extra-parliamentary ministry, and on the 21st of June Baron Fejérváry, an officer in the royal bodyguard, was nominated Fejérváry Government. minister president with a cabinet consisting of little-known permanent officials. Instead of presenting the usual programme, the new premier read to the parliament a royal autograph letter stating the reasons which had actuated the king in taking this course, and giving as the task of the new ministry the continuance of negotiations with the Coalition on the basis of the exclusion of the language question. The parliament was at the same time prorogued. A period followed of arbitrary government on the one hand and of stubborn passive resistance on the other. Three times the parliament was again prorogued—from the 15th of September to the 10th of October, from this date to the 19th of December, and from this yet again to the 1st of March 1906—in spite of the protests of both Houses. To the repressive measures of the government—press censorship, curtailment of the right of public meeting, dismissal of recalcitrant officials, and dragooning of disaffected county assemblies and municipalities—the Magyar nation opposed a sturdy refusal to pay taxes, to supply recruits or to carry on the machinery of administration.
Had this attitude represented the temper of the whole Hungarian people, it would have been impossible for the crown to have coped with it. But the Coalition represented, in fact, not the mass of the people, but only a small dominant minority,[1] and for years past this minority had neglected the social and economic needs of the mass of the people in the eager pursuit of party advantage and the effort to impose, by coercion and corruption failing other means, the Magyar language and Magyar culture on the non-Magyar races. In this supreme crisis, then, it is not surprising that the masses listened with sullen indifference to the fiery eloquence of the Coalition leaders. Moreover, by refusing the royal terms, the Coalition had forced the crown into an alliance with the extreme democratic elements in the state. Universal suffrage had already been adopted in the Cis-leithan half of the monarchy; it was an obvious policy to propose it for Hungary also, and thus, by an appeal to the non-Magyar Kristóffy’s Universal Suffrage proposal. majority, to reduce the irreconcilable Magyar minority to reason. Universal suffrage, then, was the first and most important of the proposals put forward by Mr Joszef Kristóffy, the minister of the interior, in the programme issued by him on the 26th of November 1905. Other proposals were: the maintenance of the system of the joint army as established in 1867, but with the concession that all Hungarian recruits were to receive their education in Magyar; the maintenance till 1917 of the actual customs convention with Austria; a reform of the land laws, with a view to assisting the poorer proprietors; complete religious equality; universal and compulsory primary education.
The issue of a programme so liberal, and notably the inclusion in it of the idea of universal suffrage, entirely checkmated the opposition parties. Their official organs, indeed, continued to fulminate against the “unconstitutional” government, but the enthusiasm with which the programme had been received in the country showed the Coalition leaders the danger of their position, and henceforth, though they continued their denunciations of Austria, they entered into secret negotiations with the king-emperor, in order, by coming to terms with him, to ward off the fatal consequences of Kristóffy’s proposals.
On the 19th of February 1906 the parliament was dissolved, without writs being issued for a new election, a fact accepted by the country with an equanimity highly disconcerting to patriots. Meanwhile the negotiations continued, so secretly that when, on the 9th of April, the appointment Coalition Ministry, 1906. of a Coalition cabinet[2] under Dr Sandór Wekerle was announced, the world was taken completely by surprise.
The agreement with the crown which had made this course possible included the postponement of the military questions that had evoked the crisis, and the acceptance of the principle of Universal Suffrage by the Coalition leaders, who announced that their main tasks would be to repair the mischief wrought by the “unconstitutional” Fejérváry cabinet, and then to introduce a measure of franchise reform so wide that it would be possible to ascertain the will of the whole people on the questions at issue between themselves and the crown.[3] In the general elections that followed the Liberal party was practically wiped out, its leader, Count István Tisza, retiring into private life.
For two years and a half the Coalition ministry continued in office without showing any signs that they intended to carry out the most important item of their programme. The old abuses continued: the muzzling of the press in the interests of Magyar nationalism, the imprisonment Andrássy’s Universal Suffrage Bill. of non-Magyar deputies for “incitement against Magyar nationality,” the persecution of Socialists and of the subordinate races. That this condition of things could not be allowed to continue was, indeed, recognized by all parties; the fundamental difference of opinion was as to the method by which it was to be ended. The dominant Magyar parties were committed to the principle of franchise reform; but they were determined that this reform should be of such a nature as not to imperil their own hegemony. What this would mean was pointed out by Mr Kristóffy in an address delivered at Budapest on the 14th of March 1907. “If the work of social reform,” he said, “is scamped by a measure calculated to falsify the essence of reform, the struggle will be continued in the Chamber until full electoral liberty is attained. Till then there can be no social peace in Hungary.”[4] The postponement of the question was, indeed, already producing ugly symptoms of popular indignation. On the 10th of October 1907 there was a great and orderly demonstration at Budapest, organized by the socialists, in favour of reform. About 100,000 people assembled, and a deputation handed to Mr Justh, the president of the Chamber, a monster petition in favour of universal suffrage. The reception it met with was not calculated to encourage constitutional methods. The Socialist deputy, Mr Mezöffy, who wished to move an interpellation on the question, was howled down by the Independents with shouts of “Away with him! Down with him!”[5] Four days later, in answer to a question by the same deputy, Count Andrássy said that the Franchise Bill would be introduced shortly, but that it would be of such a nature that “the Magyar State idea would remain intact and suffer no diminution.”[6] Yet more than a year was to pass before the promised bill was introduced, and meanwhile the feeling in the country had grown more intense, culminating in serious riots at Budapest on the 13th of March 1908.
At last (November 11, 1908) Count Andrássy introduced the long-promised bill. How far it was from satisfying the demands of the Hungarian peoples was at once apparent. It granted manhood suffrage, it is true, but hedged with so many qualifying conditions and complicated with so elaborate a system of plural voting as to make its effect nugatory. Every male Hungarian citizen, able to read and write, was to receive the vote at the beginning of his twenty-fifth year, subject to a residential qualification of twelve months. Illiterate citizens were to choose one elector for every ten of their number. All electors not having the qualifications for the plural franchise were to have one vote. Electors who, e.g., had passed four standards of a secondary school, or paid 16s. 8d. in direct taxation, were to have two votes. Electors who had passed five standards, or who paid £4, 3s. 4d. in direct taxes, were to have three votes. Voting was to be public, as before, on the ground, according to the Preamble, that “the secret ballot protects electors in dependent positions only in so far as they break their promises under the veil of secrecy.”
It was at once seen that this elaborate scheme was intended
- ↑ Of the 16,000,000 inhabitants of Hungary barely a half were Magyar; and the franchise was possessed by only 800,000, of whom the Magyars formed the overwhelming majority.
- ↑ The cabinet consisted of Dr Wekerle (premier and finance), Ferencz Kossuth (commerce), Count Gyula Andrássy (interior), Count Albert Apponyi (education), Daványi (agriculture), Polónyi (justice) and Count Aladár Zichy (court).
- ↑ Seton-Watson, Racial Problems, p. 194.
- ↑ The Times, March 14, 1907.
- ↑ Ibid. October 11, 1907.
- ↑ Ibid. October 15, 1907.
