Modernism: The Creation of Nation-States

František Palacký: The idea of the Austrian state

FRANTIŠEK PALACKÝ: THE IDEA OF THE AUSTRIAN STATE Title: Idea státu rakouského (The idea of the Austrian state) Originally Published: Národ, a set of eight articles published between 9 April and 16 May, 1865 Language: Czech The excerpts used are from František Palacký, Spisy drobné 1: Spisy a řeči z oboru politiky, ed. by Bohuš Rieger (Prague: Bursík a Kohout, 1900– 03), pp. 218–226, 261–267. About the author František Palacký [1798, Hodslavice (Ger. Hotzendorf, north Moravia) – 1876, Prague]: politician and historian. He came from a traditional Protestant (Bohemian Brethren) family in Moravia. He studied at the Lutheran Latin School in Trencsén (Slo. Trenčín, present-day Slovakia) and the Lutheran Lyceum in Pressburg (Hun. Pozsony; Slo. Prešporok; present-day Bratislava, Slovakia), where he became acquainted with the ideas of Czech patriotism and Slavic reciprocity. Among his friends were Ján Benedikti, Pavel Josef Šafařík and Jan Kollár. After 1818, he was tutor to several Hungarian noble families, and was concerned principally with philosophy and aesthetics. The liberal-minded environment of Upper Hungary at that time and his experience gained in noble circles opened up the world of European culture and academic life for the young Palacký. In 1823, he went to Prague with the intention of studying Czech history, in particular the Hussite period. He was employed as a genealogist for the aristocratic Sternberg family, and studied historical methods under the tutelage of Josef Dobrovský. In 1829, the Estates appointed Palacký ‘Historian of the Bohemian Kingdom.’ At the same time he was instrumental in providing the Czech patriots with a firm institutional background for their cultural endeavors. In 1827, he started the Časopis Společnosti Vlasteneckého museum v Čechách (Journal of the Patriotic Museum Society in Bohemia) the most important Czech scholarly journal of the period. He also made important contributions in 1831 to the Matice česká, a foundation that supported the publication of books written in Czech. As a secretary of the ‘Patriotic Museum Society,’ he proposed in 1841 that the main task of the museum should be to present Bohemian scholarship, and he turned it into an important centre of ‘national academic life.’ Palacký entered politics in 1848 as a member of the Czech National Committee and became a deputy to the Reichsrat (Imperial Diet) and the president of the 1848 Slavic Congress in Prague. Moreover, he was a delegate to the Constituent Assembly of 1848–1849. He also formulated the liberal political program of the bourgeoisie, and later became the un- 26 MAKING OF THE MODERN STATE IN A MULTI-NATIONAL CONTEXT challenged intellectual leader of the liberal National Party and remained so until the end of his life. He retired from active politics in the neo–absolutist period of the 1850s, but resumed his involvement in the 1860s, after the reinstatement of constitutional rule. He was a deputy to the Bohemian Diet and, in 1861, became the only Czech ever elected to the upper chamber of the Reichsrat. In subsequent years Palacký was one of the chief opponents of dualism and a supporter of the historical ‘state rights’ (Staatsrecht) arrangement of the Empire as opposed to the AustroHungarian Compromise of 1867. After 1871, he concentrated on publishing collections of his articles on politics, aesthetics, history, and literature, as well as working to complete his magnum opus, Dějiny národu českého v Čechách a v Moravě (History of the Czech nation in Bohemia and Moravia). Palacký remained a leading personality of the Czech national movement for more than fifty years. In the national historical canon he used to be referred to as the ‘father of the nation’; for his monumental academic work he has been dubbed the ‘founder’ of modern Czech historiography . Main works: Počátkové českého básnictví, obzvláště prozódie [The beginnings of Czech poetry, especially prosody] with P. J. Šafařík (1818); Staří letopisové čeští [Old Bohemian annals] (1829); Archiv český, 6 vols. [Czech archive: Documents] (1840–72); Würdigung der alten böhmischen Geschichtsschreiber [An appreciation of of the old Bohemian historians] (1830); Geschichte von Böhmen, 5 vols. [History of Bohemia] (1836–67); Dějiny národu českého v Čechách a v Moravě, 5 vols. [A History of the Czech nation in Bohemia and Moravia] (1848–67); Idea státu rakouského [The idea of the Austrian state] (1865); Radhost. Sbírka z oboru řeči a literatury...