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Published online by Cambridge University Press: 18 September 2015
On the night of December 1,1908, the city of Vienna was lit up like a giant birthday cake in celebration of the sixtieth anniversary of the reign of Emperor Francis Joseph I. This final night of the monarch's diamondjubilee was the culmination of an entire season of ceremonial occasionsranging from visits to Vienna by the German emperor William II to a seemingly endless series of fětes—everything from concerts by children's choirs to the most magnificent royal balls Vienna could muster. The streets of the imperial capital were filled with the myriad languages of the empire asmore than one million citizens crowded the Ringstraßre and its many side streets and alleys hoping for a glimpse of their emperor-king. That evening the streets of Prague were filled with thousands of angry Czechs, whose moodwas much different from that of the crowd in Vienna. In contrast to the Viennese festival of light, the Czech demonstrators were extinguishing the street lanterns of Prague, hoping that darkness would decrease the likelihood that they would be arrested. According to the Neue Freie Presse, the Old Town(staré město/Altstadt) district of Prague was experiencing a “schrecktlichstag.”
1 On the jubilee, see Egon Caeser, Conte Cortiand Hans, Sokol, Kaiser Franz Joseph (Graz, 1972), 391.Google ScholarOn the crowded Ringstraßie, see New York Times, Dec. 2, 1908, 1. On Prague, see Neue Freie Presse, Dec. 2, 1908 (morning), 5. In this essay all newspaper citations are from page 1 unless otherwise noted.Google Scholar
2 On the demonstration, see Stenographische Protokolle über die Sitzungen des Hauses der Abgeordneten des Reichsrates (hereafter SPA), 18th session, Dec. 9, 1908 (Masaryk), p. 7836.Google Scholar On martial law, see Zdeněk, Tobolka, Politické dějiny Československého národa od r. 1848 až do dnešní doby (The Political history of the Czechoslovak nation from 1848 to the present era), vol. 3, pt. 2 (Prague, 1932–1937), 514–15Google Scholar. In the parliament the primary criticism of Bienerth's decision came from the Socialist leader Victor Adler, who described the move as “sending the hangman to Prague”; SPA, 18th session, Dec. 2, 1908, p. 7670.Google Scholar
3 To date little has been written about the Czech National Socialist Party. Background sources include: Bruce, Garver, “Václav Klofáč and the Czechoslovak National Socialist Party,” in The Czech and Slovak Experience, ed. John, Morison (New York, 1992), 102–24;Google ScholarDetlef, Brandes, “Die Tschechoslowakischen National-Socialisten,” in Die Erste Tschechoslowakische Republik als multinationaler Parteienstaat, ed. Karl, Bosl (Munich, 1979), 99–112Google Scholar; Josef, Harna, Kritika ideologie a programu českého národního sodalismu (Critique of the ideology and program of Czech National Socialism) (Prague, 1978)Google Scholar; Bohuslav, Šantrůček, ed., Buřiči a tvůrci 1897–1947 (Rebels and creators, 1897–1947) (Prague, 1947)Google Scholar; Šantrůček, Masaryk a Klofáč (Masaryk and Klofáč) (Prague, 1938)Google Scholar;and Šantrůˇek, , Václav Klofáč (1868–1928): Pohledy do života a díla (Václav Klofáč [1868–1928]: Perspectives on his life and work)(Prague, 1928)Google Scholar. A brief synopsis by Klofáč, of his career is “Třicet pět let práce a bojů” (Thirty-five years of work and struggle), in Májovy list českoslovakýchnárodních socialistů (The May paper of the Czechoslovak National Socialists) (Prague, 1932), 3–16.Google Scholar
4 For recent scholarship, see, for instance, the special issue of Nationalities Papers 24, no. 1 (Mar. 1996), devoted entirely to this questionGoogle Scholar; and Milan Znoj, Jan Havránek, and Martin, Sekera, eds., Český liberalismus: Texty a osobnosti (Czech liberalism: Texts and personages) (Prague, 1995)Google Scholar. On the second traditional theme, see Kann, Robert A., The Multinational Empire, vol. 1 (New York, 1950), 209Google Scholar; and Bruce, Garver, The Young Czech Party, 1874–1901, and the Emergence of a Multi-Party System (New Haven, Conn., 1978), 14.Google Scholar
5 František, Palacký'sproposal fora reorganized monarchy is reproduced in Český liberalismus, ed. Znoj Havránek, and Sekera, 40–47.Google Scholar An example of a different proposal emanating from the radical youth of the late nineteenth century is in Antonín, Hajn, Výbor práce (Selected work), vol. 1 (Prague, 1912), 180–85.Google Scholar
6 For example, the Habsburg secret police kept close tabs on National Socialist Party chairman Václav Klofáč, especially when he traveled outside the monarchy. The extensive dossier that the secret police developed was used against him during the war when he was tried for treason, convicted, and sentenced to death, a sentence that was never carried out; Haus-, Hof- und Staatsarchiv, Vienna (hereafter HHSA), Informations Bureau “Personalia” Reports, Klofáč folder. On the trial, see Zdenék, Tobolka, Obžalovací spis proti Vdclavu Klofáčovi a Rudolfu Giuniovi (Indictment against Václav Klofáč and Rudolf Giunio) (Prague, 1919).Google Scholar
7 The anti-state rights position of the Social Democrats is discussed in Garver, Young Czech Party, 240.Google Scholar
8 One of the difficulties inherent in studying the Czech National Socialist Party is the general lack of official publications by the party on such basic issues as party programs, minutes of party conferences, and so on. As a result, my comments here on the development of the party's program rely on a combination of campaign pronouncements, speeches by party leaders, commentaries on the party's program by partymembers in other works, and the most important source on this topic, the official party publication, Program a zdsady československé strany národněsocialistické (Program and principles of the Czechoslovak National Socialist Party) (Prague, 1933)Google Scholar. I am indebted to Bruce Garver for lending me his copy of this work. On the challenges of working on the National Socialist Party, see Garver's detailed bibliographic essay in “Václav Klofáč,” note 1.
9 On the elastic program, see Garver, , “Václav Klofáč,” 102–3Google Scholar. On constant elements, see Program a zásady, 159; Václav, Klofáč, Posláni národně sociální strany v českém národč (The mission of the National Socialist Party in the Czechnation) (Vysoké Mýto, 1908), 2–5, 12;Google ScholarVáclav, Choc, Přehled politických stran v čechách (Overview of the political parties in Bohemia) (Prague, 1919), 13–14; and Klofáč, “Třicetpět let,” 5–6.Google Scholar
10 Klofáč, , Posláni, 12.Google Scholar
11 “Co chce česká státopravni democracie?” (What does Czech State Rights Democracy want?), Apr. 13, 1907, Prague, Archív Národního muzea (hereafterANM), Hajn collection, carton 19; Klofáč, , Posláni, 12.Google Scholar
12 On anticlericalism, see “Boj proti klerikalismu” (The struggle against clericalism), Mladé proudy (Young current), Feb. 10, 1908; and “Co chce česká státopravni demokracie?” 8. On antimilitarism, see Stenographische Sitzungsprotokolle der Delegation des Reichsrates (hereafter SPDR), 42nd session, Feb. 11, 1908 (Klofáč), p. 40.Google ScholarSee also Emil, Špatný, “O antimilitaristickém hnutí” (About the antimilitaristmovement), in 40 let čs. strany národně socialistické v Liberci, 1906–1946 (Forty years of the Czechoslovak National Socialist Party in Liberec, 1906–1946), ed. Frabša, F. S. (Liberec, 1947), 38–41.Google Scholar
13 On the increasing tolerance of the Young Czech Party for anti-Semitism, see Garver, , Young Czech Party, 194, 303Google Scholar. On National Socialist anti-Semitism, see Gary, Cohen, The Politics of Ethnic Survival: Germans in Prague, 1861–1914 (Princeton, N.J., 1981), 80–81, 241–42;Google Scholar and Harna, , Kritika ideologie, 28. For specific examples of the party's anti-Semitic rhetoric, see České slovo (The Czech word), May 11, 1907, and Klofáč, , Posláni, 3.Google Scholar Onthe connection between Czech nationalism and anti-Semitism in the First Republic, see Jan, Havránek, “Fascism in Czechoslovakia,” in Native Fascism in the Successor States, 1918–1945, ed. Sugar, Peter F. (Santa Barbara, 1971), 49–50.Google Scholar
14 Stříbrny's career is dealt within some detail in David, Kelly, The Czech Fascist Movement,1922–1942 (Boulder, Colo., 1995), esp. 20–26.Google Scholar A more detailed study of Czech fascism is Miroslav, Gregorovič, Kapitoly o českém fašismu (Chapters on Czech fascism) (Prague, 1995).Google Scholar
15 “Co chce česká státopravní demokracie?” 9. The party's position on the vote for women is spelled out in detail in a speech by Václav Choc in the Reichsrat Franchise Reform Committee, SPA, 34th Sitting, Sept. 12, 1906.Google Scholar
16 The Czech Social Democrats were the exception when it came to demanding language rights, as they subscribed to the Brno Program of the Austrian Social Democratic Party.
17 Choc, Přehled, 14; “Co chce česká státoprávni demokracie?” 1. On Klofáč's views on the synthesis of nationalism and socialism, see Hynek, Šik, “Od českého dělníka k svobodnému slovu” (From the Czech Worker to the Free Word), in Buřiči a tvůrci, ed. Šantrůček, 93–94.Google Scholar
18 On targeting urban Bohemia, see, for example, an electoral handbill for Choc, in the Hajn collection, ANM, carton 120, “Volby 1907” folder; and Choc, Přehled, 14. On the success of this strategy, see Garver, , Young Czech Party, 355–56.Google Scholar
19 Throughout the late Habsburg period the National Socialist Party remained primarily a Bohemian party. Although the party's activities in Moravia grew after 1910, as late as 1913 there were 575 local National Socialist organizations with 78,184 members in Bohemia, but only 74 local organizations with 3,400 members in Moravia; Jan, Heidler, České politické strany v Čechách, na Moravě a ve Slezku (Czech politicalparties in Bohemia, in Moravia, and in Silesia) (Prague, 1914), 36–37Google Scholar. For an overview of Moravian developments, see Jiří, Malíř, Od spolků k moderním stranám: vyvoy politických stran na Moravě v letech 1848–1914 (From associationto modern political party: The development of political parties in Moravia,1848–1914) (Brno, 1996),216–24, 265–67.Google Scholar
20 Choc sets forth the reasons that confrontation in the streets was so necessary if the radicals were to achieve their goals in ANM, Hajn collection, Choc to Hajn, June 19, 1906, carton 18, Choc folder. See also ANM, Karel Kramář collection, carton 54, p. 463.
21 Pieter, Judson, Exclusive Revolutionaries: Liberal Politics, Social Experience, and National Identity in the Austrian Empire, 1848–1914 (Ann Arbor, Mich., 1996),226.Google Scholar On this topic see alsoLothar, Höbelt,Kornblume und Kaiseradler. Die deutschfreiheitlichen Parteien Altösterreichs 1882–1918 (Vienna, 1993).Google Scholar
22 Česke slovo, Apr. 9, 1911, and ANM, Hajn collection, carton 20, Klofáč to Hajn (undated). Although this letter is undated, its content is such that it must have been written during late March or early April, 1911. Judson discusses these developments among the Austrians Germans in Exclusive Revolutionaries, 225–65.Google Scholar
23 Boyer, John W., Political Radicalism in Late Imperial Vienna (Chicago, 1981), 416Google Scholar. Boyer's companion volume, Culture and Political Crisisin Vienna: Christian Socialism in Power, 1897–1918 (Chicago, 1995), includes a discussion of the events of 1908 in Bohemia, 131–47.Google Scholar
24 České slovo, Nov. 19, 1908.Google Scholar
25 Choc, , Přehled, 13–14; Klofáč,“Třicet pět let,” 5–6.Google Scholar In this respect the National Socialists represent the Czechvariant of the “politics in a new key” described so famously byCarl, Schorske in Fin-de-Siècle Vienna: Politics andCulture (New York, 1980).Google Scholar
26 ANM, Hajn collection, handbills in support of Chocand Karel Stanislav Sokol, carton 120, Folder “Volbý 1907.”
27 České slovo, May 5 (quotations) and 11, 1907. The National Socialist press also criticized the Young Czechs for being too friendly with the “Jew-Germans” of Prague.Google Scholar
28 Statistická příručka království Českého (Statistical handbook for the Bohmian Kingdom), vol. 2 (Prague, 1913), 56.Google Scholar
29 Národní listy (National news), Apr. 25 and 27, 1907. The Social Democrats won 40.2 percent ofthe urban vote and 7 seats, the Young Czech/Old Czech coalition won 28.8 percent of the vote and 16 seats, and the National Socialist/Progressive coalition won 22.2 percent of the vote and 8 seats. By contrast, the National Socialists won only 6.5 percent of the vote in the rural districts of Bohemia and only 1 seat, the Young Czechs won 4.0 percent and no seats, and the Social Democrats won 38.6 percent and 10 seats.Google Scholar
30 Šantrůček, , Masaryk a Klofáč, 323–25.Google Scholar
31 Šantrůček, ed., Buřiči a tvůrci, 120, 149. This sentiment is echoed in a letter from Choc to Hajn on June 19, 1906, ANM, Hajn collection, carton18, Choc folder.Google Scholar
32 Klofáč, , “Třicet pět let,” 8.Google Scholar
33 Šantrůček, , Masaryk a Klofáč, 323; Šantrůček, , Václav Klofáč, 95; Národní listy, Apr. 15 and 16, 1907; České slovo, Apr.16, 1907.Google Scholar
34 SPDR, 42nd session, Feb. 11, 1908, p. 40.Google Scholar
35 On presenting a united front, see Zdeněk, Tobolka, ed., Proces Dm Kramáře a jeho přátel (The trial of Dr. Kramář and his friends) (Prague, 1918), 59–65.Google ScholarOn unrelenting Germanization, see České slovo, Oct. 7, 1908.Google Scholar On pro-Serb demonstrations, see Paul, Vyšný, Neo-Slavism and the Czechs, 1898–1914 (Cambridge, 1977), 133.Google ScholarOn Klofáč, , see “Bericht aus Belgrade, 12. Dez. 1908 Nr. 89 B,” in Österreichische Aussenpolitik von der Bosnischen Krise 1908 bis zum Kriegsausbruch 1914, 6 vols. (Vienna, 1922–1928), 1:587–88.Google Scholar Masaryk also opposed the Annexation. Because he was not a member of the Delegations, he spoke against it in the Reichsratduring its next session in December; SPA, 18th session, Dec. 9, 1908, pp. 7836–44. While agreeing with the National Socialist position on the Annexation, Masaryk also roundly condemned the radical nationalist excesses in Prague.Google Scholar
36 In late September 1907 a local court in Eger/Cheb in western Bohemia refused to act upon a Czech lawsuit because, the court wrote, the suit was filed in Czech, which was not a language of daily use in the region, and so could not be understood by the court. When this position was upheld by the regional court, also sitting in Eger, the Czechs inthe Reichsrat formally demanded government intervention. Although the minister of justice ruled in favor of the Czech position,he admitted that judicial independence was such that he was unable to compel the Eger court to reverse its decision. Minister-President Beck's response, a half-hearted concession that he would not oppose the use of Czech in the Bohemian inner service, satisfied no one and merely led to the increasing division of the justice system in the Bohemian lands into courts where Czech was spoken and courts where German was spoken; Tobolka, Politické dějiny, 499–500.Google Scholar
37 České slovo, Jan. 8 and 30, 1908. See also Mladé proudy, Feb. 1, 1908.Google Scholar
38 České slovo, Feb., 15, 1908. See also Samostatnost (Independence), Feb. 15, 1908.Google Scholar
39 České slovo, Feb. 15,1908. The National Socialists were the staunchest supporters of voting rights for women among the Czech parties. Evidence of their continuing support of the vote for women during this period can be seen in the correspondence between Choc and the Výbor pro volební právo žen (Committee for the voting rights of women), ANM, Choc collection, Box 2; SPA, Feb. 26, 1902 (Choc), PP. 9454–55; and SPA, Franchise Reform Committee, 34th Sitting, Sept. 12, 1906 (Choc), p. 40.Google Scholar
40 Garver, , Young Czech Party, 301.Google Scholar
41 On the purpose of congress, see Vyšný, , Neo-Slavism, ix. On electoral hopes, see Garver, Young Czech Party, 269. On the welcome, see Šantrůček, Masaryk a Klofáč, 339.Google Scholar
42 Výšny, , Neo-Slavism, 113; České slovo, July 19, 1908. Garver also points out that Kramář's opponents liked to insinuate that the Young Czech leader's “enthusiasm for the Russians confirmed … his hostility to popular sovereignty and democratic institutions”; Young Czech Party, 269.Google Scholar
43 SPDR, 43rd session, Oct. 30, 1908 (Klofáč), pp.486–87.Google Scholar
44 In one of the first sessions of the diet a German delegate physically attacked the Czech Agrarian leader Antonin Švehla on the floor of the diet, forcing the police to clear the hall to restore order; Vladimír, Dostál, Antonín Švehla: Profil československého státníka (Antonin Švehla: Profile of a Czechoslovak statesman) (New York, 1989), 23–24.Google Scholar
45 On suspension of the diet, see Českéslovo, Oct. 20 and 21, 1908. On obstructionism, see ANM, Kramář papers, Box 54, pp. 4 and 27. “Česká situace” (The Czech situation), České slovo, Oct. 23, 1908, is but one of many attacks on the Young Czechs.Google Scholar
46 On the demonstrations, see České slovo, Oct. 23 and 27, 1908. For the speeches, see SPDR, 43rd session, Oct. 27, 1908, pp. 26–38, and Oct. 28, 1908, pp.134–42. Kramář was constrained in his criticism of the government by his strong desire to avoid internal conflict atthis moment of international crisis over the annexation of Bosnia.Google Scholar
47 České slovo, Nov. 10, 1908.Google Scholar On the importance of these symbols in Czech nationalist discourse, see Mamety, Victor S., “The Battle of the White Mountain as Myth in Czech History,” East European Quarterly 14, no. 3 (09. 1981): 343.Google Scholar
48 České slovo, Nov. 10, 1908Google Scholar
49 Ibid. It is interesting to contrast Fresl's remarks with those of Serbian leader Slobodan Milošević at Gazimestan in Kosovo on June 28, 1989, the 600th anniversary of the Serbian defeat by the Ottomans; see Laura, Silber and Allan, Little, Yugoslavia, Death of a Nation (New York, 1995), 71–72.Google Scholar
50 České slovo, Nov. 12, 1908.Google Scholar
51 České slovo, Nov. 13, 1908.Google Scholar
52 On this question the Czechs had only to point to the statistical evidence that Prague's population was only 10 percent German by 1900.
53 SPA, 18th session, Dec. 5, 1908 (Kramář), pp. 7784–90; Dec. 9, 1908 (Masaryk), pp. 7836–43; and Dec. 3, 1908 (František Udržal), pp. 7687–94.Google Scholar
54 SPDR, 43rd session, Oct. 27, 1908 (Klofáč), p. 38.Google Scholar
55 České slovo, 27, 1908.Google Scholar
56 České slovo, Oct. 30, 1908, and Nov. 3, 1908.Google Scholar At times National Socialist Party anger with the Young Czechs did spill over into actual violence. According to Václav Vacek, a Czech Social Democrat and certainly not an unbiased observer of National Socialist Party activities, following a National Socialist meeting in Prague some of the participants smashed the windows of the offices of the Young Czech paper Den (Day), as well as windows at a number of German businesses; Václav, Vacek, Prvé období lidového parlamentu, 1908–1911 (The first period of the People's Parliament, 1908–1911) (Prague, 1911), 46.Google Scholar
57 České slovo, Nov. 23, 1908.Google Scholar
58 České slovo. 1, 1908. On the Casino and its role as the informal headquarters of the Prague German business community and as the center for the political and social life of the Prague ethnic German community, see Cohen, , Politics of Ethnic Survival.Google Scholar
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61 Vacek, , Prvé období lidového parlamentu, 50; Neue Freie Presse, Dec. 1, 1908 (morning), pp. 1 and 4; Česté slovo, Dec. 1, 1908, 2.Google Scholar
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63 Richard, Charmatz, Österreichs äuβere und innere Politik von 1895 bis 1914 (Leipzig, 1918), 104–5.Google ScholarSee also Andrew, Paul Kubricht, “The Czech Agrarian Party, 1899–1914” (Ph.D. diss., Ohio State University, 1974), 129–30. The Agrarians joined the National Socialists in obstruction of the Reichsrat out of frustration over the government's inability to work out a compromise that would get the Bohemian Diet working again.Google Scholar
64 On the trials, see Šantrůček, , Masaryk a Klofáč, 358.Google Scholar On censoring and confiscation, see HHSA, Personalia, Box 70, Václav Klofáč folder, Hauser to the Foreign Ministry, Apr. 23, 1909. On election results, see Karel, Hoch, Alois Rašin: Jeho život, dílo a doba (Alois Rašín: His life, work, and era) (Prague, 1934), 108,Google Scholarand České slovo, Jan. 10, 1910.Google Scholar
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66 On Young Czech obstructionism, see Národné listy, Mar. 6, 7, and 12, 1914. This decision was made over the strong objections of Kramář. Although the suspension of the Reichsrat meant that parliamentary government in Austria had ground to a halt, as Höbelt, in Kornblume und Kaiseradler and Boyer in Culture and Political Crisis in Vienna have pointed out, it did not mean a severing of the relationship between the government and a number of the parties. However, for Klofáč and Kramář, any further political negotiation with the imperial authorities ended after the outbreak of the war, when both men were arrested and tried for treason.Google Scholar
