Szell was forced to resign.
First Khuen-Hedervary Ministry, 1903.
Every one now looked to the crown to extract the nation from an
_ex-lex_, or extra-constitutional situation, but when the king, passing
over the ordinary party-leaders, appointed as premier Count Karoly
Khuen-Hedervary, who had made himself impossible as ban of Croatia,
there was general amazement and indignation. The fact was that the king,
weary of the tactics of a minority which for years had terrorized every
majority and prevented the government from exercising its proper
constitutional functions, had resolved to show the Magyars that he was
prepared to rule unconstitutionally rather than imperil the stability
of the Dual Monarchy by allowing any tampering with the joint army. In
an ordinance on the army word of command, promulgated on the 16th of
September, he reaffirmed the inalienable character of the powers of the
crown over the joint army and the necessity for maintaining German as
the common military language. This was followed by the fall of
Khuen-Hedervary (September 29), and a quarrel _a outrance_ between crown
and parliament seemed unavoidable. The Liberal party, however, realized
the abyss towards which they were hurrying the country, and united their
efforts to come to a constitutional understanding with the king. The
problem was to keep the army an Hungarian army without infringing on the
prerogative of the king as commander-in-chief, for, unconstitutional as
the new ordinance might be, it could not constitutionally be set aside
without the royal assent. The king met them half way by inviting the
majority to appoint a committee to settle the army question
provisionally, and a committee was formed, which included Szell,
Apponyi, Count Istvan Tisza and other experienced statesmen.
Istvan Tisza Ministry, 1903.
Crisis of 1904-1906.