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| The History of the Romanian National Party in the region of Banat 07/02/2011 |
| (2011-02-07) |
| Last updated: 2011-02-17 16:19 EET |
Romanians in the region of Banat in the 19th century threw themselves in the nationalist battle during the 1848-1849 revolution. However, the ideas that preceded the revolutionary events were created by European Romanticism, and were circulated by the Transylvanian School, the Romanian version of the national idea.
They took root early among Banat intellectuals. The most important Banat revolutionary leader in 1848 was legal scholar and philosopher Eftimie Murgu. After the 1848 revolution failed, Romanian political life had many ups and downs, and in the 1860s political parties formed, which was in line with the principles of census democracy and the reforms that the Austrian state was undertaking.
The following generation of Banat politicians took over the 1848 ideas and went further in securing rights for Romanians in the province. They founded in Timisoara the first Romanian political party in the Austro-Hungarian territories inhabited by Romanians. Figures such as lawyers Coriolan Brediceanu and Vincentiu Babes, journalist Sever Bocu, lawyer and banker Alexandru Mocioni defined the line to be taken by Romanian politics concentrated in Timisoara.
Typical of an ethnic party and especially typical of the period, nationalist ideas were what led to the formation of the National Party of Romanians in Banat and Hungary. The masses that the National Party was relying on was that of peasants, and one of the aims of the political struggle was election reform and the introduction of universal suffrage. Radu Paiusan, a lecturer at the Western University of Timisoara, told us about the circumstances under which the National Party formed:
“The ideas that led to the merger of the two parties in 1881, and we are now celebrating 130 years since that event, were, simply put, the Romanian struggle against national and social oppression. The party formed in Timisoara in 1869, headed by Alexandru Mocioni, was called the National Party of Romanians in Banat and Hungary. It was not all about the Romanians in Banat, but also those in what is now Hungary and from parts of Arad and Bihor that are no longer a part of Transylvania. Why do I stress that fact? In my research I have shown that, around the 19th century, Romanians were a massive population, from above the line of the Danube up to Budapest. Due to this fact, the Romanian National Party was not a local party, of Banat people, but a party for all Romanians in those areas”.
Radu Paiusan stressed the premises that generated the merger of the two branches of what was to be the Romanian National Party, the Banat branch and the Transylvania branch.
“Just one month after the party was formed, in Miercurea Sibiului came into being the Romanian National Party of Transylvania, headed by Ilie Macelariu. The fact that two political parties were formed is due to the political system in those days. The Banat had been incorporated forcibly into Hungary in 1860, and therefore was a part of Hungarian political life, and Transylvania, which had been annexed against its will also in 1860, chose as its doctrine autonomy from Hungary. The party formed in Transylvania adopted as its tactic political passivity, meaning a boycott of political life in Hungary, while the Banat party was active. This lasted until 1881, when they both realized that their only chance was to unite in a single party, the National Party of Romanians in Transylvania”.
This unification led to the creation of a unity of action, which Radu Paiusan also emphasized: “As proof of the fact that Banat people had a word to say when it came to this party is the fact that it was led by Vincentiu Babes, father of famous scientist Victor Babes, it was also led by Alexandru Mocioni, a lawyer, the true political leader of Romanians in the Banat and Transylvania. Mocioni supported financially for 10 years the “Albina” magazine in Vienna, then in Budapest. The Mocionis, an Aromanian family originally from Moscople, was one of the richest families in Austria-Hungary, owning over 10,000 hectares of land in Banat alone. The members of the family living in Banat continued their activism until 1887, when the last member of parliament, general Traian Dolea, an Austrian army reserve, turned down his elected office because he could not represent the 3.5 million Romanians in Transylvania, the Banat and Hungary. Romanians had their own parties until 1918, and after 1905, after they resumed political activism, they managed to send national deputies to the Parliament in Budapest”.
After 1900, the Romanian National Party adopted the strategy of left wing parties in reforming the state. Around 1918, at the end of World War I, people from Banat and Transylvania supported the union with Romania.
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