Milan Hodža (1 February 1878 – 27 June 1944) was a Slovak politician and journalist, serving from 1935 to 1938 as the prime minister of Czechoslovakia. As a proponent of regional integration, he was known for his attempts to establish a democratic federation of Central European states.

Early life

Milan Hodža was born in the Lutheran parish of Szucsány, in the

Turóc County Turóc (Hungarian language, Hungarian, historically also spelled ''Túrócz''), , /''comitatus Thurociensis'', ) was an administrative county (Comitatus (Kingdom of Hungary), comitatus) of the Kingdom of Hungary. Its territory is now in north-we ...

of the

Kingdom of Hungary The Kingdom of Hungary was a monarchy in Central Europe that existed for nearly a millennium, from 1000 to 1946 and was a key part of the Habsburg monarchy from 1526-1918. The Principality of Hungary emerged as a Christian kingdom upon the Coro ...

(present-day Sučany,

Slovakia Slovakia, officially the Slovak Republic, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Poland to the north, Ukraine to the east, Hungary to the south, Austria to the west, and the Czech Republic to the northwest. Slovakia's m ...

). His surname (meaning master or teacher in Turkish) was given to his ancestors at the times of the Ottomans conquest and rule. He studied at gymnasiums in Besztercebánya (today Banská Bystrica, Slovakia) from 1888 to 1890, in

Sopron Sopron (; , ) is a city in Hungary on the Austrian border, near Lake Neusiedl/Lake Fertő. History Ancient times-13th century In the Iron Age a hilltop settlement with a burial ground existed in the neighbourhood of Sopron-Várhely. When ...

from 1890 to 1894 and in Nagyszeben (today Sibiu,

Romania Romania is a country located at the crossroads of Central Europe, Central, Eastern Europe, Eastern and Southeast Europe. It borders Ukraine to the north and east, Hungary to the west, Serbia to the southwest, Bulgaria to the south, Moldova to ...

), where he passed graduation exams in 1896, before attending universities in

Budapest Budapest is the Capital city, capital and List of cities and towns of Hungary, most populous city of Hungary. It is the List of cities in the European Union by population within city limits, tenth-largest city in the European Union by popul ...

and

Vienna Vienna ( ; ; ) is the capital city, capital, List of largest cities in Austria, most populous city, and one of Federal states of Austria, nine federal states of Austria. It is Austria's primate city, with just over two million inhabitants. ...

. He started his career as a journalist in Budapest, in 1897. He edited and founded the newspaper ''Slovenský denník'' (1900–1901) and the weekly ''Slovenský týždenník'' (1903–1914). From 1916 to 1918, he was editor of the Austrian press office in Vienna.

Political career until 1918

He was a deputy to the parliament of the

from 1905 to 1910. As a member of the

Slovak National Party The Slovak National Party (, SNS) is an ultranationalist political party in Slovakia. The party characterizes itself as a nationalist party based on both social and European Christian values. Since 1990 SNS has won seats in every Slovak pa ...

, the only Slovak party in

Austria-Hungary Austria-Hungary, also referred to as the Austro-Hungarian Empire, the Dual Monarchy or the Habsburg Monarchy, was a multi-national constitutional monarchy in Central Europe#Before World War I, Central Europe between 1867 and 1918. A military ...

, he became the ideological leader and founder of Slovak

agrarianism Agrarianism is a social philosophy, social and political philosophy that advocates for rural development, a Rural area, rural agricultural lifestyle, family farming, widespread property ownership, and political decentralization. Those who adhere ...

. He was vice-chairman of the Slovak National Party from 1906 to 1914. Since the party did not endorse his agrarian program, he planned to create his own political party, but was prevented by the outbreak of

World War I World War I or the First World War (28 July 1914 – 11 November 1918), also known as the Great War, was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War I, Allies (or Entente) and the Central Powers. Fighting to ...

. Milan Hodža was a close aide of

Archduke Franz Ferdinand Archduke Franz Ferdinand Carl Ludwig Joseph Maria of Austria (18 December 1863 – 28 June 1914) was the heir presumptive to the throne of Austria-Hungary. His assassination in Sarajevo was the most immediate cause of World War I. Fran ...

, the successor to the Austrian and Hungarian thrones, after the 1910 elections. He proposed to the Archduke a detailed plan to turn the

into a federative monarchy, including a separate Slovak state. The Archduke hoped that federalization would strengthen the ties between the oppressed non- Magyar nations and the monarchy, but his initiative was strongly opposed by the Hungarian political elite. During World War I, Milan Hodža was involved in the preparations for the creation of Czecho-Slovakia. He was a member of the 1918–1919 Slovak National Council and was a signatory of the Declaration of the Slovak Nation, with which the Slovaks officially joined the newly created state of Czechoslovakia in 1918.

First Czechoslovak Republic

After World War I, he became the leader of the Czechoslovak Agrarian Party in Slovakia and as such gained considerable influence over Czechoslovakia's policy in many spheres, influencing the process of land reform, the passing of bills on agrarian tolls, enforced syndicalization, administrative reforms, and the structure and policy of the government. Between the two world wars he was also a key representative of the Czechoslovak and international agrarian movement, as a founding member of the presidium of the

International Agrarian Bureau The International Agrarian Bureau (IAB; , ), commonly known as the Green International (''Zelená Internacionála'', ''Internationale Verte''), was founded in 1921 by the agrarian parties of Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, Poland and Yugoslavia. The cre ...

, an institution of European agrarian parties. From 1921, Milan Hodža was a professor of modern history at

Comenius University Comenius University Bratislava () is the largest university in Slovakia, with most of its faculties located in Bratislava. It was founded in 1919, shortly after the creation of Czechoslovakia. It is named after Jan Amos Comenius, a 17th-century ...

Bratislava Bratislava (German: ''Pressburg'', Hungarian: ''Pozsony'') is the Capital city, capital and largest city of the Slovakia, Slovak Republic and the fourth largest of all List of cities and towns on the river Danube, cities on the river Danube. ...

. In the interwar period, he helped establish many Slovak newspapers and magazines and retained a strong political and ideological influence on them. His political papers were published in the book ''Články, reči, štúdie 1-6'' (1930–1934; Articles, Speeches, Studies). Hodža sat as a deputy in the Czechoslovak parliament from 1918 to 1938, serving in a number of posts. From 1918 to 1919 he was the Czechoslovak government's representative in Hungary, and also served as state secretary of the Ministry of Interior (1919), Minister for the Unification of Laws and the Organisation of Administration (1919–1920 and 1926–1929), Minister of Agriculture (1922–1926 and 1932–1935), Minister of Education (1926–1929), and

Minister of Foreign Affairs In many countries, the ministry of foreign affairs (abbreviated as MFA or MOFA) is the highest government department exclusively or primarily responsible for the state's foreign policy and foreign relations, relations, diplomacy, bilateralism, ...

(1935–1936), before eventually becoming the Prime Minister of Czechoslovakia from 1935 to 1938. In the 1920s, he was a Czechoslovakist (considering the Czechs and Slovaks to form one nation), which enabled him to reach high posts in Prague. Nevertheless, he had frequent conflicts with Czech politicians as a result of his attempts to take into account the specific needs of Slovakia within Czechoslovakia, which was unusual at that time. Moreover, he planned the creation of a block of anti-Centrist (i.e. anti-Prague) Slovak parties. His views changed somewhat later on; in 1938 he acknowledged the full sovereignty of the Slovaks as a separate nation and in the summer of that year, before Slovakia's autonomy was proclaimed in the autumn, he included in his government programme changes to the centralist structure of Czechoslovakia, using a combination of federal, autonomist and self-administrative ideas. In 1936–1937 he attempted to launch a project of bringing together Czechoslovakia, Austria, Romania, Hungary and Yugoslavia based on preferential duties - a step towards the unprecedented economic integration of the region. Instead, Hodža's government had to accept the

Munich Agreement The Munich Agreement was reached in Munich on 30 September 1938, by Nazi Germany, the United Kingdom, the French Third Republic, French Republic, and the Kingdom of Italy. The agreement provided for the Occupation of Czechoslovakia (1938–194 ...

in 1938 and he was forced to resign under pressure.

Exile and death

After the

in late 1938, he lived in exile in Switzerland, France (1939), Great Britain (1940) and after 1941 in the United States. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

, he was the co-author of a memorandum on the situation of Slovakia within Czechoslovakia (October 1939), in which he re-iterated his project of 1938. In November 1939, he established the 1939 Slovak National Council in Paris as the supreme body of Slovak resistance, serving as its chairman. The Slovak National Council merged with the Czech National Council to form the Czecho-Slovak National Council in January 1940. This organization (including its Czech members) competed with the

government-in-exile A government-in-exile (GiE) is a political group that claims to be the legitimate government of a sovereign state or semi-sovereign state, but is unable to exercise legal power and instead resides in a foreign country. Governments in exile usu ...

led by

Edvard Beneš Edvard Beneš (; 28 May 1884 – 3 September 1948) was a Czech politician and statesman who served as the president of Czechoslovakia from 1935 to 1938, and again from 1939 to 1948. During the first six years of his second stint, he led the Czec ...

(a strong Czechoslovakist) in London. The two exile groups were in permanent conflict. When Paris was conquered by the Germans, the British security forces took the members of the Czecho-Slovak National Council into custody, which was an accomplishment of spies working for the Beneš group. Hodža capitulated and he accepted a second-rate post in Beneš's State Council in November 1940. He did not participate in the activities of the State Council however, and left for the US in 1941, where he developed a project for a Central European Federation (published as the book ''Federation in Central Europe'', 1942). Although his plan received attention from American intellectuals and officials at the

United States Department of State The United States Department of State (DOS), or simply the State Department, is an United States federal executive departments, executive department of the U.S. federal government responsible for the country's foreign policy of the United State ...

, his plan did not materialize due to the beginning of the

Cold War The Cold War was a period of global Geopolitics, geopolitical rivalry between the United States (US) and the Soviet Union (USSR) and their respective allies, the capitalist Western Bloc and communist Eastern Bloc, which lasted from 1947 unt ...

. Hodža died in

Florida Florida ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Southeastern United States, Southeastern region of the United States. It borders the Gulf of Mexico to the west, Alabama to the northwest, Georgia (U.S. state), Georgia to the north, the Atlantic ...

, United States, on June 27 1944, at the age of sixty-six.
/ref> He held awards in high Czechoslovak, French, Italian, Romanian, Yugoslavian and Polish. On 27 June 2002, his remains were reburied in the National Cemetery in Martin, in his native Slovakia.

Family

His son was Fedor Hodža (a politician) and he was the nephew of politician and poet

Michal Miloslav Hodža Michal Miloslav Hodža (; 22 September 1811 – 26 March 1870) was a Slovak national revivalist, Lutheran pastor, poet, linguist, and representative of the Slovak national movement in 1840s as a member of "the trinity" Štúr-Hurban-Hodža. He ...

Works online

''Československý rozkol: príspevky k dejinám slovenčiny''
Turčiansky Svätý Martin: .n. 1920. 424 p. – available at ULB Digital Library.

References

External links

Biography at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Czech Republic
* a book about "divorce" of Slovaks from Hungarians in 1918, in Slovak, written by M. Hodža �
''Slovenský rozchod s Maďarmi roku 1918: dokumentárny výklad o jednaniach Dra Milana Hodžu ako čsl. plnomocníka s Károlyiho maďarskou vládou v listopade a prosinci 1918 o ústup maďarských vojsk zo Slovenska.(Odtisky zo "Slovenského Denníka".)''
Bratislava: Red. Slov. denníka, 1929. 206 p. – available online at UKB's Digital Library * a book about Milan Hodža as a Slovak journalist and Czechoslovak politician �
''Dr. Milan Hodža slovenský novinár a československý státnik, 1878-1928''
Bratislava: .n. 928 14 p. – available online at UKB's Digital Library * {{DEFAULTSORT:Hodza, Milan 1878 births 1944 deaths People from Martin District People from the Kingdom of Hungary Slovak Lutherans Slovak National Party (historical) politicians Republican Party of Farmers and Peasants politicians Prime ministers of Czechoslovakia Foreign ministers of Czechoslovakia Government ministers of Czechoslovakia Members of the House of Representatives of Hungary (1905–1906) Members of the House of Representatives of Hungary (1906–1910) Members of the Revolutionary National Assembly of Czechoslovakia Members of the Chamber of Deputies of Czechoslovakia (1920–1925) Members of the Chamber of Deputies of Czechoslovakia (1925–1929) Members of the Chamber of Deputies of Czechoslovakia (1929–1935) Members of the Chamber of Deputies of Czechoslovakia (1935–1939) Slovak expatriates in the United States Recipients of the Order of Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk Burials at National Cemetery in Martin Acting presidents of Czechoslovakia