The Eighth Hungarian Tribe, 1982 (9. évfolyam, 1-12. szám)

1982-01-01 / 1. szám

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reform of the 5,461,200 acres of agricultural land in Transylvania, only 1,904,635 acres were owned by farmers possessing more than 100 acres.)

In 1924 discrimination against Hungarians increased. Prof. C. A. Macartney writes in his book “Hungary and Her Successors” page 322: “Taxation has undoubtedly been discriminatory. Certain taxes exist which affect minorities almost exclusively. Hungarian shopkeepers, Hungarian professionals have to pay extra taxes for various reasons.. .”

Parallel with the economic persecution, the Rumanian government undertook an all-out offensive against Hungarian schooling. Hungarian, as a language of instruction, was abolished and its use strictly forbidden in all public schools. In many cases children were cruelly beaten for using their native tongue, even among themselves during the recess.

In 1925 Protestant as well as Catholic parochial schools, some of them established in the 15th and 16th centuries, were closed down. The American Committee for the Rights of Religious Minorities reported: “The administrative oppression, the violent enforcing of the Rumanian language, the aggressive hostility. . .all these are aimed for the total destruction of the minority school system. The laws of 1925 serve as oppresive political and nationalistic tools against the minorities.” (Religious Minorities in Transylvania, The Bacon Press, Boston, 1925.)

While in 1911, under Hungarian rule, there were 2,813 public schools in Transylvania in which Rumanian was the language of instruction, by 1925, five years after the Rumanian take-over, there was none left at all for the use of the Hungarian language.

Transylvania’s biggest Hungarian-language daily newspaper, the BRASSÓI LAPOK, reported on December 14,1925 from Csikjenofalva, a 100% Hungarian community: “The new teacher, Mr. Clements Tratiu, who was sent recently by the government to teach in the purely Hungarian village of Csikjenofalva, in his efforts to enforce the new language regulations handed out such beatings to his pupils that on the first day parents had to carry home twenty-four badly beaten children from the schoolhouse who were unable to walk.”

In 1926 the rigid censorship, instituted in 1919 toward all publications in Hungarian language was reinforced by two new laws. One of them required that even prayer-books and hymnals carry the stamp of apróval of the State Censor before they could be printed, while the other prohibited the “import” of newspapers, magazines and

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other printed materials from Hungary, either by mail or otherwise.

In 1928 a special delegation of Transylvanian Hungarians presented in Geneva to the League of Nations a 280 pages long list of grievances proving the breach of treaty from the part of the Rumanian government against the Hungarian people of Transylvania in 166 well documented cases. Rumania was reprimanded, and the Rumanian delegate promised redress. However, nothing happened. Members of the Hungarian delegation were taken off the train as soon as they crossed the border, detained, harassed under false pretenses, and their passports revoked.

In 1936 the “Iron Guard”, an extreme rightwing organization, secretly encouraged by Hitler’s Germany, staged the first anti-Semitic and anti- Hungarian riots in Brassó (Brasov), Nagyenyed (Aiud) and Kolozsvár (Cluj).

In 1939 King Carol of Rumania declared full co-operation with the German Reich.

In 1940 Rumania was forced to yield to the demands of the Soviet Union and evacuate Besarabia as well as Northern Bukovina. Southern Dobrudja had to be returned to Bulgaria. In August of the same year the Axis powers ordered the return of Northern Transylvania to Hungary, reuniting 1,200,000 Hungarians with their Motherland, while still leaving about 600,000 under Rumanian domination.

On August 19 of the same year there was a secret deliberation taking place between Dr. Jonel Pop, representing the Transylvanian Rumanians and Count Andor Teleki, representing the Hungarian government. Dr. Pop stated the propositions of the Rumanians in Transylvania in the following four possibilities:

1. Part of Transylvania to be returned to Hungary, followed by a population exchange.

2. The creation of an autonomous Transylvania, ruled by the three inhabiting nationalities, as part of the Rumanian Kingdom.

3. An independent Transylvania.

4. A Hungarian-Rumanian Federation under one king and composed of three independent administrative units: Hungary, Transylvania and Rumania.

Dr. Jonel Pop, the aid of the ailing J. Maniu, declared that for the sake of a permanent solution the great majority of the Rumanians would accept any one of the above possibilities. Further deliberations were postponed after the end of the war.

(To be continued)

THE TRANSYLVANIAN QUARTERLY