Politika
- Mr. Uzunović's Fourth Government?
- “Mr. Radić's Telegram Postpones the Decision on the Resignation”
- The Old Government Remains, With One Reconstruction
Politika's front page of 15 October 1926 followed a cabinet crisis in Belgrade that was moving unexpectedly slowly. Prime Minister Nikola Uzunović had handed in his resignation two days earlier, yet the King had neither accepted it nor opened consultations at Court, and the party clubs had stopped work while they waited to see which way the crisis would turn. The paper reported that a telegram from Stjepan Radić had held up the decision. It quoted Uzunović telling reporters after a royal audience that a government goes on conducting state business while in resignation, and even after the resignation is accepted. Its headings predicted that the old cabinet would probably survive with a reconstruction, while ministers said no decision would come before the next day.
This reading covers three passages from the front page: the opening of the lead report on the cabinet crisis and two later sections on Uzunović's audience at Court and the ministers' conference. All three break off at the edges of the scanned tiles, so the continuation of the report, including what the ministers said about Mr. Radić, is missing. The text was read from the page images because the machine-read text was mostly garbled. Some proper names and faint lines were left out rather than guessed, and the masthead line at the start of the first passage is reproduced as printed.
Translation
Mr. Uzunović's Fourth Government?
1 dinar | Editorial office: 20-94; 9-53; THE SITUATION — A FOURTH GOVERNMENT OF MR. … — After Mr. Radić's telegram and the explanations given, the old government will probably remain. Prime Minister Mr. Uzunović submitted his resignation the day before yesterday in the morning, but on that day the King had not yet accepted the resignation, nor had consultations begun at the Court. By the very fact that the resignation had not been accepted, the center of gravity of the situation was shifted to yesterday, which was to bring a decision on the question of accepting the resignation. In political circles a faster development of events had been expected, and so it came as a surprise that events began to develop slowly, so slowly that yesterday morning it had still not been decided whether the government's resignation would be accepted or not. And the unresolved state of that question had the consequence that the work of all the party clubs also came to a standstill, since they considered that they had nothing to decide on while it was not yet known which direction the crisis would take. The slowness with which the crisis was developing was regarded yesterday as highly symptomatic and …
“Mr. Radić's Telegram Postpones the Decision on the Resignation”
“MR. RADIĆ'S TELEGRAM POSTPONES THE DECISION ON THE RESIGNATION.” Mr. Uzunović remained at the Court until a quarter past six. A large number of journalists awaited his return to the Presidency, wanting to learn both the result and the reason for this audience. To the question the journalists put to him along these lines, Mr. Uzunović replied:
— The reason for my visit to the Court is that the government, as you know, must conduct state business even when it is in resignation. What is more, it conducts that business even when the resignation has been accepted.
— And has the resignation been accepted, Mr. Prime Minister?
— I have no information that the resignation …
The Old Government Remains, With One Reconstruction
… said Mr. Uzunović as he took leave of the journalists.
THE OLD GOVERNMENT REMAINS WITH ONE RECONSTRUCTION
After Mr. Uzunović returned to the Presidency of the Government, the conference was resumed. The ministers stayed together for another half hour and then dispersed. From members of the government one could hear that no decision had yet been made. One of the ministers stated that the whole question had not yet entered its final phase and that the decision would in any case be made only the next day. The ministers further stated that Mr. Ra…
Context
How Uzunović came to lead the government in 1926
Nikola Uzunović, the prime minister whose resignation is left undecided on this page, had been in office for only about six months. He became prime minister on 8 April 1926, after his predecessor Nikola Pašić was forced to resign in the face of corruption scandals. His premiership was troubled from the start: conflict inside his own Radical Party meant that a succession of short-lived governments came and went under his leadership. That pattern is the background to the paper's headline question about a "fourth" Uzunović government. Politika was counting the cabinets formed and re-formed under one prime minister in barely half a year, and the October resignation threatened to add another to the sequence. The figure of four is the paper's own count.
Why a telegram from Radić could decide the cabinet's fate
The page treats a telegram from Stjepan Radić as the factor holding up the King's decision, and the make-up of the National Assembly explains why it carried such weight. In the February 1925 election the People's Radical Party remained the largest group, but it won only 123 of the 315 seats, short of the 158 needed for a majority. A Radical prime minister therefore needed a partner, and Uzunović's partner was the Croatian Peasant Party, whose leaders included Radić. Any reconstruction of the cabinet depended on where Radić and his party stood. The partnership did in fact survive the October crisis for a while. On 24 December 1926 August Košutić, a Croatian Peasant Party politician who had married Radić's daughter, was named Minister of Construction in Uzunović's government.
How the Radical–Peasant partnership ended
The coalition between the Radicals and the Croatian Peasant Party broke up about three and a half months after the hesitant crisis described on this page. According to Košutić's biography, the Croatian Peasant Party left the coalition on 1 February 1927. Uzunović stayed on as prime minister until 17 April 1927 and was succeeded by Velimir Vukićević, another member of the People's Radical Party. One account of the period links Uzunović's April resignation directly to the Croatian Peasant Party's decision to leave his government, which makes the party's exit and the change of prime minister parts of a single chain of events. Read against that outcome, the October crisis was an early test of a partnership that lasted only into the first weeks of 1927.
The Crown's part in accepting resignations
The page shows how much the timing of a cabinet change rested with the Crown. In the paper's account, Uzunović's resignation remained undecided because the King had neither accepted it nor opened consultations at Court, and the party clubs had nothing to act on until he did. Uzunović's remark to reporters, that a government keeps conducting state business while in resignation and even after the resignation is accepted, described the caretaker arrangement that kept the administration running during the wait. The King followed the same procedure later in the decade: when Prime Minister Anton Korošec stepped down in late December 1928, the King began consultations. A few weeks later, on 6 January 1929, King Alexander I dissolved Parliament, abolished the constitution and banned all political parties, ending the parliamentary system within which the 1926 crisis had been played out.
Original
ЧЕТВРТА ВЛАДА Г. УЗУНОВИЋА?
1 динар | Уредништво: 20-94; 9-53; СИТУАЦИЈА ЧЕТВРТА ВЛАДА Г. - После телеграма г. Радића и обј дати, остаје вероватно стара влада Председник владе г. Узуновић поднео је оставку прекјуче пре подне, али тога дана Краљ још није био уважио оставку нити су отпочета саветовања у Двору. Самим тим што оставка није била уважена тежиште ситуације било је пренето на јучерашњи дан који је имао да донесе решење у погледу питања уважења оставке. У политичким круговима очекиван је бржи развој догађаја и због тога је дошло до изненађења што су се догађаји почели развијати споро, толико споро да се јуче пре подне није још одлучило хоће ли оставка владе бити уважена или не. А нерешеност тога питања имало је за последицу да се укочио и рад свих клубова који су сматрали да немају о чему да решавају када се још не зна којим ће правцем криза да пође. Спорост развијања кризе сматрана је јуче као јако симптоматична и
„ТЕЛЕГРАМ Г. РАДИЋА ОДЛАЖЕ ОДЛУКУ О ОСТАВЦИ“
" ТЕЛЕГРАМ Г. РАДИЋА ОДЛАЖЕ ОДЛУКУ О ОСТАВЦИ ". Г. Узуновић задржао се у Двору до шест и четврт. На његов повратак у председништво очекивао је велики број новинара који су хтели сазнати како резултат тако иразлог ове аудиенције. На питање, које су му у том правцу упутили новинари, г. Узуновић одговорио је: - Разлог моје посете у Двору је тај што влада, као што вам је познато, мора да отправља државне послове и онда када је у оставци. Шта више она те послове отправља и онда када је остав ка уважена. - А да ли је оставка уважена, господине председниче? - Немам обавештења да је оставка
СТАРА ВЛАДА ОСТАЈЕ С ЈЕДНОМ РЕКОНСТРУКЦИЈОМ
ко је г. Узуновић опраштајући се са новинарима. СТАРА ВЛАДА ОСТАЈЕ С ЈЕДНОМ РЕКОНСТРУКЦИЈОМ Пошто се г. Узуновић вратио у председништво владе настављена је конференција. Министри су остали на окупу још пола сата па су се после разишли. Од чланова владе могло се чути да није још пала одлука. Један од ми нистара изјавио је да цело питање још није ушло у завршну фазу и да ће се одлука донети свакако тек наредног дана. Министри су још изјавили да г. Ра