Toward a New Central Europe

NATIONALISM VS. FEDERALISM
IN HISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE

FRANCIS S. WAGNER

It is a widely accepted view that nationalism has played an epoch-making role only since and through the eighteenth-century French Revolution. The application of this view makes it very simple to explain the genesis of ancient and medieval political formations of a multinational character by supposing that the centrifugal forces of nationalism were completely unknown prior to the French Revolution. Needless to say, this theory proves to be false if pre-Revolution times are historically scrutinized. It is a well-documented fact that though the main stream of ancient and medieval life most of the time did not involve the phenomena of nationalism, national (racial) differences, in one or another form, worked persistently beneath the surface. This can be fairly well illustrated in the founding and downfall of the Macedonian world empire. When Philip II defeated the Athenians at Chaeronea in 338 BC, he incorporated Greece, excepting never-conquered Sparta, into the League of Corinth. Representation of its cities in the Synhedrion (Council) was accorded by population and district. Nations outside Greece were encouraged to join the Federation. Philip's son, Alexander the Great, preferred even more than his father, Greek solidarity to city patriotism and dreamt of spreading Greek culture through the Orient in the wake of his triumphal armies. Alexander and his advisers, recognizing the national and racial entity of the peoples conquered, readily adapted themselves to Oriental customs in all respects in order to win their hearts. But the conquerors made a serious miscalculation by underrating the depth of Oriental culture and its impact upon the masses. Therefore, after the sudden death of the Master of the World, during the short-lived reign of his successors, the Diadochi, the empire fell into its original ethnic ingredients and, after a while, quite contrary to the conquerors' expectation, Oriental cults started pouring into Europe, including the concept of the divine right of kings, along the same lines of communication which Alexander's invincible troops opened up.

The history of the vast, nomadic world also has some lessons for the observer which can be drawn from its peculiar power politics.

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Despite the tremendous might of politico military formations organized by the nomadic tribes in the steppe regions of Southeastern Europe and Asia, military strength alone proved incapable of controlling the life of those multitribal states in time of crisis. On such occasions, due to the lack of a widespread and deep-rooted common heritage, these political bodies underwent essential changes or even disintegrated. The example of Tartar, Mongolian and other tribes demonstrates that with the downfall of the leading tribe or the death of the chieftain (khan) the empire crumbles. The Orkhon inscriptions of old Turkish and Chinese writings indeed convincingly reveal this political philosophy of the loosely organized tribal groups when their absolute ruler dies. His death is described by the Orkhon inscriptions as if the whole empire had ceased to exist. Evidently, under such circumstances there was no other possible ground for political and social creations than the absolute power of the chieftain. It cannot be overemphasized that the political structure of the nomadic world was so loosely woven that territorial and organizational, as well as population changes occurred frequently there and, depending upon the radius of the centralized leadership, new and new ethnic groups were compelled to join the "federation", while others were able to secede from it.

Ethnically colorful Europe, and especially its heart, the Danube Valley, has not essentially changed its facade since the late Middle Ages. It was and has been a conglomeration of nations. Before continuing our investigation into these complex ethnic conditions, a very basic difference between the Western and Eastern course of development should be pointed out. In Western Europe, historical conditions made possible the evolution of more or less uniform nations while this unification process totally failed in Central and Eastern Europe. Yet the political leadership of the Central and Eastern European nations tried hard to materialize unification programs even in the twentieth century in order to reshape their countries in line with the Western pattern. This anachronistic approach was responsible for incessant power struggles between the so-called state-forming nations and its national minorities. The situation was fairly complicated by the far-reaching consequences of the Tartar and Turkish yoke and the antagonism was also heightened by religious motives.

As I have mentioned previously, the ethnic map of these territories has always been variegated. Several ethnic groups inhabited each and every state in the Danube area, the overwhelming majority being under foreign rule. The latter made coexistence in certain respects even more explosive. This frictional situation could not subside for centuries since the prevailing socioeconomic foundation did not allow the migration of social classes within the nation. Due to this static state of conceptions of power politics, the latter meaning domination. The two world wars exhausted and weakened Europe biologically and

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social classes, national minorities, even within towns or villages, have dwelt in their voluntarily chosen "ghettos" almost up to the present. There are virtually very few localities in this mixed area whose early history did not mirror this conglomerate character.

In addition, the European concept of state-church ties has also left its mark on the life of intergroup relations. At the beginning this somewhat helped promote coexistence among ethnic groups. But in modern times it became one of the chief obstacles in the way towards rapprochement, especially when the struggling groups differed in faith. And in a later stage of development, the once so peaceful relationship between religious and political elements terminated partly because the old-fashioned monarchies were incapable of coping with the problems of growing social and economic crises. It should always be noted that in the Danube area this striving for social and economic betterment was organically connected with certain language and literary efforts as well as some church factors boosting the growth of mass nationalism. It can be said that these historic features still. belong among the main characteristics of mass movements in the socialist countries. Primary sources can undoubtedly prove that these politically motivated language and literary movements in their origin are, in certain respects, of an autochtonous nature, outside influences being capable only of hastening or modifying their otherwise independent course. This occurred, for instance in Hungary, in 1671, well before modern revolutionary times, when a contemporary source, without any apparent external interference, revealed the inner dynamics of nationalism which has remained essentially unchanged from its very beginnings: "I wish that God granted the glorious and joyous day when Hungary will speak one language and the entire nation will be united again in the one true faith. . . and adore one God for ever.'' 1) This short quotation delineates the so peculiar symbiosis of religious and nationalist elements in which nationalism has triumphed absolutely over faith, thus reducing to a minimum degree the role of morality in the nationality struggles. The quotation also indicates clearly that the concept of modern nationalism, already in its initial stage, was tightly interwoven with contradictory principles which later contributed to the disintegration of multinational states.

It is not surprising in the least that in all future nationality troubles the language question, in one form or another, played a unique role. Evidently, its core was already ripe at the outset of the 18th century and only the old social and economic order had to be changed to launch the language-based nationalist mass movement. The language movement, with its highly emotional dynamics and the socioeconomic conditions of changing feudalism, aided reduction of the so-called "Gens Hungarica", which heretofore politically comprised all existing nations within historical Hungary, to its natural and individual elementsóthe Magyar and numerous non-Magyar nations.

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This rapid process of disintegration was greatly stimulated by the Western theory of nationality. This "one language-one nation-one state,' concept in general corresponded to the interests of the great homogeneous national states of Western Europe. But this concept and its German practice tragically destroyed the very foundations of any future intergroup collaborations in the multinational states of the Danube Valley. Simultaneously, such concepts as "Deutschungar,', and the short-lived "bohmischer Landespatriotismus" also lost their historical significance.

Emperor Joseph II was captivated by the ideas of the Western theory. In this spirit, in 1784, he issued his infamous decree on forceful Germanization by means of language, stating that Latin, heretofore used in Hungary, was no longer suitable for official transactions and must be supplanted by German. At first all the nations of Hungary reacted vehemently against the Germanization decree, defending the constitutional rights of lingua patria (Latin) against lingua monarchica (German). But a few years later, all these nations started promoting their own vernacular. The 1784 Germanization order and the later centralization policy of the Imperial Court were primarily directed against the Magyar nation, because the Magyars were politically more independent than any other non-German nation and, therefore, represented a greater menace to the realization of the idea of Gesamtmonarchie. Chancellor Prince Kaunitz of Austria, as early as 1791, formulated the guiding principle of how to administer a multinational state: "The more apparent and well considered the attempts at securing the unity of Hungary, Transylvania and the Illyrian nation, are the more recommended and necessary is the principle of Divide et impera,"(2)

The political renaissance of mother tongues greatly changed the situation and became a significant factor in nationalist awakening. Josef Dobrovsky at a solemn session of the Czech Society of Sciences in Prague, on September 25, 1791, in the presence of Emperor Leopold II himself, delivered an address on the right of usage of the Czech language and took a cautious but firm stand against any form of Germanization.(3) Dobrovsky's stand, a mixture of loyalty towards the Habsburg dynasty, Slavophilism and well-concealed Germanophobia, impressed not only the Czech but several other non-German nations. Its effect was so universal that even the philologically oriented Josef Jungmann school distinctly expressed its objective stating that "there are as many nations as languages; there are as many countries as languages."(4) In line with this universal trend, Istvan Kultsar, of Hungary, made an early attempt to summarize the goals of this new form of nationalism: "Only that country can be happy and powerful whose population has a national character. The Magyar nation is first in this country concerning its historical rights, first in numbers, first in the culture of its native tongue... the name Magyar is so

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glorious, so ancient and famous, and its reign on this blessed soil has been so glorious during a thousand years' period that every nation holds it a special glory to become a Magyar patriot."(5)

Parallelism between the Czech, Hungarian and all other developments can be clearly demonstrated. Naturally, there were some deviations from the general pattern due to the initial phase of the emerging new national consciousness and its changing spiritual as well as material interests. For example, until the early 1830s, which marks the beginning of a more or less organized Magyarization, the Rumanians rather felt that the Slavs and not the Hungarians were their chief enemies. This was because their Eastern Orthodox Church was administered by the Serbian hierarchy using the Cyrillic alphabet which had no respect for the formation of the Rumanian literary language and culture based upon folk traditions. These Serbo-RumanianHungarian relations contributed to some extent to the enthusiastic reception of the reform achievements of Stephen Szechenyi among the Rumanians in Hungary and Transylvania. And the Magyarization campaign as well as Louis Kossuth's quite chauvinistic articles in Pesti Hirlap were also favorably greeted by the Rumanians, for they were primarily directed against the Slavs of Hungary.

The Croatian-Hungarian collaboration seemed to be a continuation of their tranquil life so characteristic of the Middle Ages. Josephinism, the common enemy of both nobilities, brought the leading figures of the two nations so close together that Nicholas Skerlecz, a Croat leader en route to the 1790/91 Diet, asserted publicly that "unbreakable ties joined Croatia to Hungary." But somewhat later during the session of the same Diet, delegates of the two countries clashed on certain main points which were to regulate the practice of religion and language and henceforth no real and lasting compromise was possible between them.(6)

The consistent long-term application of the divide and rule principle by the Vienna Court in dealing with the complex problems of administering the multinational monarchy backfired from the very start. Having disastrous consequences for both the cause of peaceful coexistence and loyalty to the dynasty, this double-faced imperial policy was fast recognized by all parties after the 1848/49 Revolution. Even prior to the Revolution this duplicity was realized by several outstanding nationality leaders, among them Jan Kollar and Ljudevit Gaj, who were simultaneously in the service of Vienna and some foreign powers, the latter working also for Tsarist Russia's secret service.(7) T. G. Masaryk, without having access to relevant documents, clearly analyzed that situation when pointing out that "Croats and Slovaks because of the insincerity of Vienna let themselves be used as instruments of reaction in the name of the Slavic idea."(8)

Presumably the insincerity of the Vienna Court contributed much to the impatient political philosophy and practice of L. Kossuth who

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may have been coerced by circumstances to make efforts to reconcile such opposite poles as liberalism and chauvinistic nationalism in counteracting the duplicity of the central government. Recently published archival sources unanimously indicate that this double-dealing attitude of the Vienna Government was an organic part of the prelude to the 1848/49 Revolution, a real war of races.

In the second half of the past century, the fast-developing nationality and unity movements came to the fore. Historians, political scientists and other experts focused their research on the past and present events of interracial relations. Fact-finding summaries of events pertinent to the French and German-dominated spheres were the products of their investigations. Several theories and doctrines were drawn from actual development to justify the past and present and to chart the roads of the future. It is interesting to note that these teachings were of vital importance up to the end of World War II.

Towards the turn of the last century, the French concept of the nation as represented by Ernest Renan(9) partly relied upon medieval heritage and refused to acknowledge language and national (racial) origin as basic criteria of the nation. Accordingly, the nation is a spiritual and historical reality, and the moral and cultural attitude of individuals should be the determinants of their nationality. One of the chief means of implementing this theory was plebiscite. This French concept had only slight effect on the German sphere of influence.

Central and Eastern Europe on the whole were affected with the German nationality policies. The historic rivalry between the Germans and the Slavs precluded them from making any positive steps towards normalizing their relations. Thus even such liberal-minded professors as Rotteck and Welcker in their Staatslexikon (publ. since 1834) expounded belief in the application of the one-nation one-state principle as healthy and suitable for ethnically mixed areas of Central and Eastern Europe as well. They elaborated that Germanization of the Czechlands and Magyarization of Upper Hungary (Slovakia) should be completed with the view of separating the .Northern and Southern Slavs by the areaís two chief nations, the Germans and the Hungarians, to prevent the Russian occupation of the Danube Valley. Apparently, this train of thought led directly to the philosophy of the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867. The aforementioned views were shared by the distinguished historian Heinrich von Treitschke (Politic) and other pre-eminent authorities of that age, such as, Ludwig Gumplowicz,(10) and Paul de Lagarde.(11) Their viewpoints were thoroughly interwoven with the Bismarckian politics and achievements. These well-trained specialists almost unanimously declared the existence of small nations ridiculous, their rights nil, and the expediency of their assimilation or liquidation in order to create a German Central and Eastern Europe. Through the

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Bismarckian practice of their theories, the nationality problem was put on the agenda of important foreign policy issues and has remained so up to the present.

So the nationality question entered the arena of world issues. As a subject of international disputes, the question was not judged objectively, but as a part of propaganda machinery by the maneuvering rival great powers. In this struggle neither Great Britain nor any other European power viewed or treated the situations on ethical grounds. They were all fundamentally interested in throwing the nationality problem as an obstruction in the paths of German, Russian or other imperialisms. They have never regarded the fate of smaller nations seriously. In this respect let us refer to the history of the Poles and the Czechoslovaks who in the time of their crises were not even consulted. Obviously, since the Bismarckian times the question of national minorities, and indirectly the cause of federalism, have become an integral part of the fast-changing foreign policy constellations. The memoirs of T. G. Masaryk, Eduard Benes, Albert Apponyi, Winston Churchill, Charles de Gaulle, Robert Murphy and others can fully prove the soundness of this thesis. The importance of foreign policy factors does not necessarily mean, that the smaller nations have been free of certain innate defects. When the Hungarians were in power, they were inclined to commit precisely the same mistake which was later repeated by others. This hereditary disease has been the forceful execution of the political unity (rather oneness) of ethnically different groups. The main intention of the 1867 Austro Hungarian Compromise was to create two ruling nations in the Danube area.

A year later, Law No. 44 of 1868 on the equality of the nationalities stemmed also from the basic idea of the Compromise, when its preamble solemnly declared the indivisibility of the so-called Hungarian "political nation", which legal term repudiated the existence of national minorities as individual nations For this reason, Law No. 44 of 1868 could not promote the cause of equality among different nations and, therefore, was mistitled since the Nationality Law safe guarded only certain rights of using the minority languages.(12)

It cannot be overstressed that exactly the same mistake was and has been made by the inter- and post-bellum non-Hungarian regimes. These new regimes have also insisted upon the forceful implementation of the one nation-one state idea historically so inappropriate to the ethnically mixed conditions. The architects of the new regimes misapplied Woodrow Wilsonís points of self-determination, then the only remedy for curing the old, historic disease. Wilson had good ideas, but his era was unable to devise adequate plans for their realization. Then consequentially, Germans and Hungarians, the state-forming nations prior to 1918, were demoted to minority groups, while

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others, previously in minority status, rose to leadership. In this new situation the old, historic problem of coexistence under nonhomogeneous ethnic conditions has remained unsolved. I think this is the essence of the present-day situation which has been developing at least from the end of the eighteenth century.

Reflecting on the circumstances under which our life in the past decades has developed, we should make a quite depressing diagnosis. Namely, that an apparent breakdown has occurred in morals which has greatly but unfavorably influenced interrelationships. This downward trend in morality, as well as the nineteenth-century doctrines already dealt with, were responsible in part for the stand taken by political leaderships in the heart of Europe before and during the Second World War. These leaderships flagrantly disregarded all the constructive teachings and warnings of the past by flinging open the door to the Race Age whose institutions were so irrelevant to historical conditions. Temporarily during the postwar period, the Soviet-fabricated regimes prolonged the policies of racial prejudices through application of the principle of collective responsibility towards certain nations. Their legislations evinced little, if any, difference from that of the Nazi regimes. But from about 1948 these regimes have changed their course to class warfare, thereby excluding large groups from he nations.

Retaining in our minds the commonly known fact that Soviet theory and its workings clash day by day with the vital interests of oppressed peoples, let us now glance at the nucleus of the Soviet system. This is Lenin's dogma, according to which all mankind is inevitably progressing towards its ultimate destiny, the classless Communist society where all nations of the world are melted into a uniform, new race.(13) Evidently, Lenin's prophecy is as utopian a scheme for the eradication of nationalism as was a Russian linguist Marr's once popular theory that the conversion of Tsarist Russia into a proletarian country would result in an entirely new, heretofore unknown, proletarian Russian language. In the early fifties, Stalin's authority was needed to expose and refute the falsity of that statement.

Lenin's dogmatic views and their practice have never been received sympathetically by the peoples through the Soviet orbit. This is because they have witnessed innumerable startling revelations about the true meaning of the Leninist nationality policy whose Janus-faced character was masterly depicted by Frederick C. Barghoorn (14) as follows: "Moscow believes, or pretends to believe, that communism will inherit the earth. It holds out to mankind the vision of the harmonious society without coercion and inequality. But Soviet Messianism justifies a plan for a Russian communist world organized and directed from Moscow." This Moscow-centered Pan-Sovietism is a

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hotbed of present-day desertions to the flag of national communism.(15)

If the reader now summarizes for himself the history of nationalism versus federalism, he will perhaps see that lasting and sincere cooperation among the various nationalities can be secured only through universal respect of individual freedoms. He will most certainly see the American concept of freedom as it was envisioned one hundred years ago by Jozsef Eotvos, a great Hungarian statesman who, when analyzing the structure of a multinational monarchy, concluded: "The Habsburg dynasty had a great mission... If the Empire could have been organized on the basis of freedom.. . a great alliance would have developed in Central Europe... which would differ from America only in the fact that not the President, but the Emperor would be the head of state.''(16) A few years later, in 1870, Karel Sabina, a highly-esteemed executive committee member of the Czech Democratic Society, delivered a keynote address in which he reprehended Austrian absolutism and demanded that the Dual Monarchy be reorganized in line with the American pattern: "I think it would be better to transfer all American ideas to Bohemia, and to materialize the American concept of freedom in Bohemia. It would be better to transfer America to Bohemia, instead of transferring our people to America.î(17)

The reform thinkers of Central Europe were convinced that America set an example of equality to all nations. They even dreamed about a United States of Central Europe modeled on the ideals of America. Among them the greatest, Stephen Szechenyi, also inspired by the American concept of personal freedoms, laid down the foundation for a federative system by emphasizing that morals should be in indissoluble symbiosis with patriotism. In his famous academic address(18 the guiding principle for regulating the coexistence of different nations was determined by these biblical words: "Do not do that to others which you would not accept wholeheartedly from others." Szechenyi's lifework on the nationality (racial) issues has always been favorably discussed by his critics regardless of their origin or political credo, but the most grandiose monument was erected by Charles Dickens, who, in his Journal commemorated the tenth anniversary of Szechenyi's death, saying: "One last and most important particular remains to be mentioned, in which Szechenyi's opinions remain to this day far in advance of those of his countrymenófar in advance of the opinions which still prevail in England respecting the treatment of alien races."(19)

The prophets of the currently-so-fashionable federalism, if following the path of our historical heritage, will realize that a morally well-founded freedom concept is a prerequisite of forming federations in which the peaceful coexistence of ethnically different groups is lastingly insured.

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1) Kulonbozo vallasoknak egy idvosseges hitben...megegyezese. Pozsony 1671. Cf. Fritz Valjavec, Der Deutsche Kultureinfluss im nahen Sudosten. Unter Berucksichtung Ungarns. I. Munchen, Verlag Max Schick, 1940, 428.

2) Walter Friedrich, Die osterreichische Zentralverwaltung. II. Abteilung. Bd. I, Halbband 2, Teil l. "Die Zeit Josephs II und Leopolds II,, (Verofentlichun gen der Kommission fur neuere Geschichte Osterreichs, 35 (Wien: 1950), p. 82.

3) Ueber die Ergebenheit und Anhanglichkeit der Slawischen Volker an das Erzhaus Oesterreich. Prag. 1791.

4) Kolik jazyku tolik narodu, kolik jazyku, tolik vlasti" ó quotation from Prehled ceskoslovenskych dejin I. Do roku 1848 (Praha, 1958), 748.

5) Istvan Kultsar, "A magyar theatrom," Nemzeti Ujjsag vagy Hazai s Kulfoldi Tudositasok, Pest, 1809, 47.

6) Cf. Francis S. Wagner, "Szechenyi and the nationality problem in the Habsburg Empire," Journal of Central European Affairs, vol. 20, no. 3, 1960, 289-311.

7) For details see Grgur Jaksie, "Izvestaj d-ra Ljudevita Gaja o Srbiji (1847)", Srpski knjizevni glasnik, Starch 1, 1924, 368-377, and Ph.E. Mosely, "A Pan-Slavist Memorandum of Ljudevit Gaj in 1838," The American Historical Review, July 1935, 704-716.

8) T. G. Masaryk, Ceska otazka; snahy a tuzby narodniho obrozeni. Praha, Pokrok, 1908, 80.

9) Ernest Renan, Qu est-ce qu'une nation? 1882.

10) 11) Ludwig Gumplowicz, Das Becht der Nationalitaeten und Sprachen in Osterreich-Ungarn. Innsbruck, 1879; Paul de Lagarde, Deutsche Schriften, 1878-1881.

12, Cf. Oliver Eottevenyi, Nemzetisegi torvenyunk es a kisebbsegi szerzodesek. Pecs, Dunantul Konyvkiado, 1925, 24. (Miskolci ev. ,jogakademia tudomanyos ertekezeseinek tara, 25. sz.), and Ivan Nagy, A nemzetisegi torveny 1868: 44 tc. Budapest, 1943, 162.