The Slavonic Stand
Konuš, J. J.
464 THE SLAVONIC STAND By J. J. KONU\<S MR. R. W. SETON-WATSON, professor of Slavonic Studies at King's College, London, recently characterized the relations between Slovaks and Czechs in the...
...On the other hand, the Czechs are summarily classified as atheists, heathens, and infidels...
...But that there was at no time an intention on the side of the autonomists to separate the republic from the mother-body, and that a reunion with Hungary was as much out of the question as was the setting up of an independent Slovak state, is best proved by the recent acceptance by Monsignor Hlinka's party—the Slovak Popular party—of two portfolios in the ministry of M. Svehla...
...and if the economic problems can be brought to anything near equitable adjustment, peace and harmony will be restored...
...Every country that has changed political systems has had them...
...R. W. SETON-WATSON, professor of Slavonic Studies at King's College, London, recently characterized the relations between Slovaks and Czechs in the following words: "Having gotten over their honeymoon, they are now getting on each other's nerves...
...There are, of course, some "holdovers" from bygone days, unable to reconcile themselves with cold facts...
...Konus...
...It has its growing pains, but in the end will survive them, with a little perseverance and good will on both sides...
...If the Czechs are alarmed over the firm hold which the clergy have on the common people, the clergy are no less alarmed over the danger of adoption of a policy of "separation of Church and state...
...It has made the Slovaks Catholic Ask a Czech for the cause of the downfall of the Czech state in 1620, and he will assure you that it was due to the political machinations of the Roman Catholic Church in the services of the Hapsburg dynasty...
...This explanation is made for the purpose of dispelling whatever intent of animosity may be ascribed to the above...
...To make matters more complicated, the Czecho-Slovakian government, in pursuit of a policy of centralization of all administrative power, has refused to ratify an agreement, entered into with the American Slovaks during the revolution in 1918, and known as the Pittsburgh Compact...
...there may be concessions made on the one side as well as on the other...
...As a result, false slogans are raised on both sides...
...There is a difference of temperament between Czechs and Slovaks...
...There may be a tug-of-war for more political power...
...Incrimination and recrimination are the daily order...
...This agreement contains a provision which guarantees the ethnical identity of the Slovaks and calls for autonomy of Slovakia...
...But the main cause of all troubles in Czecho-Slovakia lies first in apprehension, second in misapprehension...
...Czecho-Slovakia is no exception...
...there is also a different historic and psychological background through a period of at least a thousand years, causing differences in development which the sudden joy of liberation could only bridge temporarily...
...Historic development has made the Czechs decidedly antiCatholic...
...the Catholic clergy in Slovakia are apprehensive lest together with the spreading of an economic doctrine to which they cannot and will not subscribe, other subversive theories might be carried among the masses...
...There is no one in Czechoslovakia so blind as to believe that a reunion with the feudal aristocracy of Hungary would be anything but national suicide on the part of the Slovaks...
...It was signed by President Masaryk while he was still the head of the provisional government which conducted a revolution beyond the frontiers against the Hapsburgs, and by the American Czechs and Slovaks as a guarantee to the Slovaks, to safeguard them against just such occurrences about which they are now complaining...
...Comparatively speaking, Czecho-Slovakia has the best ordered conditions among the many new states in central Europe...
...This difference of view on historic development alone could explain why each of the two major parties in the Czecho-Slovakian republic views the other with apprehension—fear of some kind of plot...
...There is, of course, a reason for this, as there is for everything...
...But they are insignificant and merely so vociferous because there are so few of them...
...Ask a Slovak who was instrumental in the preservation of his national identity, and he will answer, the Catholic Church...
...Both sides are wrong...
...46S...
...The fight for ideals as it prevailed during the revolution, has degenerated into a shuffling for positions of vantage...
...But in the main, the proposition of unity of the republic remains undisturbed...
...Here is the snag...
...Author's note:—Since the writing of this article the CzechoSlovakian government has granted the Slovaks partial autonomy, the details of which mill be ultimately settled or agreed upon some time next spring...
...That the friction between centralists and autonomists did not assume a character more derogatory to the interests of the republic, is not a fault of either of the contending forces...
...The socialists of various schools, the so-called progressive elements, are afraid that in Slovakia political clericalism may attain such an ascendency that it would become threatening to their power as political factors...
...To be an adherent of the autonomists earns for one the accusation of being a separatist, a renegade, a traitor...
Vol. 5 • March 1927 • No. 17
