Revolution and Reorientation: October-December 1918

Chapter 5 Revolution and reorientation: October-December 1918 In the course of October 1918 it became increasingly clear that the Habsburg Empire and multinational Hungary had entered a crisis of historic proportions. The non-German and non- Magyar nations were breaking away from the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, as did the Magyars themselves in an attempt to renew the Hungarian state as a democratic entity independent of Austria – but one that should maintain its territorial integrity and close links with the non-Magyar minorities. However, the latter – the Slovaks, Ruthenians, Romanians, Serbs, Croats, and ethnic Germans of ‘Historical Hungary’ – were determined not to accept the continuation of the old ethnic power structure. On 30 October 1918 the Slovaks issued their Declaration of the Slovak Nation (‘Martin Declaration’), informing the world and the Hungarian government about their intention to form an independent state together with the Czechs. In fact, this happened before they heard the news of the proclamation of the Czechoslovak Republic in Prague on 28 October, thus making it an independent act of expressing the Slovak political will. Meanwhile, the ethnic Germans were organising a national movement of their own, which demanded cultural autonomy for the German population of Hungary.278 The sudden emergence of this movement in 1918 showed that below the surface disaffection among the Germans must have been slumbering for years, and that both nationalism and socialism – the latter being particularly strong among the Germans in a city like Pressburg – had been strengthened enormously during the First World War. It was remarkable how keen the Hungarian Germans were to appropriate the slogan of self- determination for their own ends, in imitation of the other nationalities, even though most of them also continued to stress their loyalty to Hungary. By October 1918 the more than two million Germans were the only non-Magyar nationality in Hungary who seemed to be content with a status of cultural autonomy instead of complete independence. On the one hand, this could be seen as the result of their dispersed pattern of settlement, marked by different concentrations of German-speakers in various parts of western, northern, southern, and southeastern Hungary. On the other hand, it also had something to do with their special status – if more in a psychological and cultural than a political and institutional sense – as a national group that was traditionally more respected by the Magyars than the other non-Magyar nationalities. However, the Germans too had been long-standing victims of national marginalisation, Magyar resentment, and unrelenting Magyarisation pressure. The German national movement for cultural autonomy, which included the German social democrats as well, tended to be loyal to the new Hungarian government led by Mihály Károlyi. The Károlyi government represented a mix of democratic revolution, social reform promises, and 278 See for the Martin Declaration František Bokes, Dejiny Slovákov a Slovenska od najstarších čias až po prítomnosť, Bratislava 1946, pp. 361-7; Ivan Thurzo, O Martinskej deklarácii, Martin 1968, esp. pp. 11-46; Sociálne a národné hnutie na Slovensku od Októbrovej revolúcie do vzniku československého štátu (Dokumenty), ed. Ľudovít Holotík, Bratislava, 1979, documents 228-39, pp. 396-414; Viliam Plevza, Rok osemnásty, Bratislava 1988, esp. pp. 72-7. See for the German national movement in Hungary Ludmilla Schlereth, Die politische Entwicklung des Ungarländischen Deutschtums während der Revolution 1918/19, Munich 1939, esp. chaps. 1-5; Gertrud Reschat, Das deutschsprachige politische Zeitungswesen Pressburgs. Unter besonderer Berücksichtigung der Umbruchsperiode 1918/20, Munich 1942, esp. pp. 57-148; Egbert K. Jahn, Die Deutschen in der Slowakei in den Jahren 1918-1929. Ein Beitrag zur Nationalitätenproblematik, Munich 1971, pp. 33-9; Rudolf Melzer, Erlebte Geschichte. Vom Umsturz 1918 zum Umbruch 1938/39. Eine Rückschau auf ein Menschenalter Karpatendeutschtum, Vienna 1989, pp. 12-4; Paul Brosz, Das letzte Jahrhundert der Karpatendeutschen in der Slowakei, Stuttgart 1992, pp. 32-5; Gerald Schlag, ‘Aus Trümmern geboren…’: Burgenland 1918-1921, Eisenstadt 2001. See for a longer-term perspective on the complex phenomenon of German national consciousness in Hungary since the nineteenth century Land an der Donau [Deutsche Geschichte im Osten Europas 6], ed. Günter Schödl, Berlin, 1995, pp. 349-632. 139 the hope of saving Hungarian territorial integrity by making long overdue concessions to the national minorities. The German national movement was particularly important in four counties of western Hungary, where the city of Pressburg was one of its strongholds; it demanded an autonomous status for the German parts of this region as a compact territory. The German social democrats were a leading factor in the broad democratic movement – both all-Hungarian and ethnic-German – for political, social, and national reform in Hungary, and opposed the incorporation of the city and county of Pressburg into the new Czechoslovak state. In Pressburg they cooperated with democratic forces among the German and Magyar middle classes, to a decreasing extent with the national-revolutionary Slovak social democrats. Because the latter supported the consolidation and expansion of the Czechoslovak state in northwestern Hungary, interethnic social democratic cooperation became increasingly difficult after October 1918. Until December 1918, the German social democrats tended to support the movement of resistance in Pressburg against the annexation of the city by the Czechoslovak Republic. However, there was increasing confusion about the question of whether or not this annexation was inevitable. During the period from October to December 1918, as this question was intensely discussed, there gradually emerged a new tendency among the Pressburg social democrats to look at it in a more pragmatic, less uncompromisingly Hungarian-patriotic way. The arguments used in this debate revolved around issues of civic pride and national identity, and around notions like ‘freedom’, ‘justice’, and of course ‘self-determination’, the key slogan of the post-war era. This chapter will look at the reactions of the citizens of Pressburg to the new situation and the atmosphere of political uncertainty, to the challenges following the collapse of the old order in Central Europe, and to the prospect of their incorporation into the Czechoslovak Republic. In this connection we are especially concerned with the German and Magyar social democrats, who after the end of the war were working together in increasingly isolated Pressburg in what became known as the ‘German-Magyar Social Democratic Party’. More generally, we will look at the ‘old’ population of trinational Pressburg as a whole, in particular the Germans, who increasingly tended to go their own way. The expression ‘German-Magyar [Deutsch-Ungarisch] Social Democratic Party’ referred to two ethnic groups working together. This indicated not only that there was a form of unity between them but, given that both groups were specifically mentioned, that there was a process going on of growing ethnonational differentiation. The rich German- language press of Pressburg provides a wealth of information on the activities and the changing social, political, and ethnic attitudes of the city’s German and Magyar population, and on the shifting perspectives on the future of the city expressed in a situation of growing confusion and uncertainty. We are not as well informed about the activities of the Pressburg Slovaks during this period, although some crucial pieces of information are available. The Wilsonian slogan of ‘national self-determination’ was raised by all the political and ethnic groups in Pressburg in order to legitimise their claims for a share in political power and for national autonomy.279 To the great majority of politically conscious Slovaks ‘self-determination’ meant joining the Czechoslovak Republic, even though disagreement about the precise terms on which this should happen soon led to tensions within the Slovak and Czechoslovak camp itself. To the German and Magyar citizens of Pressburg ‘self-determination’ similarly meant the right to decide their own fate, in particular the opportunity to express themselves on the question of whether or not they should be incorporated into the new state. Indeed, their demand for a plebiscite was a way of trying to prevent this from happening, and the fact that this demand was rejected by the 279 The precise meaning of ‘national self-determination’ was unclear and controversial, and even Wilson himself did not seem to know. The American Secretary of State Robert Lansing noted on 20 December 1918 in his diary: ‘When the President talks of “self-determination”, what unit has he in mind? Does he mean a race, a territorial area or a community?’ The result was that everyone used their own definition to further specific interests. See D. Perman, The Shaping of the Czechoslovak State. Diplomatic History of the Boundaries of Czechoslovakia, 1914- 1920, Leiden 1962, p. 139. 140 Czechoslovak leaders confirmed the Magyar and German suspicion that the right to self- determination was only meant for the Czechs and Slovaks. The resistance to annexation by the Czechoslovak Republic was partly based on traditional loyalty to Hungary; the fact that in November 1918 Hungary became a democratic republic made the Hungarian connection even more worth defending in the

Load more