Page:The Czechoslovak Review, vol3, 1919.djvu/284

 Intimately connected with the problem of the new Slovak-Magyar frontier is the fate of the Ruthenes of Hungary, hitherto the most isolated and helpless of all the non-Magyar races. Their total number in 1910 was, according to official statistics, 464,259, distributed mainly as follows:

Isolated in their Carpathian valleys, the Ruthenes have little or no history or tradition, and even up to the outbreak of the present war, had remained practically without any connections with their kinsmen on the northern slopes. They are the descendants of succesivesuccessive [sic] waves of the colonists, introduced by the Hungarian kings as guarantees of the frontier; the main body arrived in 1340, under the leader ship of their prince Theodore Koroatovič, to whom Louis the Great granted the town and castle of Munkáč. Originally Orthodox by religion, they accepted the Uniaterite, which had been adopted by so large a proportion of the Little Russians in Poland; but it was not until late in the 18th century that they had bishops of their own. Almost from the first the Magyars contrived to exert control over the Ruthenian hierarchy and clergy within the borders of Hungary; and since the Ausgleich of 1867 this control tightened year by year, until the Church, so long a bulwark of their distinctive national character, was in danger of becoming a mere instrument of their Magyarisation. It has been the very definite policy of the Magyars to prevent any national movement among the Ruthenes, to keep them without intellectual leaders and to promote as far as possible their complete absorption. The methods employed are best illustrated by the fact that at the outbreak of war the Ruthenes had not a single school, secondary or primary, in which their language was taught, no political newspaper of any kind and practically no periodical literature. On the other hand, they had a higher percentage of illiterates than any other race in Hungary, aid among them economic exploitation by the great landed proprietors, by the Magyar officials, and by the Jewish traders and inn-keepers had reached its height. Under these circumstances it is not to be wondered at that such leaders of opposition as the Ruthenes of Hungary possess, should look back upon Magyar rule as upon a long evil nightmare, and should rely upon the Peace Conference to secure for them a settlement such as will render possible their free national development in the future. The basis for this has been provided by the proposals made to Professor Masaryk last autumn by representative deputations of the so-called “Carpatho-Ruthene,” and “Ugro-Russian” colonies in the United States, and to the Czechoslovak Premier, Dr. Kramář, last December by a deputation of the local Ruthenian National Council in Munkáč—in favour of the Ruthenes forming an autonomous province inside the Czechoslovak Republic. It is known that this disposition of the Ruthene part of Hungary has been approved by the Peace Conference.

Autonomous province of Ruthenia will be confronted by a most difficult economic and social problem, owing to the presence of an altogether disproportionate number of Jews (for the most part comparatively recent immigrants from Galicia). In the seven counties inhabited by the Ruthenes there are no fewer than 181,630 Jews, or 11.8 per cent. (Saryš, 12,323; Spiš, 7,475; Zemplin, 35,041; Užhorod, 17,587; Bereg, 33,660, or 14 per cent. of total population in county; Ugosca, 11,850, or 12.9 percent; Maramuras, 65,694, or 18.4 per cent.) out of a total population of 1,530,841. The fact that the Slovaks of Hungary have, by the aid of local banks and co-operative societies, emancipated themselves from Jewish control and from the terrible usury which prevailed twenty or even ten years ago, helps to explain why the Jewish population has tended to concentrate among the backward Ruthene population, whom systematic Magyarisation had left altogether without leaders and well-nigh incapable of self-help.


 * From the “New Europe.”