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Democracy and Its Limits: Gender and Rights in the Czech Lands, 1918–1938

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  20 November 2018

Melissa Feinberg
Melissa Feinberg*
Affiliation:
History at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte, U.S.A.
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Extract

On 28 October 1918, a group of Czech nationalists stood on the steps of the Obecni Dům (Municipal House) in Prague and proclaimed their independence from the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy, allying themselves with the new state of Czechoslovakia. Their declaration marked the beginning of a new era in the Czech lands, one in which Czechs, as the majority nation, hoped to redefine the terms of political discourse. The new Czechoslovak Republic, its Czech supporters declared, would be the antithesis of the Habsburg regime. In the place of a multinational Monarchy, they would erect a democratic nation-state. The second half of this political vision was complicated by the fact that the new Czechoslovakia actually contained many ethnic groups, but Czechs still tended to imagine their new Republic as the political expression of the Czech nation. At the same time, this “Czech-centered” politics also emphasized the democratic basis of the new country. Czechoslovakia, Czech leaders said, would be a state governed by its people and dedicated to protecting their rights and freedoms as individuals. A political culture that rested on both ethnic nationalism and democratic values obviously contained some internal tensions: the need to protect the interests of one specific nation and the duty to protect the individual rights of all citizens could rub uncomfortably against each other. Yet, at that moment in 1918, most Czechs failed to register this potential for ideological conflict, instead seeing an essential link between democratic politics and the good of the Czech nation. For many Czechs, democracy itself was a need of the nation, a political structure crucial to Czech national self-realization. This idea came from one prominent conception of Czech nationhood that had captured the public imagination in the fall of 1918. According to this strain of Czech national ideology, the Czech nation had a sort of democratic character. This meant that only an egalitarian, democratic government would suit a “Czech” state. So, paradoxically, a universal language of rights and freedoms was the key to building a truly national Czechoslovak Republic. It was with a state that emphasized equality and personal freedom that the Czechs would fulfill their national destiny.

Type
Articles
Information
Nationalities Papers , Volume 30 , Issue 4 , December 2002 , pp. 553 - 570
Copyright
Copyright © 2002 Association for the Study of Nationalities 

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References

Notes

* Substantial portions of this essay appeared previously in “La politique de la personnel genre, nation et citoyenneté en Tchécoslovaquie, 1918–1945,” Clio: Histoire, Femmes et Sociétés, Vol. 12, 2000, pp. 107–129.Google Scholar

1. This of course makes the use of identifying terms difficult. After 1918, Czechs commonly subsumed their own nationalism under the Czechoslovak label, simply substituting “Czechoslovak” for what had been “Czech.” To try to avoid replicating their practice, I use the adjective “Czechoslovak” only to describe institutions, laws, etc. that apply to the state. In all other instances, I use only national (or “ethnic”) markers.Google Scholar

2. As one example, see Masaryk, Tomás̆, S̆tefanik, Milan, and Benes̆, Edvard, Washingtonská Declarace (Brno, Czechoslovakia: Mor. Legionár̆, 1925).Google Scholar

3. The ideas of Masaryk were very influential here. See, for example, his C̆eská Otázka, 2nd edn (Prague: Pokrok, 1908).Google Scholar

4. Republican France, however, did not follow suit until 1945. See Offen, Karen, European Feminisms 1700–1950 (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2000), pp. 277–310.Google Scholar

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13. “Z̆ena a politika,” Moravská Z̆ena, Vol. 1, No. 1, 1919, p. 5. This magazine later metamorphosed into Kr̆est'anská Z̆ena, the official publication of the Czech Federation of Catholic Women and Girls.Google Scholar

14. Loucká-C̆epová, M., “Vdaná z̆ena ve ver̆ejném povolání,” Zvĕstování, Vol. 1, No. 35, 1919, p. 2. Similar sentiments were voiced by Krista Nevs̆ímalová in “Z̆ena ve státĕ c̆eskoslovenském”, Z̆enský Obzor, Vol. 17, No. 3, 1919, pp. 66–67.Google Scholar

15. “Z̆enské hnutí,” Nas̆e Doba, Vol. 31, No. 8, 1924, pp. 495–500.Google Scholar

16. Stenograph from 110th meeting of the Constitutional Committee, Archiv Federálního Shromáz̆dĕní C̆SR, box 31.Google Scholar

17. Ibid.Google Scholar

18. Ibid.Google Scholar

19. Ibid.Google Scholar

20. The Czech lands and Slovakia had previously been administered under two separate legal systems. The Czechs used the Austrian civil code from 1811, while the Slovaks followed Hungarian laws, dating largely from 1894. On Czech and Slovak family law generally, see Mikulova, Marie, Z̆ena v právním r̆ádĕ c̆eskoslovenském (Prague: self-published, 1936).Google Scholar

21. For more on the WNC, see Bures̆ová, Jana, Promĕny spolec̆neského postavení c̆eských z̆en v první polovinĕ 20. století (Olomouc, Czech Republic: Universita Palackého, 2001). The WNC was a federation that claimed to represent Czechoslovak women and did indeed include some Slovak and German-speaking groups under its umbrella. However, the leadership was exclusively Czech and its policies were, I believe, “Czech” in their ideological orientation.Google Scholar

22. Mikulová, pp. 17–107. Austrian family law was not unique in its treatment of husbands and wives, but was similar to the civil law codes in force in most European states during the nineteenth century. On debates surrounding such family laws in other European contexts see Shanley, Mary, Feminism, Marriage and the Law in Victorian England, 1850–1895 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1989); Lesley Caldwell, Italian Family Matters: Women, Politics and Legal Reform (Basingstoke: Macmillan, 1991); and Wendy Goldman, Women, the State and Revolution: Soviet Family Policy and Social Life, 1917–1936 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993).Google Scholar

23. “Obc̆anský zákoník a jeho novelisace” (internal document of the WNC), Státní Ústr̆ední Archiv (hereafter SÚA), fond Z̆enská Národní Rada (hereafter Z̆NR), box 32.Google Scholar

24. Ibid.Google Scholar

25. This represented a constituency of bourgeois liberals, rural women, conservative nationalists and Catholics.Google Scholar

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27. The Federation of Catholic Women and Girls commanded a large membership that grew rapidly during the 1930s; it claimed 250,00 members in 1931 and 307,951 in 1936. See “Rozmach a Síla—Svazu katolických z̆en a dívek,” Kr̆est'anská z̆ena, Vol. 19, No. 17, 1937, pp. 1–5.Google Scholar

28. Wiererová, Bohumila, “O pravé a nepravé emancipaci,” Kr̆est'anská z̆ena, Vol. 19, No. 25, 1937, pp. 1–2.Google Scholar

29. This meant removing them from the working world, but did not include giving up political rights. Indeed, the Federation often exhorted its members to be politically active.Google Scholar

30. Law 455/1919 and Law 113/1926, Sbírka zákonů a nar̆izení státu c̆eskoslovenského.Google Scholar

31. For a complete discussion of these practices, see Feinberg, Melissa, The Rights Problem: Gender and Democracy in the Czech Lands, 1918–1945, Ph.D dissertation, University of Chicago, 2000, Chapter 3.Google Scholar

32. According to the 1930 census, there were 1,086 married female civil servants working in Bohemia, along with 3,634 married female teachers (also state employees). Numbers were certainly smaller in Moravia and Slovakia. Marie Jurnec̆ková, “Zamĕstnanost z̆en podle sc̆ítání lidu r 1930,” Z̆enské Noviny, 1 February 1934.Google Scholar

33. Articles decrying “double earners” appeared often throughout the 1930s in a great variety of venues, including daily papers such as Národní Politika, Vec̆er, Venkov, Lidové Listy or even Lidové Noviny; political journals, ranging from the socialist Sobota to the Agrarian Brázda; professional publications like Str̆edos̆kolský Úr̆edník; women's magazines like Z̆enský Svĕt and Kr̆est'anská Z̆ena; and even emerged as themes in novels and plays. On the extent of these attacks, see Kubic̆ková, M. R., “Propus̆tĕní vdaných zamĕstnankyn̆ (uc̆itelek) ve ver̆ejných sluz̆bách,” List r̆ís̆skéko svazu c̆sl. uc̆itelek, Vol. 11, No. 11, 1932, pp. 133–137; J. Kladivá, “Fales̆ná hesla,” Pr̆ítomnost, Vol. 13, No. 27, 1936, pp. 417–418; or Dr N-Z (Nosilová-Zlesáková), “Úsporná opatr̆ení a denní tisk,” Z̆enská Rada, Vol. 10, Nos 1–2, 1934, pp. 23–24.Google Scholar

34. V.G., , “Vedlĕjs̆í zamĕstnání,” Pr̆ítomnost, Vol. 9, No. 40, 1932, p. 626.Google Scholar

35. Printed as “Pracující manz̆elky,” Pr̆ítomnost, Vol. 9, No. 40, 1932, p. 656.Google Scholar

36. Ing. Josef Kremer, letter, 17 October 1932, Pr̆ítomnostyoX. 9, No. 42, 1932, p. 687.Google Scholar

37. Letter of Helena Neswedová, 18 October 1932, Pr̆ítomnost, Vol. 9, No. 42, 1932, p. 688.Google Scholar

38. All quotations in this paragraph are from letter of Malinská, I., Pr̆ítomnost, Vol. 9, No. 45, 1932, pp. 751–752.Google Scholar

39. Firing “double earners” was actually a popular practice in Europe during the 1930s. See, for example, Grazia, Victoria de, How Fascism Ruled Women, Italy 1922–1945 (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1992), pp. 193–200; Elizabeth Heinemann, What Difference Does a Husband Make? Women and Marital Status in Nazi and Postwar Germany (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1999), p. 42, or Miranda Pollard, Reign of Virtue: Mobilizing Gender in Vichy France (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1998), pp. 145–173.Google Scholar

40. Government resolution 379/1938, Sbírka zákonů a nar̆izení c̆eskoslovenského statu.Google Scholar

41. Letter from the Federation of Catholic Women and Girls to the Czechoslovak government, 8 November 1939. SÚA, fond Ministerstvo Sociální Péc̆e, box 217.Google Scholar

42. Anonymous letter to the Ministerial Council, dated 10 November 1938. SÚA, fond Presidium Ministerské Rady, box 3137.Google Scholar

43. Jesenská, Milena, “Vdané z̆eny z práce,” Nad nas̆e síly (Olomouc, Czech Republic: Votobia, 1997), p. 134.Google Scholar