of individual nationalities must be respected, and that these nationalities, whether large or small, are to be free from domination. In view of the fact that Hungary is a polyglot state, including within its confines a number of distinct nationalities, such as the Slovaks, the Magyars, the Roumanians, the Ruthenians and the Jugoslavs, it is very interesting to follow the present attitude of Hungary toward this all-important question. Judging by recent utterances of Hungarian statesmen and writers, the chauvinistic policy of suppression and denationalization of the non-Magyar elements is still in full force, and every attempt to grant the right of self-determination to these subject nationalities will be opposed to the end. Recent attempts of Austria to find at least a partial solution for her thorny racial question have found no sympathetic response in Hungary. On the contrary, they have made the Magyars more than ever determined to defend the territorial integrity of the so-called Magyar state (Hungary) and to pursue their policy of de-nationalization.
Commenting on the Austrian Premier’s attitude toward the nationalities, the Az Ujsaz of July 1st publishes the following interesting article: “The principles of nationality, and the political development of that right, are constitutions foreign to us and must remain foreign to us. We have Magyar law and Magyar policy because legally, on the basis of general laws and rights, we have only Magyar citizens. We have no law of nationalities, for in the common law sense we have no nationalities, but recognizing them in their actuality, for they exist, the Magyar state idea cannot admit—what the Austria idea demands as a requirement of time—the racial discussion of the unitary Magyar state.”
Premier Esterhazy, answering an interpellation of Count Tisza in regard to the same question, gives the following instructive answer: “Neither the Hungarian nor the Austrian government would ever recognize the view propagated recently by the Entente that any group of Hungarian subjects, formed on the basis of nationality or any other basis, could, of their own accord, determine their fate by dissolving their union with the Hungarian state.”
These two excerpts are highly instructive, for they give us in a nut-shell the future attitude of Hungary towards the rights of nationalities to exist as independent states. Hungary is anything but a Magyar state, being more than 50 per cent non-Magyar, but in spite of that the Magyar statesmen cling steadfastly to the Magyar state idea, which means the forcible de-nationalization of the various nationalities in Hungary. From the very moment that dualism was established in Austria-Hungary, Austria’s main mission consisted of Germanization, while Hungary’s main mission has been and remains one of Magyarization. It is time to cease making a distinction between Austria-Hungary and Germany so far as war policies are concerned. They are both in perfect accord and both determined to prosecute the war to a favorable termination, for only by a victory over the Allies will they be able to pursue their previous policies.
Those who look for any voluntary reforms in Hungary are doomed to a sad disappointment. There will be none, for any genuine democratic reforms are bound to undermine the coveted Magyar hegemony, which every Magyar statesman regards as the divine right of the Magyar people. Whenever internal reforms are considered, or whenever any modification of foreign policies is under consideration, they are always judged according to the influence that they will have on the existing Magyar privileges and since any such reform would put the non-Magyar nationalities in power, they will have to come from the outside, and will never be introduced from within.
When once a free Bohemian land emerges in the heart of Central Europe we shall know that the flood of German-Magyar aggression is receding, never to rise again. For the Powers which establish Bohemian independence will by that very act be united in the future against a possible recrudescence of German Imperialism. There is not a single State among the Allies whose interests clash with those of the Czech nation. To all of them the freedom of Bohemia will be a safeguard against a new German advance and a barometer of German pressure. The desire to remove the Czech wedge which divides “Mittel-Europa” will be foremost in any revival of the Pan-German dream. But once the independence of Bohemia is established, neither Russia, Great Britain nor France can ever concede the smallest abridgement thereof.
Now at least the problem of “Mittel-Europa” and of its aggrandisement has become for all Europe the cardinal political issue. At such a moment can Bohemia be forgotten, or her case.
Louis B. Namier. The Case of Bohemia.
