Prager Tagblatt
- Politics and schools
- National Democracy and fascism
- The Gajda trial
Paul Fürstenau argues that frequent changes of education minister prevent sustained reform, even when political appointees make serious efforts to master their responsibilities. A National Democratic resolution welcomes the national movement associated with Czech fascism while rejecting dictatorship and racial hatred, and insists that members of fascist organisations remain loyal to the party. In Gajda’s libel case, Kratochvíl recounts alleged approaches to Soviet military service after returning from Russia.
Translation
Politics and schools
If all this lacked anything, it was direction and coordination by a single, authoritative will with a clear purpose. Here another harmful aspect of politics’ influence on schools becomes apparent: the person at the head of the education system depends on the current alignment of parties and changes with it. I know very well that this must be so in a democracy, but it is not good for the overall health of the schools. We have had political education ministers whose careers, whose previous experience, as I might call it, had given them little or no connection with education, but who made the most commendable efforts to master the subject and could thus have become true leaders. Changes of government gave none of them the time to do so.
For the problems of upbringing and schooling today demand thorough study and sustained engagement with the subject just as those of public finance do. The education minister need not be a specialist in the bad sense of being narrow-minded, but should be someone deeply committed to the field, conscious of the task, the goals and the means of reaching them.
National Democracy and fascism
“True to its national programme, the National Democratic Party cannot regard the national movement brought forth by Czech fascism as unwelcome. In keeping with its programme of democratic constitutionalism, National Democracy cannot agree with any kind of dictatorship as a matter of principle, nor with the excesses of national and racial hatred, for our nationalism can be defended manfully and confidently without them. In our view, Czech fascism cannot be a political party; its duty, however, is to cleanse our public life in the spirit of sincere democracy through national thought and will, to fight ruthlessly against all subversive elements, and to strengthen those parties that want a healthy national Czechoslovak state. If our members belong to fascist organisations, this must therefore mean that they are and remain, above all, honest, convinced National Democrats and convinced supporters of their party, the representative of consistent nationalism. National Democracy also wants everything that is good in fascism.”
The Gajda trial
The hearing began with the questioning of the defendant Jaroslav Kratochvíl, who was born in 1885 and is a qualified agronomist. He relates:
In 1920 I returned from Russia, and my wife and I had no home. The Russian colonel Krakowjecki took us into his flat. We lived in a room in Žižkov. Solowjew, whom I had not known before, also came there. I learned that Solowjew was visiting Krakowjecki on Gajda’s behalf. Krakowjecki told me—no secret was made of it in my presence—that Gajda was applying to enter the service of the Soviet army. This did not strike me as particularly strange, because Gajda’s whole course of action pointed in that direction. He wanted to enter the service of the Russian army through Krakowjecki. I did not know what status he held in our army. I knew that Gajda had already been seeking a way into the Red Army in Siberia. The overthrow in Siberia was nothing but a means of taking that path. He was for peace with Russia and against the Entente. Gajda wanted to make peace with the Bolsheviks.
Context
An education system between cabinets
Fürstenau’s concern was that educational reform needs more time than a minister may remain in office. Elsewhere in this same article he links that problem to the prospect of cooperation between Czech and German parties, which might ease pressure on German schools but also strengthen clerical influence. The next cabinet took office on 12 October 1926, after this issue appeared: Antonín Švehla became prime minister and Milan Hodža education minister, alongside Robert Mayr-Harting at Justice and Franz Spina at Public Works. That approaching redistribution of responsibility gives the appeal for continuity its immediate political setting.
Kramář’s party and the appeal of fascism
Karel Kramář, who chaired the meeting reported here, had been Czechoslovakia’s first prime minister and led the National Democrats from 1919. His conception of a Czechoslovak national state differed from Masaryk’s conception of a state embracing several nationalities. The resolution’s language of a healthy national state belongs to that political outlook. Its position on fascism is deliberately qualified: it rejects dictatorship and racial hatred while accepting nationalist mobilisation and allowing dual membership. The insistence on loyalty to the National Democratic Party reveals a concern with who would direct that mobilisation, as well as what principles it would serve.
Why Gajda’s Russian connections mattered
Gajda had commanded anti-Bolshevik forces in Siberia and later rose to senior posts in the Czechoslovak army. This made testimony about a supposed wish to enter Soviet service politically explosive. The Military History Institute describes espionage accusations and suspicions of a planned right-wing coup in 1926 as unproved; the affair nevertheless ended his active military career that August. The newspaper’s libel hearing therefore belongs to an unresolved struggle over his reputation, not an established finding of espionage. His election as leader of the National Fascist Community followed in January 1927.
Original
Politik und Schule.
Wenn alledem etwas fehlte, jo war es die
Führung und Zusammenfassung durch einen
einheitlichen, maßgebenden, zielbewußten Willen. Hierin zeigt fid) von einer anderen Seite
der üble Einfluß der Politik auf die Schule: die
Person des gbersten Leiter3 des Schulwesens
ist von der jeweiligen Konstellation der Parteien abhängig und wechselt mit ihr. Jh weiß
wohl, das muß in der Demokratie so sein, aber
günstig für das Gesamtbefinden der Schule ist
es nicht. Wir hatten politische Schulminister,
die durch ihren Entwiklungsgang, durch ihre,
ich möchte jagen, Vorpraxi3, wenig oder gar
feine Beziehungen zum Schulwesen hatten, die
aber in wertvollstem Streben sich in die Materie einarbeiteten und so zu wirklichen Führern werden konnten. Der Wechsel der Regierungen ließ keinem von ihnen die Zeit dazu.
Denn die Probleme der Erziehung und Schulbildung verlangen heute gründliches Studium,
dauernde Beschäftigung mit dem Stoff ebenso
wie die der Finanzwissenschaft —, und der
Schulminister müßte ja nicht gerade ein Fachmann im üblen Sinne der Einseitigkeit sein,
aber ein Mensch, vom Fach innerlich erfüllt,
jeiner Aufgabe, der Ziele und Wege bewußt.
Nationaldemokratie und Fascismus.
„Die nationaldemokratische rtei kann,
getreu ihrem nationalen Program, die vom
tschechischen Fascizmus hervorgerufene nationale Bewegung nicht unwillkommen
heißen. In Erfüllung ihres Programmes
des demokratischen Konititutionalismus kann
die Nationaldemokratie mit keiner wie
immer gearteten programma»tischenDiktatur übereinstimmen,
ebensowenig mit den Uebergriffen des
nationalen und Rassenhasses,
denn unser Nationalismus kann auch ohne
diese mannhaft und selbstbewußt verteidigt
werden. Der tschechische Faseiömus kaun
nach unserer Auffassung keine politische Partei
sein, es ist aber seine Pflicht, durch den
nationalen Gedanken und Willen unser
öffentliches Leben im Sinne der aufrichtigen
Demokratie zu reinigen, rücsichtölos
gegen alle umstürzlerischen Ele»
mente zu kämpfen und jene Parteien zu
stärken, welche einen gesunden nationalen
tschechoslowakishen Staat wollen. Wenn
also unsere Mitglieder fascistischen Organi»
sationen angehören, muß dies bedeuten, daß
fie vor allem ehrliche, überzeugte National»
demokraten und überzeugte Anhänger ihrer
Partei, der Repräsentantin des konsequenten
Nationali8mus, find und bleiben. Alles Gute,
das im Fascismus ist, will auch die Nationaldemokratie.“
Der Prozeß Gajda.
Die Verhandlung begann mit der Ein-j
vernahme dez Angekragten
Jaroslaus Kratoc<hvil,
der 1885 geboren und diplomierter Agronom ist.
Er erzählt:
1920 kam ich aus Rußland und hatte mit
meiner Frau keine Wohnung. Der russische
Oberst Krakowijecki nahm uns in seine
Wohnung mit, Wir wohnten in einem
Zimmer in Ziäkow. Dorthin kam auch
Solowjew, den ich vorher nicht kannte. Ich
erfuhr, daß Solowjew im Aufträge von
Gajda zu Krakowjecki komme. Krakowjecki
teilte mir mit (e8 wurde vor mir kein Geheimnis gemacht), daß Gajda fich um den
Eintritt in den Dienst der Sowjetarmee be=
werbe. Es hat mich das nicht besonders
befremdet, weil die ganze Linie Gajdas darauf
hinausging. Er wollte durch Krakowjecki in
den Dienst der russischen Armee gelangen.
ag für einen Charakter er in unserer Armee
hatte, wußte ic) nicht. Ich wußte, daß
Gajda schon in Sibirien den Weg zur Roten
Armee suchte. Der Umsturz in Sib rien war
ja nichts anderes als ein Mittel, diesen Weg
zu betreten. Er war für den Frieden
mit Rußland und gegen die
Entente. Gajda wollte mit den Bolschewilen Frieden schließen.