HUNGARY. 



403 



close of 1881, was composed as follows: Presi- 

 dent of the Ministry and Minister of the Interior, 

 Kolomon Tisza de Borosjeno ; Minister near the 

 King's person (ad latm), Baron Bela d'Orczy ; 

 Minister of Education and Worship, Augustus 

 de Trefort; Minister for the Defense of the 

 Country, Colonel B. Szende de Keresztes ; 

 Minister of Public Works, Paul d'Ordody ; Min- 



ister for Croatia and Slavonia, Gabriel Baron 

 de Pronay; Minister of Justice, Dr. Theodor 

 Pauler ; Minister of Finance, Count Szapary ; 

 Minister of Agriculture, Commerce, and In- 

 dustry, Baron Kemeny. 



The area and population of the countries f 

 the Hungarian crown are as follows, according 

 to the census of December 31, 1880 : 



In the budget for Croatia and Slavonia for 

 1881, the receipts and expenditures were esti- 

 mated at 3,603,464 florins. 



The public debt of Hungary, at the beginning 

 of 1880, amounted to 1,001,330,351 florins, ex- 

 clusive of the common debt of the empire. 

 Hungary also has a share in the liability for the 

 public debt of Austria proper, about 30 per 

 cent of its amount, previous to 1868, falling 

 upon her. This debt is regarded as exclusively 

 Austrian, but Hungary pays annually a fixed 

 sum for interest and for amortization. The so- 

 called common floating debt is guaranteed by 

 both parts of the empire, and Hungary's share 

 of this also amounts to 30 per cent. The as- 

 sets of the state were estimated, in 1879, at 

 1,114,900,000 florins. 



The Chamber in April adopted a bill pro- 

 viding for the levying of a statistical import 

 tax. The amount was small indeed, but the 

 measure still created considerable excitement 

 in Austria, where it was regarded as the pre- 

 cursor of a complete customs-barrier between 

 the two parts of the empire. The Austrian 

 Minister of Commerce, as well as Count Taaffe, 

 declared to a delegation of Austrian merchants 

 that they could see in it no infringement of 

 the customs and commercial union of the two 

 countries. 



The Diet passed, shortly before its adjourn- 

 ment in June, the bill regulating the commer- 

 cial relations with Germany. It was generally 

 regretted that nothing beyond a most favored- 

 nation clause had been secured. Count Ap- 

 ponyi demanded a thorough change in the cus- 

 toms policy, and even attacked the customs 

 union with Austria. M. Tisza, however, de- 

 clared in reply that the damage for Hungary 

 could not be estimated if two customs terri- 

 tories were to exist in the monarchy, and it 

 might even happen in such a case that the ex- 

 port of Hungarian products to Austria would 

 be entirely prevented. 



New elections for the Diet were held through- 

 out Hungary, from June 27th to July 4th, and 

 resulted in large gains for the Government 

 party, giving it a majority of over fifty in the 

 new Diet. The Diet was opened on September 

 28th by the King. In his speech he announced 



a convention with Servia, laws regulating the 

 relations of Fiume to Hungary, and called at- 

 tention to the gradually approaching equality 

 of receipts and expenditures. The debates on 

 the address led to a declaration of M. Tisza 

 that the authorities desired above all things 

 a friendly relation between the soldiers and 

 citizens, and that he would see to it that the 

 citizens were protected against excesses of the 

 military, as well as the military against the 

 citizens. 



The question of incorporating the Military 

 Frontier with Croatia was finally settled in Feb- 

 ruary, when the Hungarian and Croatian dep- 

 utations came to an agreement. Croatia had 

 demanded that it be granted an increase in the 

 number of deputies to the Hungarian Diet, cor- 

 responding to its increase of population. This 

 claim, which was strongly opposed by the Hun- 

 garians, the Croatians finally dropped, and con- 

 tented themselves with the six new deputies to 

 which they were entitled in accordance with 

 the increase of population in Croatia proper. 

 The incorporation was completed by a royal 

 decree of July 14th, which relieved the inhabit- 

 ants of the Military Frontier from their ardu- 

 ous duty of protecting the empire against the 

 invasion of the Turks, and placed them on the 

 same footing as the inhabitants of the other 

 parts of the empire. 



The city of Fiume, which had been for some 

 time a bone of contention between Hungary 

 and Croatia, was in July finally given to Hun- 

 gary. It had been assigned to Hungary by the 

 compromise of 1868, but the Croatians pro- 

 tested against this arrangement; in July, how- 

 ever, the Diet of Croatia, after a debate ex- 

 tending over two days, agreed to submit to 

 the compromise. 



The agitation against the Jews was also felt 

 in Hungary during the year. An anti-Semitic 

 meeting of students had been prohibited by 

 the police in Budapest in March, and the Gov- 

 ernment was interrogated by M. Istoczy, who 

 had on a previous occasion proposed to send 

 all the Jews to Palestine. M. Tisza, in reply, 

 stated that he would not interfere with free 

 speech as long as there was no danger of 

 breaches of the peace. Any meeting, however, 



