The Formation of the Hungarian Ethnicity in
the United States:
The Movement to Erect the Statue of Kossuth Lajos in
Cleveland
Akiyo YAMAMOTO
Copyright
(c) 1998 by
the Slavic Research Center( English
/ Japanese ) All rights reserved.
-Summary-
Migration studies have remarked that the formation of ethnic
identities of immigrants in their areas of settlement cannot be a
simple reproduction of their former, pre-migration identities, but
rather a dynamic process of acculturation in which such factors as
their mother country, host country, native region, and settled locale
each play definite roles. This essay tries to illuminate this process,
focusing on the discourse and symbols in a movement of "Hungarians" in
Cleveland at the turn of the century who were asking to erect a statue
of Kossuth Lajos.
Cleveland, in the State of Ohio, was one of the American cities
which attracted immigrants from Hungary, in particular from its
north-eastern region. The 1848 Revolution resulted in the influx of a
significant number of political refugees from Hungary. This was
followed by "petit-bourgeois" emigration for economic reasons (of those
who became craftsmen, storekeepers, and skilled laborers in the United
States), and in the 1880s a tidal wave of immigrants from Hungary
provided Cleveland with abundant labor power for its rapid
industrialization.
Immigrants from Hungary settled in different districts of Cleveland
according to the period of their immigration, their faith, language,
and social status in the motherland. Largely, the early petit-bourgeois
immigrants settled on the West side of the Cuyahoga River, whereas the
later massive settlement of immigrants sprawled within the East side,
from the central Hay Market district to the vigorously industrializing
Buckeye Road district. The "source" region of Hungarian immigrants
spread too, from Abauj-Torna prefecture, which was stimulated by the
early emigration from Bohemia and Galicia, to other territories of the
Kingdom of Hungary. Divided both geographically by the Cuyahoga and
socially by their varying former social statuses in the motherland, the
two groups of Hungarians hardly contacted each other until the issue of
the Kossuth statue was raised.
In the early period immigrants from Hungary relied on "information
channels" they had brought from their motherland, i.e., on their
relatives and other people from the same village. After the massive
immigration began, the newcomers organized themselves into societies
for mutual aid and cultural and confessional organizations, which were
distinct from the previous networks based on kin and parochial
relations. It was through these new organizations that numerous
immigrant groups from Hungary were integrated into a nascent single
ethnic group which professed itself "Hungarian." These cultural
organizations invented a "Hungarian culture," which began to replace
the authentic folk cultures transplanted from various regions of
Hungary.
A previous movement to erect the Kossuth statue in New York had
ended in failure. In contrast, the movement in Cleveland for the same
cause gained mass support not only from Hungarian immigrant
organizations in the city, but also from the Hungarian population in
the United States as a whole, and developed under close cooperation
with admirers of Kossuth in Hungary. It should not be ignored that the
political establishment of Cleveland cooperated with the movement too.
The movement was launched to commemorate two events surrounding
Kossuth: the fiftieth anniversary of his visit to the United States and
the one-hundredth anniversary of his birth. Actually, Kossuth visited
the United States in 1851-52 in search of financial and moral support
for the independence of Hungary. He was welcomed as a "champion of
freedom" by the American public, in particular by the "Young America"
faction in the Democratic Party.
In July, 1901 the erection of the Kossuth statue was proposed by
the Honved (National Guardsmen) Veteran Club. This club had been
established in the 1890s by the participants in the 1848 Hungarian
Revolution. Aiming at erecting the statue, various Hungarian immigrant
organizations were integrated for the first time into the United
Hungarian Societies which, before long, were transformed into the
Kossuth Statue Committee. This committee consisted of a major
commission, an advisory commission, and an executive commission through
which the Hungarian middle class, notables, and religious and cultural
leaders were mobilized respectively. Thus the nascent "Hungarian"
identity found its organizational expression.
A major Hungarian newspaper campaigned for "widow's mite" and thus
popularized the movement beyond the scope of the existing immigrant
organizations. Moreover, the movement aimed at bringing the immigrants
closer to their motherland. The statue was sculpted as a replica of a
statue in Nagyszalonta in Hungary (now Salonta in Romania). The Statue
Committee sent a circular to all the prefectural authorities in
Hungary, asking them to send a handful of soil from the battlefields
during the 1848 Revolution and other historical places. "Sacred soil"
and mythic national memories legitimized the emerging "Hungarian"
identity by accentuating the closeness of the two nations of freedom
fighters - Hungarians and Americans.
It was precisely at this point that Slovakian and Czech priests of
the Catholic Church and other leaders of Slavic immigrants in Cleveland
protested against erecting the Kossuth statue. In their opinion,
Kossuth was not a freedom fighter at all, but rather a "Magyar"
aristocrat and dictator who betrayed his own Slavic origin and
mercilessly executed many Slavic people who had requested the same
status as the Magyars enjoyed in the Habsburg Empire. Considering this
protest, Mayor Tom L. Johnson proposed to erect the statue not in the
Public Square (the center of the city) as had been planned, but in the
eastern part of the city which was, as mentioned above, a developing
industrial area at that time and not far from the settlement of
Hungarian newcomers (i.e., the Buckeye Road district). The city council
approved this proposal. Thus the Kossuth issue polarized the two groups
from Hungary - Hungarians and Slavs - who had settled in the same
districts of the city. It is noteworthy that both groups used "American
values" as their legitimizing cause.
The Kossuth statue was unveiled in September 28th, 1902. More than
eight thousand people participated in the parade from the Public Square
to Wade Park where the statue was to be erected. The parade exhibited
"Hungarian-style" dress and decorations which had never actually
existed in Hungary. In the parade, the Kossuth statue was covered by
the Stars and Stripes, and it was unveiled in Wade Park by old
ex-soldiers of the 1848 Hungarian Revolution. This symbolized that
Kossuth was not a mere freedom fighter and Hungarian patriot, but an
incarnation of American values. This metamorphosis was much needed by
the city's political leaders - both Hungarian and non-Hungarian - for
the political education of immigrants from Eastern Europe. Thus Kossuth
and glorious memories of Hungarian history were reinterpreted so that
the immigrant Hungarians could become Hungarian Americans or "good
Americans" and climb up the social ladder in America.
What did this movement for the Kossuth statue signify for party
politics in the city ? At the turn of the century in Cleveland the
majority of the immigrants from Eastern Europe voted for the Democrats.
Because of this support the reformist, Johnson, could be elected as
mayor in 1901. The Republicans, while their traditional supporters were
Anglo-Saxon protestants, tried to stretch their influence to the
immigrants. The Russian-Jewish Bernstein and his successor, the
German-Jewish Maschke were the Republican bosses in charge of this
strategy. Hungarian immigrants were the harbingers in this
ethno-machine politics, whereas Czech and Polish immigrants were
integrated in the city politics only in the 1910s, and Slovakians - no
earlier than the 1920s. Theodore Kundtz, who had immigrated from
Abauj-Torna prefecture in the early 1870s and become a factory owner in
the West side, was one of the bosses that bolstered Johnson's city
hall.
Although there was no Hungarian representative in the City Council
then, the movement for the Kossuth statue was closely connected with
the city leaders from the beginning. This was enabled by the bosses of
the Hungarian machine, such as Kundtz, Black, and Weizer. Moreover, the
movement for the Kossuth statue resulted in the cooperation of the
first and second generations of immigrant bosses. If the first
generation had been tempered by their biographies per se, the second
was more adept in mass mobilization due to their commitment to
religious and cultural activities. This cooperation of the generations
was a source of strength of the Cleveland Hungarians which
distinguished them not only from other immigrant groups from Eastern
Europe in the city, but also from Hungarians in New York who failed in
erecting the Kossuth statue.
As this essay illustrates, the Hungarian identity in the United
States was formed through multi-dimensional social relations: between
immigrants and their mother country; between various social groups of
immigrants; between authentic cultures and American values; between
Hungarians and other Slavs; between the urban political establishment
and the immigrants as voters; and between generations of immigrant
leaders.