Founder of Polish National Democracy who chose accommodation with Russia over revolution; Piłsudski's rival
Born near Warsaw in 1864, he studied biology. He founded the National League in 1893 and the National Democratic party (Endecja) in 1897, leading a Polish nationalism that put the nation before class. During the Russo-Japanese War he went to Tokyo to keep Japan from backing Piłsudski's planned rising, and in the 1905 revolution he chose cooperation with the Russian authorities against the socialist parties. In the Second and Third Dumas he led the Polish caucus and named Germany as Poland's main enemy. In the First World War he headed the Polish National Committee in Paris, and he signed the Treaty of Versailles. Openly antisemitic, he organised boycotts of Jewish businesses.
Also known as: Roman Stanisław Dmowski · Roman Stanislaw Dmowski
Activities and affiliations
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1893–1928
National League (Liga Narodowa, Poland)Main
Political and party leadership -
1907–1909
Russian Empire state institutions
Legislature and state representation -
1923
Government and administration
Career Timeline
- 1893.04Co-founded the National League and became its first leader
- 1897Founded the National Democratic party (Endecja)
- 1904In Tokyo, worked against Piłsudski's plan for a rising
- 1907–1909Deputy to the Second and Third State Dumas, chair of the Polish caucus
- 1917.08–1919Head of the Polish National Committee in Paris
- 1919Polish delegate to the Paris Peace Conference, signatory of the Treaty of Versailles
- 1923.10.27–1923.12.14Minister of Foreign Affairs of Poland
- 1926Founded the Camp of Great Poland
Related historical events
1905: On the Other Side of the Revolution
When the Russo-Japanese War broke out, Piłsudski hoped to raise a Polish rising with Japanese help. In 1904 Dmowski went to Tokyo as well, to persuade the Japanese that a rising would fail and that they should not support it. When the revolution of 1905 swept the Kingdom of Poland he returned to Warsaw, chose cooperation with the Russian authorities, and opposed the Łódź rising in June. National Democratic papers demanded that "socialist anarchy" be crushed, and worker activists of the National League founded the National Workers' Union to contest the factories with the socialists. In Łódź National Democratic gunmen fought fighters of the Polish Socialist Party, and through 1906–1907 Polish workers killed one another in a "fratricidal war". The socialists suspected him of a secret understanding with the tsarist government against the PPS.
What he wanted was autonomy through legal politics, not a rising. While the socialist parties boycotted the First Duma elections, the National Democrats took the Kingdom of Poland's Duma representation, and in 1907 Dmowski was elected to the Second and then the Third Duma, where he led the Polish caucus. In Germany, Russia and the Polish Question (1908) he argued that Germany was Poland's main enemy and that Poland should win autonomy inside the Russian Empire to stand against it. It was the opposite of Piłsudski's road, which took Russia as the main enemy, and the rivalry of the two men became the two poles of Polish politics for the next thirty years.