The Provincial Christian Socialist Party in Czechoslovakia led by Count János Esterházy in the period of 1933-1935
Abstract
Count János Esterházy, the new chairman of the Provincial Christian Socialist Party (OKSzP) elected to its leading position in December 1932, confirmed his commitment to the Party's main political line of opposition to the centralistic state administration and the unambiguous political support to territorial autonomy for Slovakia. He made it clear that the Hungarians in Czechoslovakia categorically refused any concession in this particular question.
Thus, the OKSzP under Esterházy's leadership continued to be committed to the negativist opposition policy of the Hungarian Christian Socialists as stabilized since the appearance of Géza Szüllő in its top position in 1925. Irrespective of the common political goal of the Hungarian Christian Socialists and the Slovakian autonomists and in spite of the ongoing talks with Hlinka's Slovakian People's Party (HSĽS) it proved impossible before the fourth Parliament elections in prewar Czechoslovakia to create a monolithic Slovak-Hungarian autonomist bloc.
Also the relation of the Hungarian minority's political representation to the Sudeten German parties remained rather lukewarm, taking only the form of unbinding consultation contacts without reaching the level of organized and coordinated binding political cooperation, in spite of the pressure of German government circles. The fourth Parliament elections in prewar Czechoslovakia only confirmed the already constant opposition and negativistic policy of the OKSzP, which obtained seven mandates in the country's National Assembly.
On the MP benches was now sitting also Party Chairman János Esterházy, who used the very first opportunity in the House to unambiguously reconfirm the constant opposition and autonomist political line of the Hungarian Christian Socialists.