PRÁVNĚHISTORICKÉ STUDIE
PRÁVNĚHISTORICKÉ STUDIE

Právněhistorické studie / Legal History Studies (Charles University journal; below referred to as PHS or Journal) is a scientific journal listed in the international prestigious database SCOPUS. The journal is published by Charles University in Prague under the guarantee of the Department of Legal History of the Faculty of Law of Charles University. It is published by the Karolinum Press. The journal focuses on the field of legal history and related topics.

Issue 1 of the Journal was published by the Czechoslovak Academy of Sciences Publishing in June 1955. The Journal was initially published by the Cabinet of Legal History of the Czechoslovak Academy of Science (CSAV), later by the Institute of State and Law (CSAV) and then by the Institute of Legal History of the Faculty of Law of Charles University.

PHS is issued three times a year in April, August, and December and it presents original scientific works/papers as well as reviews, annotations and news from the scientific field of legal history. It also introduces annotated texts of a legal history nature. PHS accepts manuscripts from domestic as well as foreign authors. Manuscripts submitted by foreign authors are published in original language, namely in English, Slovak, German, French, Italian or Polish.

PHS (ISSN 0079-4929) is registered in the Czech national ISSN centre (supervised by the State Technical Library). The Journal is registered by the Ministry of Culture of the Czech Republic according to Act No. 46/2000 Sb., on Rights and Liabilities for the Publishing of Periodicals and Change of Some Acts (Press Act), and it is allocated with registration number of periodical press MK E 18813.

PHS is an open journal and ensures open access to scientific data (Open Access). The entire content is released as open to the public on the web pages of the journal.

The journal is archived in Portico.

PRÁVNĚHISTORICKÉ STUDIE, Vol 43 No 1 (2013), 138–165

Uhorsko a Maďarsko – totožnosť, kontinuita, diskontinuita

[Withdrawal and expulsion of citizens of Hungary from Czechoslovakia as an agreement on population exchange of 1946]

Jozef Beňa

published online: 25. 02. 2015

abstract

Czechoslovak citizens of Hungarian nationality, when obtaining the Hungarian Kingdom citizenship after the Vienna Award (November 2nd, 1938), have lost their Czechoslovak citizenship, based on the Czechoslovak Constitution of 1920 and ex lege by the constitutional Decree of the President of Republic no. 33/1945 Coll. The constitutional charter excluded dual nationality (bipolitism) and the constitutional decree considered the acquisition of Hungarian citizenship as acquisition of citizenship of occupying power. The acting of the former Czechoslovak citizens of Hungarian nationality constituted in the eyes of Czechoslovakia a continued and sustained anti-state behavior, aid, connivance and approval of crimes against inviolability of state borders, the integrity of national territory and sovereignty of Czechoslovakia. For this action the supporter and organizer was Horthy’s Hungary, which became an accomplice in the preparation and implementation of crime of conspiracy against the peace, when triggering war together with Nazi Germany. The original intention of ČSR to deport these people to their home country of acquired citizenship, in accordance with international law on aliens, was prevented by a misunderstanding of similarity of proceedings against Hungarian minority with the treatment of German minority, and further by the fact that Hungary, unlike Germany, has maintained its own state power and Western public opinion rejected such a solution by describing this process as the application of the principle of collective guilt on an ethnic basis. This has led to a procedure consisting of a number of steps: a) the deportation of those who came to the territory of Czechoslovakia along with the occupiers (anyások), b) exchange of population by adequate proportionality, c) transfer of the remaining citizens of the Hungarian state to Hungary. A loss of citizenship of the Czechoslovak Republic was based on individual acts of these persons by which they acquired the citizenship of the occupying power. The expulsions of foreigners were also based on individual responsibility. Particularity of this legal approach was that the design was based on the presumption of liability, not on the presumption of innocence. Nevertheless, persons were allowed to rebut the presumption of liability by proving loyalty to CSR and their antifascist integrity. Justice and legitimacy of this design stemmed from the suffering of victims of total war, waged by the Axis powers. Presumption of innocence is a principle of criminal procedure that applies under conditions of peace. USA indeed suggested that any person who has acquired citizenship of the occupying power should undergo an individual criminal judicial trial, be accused, tried, and penalized. Given the number of such people, this was unrealistic. The Czechoslovak request for expulsion and removal of all persons of ethnic minorities, which have become an instrument of intrigue and manipulation against the sovereignty of CSR, was analogous to the concept of responsibility and guilt originating with the German philosopher K. Jaspers. He distinguished criminal guilt, political guilt, moral and metaphysical guilt. If guilt is related to political events that were decided by war, the losers could be destroyed, deported, exterminated. The author identifies certain concepts of philosophy and law, subject to varying interpretations, namely: collective rights, collective guilt, deportation, general labour obligation and mobilization.

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Uhorsko a Maďarsko – totožnosť, kontinuita, diskontinuita is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

240 x 170 mm
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print price: 250 czk
ISSN: 0079-4929
E-ISSN: 2464-689X

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