Mitteilungen des Österreichischen Staatsarchivs 36. (1983)
BARANY, George: Széchényi, America, and Assimilation: An Ambiguous Legacy
Széchenyi, America, and Assimilation 195 party in the Paris home of James Rothschild, Széchenyi became disenchanted with Alexander Humboldt because he found that the famous German scholar was not only uncouth but also kow-towed to “the Jew at whose table we ate” * 39). This happened in mid-1825, during his travels in France as a member of the official Austrian delegation attending the coronation ceremonies of Charles X. At the time, Széchenyi was still in Metter- nich’s favor but his admiration for constitutional and even revolutionary ideas were to bring about his first ideological confrontation with the Chancellor before the year was out. Although his stand concerning the admission of Jews to the National Casino was more enlightened than that of many other liberals, Széchenyi’s position in the public debate on Jewish emancipation, as has been mentioned above, was ambiguous to say the least. In the 1844 dietal discussion on prison reform which revolved around capital and corporal punishment, Széchenyi took a stand against experiments untested elsewhere by “digressing” into the hypothetical question of what would happen to Magyar nationality if Hungary emancipated its Jews at the very moment when the lot of “poor Israelites” in Bohemia, “regrettably”, was not too good and when, hard pressed by the Catholics in Galicia, their brethren might migrate to Hungary along with various criminals fearing harsher punishment elsewhere 40). But his most notorious public speeches were made in the emancipation debate itself, less than two months before his third Academy speech. Twice in the emancipation debate of October 1, 1844, Széchenyi took the floor. Initially, he showed himself in sympathy with “this unfortunate race that has exerted such industry in Hungary recently”, and appeared to appreciate the liberals’ efforts to grant full rights to the Jews. But he saw a basic conflict between the emancipation of the Jews and the “complete” unfolding of Magyar nationality preferring “loyalty to my race” to progress toward a “hodge-podge of a people” that might perhaps be more affluent but would constitute a swing from the previous excess of intolerance to what he regarded as ultra-liberalism. Not without hypocrisy not to mention anti-Semitism, Széchenyi protested against the dilution of Magyardom, claiming that whereas in England and France Jewish emancipation meant the pouring of a bottle of ink into a big lake whose waters would not be contaminated, the same bottle of ink would render the Magyar pot of soup inedible. In another example, he spoke of a boat taking on water while he was sitting in it with his own child and somebody else’s: if it became “apodictic” that he could not keep both children, he exclaimed Országos Levéltár Budapest Nádori Levéltár, Archivum palatinale secretum archiducis Josephi Praes. 1846, no. XCV; letter of Solomon Rothschild Vienna, February 26, 1848, to ‘Meine lieben Freunde’: Rothschild Archives London RAL XI/126/16 B. 39) V i s z o t a Széchenyi naplói 2 546: entry of June 22, 1825. 40) Zichy Széchenyi beszédei 335—336. 13*
