Lietuvos Taryba
The Lietuvos Taryba (short Taryba , German Lithuanian State Council , Polish Litewska Rada Państwowa ) was the first provisional legislative assembly Lithuania before the founding of the First Republic. It existed from September 1917 to May 1920.
prehistory
Lithuanian National Council
On March 13th, Jul. / March 26, 1917 greg. A few days after the Russian February Revolution in 1917 in what was then Petrograd , the first meeting for the constitution of the Lithuanian National Council took place at the same place . Delegates from all Lithuanian parties represented in the 4th Russian Duma , as well as the Democratic Association of National Freedom and the Lithuanian Catholic National Association , took part and passed a political resolution calling for Lithuanian autonomy . In addition, the National Council created a Provisional Committee for the Administration of Lithuania and in June even tried to found a Lithuanian Sejm or Lithuanian Seimas . But the effects of the October Revolution and the Russian Civil War prevented further action.
Activity of the Lietuvos Taryba
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Founding conference
The State Council was elected at the Vilnius Conference (lit. Vilniaus konferencija ). The Vilnius Conference was the first attempt by Lithuanian political forces to (re) regain the country's independence in the turmoil of the First World War . It had been allowed by the German occupation authorities, which had occupied Lithuania since the end of 1915, but with the restriction that its participants were not determined in free elections. Any painting of the founding of a state should be avoided. Accordingly, the 264 participants of the Vilnius Conference were invited by an organizing committee ( committee ), trying to take into account all social and political currents. Geographically, the participants covered the three former Russian provinces ( gubernija ) Vilna, Kaunas and Suwalki.
On September 18, 1917, 214 representatives of the people met in Vilnius for the week-long conference. They decided to strive for the independence of Lithuania within its ethnic borders, to guarantee the minorities ( Poles , Jews , Belarusians ) full minority rights in this area and to enter into "special" relationships with Germany (not precisely defined), provided that the German Reich Lithuania is an independent state would acknowledge. At the end of the conference, a 20-person executive committee was elected to put the idea of state independence into practice. This was the beginning of the State Council.
First session
The elected 20-member State Council met for the first time on September 24, 1917. It consisted of eight lawyers, four priests, three agronomists, two bankers and one doctor, one journalist and one engineer. It should cover the social classes and political currents as broadly as possible. At the protest of the Social Democrats about their lack of representation, two priests were replaced by two Social Democratic partisans in the course of 1917. The members elected Antanas Smetona as chairman of the body .
Striving for independence
The State Council first tried to obtain state recognition for Lithuania. The first point of contact here were the German authorities, who had approved the Vilnius Conference, but ignored their decisions as much as possible and subjected them to censorship. Germany's aim, if not to annex Lithuania, was to make it a puppet state with only limited independence. The following months were marked by unsuccessful negotiations in which the Germans tried to thwart any state independence and sowed discord over the future ties of Lithuania to Germany. After Lithuania was not invited to the peace negotiations in Brest-Litovsk and Woodrow Wilson presented his 14-point program for self-determination on January 8, 1918, the State Council's desire for a more radical approach increased.
Declaration of Independence
On February 16, 1918, the State Council unilaterally declared Lithuania's independence. This declaration was even printed in some German press products. On March 23, Kaiser Wilhelm II signed a manifesto in which he recognized Lithuania as a state de iure , but in a "firm and permanent union" with the German Empire, and did not mention the declaration of independence at all.
In the following months there were disagreements in the State Council about how to proceed. In June the monarchists prevailed, advocating a constitutional monarchy and wanting to proclaim a representative from an unbound German princely house as King of Lithuania for this purpose.
Kingdom of Lithuania and Mindaugas II.
The decision to establish a monarchy went against the original intention of having the form of government determined by a constituent assembly. Four members of the State Council resigned in protest; with the votes of the rest, Duke Wilhelm Karl von Urach was appointed King of Lithuania as Mindaugas II on July 11, 1918. However, Germany continued to make no move to recognize Lithuanian independence.
Mindaugas II never took office because after the weakening of Germany in the last months of the war, the State Council revised its decision. At the end of October, the new German Chancellor, Max von Baden , indicated that Germany would recognize Lithuania as soon as laws were passed.
Provisional Constitution and Government
On November 2, 1918, the State Council annulled the appointment of Mindauga II and declared itself the legislature and put a first provisional constitution ( see also the Lithuanian Constitution ) into force, which left the final form of government to the constitution , which was to be determined in free elections. In the following week, coinciding with the end of the First World War, a first government was formed and a three-member Presidium of the Council of State was declared head of state. First Prime Minister was Augustinas Voldemaras of the National Union , and Chairman of the Presidium Antanas Smetona. The new government was faced with great difficulties: the withdrawal of German troops, the inexistent administrative authorities and the lack of financial resources meant that the declared independence of the state to be founded was without any factual basis.
On December 16, 1918, the Communist partisans led by Vincas Mickevičius-Kapsukas set up a "Provisional Revolutionary Workers 'and Peasants' Government" in Vilnius. After the provisional government of the State Council fled the advancing Red Army on January 2, 1919 and moved to Kaunas , the Lithuanian communists under Mickevičius-Kapsukas were able to seize power in and around Vilnius, and in 1920 also the Polish government of Lucjan , which ruled Vilnius Żeligowskis arise. ( see also ↑ Lithuanian SSR and Litwa Środkowa , "Central Lithuania ").
Government in Kaunas
Further military conflicts delayed the convening of free elections. In the course of the spring of 1919 the weakness of the government of the State Council became apparent and it was decided to draw up a new provisional constitution, which should give the executive more power, accordingly the presidium was replaced by a single president .
On April 4, the State Council elected a Lithuanian president for the first time, Antanas Smetona . On April 12, the new government under Mykolas Sleževičius took office as Prime Minister , which functioned for six months and was able to stabilize the political situation.
The actual state formation took place under the government of Ernestas Galvanauskas . The independent Prime Minister was able to pass the electoral law in December 1919 and in February 1920 the first free elections to a constitution-giving assembly for the 14th and 15th April 1920. On May 15, 1920, the assembly reaffirmed the state's independence.
Based on the constitution adopted on August 1, 1922 , the first Seimas was elected on October 11 and 16, 1922 in Kaunas . This replaced the Council of State as parliament .
literature
- Joachim Tauber: «The burden of history». On the ideas of the Taryba about the future Lithuanian state 1917-1918 , in: Norbert Angermann et al. , Baltic provinces, Baltic states and the national. Münster 2005 ISBN 3-8258-9086-4 , pp. 389-402
Individual evidence
- ↑ Published in: Robert Paul and Alexander Kerensky : The Russian Provisional Government 1917 Documents Volume 1. Stanford University Press, Stanford, 1961. p. 406.
- ↑ Abba Strazhas: German Ostpolitik The case Upper East 1915-1917 , in publications of the Eastern Europe Institute Munich: Series History , Volume 61 and 62. Harassowit-Verlag. Wiesbaden, 1993. pp. 158ff. ISBN 3447-03293-6 .
- ^ Janusz Bugajski: Political Parties of Eastern Europe . The Center for Strategic and International Studies. Washington DC, 2002. p. 127. ISBN 978-15632-4676-0 .
- ↑ http://www.lituanus.org/1986/86_1_02.htm
- ↑ Janusz Bugajski: ibid .
- ↑ http://www.lituanus.org/1986/86_1_02.htm
- ↑ Thomas Schmidt: The foreign policy of the Baltic states: in the field of tension between East and West . West German publishing house. Wiesbaden, 2003. S33ff. ISBN 978-35311-3681-3 .
- ↑ Janusz Bugajski: ibid .