Prager Tagblatt
- Without Fanfare.
- 159 : 113 for the Government.
- The New Hungarian Upper House.
The Prager Tagblatt of 21 October 1926 led with the Czechoslovak Chamber of Deputies' approval of Antonín Švehla's new Czech-German government. Its news report gave the result after a three-day debate, 159 votes to 113, explained that the finance minister's exposé would be voted on only after the budget debate, and listed the few absentees, among them twelve Communists, the four Hungarian Christian Socialists and the deputy Stříbrný. Beside it, an editorial urged the coalition not to celebrate its success loudly and so provoke its numerous opponents, a warning addressed to those who prized the cabinet's multilingualism as its best quality. From Budapest the paper reported that the Hungarian National Assembly had begun debating a law creating a new upper house to replace the old House of Magnates, its subheadings mentioning 35 representatives of the hereditary magnates and the Hungarian members of the House of Habsburg.
Translation
Without Fanfare.
Prague, 20 October. The new Czech-German government has no cause to extol its initial success, insofar as it is expressed in the approval of Švehla's exposé, as a victory in loud words. Anyone who prizes this cabinet's multilingualism as its best quality will take care not to provoke the government's opponents, who are by no means few in number or slight in weight, by [?]. The vote on the government declaration was preceded by a week of doubt, and if Švehla in the end nevertheless …
159 : 113 for the Government.
Kramář: Cooperation of the Germans – Consolidation of the State.
Prague, 20 October. After a three-day debate, the declaration of the new government was today taken note of by 159 votes to 113. Only the Prime Minister's declaration was put to the vote; on the motion of Bradač, the vote on the Finance Minister's exposé will be held only after the budget debate has ended. The House was almost fully assembled. Absent were 12 Communists, the four Hungarian Christian Socialists, and also Stříbrný and Trnobranský.
The New Hungarian Upper House.
35 representatives of the hereditary members of the House of Magnates. – The Hungarian members of the House of Habsburg.
Budapest, 20 October. The National Assembly today began its deliberations on the law creating a new upper house, which is to take the place of the old House of Magnates. Organization and …
Context
The first German ministers in a Czechoslovak cabinet
The paper called Švehla's cabinet a “Czech-German government”, and its news report put in its headline Karel Kramář's view that German cooperation meant the consolidation of the state. According to the Neue Deutsche Biographie, Franz Spina and Robert Mayr-Harting entered a Czechoslovak cabinet together in 1926 as the first Germans to do so, with Spina taking over the Ministry of Public Works. Spina had argued since the founding of Czechoslovakia for German participation in the state, a course known as activism. The stenographic record of the sitting of 20 October lists both men among the government members present beside Švehla. Former Czech prime minister Petr Pithart, quoted by Seznam Zprávy, described it as the government that two German political parties joined. The size of the minorities explains why the editorial singled out the cabinet's multilingualism: a German minority of about three million formed almost a third of the population of the Czech lands, and more than half a million Hungarians lived in Slovakia. The absent Hungarian Christian Socialists on the paper's list came from that second group.
How Švehla returned to power in October 1926
The editorial speaks of a week of doubt before the vote, and the news report of a three-day debate; both followed a breakdown earlier in the year. Seznam Zprávy recounts that the coalition formed after the 1925 elections came into open conflict in March 1926, when the Agrarian Party again demanded higher grain tariffs and at the same time resisted pay rises for state officials. As no agreement was possible, the coalition dissolved and President Masaryk appointed a caretaker government of officials. In October 1926 Švehla returned to form his third and last cabinet; the article's list of governments dates the caretaker cabinet's end and the start of Švehla's to 12 October 1926, with the new government lasting until 1 February 1929. The stenographic record of the 45th sitting on 20 October shows that the agenda was the continued debate on the declarations of the prime minister and the finance minister, and it counts 264 deputies on the attendance list at the opening. The paper adds that only the prime minister's declaration was put to the vote, while the finance minister's exposé was held over until after the budget debate.
The Slovak People's Party's terms for supporting the government
On the day of the vote, the Slovak People's Party set out its terms in the chamber. Its deputy Buday demanded that in Slovakia the Slovak language should enjoy in offices and schools the same right that Czech enjoyed in the historic lands. He closed by declaring that, in this hope and while reserving the freedom of factual criticism of the government's further conduct, his party would vote for the government's declaration. These demands rested on a longer programme. The party leader Andrej Hlinka believed that Slovakia's problems could be solved on the basis of the Pittsburgh Agreement, which had promised autonomy for Slovakia within Czechoslovakia, and from 1920 he led the struggle for autonomy and for acknowledgment of an independent Slovak nation for almost twenty years. Buday's speech shows that the Slovak party announced its support for the declaration that the paper reported as approved by 159 votes, while tying that support to language rights and to hopes the government had yet to fulfil.
Jiří Stříbrný, an absentee from the vote
The news report names Jiří Stříbrný among the few deputies missing from the ballot. Seznam Zprávy describes him as a prominent politician of the First Republic, one of the men of 28 October 1918 and one of the first members of the political Pětka, where he represented the National Socialists. The Pětka, which the same article calls Švehla's creation, was an extra-parliamentary, extra-governmental and even extra-constitutional grouping of the top leaders of the decisive parties. Stříbrný later founded, in protest against its practice, a League against bound candidate lists, and in the end landed among radical nationalist formations. The stenographic record shows that he took the floor in the debate of 20 October itself and called the government declaration brief and evasive about concrete matters. The paper's list therefore records the absence at the ballot of a deputy who had criticised the declaration from the floor the same day.
The House of Magnates and the new Hungarian upper house
The Budapest report concerns the rebuilding of Hungary's parliament after the collapse of 1918. The House of Magnates had been the upper chamber of the Hungarian Diet from 1867 to 1918, and the Wikipedia summary records that it operated again from 1927 to 1945. Before 1918 the house had no fixed membership, since anyone who met the qualifications could sit in it; its members included the adult princes of the royal house, sixteen in 1904, and the hereditary peers who paid at least 3,000 florins a year in land tax, 237 in 1904. Against this background the paper's subheadings point to the two groups whose position the new law had to settle: the hereditary magnates, who according to the report were to be represented by 35 delegates, and the Hungarian members of the House of Habsburg. The 1927 date in the reference work shows that the chamber whose creation the National Assembly began debating on 20 October 1926 came into operation the following year.
Original
Ohne Gang und Klang.
Ohne Sang und Klang. Prag, 20. Oktober. Für die neue tschechisch-deutsche Regierung besteht kein Anlaß, ihren Anfangserfolg, insofern er sich in der Billigung von Svehlas Exposé kundgibt, mit lauten Worten als Sieg zu preisen. Wer als beste Eigenschaft dieses Kabinetts seine Mehrsprachigkeit schätzt. wird sich hüten, die an Zahl und Gewicht nicht geringen Gegner der Regierung durch [?] zu reizen. Der Abstimmung über die Regierungserklärung ist eine Woche des Zweifels vorangegangen, und wenn Svehla schließlich doch
159 : 113 für die Regierung.
159: 113 für die Regierung. Kramář: Mitarbeit der Deutschen - Konsolidierung des Staates. Prag, 20. Oktober. Nach dreitägiger Debatte ist heute die Erklärung der neuen Regierung mit 159 zu 113 Stimmen zur Kenntnis genommen worden. Es wurde nur über die Erklärung des Ministerpräsidenten abgestimmt, auf Antrag Bradač ' wird über das Exposee des Finanzministers erst nach Beendigung der Budgetdebatte abgestimmt werden. Das Haus war fast vollzählig versammelt. Es fehlten 12 Kommunisten, die vier ungarischen Christlichsozialen, ferner Střibrny und Trnobransky.
Das neue ungarische Oberhaus.
Das neue ungarische Oberhaus. 35 Vertreter der erblichen Magnatenhausmitglieder. - Die ungarischen Mitglieder des Hauses Habsburg. Budapest, 20. Oktober. Die Nationalversammlung hat heute die Verhandlungen des Gesetzes über die Schaffung eines neuen Oberhauses begonnen, das an Stelle des alten Magnatenhauses treten soll. Organisation und