People of the Revolution and the USSR

Hungary Liberalism and republicanism 1871–1944 ○ Heart attack

Last prime minister of the Hungarian People’s Republic, who resigned with his cabinet over the Vix note

A lawyer from a Calvinist family in Komárom County, he headed the international department of the Ministry of Justice until 1918 and was a founding member of the social-science review Huszadik Század. After the Aster Revolution he was justice minister in the Károlyi government from November 1918 and became prime minister in January 1919. When the French Lieutenant Colonel Fernand Vix handed him the Entente note on 20 March, he resigned with his cabinet rather than accept terms that violated the country’s territorial integrity, opening the way to the Soviet Republic. He then withdrew from politics, worked as a lawyer from 1920 and published studies in international, criminal and private law. He died of a heart attack in Budapest in 1944.

Hungary Liberalism and republicanism 1875–1955 ○ Natural causes

Liberal aristocrat who came to power in the Aster Revolution and was president of the First Hungarian Republic

Born into an extremely wealthy Catholic aristocratic family, he led the small anti-war faction in parliament that demanded an immediate peace during the First World War. The Aster Revolution of October 1918 made him prime minister; when the People’s Republic was proclaimed on 16 November he also became provisional head of state, and in January 1919 he was recognised as president. As an example for land reform he gave his family estates to his tenants. After his government fell over the Vix note in March 1919 the Soviet Republic was proclaimed, and in July he went into exile. He returned in 1946 and was ambassador to France from 1947 to 1949, resigning in protest at the Rajk trial, and died in Vence, France, in 1955.

Hungary Liberalism and republicanism 1875–1957 ○ Died

Social scientist who led the Radical Party and served as minister of nationalities in the Károlyi government

Born to a Jewish doctor’s family in Nagykároly, he saw the family change its name to Jászi and convert to Calvinism in 1881. In 1900 he co-founded the social-science review Huszadik Század (Twentieth Century) and became its leading editor for two decades, arguing for universal secret suffrage and land reform. In June 1914 he founded the National Civic Radical Party. After the Aster Revolution of October 1918 he became minister of nationalities in the Károlyi government and tried to keep the minorities within Hungary by offering them maximum autonomy, but failed and resigned in December. Unable to tolerate the Soviet Republic’s denial of freedom of thought and conscience, he emigrated on 1 May 1919. In 1925 he joined the faculty of Oberlin College in the United States as a history professor, wrote The Dissolution of the Habsburg Monarchy (1929) and died in Oberlin in 1957.