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Oppression of the other non-magyar nations.

The Magyar students of the University wish to make it appear that only the Roumanians are discontented, whilst the other non-magyar nationalities have no reason to complain of the arbitrary acts of Magyarism.

We shall therefore point out in what situation the other nationalities find themselves, and we may remark that what we state is taken from the most authentic sources, as well as from the press of these other nationalities.

Slovaques.

This people amounting to about two millions of individuals, belonging to the Tcheco-Slav branch, inhabit from time immemorial the N.-W. of Hungary.

The Slovaques as well as the other nationalities have had to support the most grievous wounds inflicted on their national existence by those in power.

Their societies for improvement are annihilated one after another, their children are carried off and magyarized by force, they themselves are forbidden all admission into public life.

I. The Slovaques ejected from Parliament.

Although these people live in compact masses, they cannot be represented in Parliament, by deputies chosen from among their number, so that at the present time the Slovaques have not one single national deputy in the Parliament of the country. The bayonets of the Magyar soldiers and gendarmes render all election impossible. In this way it has come to pass that there are seated in the Parliament of Buda-Pesth, in the name of the Slovaque people, about fifty deputies all recruited from among the most fanatic of their enemies.

II. Political Liberty.

If a Slovaque have a patriotic sentiment, il he interest himself in his language and national literature, if he resolve important questions for the progress and well being of his countrymen, Magyar public opinion immediately taxes him with being a panslavist. Every Slovaque who shews any interest in his nation is a panslavist He is forbidden to use his own tongue in public meetings; if he undertakes anything useful to his nation, he is immediately excluded from all public functions. He can only obtain a post under government by denying his nationality.

If in his character of citizen, he is willing to submit to the orders he receives from the different authorities, he must employ an interpreter to translate them.

The Slovaques are not permitted to form societies, either Choral, Economical or otherwise.

This case happened at Tisovec, where the government forbade the opening of a choral society, under pretext that the citizens of that locality were not patriotic enough. In other words, they are neither sufficiently magyarizing nor are they traitors to their nationality. At the same time the government ordered that all those who should be active in the getting up of such societies should be prosecuted.

If the Slovaque people who belong to the evangelical rite, wish by right of the autonomy of their church, to elect a priest who has opinions of his own, and whose desire is to work for the well-being and progress of his parishioners, they are suspected of panslavism.

This case happened at Hunst, where the Slovaques were obliged by armed force to abandon their project of electing as priest the person they desired.

When the Slovaques organize any amusements, such as balls, literary evenings, theatrical performances, etc., the whole magyar press cries out: The police! the police! there is a rise amongst the panslavists!

Here is another example of Magyar liberalism. After all the literary institutions of the Slovaques had been suppressed these latter built in 1889 at Turocz-Saint-Martin, an edifice (« Dom ») to serve as a Museum and handsome public library. The modern arrangement of this building allowing of its being used at the same time as a Restaurant and Café, the government, for political reasons, refused them the necessary license for the selling of wine, beer, spirits, etc.!

III. Literary Institutes.

Although the provisions of the law ordain that scholastic instruction be given in non-magyar districts in the tongue of the inhabitants of those districts, nevertheless in all the territory inhabited by the Slovaques, not a single professional school is to be found, in which the Slovaque language is even taught.

In the Magyar institutions for education, they do nothing but praise the chivalrous magyar nation, and at the same time instil into the hearts of the non-magyar children the hatred and contempt of their own nationality.

The Slovaque youths are forced to listen to the vilest and most infamous insults against the nation of which they form a part, for they have but purely Magyar colleges for their education.

It is not that the Slovaques have never had any colleges but that the liberal magyar government has thought proper to suppress them. In 1860, that is to say, at the time of the Austrian absolutism, the Slovaques, by right of law, founded at their own expense a secondary High School at Turocz-Saint-Martin, another superior one at Velka-Revica, and a professional school at Zniov. These secondary schools being destined to give to the Slovaque nation, a contingent of well-educated men, who might eventually become a danger to the Magyar plans, the government wisely kept an eye upon them. After inquests and investigations of every kind, as nothing could be proved against these colleges, the government under some futile pretext, as for example, that the new buildings were too damp, ordered them to be closed in 1874.

At the present time the Slovaques are overrun with foreign officials, professors who have not the least idea of the Slovaque grammar, and priests who are incapable of preaching in the language of the people.

One may gain an idea of how the Slovaques are oppressed in religious matters by this fact, that the Magyar press itself has not hesitated to publish that the Slovaque citizens of such a locality were forced, by blows, to listen in church to a sermon pronounced in Magyar. [1]

It could not be otherwise when in a diocese as purely Slovaque as that of Neusohl, a person is elected bishop, who is ignorant of the Slovaque language and who, in the several rounds that he makes for the confirmations, clothes himself in pan-magyar fanaticism, and exhorts the congregation to learn magyar, as quickly as possible.

The same fate inflicted by the government on the High Schools was shared by the literary society Matica Slovenska, founded by some of the generous Slovaques. for the improvement of national culture. After having given for 10 years, the most exceptional literary results, the society was suddenly suspended without motive by the Magyar government. Their funds, amounting to more than 100,000 florins, which had been amassed penny by penny by the poor Slovaques — their building estimated at 30,000 florins, a rich museum and fine library, all were confiscated. The most valuable things of the Museum were transferred to Buda-Pesth; the library is left a prey to the rats.

That it may be seen what audacity and brutality is used to prevent the development of the Slovaque race, we will call to mind that during the last few years several Slovaque students have been dismissed from different High Schools[2] and theological institutions, for having dared to read books of their own literature, and to sing their national songs.

For want of other motives, in order to send away the children, the most stupid accusations were invented. Wishing to expel some boys of the 5^th and 6^th classes at the High School of Leutschau, they gave as motive, that the boys kept up a correspondence with the Tzar of mighty Russia!!... Undercover of this absurd assertion, the young Slovaques were expelled from all the High Schools of Hungary!

IV. Rapt of Slovaque children.

Just as with the other nationalities, so with the Slovaques, the Magyar government has recourse to every possible means to magyarize them. We will give an example.

In 1874, in 1888 and in 1889, a mass of Slovaque children were torn away from the bosom of their families and transported to the purely Magyar districts of the « puszta » of Hungary. This act of modern janissaries was accomplished with the help of the authorities, under pretext that the government intended to provide for the Slovaque orphans. But it was soon proved that the government had no such philanthropical end in view, for, amongst the children carried on', many had their parents still living. Consequently the intention was to deprive the Slovaques of the ardour of the rising generation, and at the same time to augment that of the Magyars by the addition of these unfortunate children destined one day to insult their own nation.

Most of these poor children, being ill-treated by the masters to whose care they were confided, ran away and returned home to their parents.

This unheard of act committed by people who call themselves civilized — not to say liberal — produced great indignation in the whole civilized world. The Hungarian-Jewish press nevertheless found means of presenting the affair in such a light, that it was believed the government had been actuated only by charitable motives. If its intentions had been pure, they had only to found on the territory inhabited by the Slovaques, an orphanage where the children would be given a good education and made active and useful citizens of their country and their nation.

Although we do not pretend to have related half the illicit acts committed against the Slovaques, yet we think that what we have said, may give a true idea to the public of the intolerable state in which the nationalities of Hungary find themselves.

That the veracity of the tacts we have related may not be doubted, we will quote the opinion of an eminent Austrian writer, von Heitert, on the subject of the position of the Slovaques.

» . . . . And if we call to mind the words pronounced by Francois Pulszky about 1840, which denied the Slavs all right of existence on Hungarian land, then we will look upon the new tendencies of the « exterminator of the Slovaques » not as a whim, but as the last phase of quite a venomous system which was begun more than 50 years ago, and which was continued when, by the treaty of 1867, the Magyars had succeeded in making themselves masters of the whole of the territory of the Kingdom of Saint Etienne. A short time after, the government commenced by destroying the Matica of Turocz-Saint Martin that is to say a literary institution similar to that of the Matica of the Serbians and to that of the Bohemians, because the Slovaques were not permitted to have lor their highest intellectual culture, a centre of literary meeting.

Almost directly afterwards the government shut the Slovaque High schools of Turocz-Saint Martin and of Nagy-Röcze and transformed them into Magyar colleges. The mission of the Secondary schools of Upper Hungary as Bela Grunwald affirms, is only to thrust in at one door hundreds of Slovaque children and a few years later to send them out at another transformed into Magyars. »

The same method is put into practice in the government schools, where the Slovaque children are tormented by being made to learn in Hungarian, prayers and songs of which they understand nothing.

There are even some communes where, — these cases happened before 1848, — the professor was obliged to teach in Hungarian and the priest to preach to his flock in the same language!

« The last manifestation of this system, contrary to all the laws of education and civilization, was the expelling of several young Slovaques from all the educational Institutions in Hungary, and the declaring them unfitted for ever holding any official post. And the circles of Buda-Pesth have even thought proper to petition our Austrian government that this draconian sentence may be extended to the colleges and public offices of Bisleithanie! And what was the crime for which these young men were so pitilessly condemned? They were panslavists, all their aims tended to panslavism, they were traitors to their country! And in what way had they shown these dangerous sentiments? These young men, in their societies sang their national songs and endeavoured to cultivate their tcheco slovaque dialect and to raise it to the rank of a literary language. »[3]

That those who hold the reins of power may at least in part justify the systematic attempts which they commit against the national existence of the Slovaques, they accuse them of being panslavists. « What the Magyars stamp, say they, with the stigma of panslavism is generally the attachment of the Slovaques to their race and to their national language. If a child sing « I am and will remain a Slovaque » he commits the crime of treason to the country. If a commune wish to employ its own language in church and school, it is immediately taxed with being panslavist. If a priest or a professor read a Slovaque or Bohemian paper, or by chance write an article in one of them, these are considered proofs of the purest panslavism![4]

The informants penetrate even to the heart of private circles; they instigate the punishment of young men who oppose denationalization, they shatter the prospects of those amongst them who have dared even in privais societies to occupy themselves with national literature, language and progress.

Serbians.

A Serbian paper[5] holding very moderate views writes thus: «During these last 20 years, the nationalities of Hungary have maintained a desperate struggle to preserve their national existence. This is proved by the statements of the sittings of the Parliament, of the Municipal and county Assemblies and by the struggles during the past elections. Is it because they are satisfied that the Serbians, the Roumanians, the Slovaques and the Saxons have become silent all of a sudden? The voice of these different nationalities is no longer heard in the Hungarian parliament, neither is it heard in the counties nor in the municipalities. All that caused the struggle made by the different nationalities is arranged and naturally has all been decided contrary to their interests and wishes.

« There is not one single deputy to day in the parliament who defends a national programme. The Hungarian parliament represents a state united by race. A profound silence reigns over the subject of the nationalities.

» This profound silence appears to us to be a very bad sign. It is not because they are satisfied, that the Hungarian nationalities are silent, but because they are not allowed to speak, because the possibility of raising their voices is not left them. They are shut out from the committees of the counties, the municipalities and even from parliament. The last elections proved that it is impossible to return a deputy with a national programme.

» If the «reigning» races consider Hungary as a united national State, and desire to stamp the whole public administration with this character, it is natural that all cannot agree upon the subject of making peace with the nationalities. But no, this character which they wish to give to Hungary, this, it has never had, and everything which is done to effect it, is artificial and is contrary to the nature of things. The State with all the power of which it disposes, has worked to this end for over 23 years, and what is the result? Simply that all the power of the State has not in the least succeeded in transforming the Serbians, Slovaques, Roumanians and Saxons into Magyars. And all this display of forces has only rendered the defeat more evident, and on the other hand has sown discontent amongst the majority of the inhabitants of Hungary.

We ourselves think that as long as the non Magyar nationalities form two thirds of the population of Hungary, and as long as the Magyar statesmen give no satisfaction to this majority and hold to the policy that Hungary shall be a united national State, so long will the question of nationalities exist.

The great eastern question has not yet been solved, and when it is, this solution whatever it may be, will have a great influence on our monarchy and upon the position of the Hungarian nationalities.

It is in the nature of things that sooner or later some intercourse must be re-established, if we wish our country to have any future. ... In the interest of our country, we cannot but see with regret how little the question of nationalities in Hungary is taken into consideration, for the fatal moment will eventually come when we shall have to acknowledge the accomplishment of the famous words: Too late!

Saxons.

To prove that this people also suffers from the Magyar supremacy, we will let the Saxons speak for themselves.

In the « Siebenburgisch-D. -Tageblatt », one of the best informed Saxons papers, we find the following proofs of the truth of our assertions.

« Make yourselves Magyars! » These words re-echo with a trumpet sound through all the land. « Make yourselves Magyars! » repeats the hoarse echo through all the provinces. « Make yourselves Magyars! » In this appeal the whole patriotism of the Magyars is condensed. This, to them, is the highest degree of perfection. Village notaries, who only obtain their positions by favour, or who are well versed in criminal affairs; copyists, remarkable for their illegible writing and for the painful effort they must make to write from dictation; pillars of the inns and coffee-houses, whose only means of acquiring knowledge is derived from the reading of the paper of their party; functionaries, who distort the law and who know how to adopt an arrogant tone towards the people who depend upon them: counts of all ranks, who base their arbitrary acts on some order or command of their superiors; deputies, who know only how to make a noise and interrupt, and at the slightes word they do not understand, to draw their swords or pistols; government clerks, to whom the abc of all political wisdom, — that is to say respect for the people and for their wants — Is but an obstacle to the plans of their party; newspaper writers, who think themselves universal geniuses, because they are not capable ot distinguishing themselves in anything else; priests, intolerant, eager to persecute, and themselves an easy prey to all human frailties; all of them cry, « Make yourselves Magyars! » and think it is no business of theirs.

This resumes the whole of the question concerning the people of Hungary. As formerly, the cross on the shoulder of the Christians was a symbol which meant that they would sacrifice their property and their blood in the conquest of Jerusalem; as later the Mussulmans dreaming after centuries, of revenging the enterprise of. the crusaders, saw in the Crescent the celestial sign by which they would arrive at the destruction of the civilization, the religion, and the customs of the Christians in Europe, so today, in Hungary, the word of magyarization is the intellectual lever of all the political, economical and moral movements. By continuing in this way, things will soon arrive at such a pass that every man who has not made himself a magyar, will be treated as immoral. ... »[6]

This article was written much after the so-called union of the Saxons with the Magyars.