Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk

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(b. Hodonin, Moravia, 7 Mar. 1850; d. Castle Lany, 15 Sept. 1937) Czech; President of Czechoslovakia 1918 – 37 Masaryk was born on a Habsburg estate, the son of a coachman. His parents were Czechs who spoke German as their first language. He learned Czech and Slovak as second languages. He displayed intellectual promise at an early age and was educated at the universities of Brno, Vienna, and Leipzig, receiving a doctorate from Vienna in 1876. From 1879 to 1882 he taught philosophy there. In 1882 he became professor of philosophy at the newly founded Czech University in Prague. In his political writings he supported democracy and social reform; in philosophy he sought to combine the Western empirical tradition with Slavonic thought. From 1891 to 1893 Masaryk represented the Young Czech Party and from 1907 to 1914 was the head of the Czech Realist Party in the Austrian parliament. He sought a federal status for Bohemia and Moravia within the Habsburg Empire, but still regarded complete independence for the Czechs as impossible because of their proximity to Germany. Unlike the Czech Pan-Slavists he did not look to Russia as liberator and inspiration, but to the democratic traditions of Britain and France. In 1909 Masaryk became famous throughout Europe when he defended a group of Croat nationalist leaders in a treason trial at Agram (Zagreb) by proving that the Austrian Foreign Ministry had forged the evidence used against them.

In December 1914 Masaryk fled to London. In 1915 he became chairman of the Czech National Council, which he co-founded with Beneš. It campaigned for an independent Czechoslovak state. Masaryk convinced the British Cabinet that the Czechs and Slovaks should be united. While in London he was a lecturer in Slavonic history at King's College. At the end of 1916 he became editor of the monthly periodical The New Europe. In 1917 he visited Russia, where he organized the Czech Legion from prisoners of war. In the United States in 1918 he concluded the Pittsburg Agreement with the local Slovak leaders which provided for the union of Czechs and Slovaks in a new state. Masaryk had great influence on President Woodrow Wilson's views on the post-war settlement. In September 1918 the US government recognized him as the leader of an Allied country.

In November 1918 Czech independence was declared in Prague and Masaryk was elected President of the new republic. He was re-elected in 1927 and in 1934. Masaryk believed that the presidency should remain above party politics. His attempt to reconcile the national minorities with the new state failed in the cases of the Sudeten Germans and the Hungarians. Nonetheless his great achievement was the maintenance of Czechoslovakia as the only democracy in Eastern and Central Europe in the inter-war period. In foreign policy Masaryk was aware that Czechoslovak independence was dependent upon the backing of the great powers and he was therefore a firm supporter of the League of Nations. He was alarmed by the rise of German strength after Hitler came to power in 1933. In December 1935 he resigned as President, feeling that a younger man was needed to counter the Nazi threat. He was succeeded by Beneš.

The Czech philosopher Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk (1850-1937) was the founding father and first president of the former Czechoslovakia. A proponent of realism in both philosophy and politics, he first became known to the world through his championship of unpopular causes.

The age of Tomáš Masaryk was an age of liberalism and nationalism, ideologies which called for political freedom and national independence. Being a true son of his age, and a member of one of Austria-Hungary's unrepresented nationalities, Masaryk picked up this challenge and brought his ideas to their logical conclusion in the foundation of Czechoslovakia.

Education and Early Career

The son of a Slovak father and Germanized Czech mother, Masaryk was born on March 7, 1850, near Hodonin (Göding), Moravia, on the imperial estate where his father, a coachman, was employed. Given the low social position of his parents, his education got off to a rather rocky start, and for a while it seemed that he would become a blacksmith. But after studying at several local village schools and at Brno (Brünn), Masaryk completed his secondary education in Vienna in 1872, where he then entered the university. Receiving his doctorate in philosophy 4 years later, he spent a year at Leipzig (1876-1877), took a brief excursion to America to get married (1877-1878), and then returned to Vienna to become a lecturer at the university.

The Vienna and Leipzig years were of considerable influence on young Masaryk's mind. He had already developed a rebellious disposition and independent mind at Brno, but only in Vienna and Leipzig did these characteristics become part of his personality. (These character traits went well with his erect and vigorous physique, topped by a high-domed head that sculptors later liked to model). In Vienna he fell under Plato's influence (his thesis was entitled The Essence of Plato's Soul); and in Leipzig he embraced Protestantism, whose teachings appeared to him to be more in accord with the revered Hussite traditions, and his own quest for freedom, than the "authoritarian" thought of the Catholic Church. It was also in Leipzig that he had met his future wife and life companion, the American Charlotte Garrigue (1850-1923), who brought her own Huguenot-Unitarian traditions to bear upon Masaryk's mind.

After his return to Vienna, Masaryk supported himself and his growing family partly on his university lectures and partly on subsidies from his father-in-law. His first important work, Suicide as a Mass Phenomenon of Modern Civilization, appeared in 1881, and it was on the strength of this work that in the following year he received a professorship in the Czech University of Prague. His decision to accept this offer proved to be one of the most important milestones in Czech history. It was in Prague that his nascent national consciousness turned into a living force, and he became the most articulate and level-headed spokesman of his nation.

Philosopher and Politician

When making this important move, Masaryk was only 32 but already enjoying a reputation as a philosopher. His philosophy had been inspired chiefly by Plato, whose logic and language taught him to acquire the habit of accuracy necessary for the attainment of his selfdeclared goal of "search for truth" through "realism." For this same reason, and also "to overcome the Slavanarchy in myself," he became interested in such Western thinkers as the British empiricists John Locke and David Hume, whose philosophy he tried to emulate and live by, teaching others to do likewise. Simultaneously, however, he was also fascinated by the Slavic models of social and religious thought (particularly Russian mysticism) and produced his epoch-making The Spirit of Russia (1913).

During the 1880s, in addition to writing a number of works on philosophy, Masaryk involved himself in the affairs of the day, propagating his views in the Athenaeum and the Naše Doba (Our Epoch). It was in the former that he exposed the Königinhof (Karlovy Dvur) and Grünberg (Zelena Hora) manuscripts, forged 6 decades earlier to prove the alleged preeminence of medieval Czech literary culture over its German counterpart. With this exposure Masaryk earned the hate and abuse of his countrymen but also the respect of the whole scholarly world. This also holds true for his brave denunciation of anti-Semitism in the notorious ritual murder case of Leopold Hilsner (1899), whose trial revived the hoary medieval myth of Jewish ritual sacrifice. It is correct to say, therefore, that Masaryk achieved fame by his unpopularity.

Masaryk's unpopularity did not prevent him from lecturing his countrymen on the form in which life should present itself to the Czech mind. Thus, in a series of essays in the Naše Doba (published as The Czech Question in 1895), he advocated a return to the humanitarian ideals of the Czech Brethren. Simultaneously, he also dealt with the question of Marxism (The Philosophical and Sociological Foundation of Marxism, The Social Question, both 1898). Although he criticized historical materialism, he spoke up for progressive social reform.

Since Masaryk could not dissociate thought from action, he became active in politics and served in the Austrian Reichsrat (1891-1893, 1907-1914) as the representative of his own Realist (later, Progressive) party. Generally, he tried to dissociate himself from the squabbles of the Young and Old Czechs and advocated a human, liberal, and realistic approach to the solution of political questions. Meanwhile he retained his custom of championing unpopular causes, as attested to by the famed Zagreb treason (1908) and Friedjung (1909) trials, where he proved that the government's case against a number of South Slavs rested on forged documents. With this, his worldwide reputation was further enhanced.

Founding Father

Prior to 1914, Masaryk worked for reform within the Hapsburg Empire. The empire's involvement in World War I, however, altered his views diametrically, and he became an advocate of Czech independence. He left Austria in December 1914. Then, relying on his great European fame, and on the aid of such well-known Western critics of the empire as E. Denis, W. Steed, and R. W. Seton-Watson, he launched a campaign of propaganda to convince the Allies of the desirability of carving up Austria-Hungary. Making good use of the propaganda effects of the activities of the "Czechoslovak Legion" in Russia (1917-1918), and coming to terms with the leaders of the Slovak emigration (Pittsburgh Pact, May 30, 1918), he managed to get Allied support for his independence movement (May-June), largely on the basis of his ideas elaborated in his The New Europe (1918). On the strength of this support, on Oct. 14, 1918, he declared the independence of Czechoslovakia and a month later (Nov. 14) was elected the new state's first president. The Making of a State (1927) is Masaryk's own version of his struggle for the creation of Czechoslovakia.

Masaryk served as president for 17 years, and during this relatively long period he tried to implement his ideas on progress and democracy. Like many others, he was only partially successful. He retired at the age of 85 in December 1935 and died on Sept. 14, 1937, at Lány near Prague.

Further Reading

President Masaryk Tells His Story, recounted by Karel Čapek (trans. 1934), and Čapek's Masaryk on Thought and Life: Conversations with Karel Čapek (trans. 1938) are valuable sources. Although there is no definitive study of Masaryk, there are many popular biographies by British and American authors. The best of these is Paul Selver, Masaryk: A Biography (1940); the most recent, Edward W. P. Newman, Masaryk (1960). See also Donald A. Lowrie, Masaryk of Czechoslovakia (1930; new enlarged ed. 1937); Emil Ludwig, Defender of Democracy: Masaryk of Czechoslovakia (1936); Robert Joseph Kerner, Masaryk (1938); Victor Cohen, The Life and Times of Masaryk, the President-Liberator (1941); R. W. Seton-Watson, Masaryk in England (1943); and Robert Birley, Thomas Masaryk (1951).

There are no adequate works about Masaryk's philosophy and teachings; W. Preston Warren, Masaryk's Democracy: A Philosophy of Scientific and Moral Culture (1941), is the best available treatment. For general historical background C. A. Macartney's monumental The Habsburg Empire, 1790-1918 (1968) supersedes all previous works. One may also consult with profit Arthur J. May's two works, The Hapsburg Monarchy, 1867-1914 (1951) and The Passing of the Hapsburg Monarchy, 1914-1918 (2 vols., 1966), and A. J. P. Taylor, The Habsburg Monarchy (1941; new ed. 1948). Robert A. Kann, The Multinational Empire (2 vols., 1950), is still the best source covering the nationality problems of the empire.

Quotes:

"Dictators always look good until the last minutes."

Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk
Masaryk digitally removed from photograph by Josef Jindřich Šechtl, 1918
President of Czechoslovakia
In office 14 November 1918 – 14 December 1935
Succeeded by	Edvard Beneš
Born	7 March 1850(1850-03-07) Hodonín, Austria-Hungary
Died	14 September 1937 (aged 87) Lány, Czechoslovakia
Spouse(s)	Charlotte Garrigue
Profession	Philosopher

A monument in Prague

Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk (Czech pronunciation: [ˈtomaːʒ ˈɡarɪk ˈmasarɪk]), sometimes called Thomas Masaryk in English, (7 March 1850 – 14 September 1937) was an Austro-Hungarian and Czechoslovak statesman, sociologist and philosopher, who as the keenest advocate of Czechoslovak independence during World War I became the first President and founder of Czechoslovakia. He originally wished to reform the Habsburg monarchy into a democratic federal state, but during the First World War he began to favour the abolition of the monarchy and, with the help of The Allied Powers, won independence for his nation. Masaryk regarded democracy as both a political system and a humanistic world outlook.

Contents 1 Biography 2 Philosophy and religion 3 Order of Masaryk 4 Memorials 5 Bibliography 6 Family Tree 7 References 7.1 Notes 7.2 Literature 8 External links

Biography

Masaryk was born to a poor working-class family in the predominantly Catholic city of Hodonín, Moravia.^[1] His father Jozef Masaryk (Masárik), an illiterate carter (later steward), was a Slovak from the Hungarian part of Austria-Hungary (after 1918 became the eastern province of Slovakia in Czechoslovakia), his mother Teresie Masaryková (née Kropáčková) was a Moravian of Slavic origin but with German education (she wasn't able to speak Czech until the end of her life). They married on 15 August, 1849, Teresie Kropáčková being two and half months pregnant.

As a youth he worked as a blacksmith. He studied in Brno, Vienna (1872-1876 philosophy with Franz Brentano) and Leipzig (with Wilhelm Wundt). In 1882, he was appointed Professor of Philosophy in the Czech part of the University of Prague. The following year he founded Athenaeum, a magazine devoted to Czech culture and science.

He challenged the validity of the epic poems Rukopisy královedvorský a zelenohorský, supposedly dating from the early Middle Ages, and providing a false nationalistic basis of Czech chauvinism to which he was continuously opposed. Further enraging Czech sentiment, he fought against the old superstition of Jewish blood libel during the Hilsner Trial of 1899. The topic of his doctoral thesis was the phenomenon of suicide.

Masaryk served in the Reichsrat (Austrian Parliament) from 1891 to 1893 in the Young Czech Party and again from 1907 to 1914 in the Realist Party, but he did not campaign for the independence of Czechs and Slovaks from Austria-Hungary. When the First World War broke out, he had to flee the country, with a Serbian passport, to avoid arrest for treason, going to Geneva, to Italy, and then to England, where he started to agitate for Czechoslovak independence.

In 1915 he was one of the first members of staff of the newly formed School of Slavonic and East European Studies, which was initially a department of King's College London^[2], and is now a part of University College London, and where the Student Society and Junior Common Room are named after him.

He became Professor of Slav Research at King's College in London lecturing on "The problem of small nations".

During the war, Masaryk's intelligence network of Czech revolutionaries provided important and critical intelligence to the Allies. Masaryk's European network worked with an American counter-espionage network of nearly 80 members headed by E.V. Voska who, as Habsburg subjects, were presumed to be German supporters but were involved in spying on German and Austrian diplomats.

Among other things, the intelligence from these networks was critical in uncovering the Hindu-German Conspiracy in San Francisco.^{[3][4][4][5][6]}

In 1916, Masaryk went to France to convince the French government of the necessity of disintegrating Austria-Hungary. After the February Revolution in 1917 he proceeded to Russia to help organize Slavic resistance to the Austrians, so-called Czechoslovak Legions.

In 1918 he traveled to the United States, where he convinced President Woodrow Wilson of the rightness of his cause. Speaking on 26 October 1918 from the steps of Independence Hall in Philadelphia as head of the Mid-European Union, Masaryk called for the independence of the Czecho-slovaks and other oppressed peoples of Central Europe.

President Masaryk receives Dutch envoy Dr. Hendrik Muller in audience, 1924

With the fall of the Austro-Hungarian Empire in 1918, the Allies recognized Masaryk as head of the Provisional Czechoslovak government, and in 1920 he was elected the first President of Czechoslovakia.

He won re-election twice subsequently, and held office until 14 December 1935, when he resigned owing to bad health and Edvard Beneš succeeded him. Masaryk enjoyed almost legendary authority among the Czech and Slovak people, and he used this authority to create an extensive informal political network called Hrad.

Masaryk married Charlotte Garrigue, a Protestant American, from whom he took his middle name, who died near Prague in 1923 from an unspecified illness. His son, Jan Masaryk, served as Foreign Minister in the Czechoslovak government-in-exile (1940-1945) and in the governments of 1945 to 1948. Charlotte gave birth to four other children, Herbert, Alice, Anna and Olga.

President Masaryk 1933

Masaryk died from natural causes in 1937 at the age of 87, in Lány, Czechoslovakia, now the Czech Republic. His funeral is pictured in the artwork for the American band Faith No More's final LP, Album of the Year, to portray the end of a golden age. Dying when he did, Masaryk was spared witnessing the Munich Agreement and the Nazi occupation of his country.

Masaryk wrote several books, including The Problems of Small Nations in the European Crisis (1915). The writer Karel Čapek wrote a series of articles entitled 'Hovory s TGM'(=Conversations with TGM) which were later collected as a form of autobiography.

Philosophy and religion

Masaryk's life motto was: Nebát se a nekrást (Do not fear and do not steal). Masaryk as a philosopher was an outspoken rationalist and humanist. He emphasised practical ethics, reflecting the influence of Anglo-Saxon philosophers, French philosophy, and especially the work of 18th Century German philosopher, Johann Gottfried Herder, who is considered the founder of nationalism. He was critical of German idealistic philosophy and Marxism. Although born Catholic, he eventually became a non-practicing Protestant Unitarian, influenced in part by the declaration of Papal Infallibility in 1870 and his wife, Charlotte, who was raised Unitarian.

Order of Masaryk

The Order of Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk, a state decoration of the Czech Republic and in Czechoslovakia (established in 1990), is awarded to individuals who have made outstanding contributions to humanity, democracy and human rights.

This sentence shows to what extent T.G. Masaryk was recognized: "As long as Masaryk is alive, Hitler won't start war."

Memorials

Masaryk and Štefánik's monument in Košice, Slovakia

Avenida Presidente Masaryk ("President Masaryk Avenue"), Mexico City's equivalent of Fifth Avenue in New York City, takes its name from him, as do Masaryktown, Florida and kibbutz Kfar Masaryk in Israel (near Haifa). This kibbutz was founded largely by Czechoslovak immigrants. Also Tel Aviv has a Masaryk Square.(Masaryk had visited Tel Aviv in 1927). There is Masarykova street in Croatian capital Zagreb, as well in many other Croatian towns such as Dubrovnik, Varaždin and Split. Masarikova street in Belgrade, Serbia, although one of the smallest in the city, has the address of the tallest building in Belgrade, the Beograđanka palace. One of the streets in centre of Novi Sad, Serbia is named Masarikova street. One of the biggest street in capital of Slovenia - Ljubljana is also named upon Masaryk.

There is a statue of Masaryk in Washington, DC on Massachusetts Avenue as well as in Chicago on the Midway.

Bibliography

• Základové konkretné logiky ("The foundations of concrete logic") Prague, 1885 (German translation, Versuch einer concreten Logik, Vienna, 1887)
• Otázka sociální ("The social question") Prague, 1898 (German translation, Die philosophischen und sociologischen Grundlagen des Marxismus, Vienna, 1899)
• Russland und Europa Jena, Germany, 1913 (English translation by Eden and Cedar Paul, The Spirit of Russia, London, 1919)
• Světová revoluce ("The world revolution") Prague, 1925 (English translation edited by H. W. Steed, The Making of a State, London, 1927)
• Hovory s T. G. Masarykem ("Conversations with T. G. Masaryk") Prague, 1931–1935) by Karel Capek (English translations by M. and R. Weatherall, President Masaryk Tells His Story, London, 1934, and Masaryk on Thought and Life, London, 1938)^[7]

Family Tree

Tomáš Masaryk

Charlotte Garrigue

Alice

Herbert

Jan

Eleanor

Olga

Hana

References

Notes

1. ^ Then part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, now in the Czech Republic.
2. ^ UCL School of Slavonic & East European Studies Handbook for MA Students 2007
3. ^ Popplewell 1995, p. 237
4. ^ ^{a b} Masaryk 1970, p. 50,221,242
5. ^ Voska & Irwin 1940, p. 98,108,120,122,123
6. ^ Bose 1971, p. 233,233
7. ^ Donald E. Borchert, ed. (2006), "Masaryk, Tomáš Garrigue", Encyclopedia of Philosophy, 6 (Second ed.), Thomson-Gale, pp. 1, ISBN 0-02-866072-2 

Literature

• Bose, A.C (1971), Indian Revolutionaries Abroad,1905-1927, Patna:Bharati Bhawan., ISBN 8172111231.
• Masaryk, T (1970), Making of a State, Howard Fertig, ISBN 0685095754.
• Popplewell, Richard J (1995), Intelligence and Imperial Defence: British Intelligence and the Defence of the Indian Empire 1904-1924., Routledge, ISBN 071464580X, <http://www.routledge.com/shopping_cart/products/product_detail.asp?sku=&isbn=071464580X&parent_id=&pc=>.
• Voska, E.V & W Irwin (1940), Spy and Counterspy, New York. Doubleday, Doran & Co.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk

Wikisource has original text related to this article: Karl Popper: Prague lecture, 1994

• Who's Who: Tomas Masaryk
• Works by or about Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk in libraries (WorldCat catalog)

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