Századok – 2006
TANULMÁNYOK - Makkai Béla: A sajtó szerepe a magyar kormány ó-romániai nemzetgondozási programjában 3
24 MAKKAI BÉLA THE ROLE OF THE PRESS IN THE PROGRAM OF THE HUNGARIAN GOVERNMENT FOR THE MAINTENANCE OF THE HUNGARIAN MINORITY IN ROMANIA by Béla Makkai (Summary) After the previous attempts at forced assimilation, at the turn of the 19t h and 20t h centuries a new national policy was initiated in multiethnical Hungary. An important part of the new policy was the program entitled „National care for the Hungarians living abroad", which was elaborated by Kuno Klebelsberg, then secretary at the prime minister's office. From the forced assimilation of the non-Hungarian peripheries the emphasis shifted to the maintenance and strengthening of the „internal racial force". The prime aim to achieve was to halt Hungarian emigration to be followed by the repatriation of hundreds of thousands of Hungarians from abroad. (By means of this „remigrating surplus" the Hungarian enclaves living on the linguistic border were to be formed into pure Hungarian blocks, thus broadening the residence area of the Hungarians; it was regarded as the main obstacle against the non-Hungarians' separatism.) In view of the millions of Hungarians emigrating to America, the first program was launched there, to be followed by those organised in the neighbouring countries (Romania: 1901, Slavonia: 1904, Bukovina: 1905, Bosnia: 1909). The core of the new policy was to secure the conditions of Hungarian religious life and schooling, but in order t<> counter the efforts at assimilation all sorts of other means were used (support for cultural assotiations, scholarships for intellectuals and craftsmen, occasionally economic and financial aid, legal assistance etc.) Although the Hungarian press in Romania had as rich traditions as its counterpart in the United States (eg. Bucuresti Magyar Közlöny, Bucuresti Híradó, Bukaresti Közlöny), its financial basis and public influence were unsatisfactory to counterbalance the assimilative effects. Consequently, the increasingly anti-Hungarian Romanian press became dominant in influencing the minds of Hungarians living there. It was therefore an absolute necessity to reestablish, through the financial means and foreign relations of the Hungarian government, the press of the Hungarian minority in a country that was not unreasonably referred to as „the great cemetery of the Hungarians". The study presents a specific aspect of the secret Romanian action on the basis of the documents of the prime minister's office. It follows the process of aiding and reorganising the Bukaresti Magyar Újság, founded in 1902, as well as its fight for dominance with the Romániai Hírlap, which was launched in 1907 as an independent private enterprise. As a result, a clearer picture is drawn of the internal disputes, crisis of identity and struggle for survival which characterised the life of the Hungarian minority in Romania. At the same time a new light is shed on the discreet influence of the Austro-Hungarian Embassy as well as on the political efforts of the Romanian government, which was unable to regard the emigrees as other than mere agents of the neighbouring power. The Romániai Magyar Újság, published from 1908, influenced and educated the emigree Szeklers as well as the Csángó Hungarians within more consolidated circumstances until its prohibition in 1916. The Bukaresti Magyar Újság was first published in the last year of the War. The main elements of its program were the maintenance of the relationship with the mother countiy, the intellectual orientation of the emigrees and the alleviation of the historical conflicts between the mother country of the emigrees and their new homeland. At the same time it wanted to remind its over-loyal readers of the anti-Hungarian requirations and internations. Yet the drastic reinterpretation of the traditional Hungaro-Romanian relationshiup was finally undertaken by history itself: due to the dismemberment of historical Hungary one and a half million Hungarians were subjected to Romanian rule. Within these circumstances the Hungarian government was forced to continue its policy of controlling and influencing the minds of the Hungarians who became citizens of a Romania whose aim was to create a „monolithic" nation state. This policy was pursued with limited means and confidence in the interwar period, putting to use the rich experience inherited from the age of the double monarchy.
