COMBAT - The Theoretical Journal of the Communist League

THE HUNGARIAN "SOVIET REPUBLIC" OF 1919.

COMMUNIST LEAGUE JUNE 1978
First Published on the web by ALLIANCE ML (NORTH AMERICA)

T H E  H U NGA R I A N  "S OV I E T  R E P U B L I C" OF 1919

I N T RO D U CT I 0 N

 For 133 days, from March 21st. to August 1st., 1919, a "Soviet Republic" existed in Hungary.

 This "Soviet Republic" was defined as a state in which "the working class held political power",, as "the dictatorship of the proletariat":

and the process by which the "Soviet Republic" was established was characterised as a "peaceful socialist revolution".

It is, however, a fundamental principle of Marxism-Leninism that a ruling capitalist class will use every means within its power to prevent the seizure of political power by the working class and the resultant elimination of exploitation:

Marxist-Leninists recognise that it is possible for a working class to seize political power peacefully, without resistance on the part of the capitalist class, in certain exceptional circumstances - namely, when the capitalist class possesses no effective state machinery of force with which to resist.  It is sometimes argued that this was the situation in Hungary in March 1919, that the Hungarian national capitalist  class.  having only won its own freedom from Austrian domination in July 1918, had not had time to build up an effective state machinery of force by its own by the following March.

What cannot be explained on the basis of this theory, however, is the fact that the ruling capitalist class actually released the leaders of the Communist Party of Hungary from prison and invited them, in conjunction with the leaders of the Social Democratic Party, to set up a "Soviet Republic". As the President of the Republic, Count Mihaly Karolyi, related in his memoirs:

 This strange fact is sometimes "explained" on the basis of the theory that capitalism in Hungary in March 1919, only eight months after the-Hungarian National capitalist class had gained power, was already "bankrupt" and the ruling class in a state of "collapse":

Although. this theory is Luxemburgist, and not Marxist-Leninist, even Lenin - despite his misgivings about the character of the Hungarian "socialist revolution", misgivings which are documented in the text which follows - felt compelled by the facts to adopt this theory:

 It follows that the manner in which the Hungarian "Soviet Republic" was established in March 1919 can be explained only on the basis of one of the following theories:

 The analysis which follows demonstrates that the second theory is the correct one.

On March 20th., 1919 the Hungarian national capitalism class, and its government headed by President Mihaly Karolyi, were faced with a grave dilemma. On that day there was received in Budapest an ultimatum from the victorious Allied Powers which amounted to the dismemberment, not merely of the territory of the former multinational Kingdom of Hungary, but of ethnic Hungarian territory.

 They were unwilling to accept this ultimatum.  Indeed:

But, on the other hand, they were unwilling to reject it, since this would almost certainly mean war with, and occupation by, the military forces of the Allied Powers, leading, in all probability, to the enforced loss of even more Hungarian ethnic territory.

 They therefore embarked on a cunning plan, a plan to frighten the Allied Powers with "the spectre of Bolshevism".  On March 21st., 1919 they arranged for the establishment of a "Soviet Republic" in Hungary with the declared aim of bringing about a military alliance with Soviet Russia.

 Already, on March 19th., Karolyi had:

The representatives of the "overthrown" Hungarian national capitalist class, whose principal political party was the Social Democratic Party, then made it clear that the "socialist revolution" had been "caused by the Allied ultimatum".

As the Minister of Nationalities in the Karolyi regime, Oszkar Jaszi, expressed it:

an opinion which was obligingly confirmed by the Chairman of the Revolutionary Governing Council, Sandor Garbai:

and by its Peoples Commissar for Foreign Affairs, Bela Kun:

The representatives of the capitalist class added that public opinion against the Allied demands was "so overwhelmingly hostile" that they could only "rescue" Hungary from "the dictatorship of the proletariat" if these demands were "greatly modified to Hungary's advantage".

The political atmosphere in Hungary at the time - where workers were setting up Councils modelled on the lines of the Soviets in Russia and where in many areas the landless peasants were arbitrarily seizing the large estates - played an important role in disguising the false facade of the "Soviet Republic".

But that the officials of the national capitalist regime did not take the "Soviet Republic" seriously is testified to by Matyas Rakosi, relating at his trial in 1955 the events which followed his release from prison on March 21st., 1919:

But, however, the political representatives of the national capitalist class may have sought to disguise the spurious character of the "Soviet Republic", the political representatives of the landlord class saw it clearly as a mere manoeuvre designed to frighten the Allied powers into withdrawing their demands for the dismemberment of the Hungarian state.  Rakosi quotes from a book entitled "Data on the Szeged Counter-Revolution" by Bela Keleman, who was Minister of the Interior in the counter revolutionary "National Government" set up at Szeged during the period of existence of the "Soviet Republic":

The plan was by no means as risky as it sounds, for it was conditional upon the imprisoned leaders of the Communist Party accepting the dissolution of their party and its "merger" with the Social Democratic Party into a "Socialist Party of Hungary" - in fact, the submerging of the Communists into a party more than a hundred times the size of their own party.  The Hungarian "Soviet Republic" was in fact dominated and controlled by the "former" Social Democratic Party, whose members held the principal state posts throughout the country:

As the social-democratic leader Vilmos Bohm expressed it later:

Further, any risk that the spurious "Soviet Republic" might become transformed into a genuine one, and consolidate itself, was nullified by the fact that the programmes of both the Social Democratic Party and the Communist Party rejected any distribution of the land of the large estates among the peasantry, thus dooming the "Soviet Republic" to alienate the land hungry rural poor:

If the ploy was successful in securing satisfactorily modified armistice terms from the Allied Powers, the "Soviet Republic" could then be dismantled at a convenient moment.

From the point of view of its authors, the Hungarian national capitalist class, the plan proved very successful.  Within a week of the "socialist revolution" the Peace Conference in Versailles despatched to Budapest the mission which the Karolyi regime had striven unsuccessfully to obtain, bearing with it new terms which Karolyi himself described as "amazingly favourable".

The representatives of the national capitalist class within the Soviet regime", the former leaders of the Social Democratic Party, then turned against both the Communists and the regime - bringing about the resignation of the "Revolutionary Governing Council" and the end of the "Soviet Republic" on August 1st., 1919.

Some of the lessons which Marxist-Leninists drew from the collapse of the "Soviet Republic" in Hungary were formulated in the following year in the Conditions of Affiliation to the Communist International, drafted by Lenin, which were adopted by the Second Congress of the CI:

In his speech to the First Congress of Collective Farm Shock Brigaders in February 1933, Stalin's inescapable implication is that the Hungarian "socialist revolution" of March 1919 and the Hungarian "Soviet Republic" of March-August 1919 were not genuine:

T H E  H U N G A R I A N  S 0 V I E T  R E P U B L I C  OF 1919

PART ONE:  THE POLITICAL, ECONOMIC AND SOCIAL BACKGROUND

The Hungarian National-Democratic Revolution of 1848-9

 In the 1840s Hungary was a semi-colonial province of the Austrian Empire, three times the size of the present-day state.  Its population included not only Magyars (ethnic Hungarians), but also national minorities of Czechs, Germans, Italians, Poles, Romanians, Serbs, Slovaks, Slovenes and Ukrainians.

The social system of Hungary was predominantly feudal and agricultural, with land ownership dominated by a handful of aristocratic Magyar families who were content with their status of junior partners to their Austrian counterparts.

As a capitalist economic system developed, slowly and  with difficulty, within Austrian feudalism, the rising bourgeoisies of the nations and part nations imprisoned within the empire became the leading force in the democratic revolutionary movement directed against the ruling autocratic centred In Vienna.

On March 13th., 1848 a revolutionary uprising in the imperial capital led to the resignation and flight of the Austrian Minister of Foreign Affairs Prince Klemens von Metternich, to the acceptance by emperor Ferdinand I of a Constitution on April 25th., 1848, and to the abdication of the Emperor on December 2nd., 1848 in favour of his nephew, who became Franz Josef I.

In Hungary at the same time, a national-democratic revolution led to the Declaration of Independence of April 14th., 1849, which proclaimed Hungary to be an independent republic with Lajos Kossuth as Governor-President.

Following the "restoration of order" in Vienna by imperial forces commanded by Prince Alfred zu Windisch-Graetz, the independent regime in Hungary was crushed by the combination of an Austrian imperial army under the command of General Baron Julius von Haynau and Russian forces under the command of Field-Marshal Ivan Paskevich.  Its overthrow was followed by a bloody reign of terror under Haynau which lasted for nearly a year.

The Compromise of 1867

The one permanent achievement of the revolution of 1848-9 was the law of September 6th., 1846 abolishing serfdom, which was not repealed after the successful counter-revolution.  This helped forward the development of the capitalist economic system within Hungary.

In 1859 the Austrian imperial armed forces were defeated by the armies of Italy and France, resulting In the cession to Italy of Lombardy.  And in 1866 a  further defeat at the hands of Prussia resulted in the cession to Italy of Venetia and the payment to Prussia of a large sum in reparations.

These internal and external developments so weakened the Austrian autocracy that in 1867, it was forced to strengthen its position by raising the status of the Hungarian aristocracy to that of nominally equal partners.  The Act of Compromise of May 29th., 1867 transformed the Austrian Empire formally into the Dual Monarchy of Austro-Hungary.  By this, Hungary became a Kingdom in "indissoluble unity" with Austria, with the Austrian Emperor as King, with autonomy in internal affairs but accepting the "joint character" of foreign affairs, finance, defence and diplomatic representation.

In June 6th., 1867 the Emperor Franz Josef was crowned King of Hungary.

The Development of Capitalism

Although the development of the capitalist economic system in Hungary continued to be held back by the dominant landed aristocracy, the Compromise of 1867 permitted this development to a limited extent - as the following table shows:

 Coal production (million quintals):                         7                                     102
 Iron ore production (million quintals):                    5                                       21
 Length of railway lines (kilometres):                 2,200                                 22,000
Number of factories:                                                     24                                               5,000
Power used in factories
(thousand horse-power):                                             9    (1863)                                    886
Number of industrial companies:                               170 (1875)                         1,000
 Capital of industrial companies (million crowns)  200 (1873)                             1,512 (1910)
 Capital of Banks (million crowns):                     729                                  13,197
 Number of industrial workers (thousands):          110 (1880)                             620
 % of national income from industry and mining:  16% (1870)                        26%

Industrial capital in Hungary was relatively concentrated:  by 1900 0.5% of all industrial companies produced 66% of output and employed 44% of the workers. This concentration was particularly strong in metallurgy. Three iron-producing firms controlled the majority of output.

With the development of industry, the share in it of the Hungarian national capitalist class (which was predominantly Jewish) rose - from one third of the industrial plants in 1880 to two-thirds in 1913.

Class Composition

 In 1913 the class composition of the population (including dependants) was roughly as follows:
                                                      Millions
 Landlord class:                                 0.1
 Comprador capitalist class:                 0.2
 National capitalist class:                     0.2
 Rich peasantry:                                 0.3
 Urban petty bourgeoisie:                    1.9
 Middle peasantry:                             6.0
 Poor peasantry:                                8.2
 Urban working class:                        5.9
                                         Total: 20.8

The Development of the Working Class Movement

The first political organisation claiming to represent the interests of the working class was the General Workers' Association, formed on February 23rd., 1868 on the initiative of Janos Hrabje, a member of the General Council of the First International.  Its programme, strongly influenced by the teachings of Ferdinand Lassalle, included demands for the extension of the franchise, for working class education, and for the establishment of workers' productive associations "to overcome capitalism".

In the spring of 1871 the GWA organised a series of strikes in support of improved working conditions, and a number of demonstrations in support of the Paris Commune.  After the suppression of the Commune, the government banned the GWA, arresting its leaders and, in April/May 1872, trying them for treason. Although they were acquitted, the persecution brought about the disbanding of the organisation, although its Sickness and Disablement Fund (established in 1870 on the initiative of Karoly Parkas) survived.

 In 1876 Leo Frankel, who had been Commissioner of Labour in the  Paris commune and a member of the General Council of the First International, returned home to Hungary, and on his initiative a conference held on April 2lst-22nd., 1878 re-established a political organisation claiming to represent the interests of the working class - the Non-Voters' Party (the only name which the authorities would permit).

At a conference on May 16-17th., 1880 the General  workers'  Sickness and Disablement Fund merged with the Non-Voters' Party to form the General Workers' Party of Hungary (GWP).  Although this party did not break completely with the influence of Lassalle, its programme was couched in the language of Marxism and aimed at public ownership of the means of production.

In 1881 Frankl was arrested on charges of 'criminal libel'  in the party's press and sentenced to eighteen months imprisonment.   On his release he left the country, and the leadership of the General Workers' Party shifted into the hands of the more openly right-wing officials of the sick fund.

In 1889. the General Workers' Party of Hungary took part in the foundation congress of the Second International.

A conference of the GWP in the autumn of 1889 elected Pal Engelmann to the leadership, and on his initiative the party began to lay greater stress on socialist agitation.  In 1890, for the first time in Hungary, 60,000 workers celebrated May Day.

At a congress on December 7th., 1890 the General Workers' Party of Hungary was renamed the Social Democratic Party of Hungary (SDP), and the congress became the First Congress of the SDP.  The congress adopted a "Declaration of Principle" designating as the ultimate aim of the party the public ownership of the means of production, but without specifying how this was to be brought about, and as more immediate aims universal suffrage and "parliamentary democracy".  It made, however, no mention of land reform.

In the summer of 1891 violent clashes took place in the rural southeast of Hungary (the "Stormy Corner") between the gendarmerie and agricultural workers demonstrating for higher wages and better working conditions.  Following this, at the Second Congress of the SDP at the end of 1892, the right-wing officials of the sick fund, who repudiated class struggle, succeeded in expelling the "left-wing", headed by Engelmann, from the party.

At the Third (Unification) Congress of the SDP, on May 13th. 1894, the "left-wing" was readmitted to the  party, and  one of its representatives, Ignac Silberberg, became party leader.  This congress adopted, for the first time, an agrarian programme; this, however, declared that the working class had no interest in "preserving the peasantry" and put forward a policy of nationalisation of the large estates without redistribution.

This policy towards the peasantry was continued into the 20th century. An article on "Peasant Politics" published in "Nepszava" (The People's Voice) in July 1907 declared:

On April 22nd., 1894, following the arrest of Janos Szanto Kovacs, who had been organising agricultural workers at Hodmezovasarhely in the Great Plain, the local population stormed the town hall and engaged police and the army in heavy fighting.  The government declared a state of emergency and banned all "socialist" meetings, while Szanto Kovacs and the Hodmezdvasarhely "rebels" were sentenced to long terms of imprisonment.

At the end of 1895, however, the right-wing faction had been successful in removing the "left-wing" faction, headed by Silberberg, from the leadership.

In the summer of 1897 large-scale harvest strikes broke out among agricultural labourers in 14 counties.  The movement found enthusiastic support within the leadership of the SDP in the person of Istvan Varkonyi, who had himself been an agricultural labourer and who had commenced publication in the summer of 1896, mainly from his own resources, of the newspaper "'Foldmivelo" (The Agricultural Labourer).  The leadership of the SDP repudiated class struggle in the countryside, as in the towns, and officially dissociated the party from Varkonyi and his paper.  As a result, on the initiative of Varkonyi, a congress was held at Cegled on September 8th., 1897 which formed a new party, the Independent Socialist Party (ISP) which adopted a correct agrarian policy of demanding, not only better conditions for agricultural workers, but the nationalisation of church lands and of all estates over 60 hectares - these to be redistributed in plots of 5 hectares at a low rent.  The influence of the ISP spread rapidly in the rural areas of Hungary, and in 1898 the government arrested Varkonyi, banned "Foldmivelo" and savagely repressed the movement for the land reform.  At the same time the government declared trade unions under militant leadership (about one-third of the total) illegal, and even banned the congress of the SDP from being held.  In 1898 also the government adopted the so-called "Slave Act", which compelled every farm worker to enter into a written contract with his employer, the breaking of which constituted a criminal offence, and which prescribed severe penalties for organising agricultural workers or engaging in strikes.

Until 1899 trade unions were local organisations only, but in this year the first Trade Union Congress was held - following which the first countrywide trade unions were organised.  By 1904 the number of trade unionists had risen to more than 50,000, five times the number in 1899.  Almost all the trade unions were closely associated with the Social Democratic Party.

On March 25th., 1906 the Independent Socialist Peasant Party was formed under the leadership of Andras Achim.  It published "Paraszt Ujsag" (The Peasant Journal) and called for land reform, universal suffrage, progressive taxation and measures to protect small farmers and agricultural workers. Although Achim endeavoured to build an alliance between the poor and middle peasantry on the one hand and the industrial workers on the other, this was fiercely resisted by the leadership of the SDP.  In May 1911 Achim was shot down by the sons of a landowner, and his party fell to pieces.

Meanwhile in 1909 the landlord class made a rival attempt to win the middle peasantry to its side by the formation of the National Independence and '48 Farmers' Party (known as the "Smallholders' Party"), led by Istvan Nagyatadi Szabo, but this did not become a serious political force until after the destruction of the "Soviet" Republic in August 1916.

Also In 1909 the Hungarian national capitalist class launched, at the University of Budapest, the Galileo Circle as a centre for progressive young intellectuals from the bourgeoisie and petty bourgeoisie.
 
On May 23rd., 1912 the SDP launched a general strike and demonstration in Budapest in protest at the appointment of the arch-reactionary Count Istvan Tisza as Speaker of the House (an appointment made to try to force through the Army Bill against parliamentary opposition).  The demonstration was attacked by mounted police and unit of the army, and pitched battles were fought for most of the day, which became known as "Bloody Thursday".

On July 28th., 1914, Austro-Hungary declared war on Serbia, and within the next few days the war developed into the First World War, with Austro-Hungary and Germany at war with Britain, France and Russia.

The Social-Democratic Party gave full support to the war "against tsarist barbarism", and in February 1918 Jakab Weltner, the editor of the party's newspaper "Nepszava" (The People's Voice) was able to boast  that it was one of the few parties of the Second International in which no left-wing group of opposition to the war broke away .

On November 21st., 1916 the Emperor Franz Josef died, and was succeeded by his nephew as Karl I (Karl IV of Hungary).

On November 25th., 1917 several hundred thousand people attended a mass meeting in the Hall of Industry in Budapest called to express support for the socialist revolution in Russia.  The meeting adopted a resolution calling for a general strike against the war and for the formation of Workers' Councils along the lines of the Soviets formed in Russia.

The first such Workers' Council was set up on December 26th., 1917.

Until 1919, the franchise was limited by property and sex qualifications to 6% of the adult male population, so that the Hungarian National Assembly was dominated by political representatives of the landlord, comprador capitalist and national capitalist classes:

The Hungarian national capitalist class was represented in the National Assembly by deputies from  the  Independence and '48 Party, formed In July 1916 under the leadership of Mihaly Karolyi, and from the National Bourgeois Radical Party, formed in June 1914 under the leadership of Oszkar Jaszi.
The other party representing the interests of the national capitalist class, the Social  Democratic Party, did  not have a single member in the National Assembly, or in any local council. 

PART TWO  THE EVENTS LEADING UP TO THE NATIONAL-DEMOCRATIC REVOLUTION (January - October 1918)

The January General Strike

On January 18th., 1918 a large-scale political strike broke out in Vienna in protest at the harsh demands being made by the Central Powers against Soviet Russia in the peace talks at Brest-Litovsk.  Budapest workers joined the strike, which for three days spread through most of the industrial centres in Hungary, involving more than half a million workers.

The government reacted to the strike by placing returned prisoners-of-war from Russia in quarantine for screening, by banning the Galileo Circle, by arresting labour leaders who had expressed sympathy with Soviet Russia, and by creating a special security headquarters to combat "subversion".

The Development of the National Movements

 By the spring of 1915 the national movements of the oppressed part-nations within Hungary were demanding a radical redrawing of the frontiers of southeastern Europe along ethnic lines.  The Allied powers gave support to many of these national movements with the aim of further weakening the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

The Social Democratic Parties in both Austria and Hungary denounced the demands of the national movements in the name of preserving the territorial integrity of the Empire.

The June General Strike

From the middle of 1918 Hungary became increasingly short of food  fuel and raw materials.  The real wages of the workers had sunk to 53% of the pre-war level, that of day labourers to 46%, that of office workers to 35%.

On June 20th. the Military Commandant in Budapest ordered workers demonstrating at the MAVAG works in support of demands for the resignation of the government to be fired upon.  Within a few hours all factories in the capital had stopped work in protest, and the workers of the provincial towns followed suit the next day. The general strike lasted nine days and involved half a million workers, who demonstrated, despite martial law, for an end to the war and the resignation of the government.

The Disintegration of the Austro-Hungarian Army

By 1918 the Austro-Hungarian Army was gradually disintegrating. In February a mutiny broke out in the Cattaro fleet.  By the summer the number of deserters exceeded a hundred thousand.  On May 20th. mutinous soldiers at Pecs occupied the barracks and railway station, and were disarmed only after a long and bitter battle.

On September 30th., 1918, Bulgaria surrendered to the Allied Powers, and the enfeebled Austro-Hungarian army was compelled to try to fill the gaping hole in the southern front.

The Extraordinary Congress of the SDP

In mid-October 1918 an Extraordinary Congress of the Social Democratic Party of Hungary adopted a resolution calling for the formation of a "People's Government" in Hungary.

The Proclamation of Federal Union

In an effort to save the Empire from dissolution, on October 16th., 1918 Emperor Karl proclaimed its transformation into a Federal Union of four states - German, Czech, South Slav and Ukrainian.  'The lands of the Hungarian Crown" were, however, to be outside this federal arrangement and to be governed as at present.  The Polish inhabitants of the Empire would be permitted to join the new state of Poland, whose independence had been proclaimed on October 7th.

 Within the next two weeks National Councils were forced by the peoples of most of the oppressed nations and part-nations within the Empire.

The Resignation of the Wekerle Government

As it became clear that the military position of  the Austro-Hungarian Empire was hopeless, on October 23rd., 1915 the Hungarian Government, headed by Sandor Wekerle, resigned.

The Formation of the Hungarian National Council

On October 25th., 1918, on the Initiative of Count Mihaly Karolyi, the leader of the Independence and '48 Party, a Hungarian National Council was formed in Budapest, composed of representatives of his own party, the National Bourgeois Radical Party, and the Social Democratic Party.

The Battle of the Chain Bridge

On October 28th., 1918 a large crowd marched to Castle Hill in Buda in a demonstration calling for the appointment of a Government headed by Count Mihaly Karolyi.  At the Chain Bridge police fired on the demonstration, killing 3 people and wounding 55.

The Formation of the Hadik Government.

On October 29th., 1918, in defiance of popular demands, the Emperor appointed a political representative of the landlords, Count Janos Hedik, as  Prime Minister of Hungary.  His government lasted barely two days.

The Request for an Armistice.

On October 29th., 1918 the Austro-Hungarian Government requested the Allied Powers for an armistice   (which was signed in Padua on November 3rd.).

During the war Hungary had mobilised 3.6 million men (17% of the population), and had lost 0.7 million killed, with 0.7 million wounded and million taken prisoner.

The  Dissolution of the Empire

By this time the Austro-Hungarian Empire had no real existence.

On October 21st., 1918 the 210 German members of the Imperial Parliament had formed themselves into a National Assembly of German Austria, and proclaimed this an independent state on October 30th.

On October 27th, 1918, the Romanian National Council in Bukovina announced its secession from Austro-Hungary in order to join Romania.

On October 28th. the Czech National Council, and on October 30th. the Slovak National Council proclaimed the establishment of an independent state of Czechoslovakia.

 On October 29th., 1918 the parliament of Croatia voted to secede from Austro-Hungary in order to join the new state of Yugoslavia, which was proclaimed on the same day.

 On October lst.; 1918 the Ukrainian National Council in Galicia announced its secession from Austro-Hungary in order to join the Ukraine then under the Skoropadsky regime.

The National-Democratic revolution in Hungary

On October 30th., 1918 crowds of soldiers and workers demonstrated in front of the headquarters in Budapest of the Hungarian National Council. By this time the Austro-Hungarian state authority had virtually collapsed, and at dawn on October 31st. they occupied, without resistance, the headquarters of the military Commandant of Budapest and the principal public buildings throughout the capital.

The Hungarian national-democratic revolution had been accomplished.

PART THREE : THE KAROLYI REGIME 

(October 1918 - March 1919)

The Formation of the Karolyi Government

On October 3lst, 1919 the victory of the national-democratic revolution was celebrated in Budapest with the wearing of michaelmas daisies.  The government headed by Count Janos Hadik resigned, the revolutionary soldiers arrested the military commandant of Budapest and the king called on Count Mihaly Karolyi (leader of the Independence and '48 Party) to form a government.

Karolyi formed his government later the same day, with ministers drawn from his own party, the National Bourgeois Radical Party and the Social Democratic Party.  In its programme, the government promised to enact legislation formalising independence, introducing universal suffrage and the secret ballot, civil rights, social reform and land reform.
 
The Formation of the Budapest Central Workers' Council

On November 1st. the peasants began to drive out the local government officials and to disarm the gendarmerie.  In the towns the workers had already begun to form Councils modelled on the Soviets set up in Russia, and the soldiers in the army quickly followed suit.  From meetings and demonstrations all over the country, demands for the immediate organisation of a republic began to flow in to the government.

On November 2nd., in an effort to canalise this spontaneous movement into legal channels, the leaders of the Social Democratic Party formed the Budapest Central Workers' Council, under the control of right-wing social-democrats. This body, jointly with the government, immediately called upon the population to observe "law and order", to wait for the government's decrees, and to surrender all arms; it began to organise a National Guard for the preservation of "order".

The Armistice

On November 3rd. representatives of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy signed an armistice with representatives of the Allied Powers in Padua. This contained no provisions as to the frontiers of Hungary, and the Allied army in the Balkans continued to advance.  A government delegation led by Karolyi therefore  began negotiations in Belgrade with General Franchet d'Esperey, the Allied Commander-in-Chief in the Balkans, and a separate armistice was signed here on November 13th.  The demarcation line laid down in this armistice agreement ran deep into the former territory of Hungary in the south and east, but did not affect Slovakia in the north.

National Policy
 
The Karolyi government officially condemned the repressive policy adopted by the Dual Monarchy to the national minorities in the territory of Hungary. At the same time, in the interests of the capitalist class  which it  represented, it was keenly anxious to maintain the territorial integrity of the old Hungary, and for this reason rejected the granting of the right of secession to the national minorities.

On November 13th., 1918 the Minister for Nationalities, Oszkar Jaszi, began negotiations with the various National Councils within Hungary in an effort to persuade them to accept measures of limited political and cultural autonomy within the Hungarian state.  This programme was, however, unacceptable to the national councils.

The Proclamation of the People's Republic

On November 16th., 1918 the National Council passed a "People's Decree", which was ratified by a mass meeting of 300,000 people in front of Parliament.  It declared that:

The decree went on to bind the government to enact laws on the following questions:

The Foundation of the Communist Party

On March 24th., 1918 a group of released Hungarian prisoners-of-war in Russia, headed by Bela Kun, had formed the Hungarian Federation of the Russian Communist Party, which proceeded to carry on propaganda work among Hungarian prisoners-of-war still interned in the Soviet Republic.  It also
ran two schools - in Moscow and Omsk - in which, by November 1918, some 500 cadres had been trained as cadres for the future Communist Party of Hungary.

Bela Kun was born on February 20th., 1886 in the village of Lele, in Szilagy county  in Transylvania.  He joined the Social Democratic Party in 1902 at the age of 16.

In the autumn of 1904 he enrolled in the Koloszvar Law Academy, at the same time taking a part-time post with the local Workers' Insurance Fund and writing articles for the radical newspaper "Or" (Guardian).

In 1905 he moved to Nagyvarad to join the staff of another radical newspaper "Szabadsag" (Liberty), and in February 1907 moved once more, this time to the capital to become a staff member of the influential "Budapest  Naplo" (Budapest Post).

In 1915 he married Iren Gal.

On the outbreak of war in 1914, he was conscripted into the army, and in January 1915, sent to the Russian front.  In early 1916 he was taken prisoner, and interned near Tomsk in Siberia..

In the spring of 1917 Kun wrote to the Tomsk City Council, which was controlled by the Russian Social-Democratic Labour Party, and persuaded it to allow himself and a number of other prisoners who were members of the SDP to live outside the prison camp.

On April 23rd., 1917 he wrote to the Tomsk branch of the RSDLP offering his services to "the socialist cause".  At the end of the month he was admitted to the branch, becoming a member of  its executive Committee.

In early December 1917, following the socialist revolution in Russia, he went to Petrograd at the invitation of the Central Committee of the RCP. Here he met Lenin and joined the staff of the Propaganda Department of the People's Commissariat for Foreign Affairs - becoming editor of its Hungarian-language newspaper "Jemzetkosi  Szocialista" (International Socialist) and later editor of its German-language newspaper "Fackel" (the Torch).

He attached himself to the "Left Communist" faction within the party, headed by Nikolai Bukharin.

On February 23rd., 1918 the Propaganda Department of the PC of Foreign Affairs was wound up in accordance with the terms of the Treaty of Brest-Litovsk.

On March 24th., 1918 he became Chairman of the Hungarian Federation of the RCP, and in April also Chairman of the Confederation of  Foreign Communist Groups of the RCP.
 
On November 4th., 1918, when the news of the national-democratic revolution in Hungary had reached the Soviet Republic, the Hungarian Federation of the RCP convened a conference in Moscow, which resolved that members should return home forthwith and proceed there as soon as possible to found a Communist Party.

Bela Kun and other leading members of the Federation arrived in Budapest on November 17th.
- Matyas Rakosi had already returned in May - and others followed during the next few days.

On November 24th., 1918 the returned members of the Hungarian Federation of the RCP, together with some left-wing elements who had now broken away from the SDP and the anarcho-syndicalist Revolutionary Socialists (established in the autumn of 1917), held the Foundation Congress of the Communist Party of Hungary, under the chairmanship of Karolyi Vantus.

The Temporary Constitution of the party, adopted by the congress, contained the "leftist" provision that:

The congress elected a committee of 13 members, headed by Bela Kun as Chairman, and an Alternate Central Committee, headed  by Tibor Szamuely as Chairman, to function in case the open CC was unable to function.  The latter, in fact, took over the leadership of the party during the imprisonment of members of the open CC, from February 21st; to March 21st; 1919.

The principal points of the party's programme adopted at its Foundation Congress, were:

(1) an end to class collaboration with the capitalist class;

(2) exposure of the right-wing leadership of the Social Democratic Party;

(3) effective means to combat unemployment;

(4) assistance for demobilised soldiers and the disabled, to be paid out of war profits;

(5) the immediate introduction of "workers' control" in the factories;

(6) nationalisation of the large estates and their conversion into large-scale state or co-operative farms;

(7) the replacement of the foreign policy based on seeking the favour of the Allied Powers by one based on alliance with Soviet Russia;

(8) extension of the role of Workers', Soldiers' and Peasants' Councils;

and  (9) ultimately, the seizure of political power by these Councils and the construction of socialism.

On December 7th., 1919 the party began publication of the newspaper "Voros Ujsag" (Red Journal), and in January, 1919 of a monthly theoretical journal "Internationale" (International).

Although the party conducted agitation in the factories, in the first months of its existence it had little success in winning the support of the organised workers who, by and large, remained loyal to the social democratic Party.  It did, however, win wide support among the unemployed, who were neglected by the SPD.

Nevertheless, a mass meeting organised by the party in Budapest in the second half of December 1918 endorsed the slogan "All Power to the Workers' Councils!", and this slogan was adopted in the next few weeks by a number of such councils.

The Formation of the Hungarian National Defence Force Association

On November 30th., 1918 a fascist-type counter-revolutionary organisation representing the interests of the landlord class was formed - the Hungarian National Defence Force Association (Magyar Orszagos Vedero Egyesulet )(MOVE), under the leadership of Gyula Gombos.

The Revision of the Armistice Agreement

In December 1918 the Allied Powers unilaterally amended the armistice agreement signed with the Hungarian government in Belgrade on November 13th. This amendment permitted the Czechoslovak and Romanian armed forces to cross the demarcation line laid down in the armistice agreement into Slovakia and Transylvania respectively.

Government Legislation

In December 1918 and January 1919 the Karolyi government adopted:

The January Strike and Occupation

On January 2nd., 1919 a strike broke out at one of the largest coalmines in the country, at Salgotarjan, and the miners proceeded to occupy the pits, the local administration buildings and the railway station.  The government crushed the action by armed force, and executed 10 strike leaders on January 10th.

Over the next few days, however, a number of factories in the capital and in provincial towns were taken over by Workers' Councils, who evicted the managers and proceeded to run the enterprises themselves.

The Election of the President

On January 11lth, 1919 the National Council elected Mihaly Karolyi President of the Republic.

The Coollidge Mission

 On January 15th., 1919 a  mission from the Allied Powers, led by US historian Archibald Coolidge, arrived in Budapest.  The government sought to convince the mission of the importance of granting economic "aid" to Hungary - through the American Relief Administration directed by Herbert Hoover - in order to strengthen the position of the bourgeois democratic regime and avert the "threat" of the "spread of Bolshevism".

The mission did, in fact, make such recommendations, but they were not acted upon.

The Formation of the Berinkey Government.

On January 18th., 1919 President Karolyi appointed Denes Berinkey, a lawyer who had been Minister of Justice in the Karolyi government, Prime Minister.  He formed a new coalition government, with four Ministers (of Education, Public Welfare, Trade, and Defence) drawn from the Social Democratic Party.

The Offensive against the Communist Party

A few days after the Coolidge mission had left Hungary - leaving behind one of its members, Philip Brown, in Budapest - the head of the British Military Mission in Vienna, Colonel Sir Thomas Cunninghame, had talks with the Hungarian government, informing it that Allied economic "aid" would be dependent upon "a reduction of Communist influence" in Hungary.

Accordingly, on January 28th. 1919, the Budapest Central Workers Council, under the leadership of right-wing members of the Social-Democratic Party, expelled members of the Communist Party from its membership and from that of the trade unions, in the interests of 'safeguarding democracy".

A few days later, on the orders of the Minister of the Interior, police raided the premises of the Communist Party and of its' newspaper "Voros Usjag" (ed Journal), destroying the latter's printing press.

The Land Reform Law

On February 16th., 1919 the government enacted its Land Reform Law. It provided that all estate land in excess of 700 acres (in certain instances, over 300 acres) was to be acquired by the state, with compensation payable to the landholders concerned.  This nationalised land was then to be leased or
sold either individually or  co-operatively.

On March 23rd., 1919 President Mihaly Karolyi distributed surplus land from his own vast estates at Kalkapolna in accordance with the provisions of the law.

The law failed to satisfy the expectation of the land-hungry poor peasantry.  Not only did they consider the limits set on the size of estates to be unreasonably high, but they found that the process of distribution was surrounded with so much bureaucratic red tape - of which the civil servants, who were mostly unsympathetic to the land reform, took full advantage - that very little land was distributed during the lifetime of the Karolyi regime.

The impatient peasants at first deluged the government with demands that the land reform should be speeded up, but soon they began arbitrarily to occupy the large estates, redistributing the occupied land either among individual peasant families or - in so far as they were under the influence of the SDP (which opposed individual redistribution) - to peasant co-operatives.

The Unemployed Demonstration

The dissolution of the Austro-Hungarian Empire had a serious effect on the economy of Hungary, already disastrously weakened by four years of war. This, together with the occupation of the southern, south-eastern and northern areas of Hungary's former territory, further fragmented the economic unit which had until then functioned as an economic whole.  Serious shortages of fuel and raw materials brought the majority of the factories to a standstill.

As a result of this economic situation, by the beginning of 1919 unemployment in the towns had assumed massive proportions, the ranks of the unemployed being swelled by over a million demobilised soldiers and refugees from the occupied areas.

On February 20th., 1919 a mass demonstration of unemployed took place outside the offices of the Social Democratic Party's daily newspaper "Nepszava" (The People's Voice) in Budapest.  The demonstrators clashed with police, a number of them being injured and several policemen fatally injured.

The Arrest of the Communist Party Leaders

For some weeks the Social Democratic Party Ministers in the government had been resisting recommendations from the Minister of the Interior and the Commissioner of Police that the leaders of the Communist Party should be arrested.  The violence of February 20th. gave them the pretext to change their position, and on February 21st. 68 leading members of the Communist Party were arrested.  They were, however, treated as political prisoners, enabling them to receive visitors and to continue a degree of leadership of the party from prison.

The Formation of the Directories

In March 1919 arbitrary occupation of the large estates took on countrywide dimensions.

 In numerous places, both in the towns and in the countryside, the Workers and Peasants' Councils refused to allow the government-appointed Commissioners to take up their posts, and seated their own local administrations - called Directories.

The Allied Ultimatum
 
On February 26th., 1919 the Peace Conference in Versailles decided to set up a "neutral zone"' in Hungary, outside the jurisdiction of the Hungarian government and to be occupied by Allied forces, in the southeastern part of  the country.  The purpose of this move was to establish a secure buffer zone between Romanian and Hungarian armed forces, in order that the former could be used in the war of intervention against the Soviet Republic without any danger of their being attacked by the latter.

The Allied demand was handed to President Karolyi on March 20th., 1919 by the representative of the Allied Power  in Budapest, the French Lieutenant-Colonel Vix, in the form of a Note.

Vix  made it clear to the Hungarian government that the demarcation line of the "neutral zone" would be the new frontier of Hungary;

and that if the government did not accept the Ultimatum by 6.00 PM, the following day (March 21st.), the Allied Powers would reopen hostilities against Hungary:

The Resignation of the Berinkey Government

Since the "neutral zone" included areas inhabited entirely by Magyars, the government considered it impossible to accept the ultimatum.  On the other hand, it considered that the armed forces at its disposal were totally insufficient to enable it to reject the ultimatum.  It therefore resigned on the day the ultimatum was received, March 20th., 1919.

The Merger of the CP and the SDP

On the afternoon of March 21st., 1911, a delegation of leaders of the Social Democratic Party, headed by Jakab Weltner, visited the leaders of the Communist Party in prison and informed them that they would be released forthwith from prison if they agreed:

The imprisoned Communist Party leaders agreed to these proposals, and were immediately released from prison.

On the following day, March 21st., 1919., the leadership of the two parties met and formally agreed - without either party attempting to hold a congress which would normally decide such an issue of principle- - to "merge" the two parties into the Socialist Party of Hungary.

A few members of the right wing of the SDP refused to participate in the "merger":

but this did not change the fundamental position:

 The "merger" was not brought about, of course, because the leaders of the Social Democratic Party had been miraculously converted overnight to the principles of Marxism-Leninism:

The real character of the "merger" is evidenced by the relative sizes of the two parties participating in it.

Because of the peculiar method of organisation of the Social Democratic Party, by which every member of a trade union automatically became a member of the party, its total membership in the spring of 1919 was approximately 700,000, organised in thousands of branches:

The total membership of the Communist Party, formed less than four months earlier, was, of course, only a small fraction of this.  Jeno Varga speaks of the party in the spring of 1919 as having:

Vilmos Bohm estimates the membership of the Communist Party at this time as:

and Oskar Jaszi at: 

Even on the basis of Jaszi's higher estimate, therefore, the total membership of the Communist Party in the spring of 1919 was no more than O.7% of that of the Social Democratic Party.

The "merger" between the Communist Party and the Social Democratic Party was thus the liquidation of the party of the working class, and the virtual submersion of its members in the Social Democratic Party.

On the side of the Communist Party the merger was accepted by a majority of the leadership who accepted a Luxemburgist underestimation of the role of the party in the socialist revolution:

The "merger" was, however, opposed by a number of leading members of the Communist Party, notably by Bela Ozanto, Tibor Szamuely, Matyas Rakosi, Jeno Laszlo and Laszlo Rudas, who were denounced on account of their opposition, by Bela Kun and those supporting the "merger" as  "leftists":

The new party carried on the publication of the former SPD newspaper - "Nepszava" (The People's Voice) - as its morning paper, and of the former SPD newspaper "Voros Ujsac" (Red Journal) as its evening paper.
 

 PART FOUR: " THE SOVIET REPUBLIC"  (March - August 1919)

The Formation of the Revolutionary Governing Council

The "merger" agreement between the Executive Committees of the Social Democratic and Communist Parties provided that the two former parties would "jointly participate" in forming a government:

and that the new party formed by the "merger" would immediately "assume complete authority":

On March 21st., 1919, therefore, the leaders the Hungarian Socialist Party formed a new government, the revolutionary Governing Council, with Sandor Garbai (a former leader of the SDP) as  its President.  The members of the government, called People's Commissars, who headed the various departments of state, called People's Commissariats, were, in  fact, drawn entirely from the former SDP with one exception:  the former leader of the CPH, Bela Kun as - significantly, in view of the real aim behind the formation of the RCG - People's Commissar of Foreign Affairs:

In order to maintain the appearance of a "socialist revolution", the new government was not formally appointed by President Mihaly Karolyi.  He simply withdrew from the political scene.

The left-wing of the former Communist party, led by Tibor Szamuely, who had opposed the dissolution of the party, also opposed the acceptance by the  former Communist party of less than 50% of the posts in the revolutionary Governing Council:

Bela Kun, in fact, found himself at one with the former leaders of the SDP, in preferring responsible posts to be occupied by members of the former SDP  rather than by members of the left-wing of the former CP, and in allocating the latter only minor positions:

The "merger" agreement between the SD? and the C? had declared, rather vaguely, that it would be the aim of the new party:

But the Revolutionary Governing Council made no attempt to remove from their posts in the state apparatus (the civil service, the armed forces, the police, the gendarmeries, etc.) the existing officials and officers:

The Proclamation of the "Soviet Republic"

The first act of the new government, on March 21st., 1919, was to proclaim the establishment of the Hungarian "Soviet Republic'".

Martial Law

On the night of March 2lst./22nd., 1919 the Revolutionary Governing Council proclaimed martial law throughout the country.  The administration of martial law was placed in the hands of a special Political Department of the People's Commissariat of Internal Affairs, headed by Otto Korvin, which proceeded to establish a security police modelled formally on the lines of the Cheka in the Russian Soviet Republic.

Although opponents of the regime put out much propaganda about the "savage" nature of the "Red Terror" which existed under the "Soviet Republic", even former President Mihaly Karolyi was compelled to admit that this was, in fact, "mild":

The RGC's Appeal

The "merger" agreement between the SD? and the CP had stressed:

On March 22nd, 1919, the day after its formation, the Revolutionary Governing Council issued an appeal, entitled "To All", emphasising that the country's difficulties could be solved only by a "socialist" government which would seek a military alliance with Soviet Russia.

The Abolition of Titles and Ranks

On March 22nd., 1919 the RGC issued a decree abolishing titles and ranks.

Lenin's Misgivings about the "Soviet Republic"

On March 23rd., 1919 Lenin sent a radio message to Bela Kun  on expressing serious misgivings about the nature of the Hungarian "Soviet Republic":

Kun's reply gave a very  misleading picture:

It was on the basis of this communication from Kun that Lenin drew the incorrect conclusion that the Hungarian "Soviet" regime was a genuine one:

Bela Kun's Note to Versailles

On March 24th., 1919 the People's Commissar for Foreign Affairs Bela Kun despatched a Note to the Peace Conference at Versailles on behalf of the RGC. This emphasised the peaceful intentions of the Hungarian government towards all states and asked the conference to send a diplomatic mission to Budapest to open direct negotiations.

The Closure of Retail Shops

On March 24th., 1919 the People's Vice-Commissar for Socialisation, Gyula Hevesi, issued the most absurd decree of the "Soviet Republic's brief existence, all retail shops, with the exception of food shops, tobacconists and pharmacies, were ordered to close, and the death penalty prescribed for any retail commercial transactions outside these exempted fields.

The decree caused such chaos that it was sensibly repealed on the following day.

The Separation of Church and State

On March 25th., 1919 the RGC issued a decree separating the Church from the state, and formally guaranteeing freedom of religious worship.

The latter section of the decree was partly nullified in practice by the fact that the RGC gave its encouragement to an "anti-religious campaign, directed by a defrocked priest Oszkar Faber, which involved the desecration of churches and the insulting of priests.

The Formation of the Red Army

The "merger" agreement between the SDP and the CF declared:

On March 25th., 1919 the RGC issued a decree reorganising the existing army into the Red Army.  All officers and men who were willing to continue to serve were permitted to do so, and since almost all the officers were drawn from the landlord class, they felt no loyalty to the "Soviet Republic".

In an effort to check this position, Political Commissars are attached to all units with the aim of maintaining the "loyalty" of these officers. But, as will be discussed in the later section entitled "The Council Elections", these Political Commissars themselves were neither politically reliable nor competent.  As a result the officer corps of the Red Army consistently betrayed the interests of the "Soviet Republic".

The decree also established workers' battalions and regiments, to be based on each factory and to undergo training after work with arms stored in the factory, to function as a reserve for the Red Army.

The Establishment of Revolutionary Tribunals

On March 25th., 1919 the ROC issued a decree abolishing the existing courts and replacing them by revolutionary tribunals.  These included, in addition to trained lawyers, lay assessors drawn from the working class.

The Establishment of the Red Guard

On March 26th., 1919, the government issued a decree merging the police and the gendarmerie into a single force, called the Red Guard, but without any significant change of personnel.

The Nationalisation of Banks, Insurance Companies and the larger Industrial Enterprises

On March 26th.  1919 the RGC, issued a decree nationalising all banks, Insurance companies, together with all industrial mining and transport enterprises employing more than 20 workers.  Some 100,000 workers were employed in these nationalised enterprises.

Production Commissars were appointed by the government to direct each nationalised enterprise, and workers' councils were to be elected in each to "assist" the Production Commissar.

The decree also froze bank deposits, placing restrictions on the amount of withdrawals.

The nationalisation of industrial enterprises was, however, premature. Neither the Production Commissars appointed by the state, nor the workers councils had the necessary experience of industrial management, and the decree was followed by a sharp fall in industrial production:

The New Banknotes
From the time of the nationalisation of the banks on March 26th. 1919; the RGC began printing bank notes, which were in fact reproductions on white paper of the "blue" Banknotes issued by the Austro-Hungarian banks. These were denounced by the bank in Vienna as "counterfeits", and since the mass of the peasantry refused to accept them, this caused great problems in the purchase of food from the countryside:

The Housing Decree

On March 27th., 1919 the RGC issued a decree nationalising blocks of flats, requisitioning all housing accommodation in excess of three rooms per family for the rehousing of homeless families and those in substandard accommodation, reducing rents by 20% and cancelling arrears of rent.

Under this decree, in Budapest alone 51,410 working class families (amounting to more than 100,000 people) were rehoused in requisitioned accommodation.

The Allied Blockade

On March 26th., 1919 the Allied Powers announced that they would continue the economic blockade of Hungary imposed during the World War.

The Education Decree

On March 29th., 1919 the RGC issued a decree nationalising all educational institutions (some 80% of elementary schools and 65% of secondary schools had been owned by the church) and establishing free compulsory education up to the age of 14.

A campaign was also undertaken against illiteracy, providing for the establishment of free evening courses in reading and writing for adults.

Other Social Measures
 
Among other social measures instituted by the RGC in March/April 1919 were:

(I) the implementation of the law passed under the Karolyi regime establishing an 8-hour working day;

(2) the establishment of equal pay for equal work;

(3) the introduction of 6 weeks maternity leave on full pay for women workers;

(4) the general raising of wages by 40%, the raising of overtime rates to time-and-a-half for the first two hours, and to double time for each subsequent hour, together with the introduction of a bonus of 20% for night work:

(5) The increase of the produce traditionally allocated  to agricultural workers by an average of 100%;

(6) The (mistaken) abolition of piecework system in industry;

(7) the introduction of unemployment benefit;

(8) the introduction of a state accident and sickness insurance scheme (compulsory for employed workers, voluntary for working peasants); during the first four weeks of disability, benefits amounted to 60% of wages, rising to 75% after the fourth week.

Cultural Measures

During the period of existence of the "Soviet Republic", the state organised many theatrical performances, concerts, art exhibitions and film shows for the working people of town and country.

Among the leading artists who participated In this cultural work were:

 the poets Gyula Juhasz and Arpad Toth;

the writers Mihaly Babiti, Bela Balazs, Gyula Krudy and Zsigmond Moricz;

the philosopher Gyorgy Lukacs;

the painters Robert Bereny and Bortalan Por;

the sculptors Beni Ferenczy and Ferenc Medgyessy;

and  the composers Bela Bartok,  Erno Dohnanyi and Zoltan Kodaly.

The Constitution

On April 2nd., 1919 the Draft Constitution of the Hungarian "Soviet Republic" was published; it was modelled closely on that of Soviet Russia.

The Draft Constitution defined the state as "a Republic of Workers', Peasants' and Soldiers' Councils", in which "the working class held full political power", as "the dictatorship of the proletariat", and stated that Its aim was "the construction of a socialist society":

In pursuance of this aim, the state would take over all large and medium sized industrial, mining and transport enterprises, together with all financial institutions and insurance companies.

It would arm the workers, establish a Red Army as the "class army of the proletariat", and "disarm the exploiting classes".

The local organs of the soviet state were to be Village and Town Councils, elected by the working people in each locality. These councils would elect delegates to constitute District Councils, Dan the latter would in turn , elect delegates to a National Congress of Councils, which was to be the highest organ of the state.

The National Congress of Councils would elect a Governing Central Committee, to be the highest organ of the state between sessions of the congress and responsible to the latter.

The Governing Central Committee would elect the government, the Revolutionary Governing Council. which would be the highest organ of the state, between sessions of the Governing Central Committee; this government would be responsible both to the latter and to the National Congress of Councils.

The members of the Revolutionary Governing Council would be called People's Commissars, and each would head a department of state, called a People's Commissariat.

The Revolutionary Governing Council, the Governing Central Committee and the National Congress of Soviets would all have the power to issue decrees.

The franchise would be restricted to working people of both sexes over the age of eighteen - this term being defined to include pensioners, soldiers and those engaged in housework.
 
All citizens were guaranteed the right to work (or to state support if unemployed or incapacitated).

The working people were guaranteed the right to free education, together with freedom of speech, of press, of association, of assembly and of demonstration.

Racial or national oppression was outlawed, and national minorities were guaranteed the right to use their own language and to form councils for the promotion of their national culture.  A continuous area in which a majority of the inhabitants were of German or Russian nationality would constitute an autonomous national county.

The Appointment of Bohm as Commissar for War

On April 3rd., 1919, as a result of hostile demonstrations outside the headquarters of the People's Commissariat for War by left-wing soldiers, the former SPD leader Joszef Pogany was forced to resign as Commissar for War. He was replaced by another former SPD leader, Vilmos Bohm, who also became Commander-in-Chief of the Red Army.
 
The Land Reform

On April 3rd., 1919 the RGC decreed the nationalisation of all land on estates in excess of 140 acres.

Both the Social Democratic Party and the Communist Party, before their "merger", had opposed the redistribution of land among the poor peasantry, contending that the large estates should be kept intact and farmed collectively.

Already, at the time of its formation, the RGC had stopped the redistribution of land being carried out under the Karolyi regime's land reform. With the passing of the RGC's own land decree, the nationalised land was not redistributed, but made available for collective farm only.

This caused bitter dissatisfaction among the poor peasantry:

The dissatisfaction of the poor peasantry was accentuated by the fact that the "collective farms" formed in this way were not genuine co-operative farms, since the state appointed a Production Commissar to manage each farm, and since this Production Commissar was in most cases, because of the shortage of peasants with experience of large-scale farming, either a former estate-owner or his steward: