expenses of education were distributed as follows: the communes built the schoolhouses, the political sub-districts (Bezirke) paid the teachers, the Crown territory gave a grant, and the State appointed the inspectors. Since the State supervised the schools without main- taining them, it was able to increase its demands without being hampered by financial considerations. It is remarkable that the difference between the State educational estimates in Austria and in Hungary was one of 9-3 millions in the former as opposed to 67-6 in the latter. The elementary schools in Hungary were a State con- cern and a means of Magyarization, whereas in Austria their direc- tion was left by the State to the nationalities. Thus in the former the schools were a means of denationalization, in the latter a means of national education. Under Austria, since everywhere that 40 scholars of one nationality were to be found within a radius of 5 km. a school had to be set up in which their language was used, national schools were assured even to linguistic minorities. It is true that this mostly happened at the expense of the German industrial com- munities, since the Slav labourers as immigrants acquired schools in their own language. The number of elementary schools increased from 19,016 in 1900 to 24,713 in 1913; the number of scholars from 3,490,000 in 1900 to 4,630,000 in 1913.
Illiteracy. In proportion to the raised standard of popular educa- tion, further aided by the number of popular educational establish- ments which were springing up, and the university extension move- ment formed on the English plan, the proportion of illiteracy rapidly decreased. In 1890 the percentage of illiterates in the total popula- tion had been 28-5; in 1900 it had fallen to 22-7, and in 1910 to 16-5. As regards the several nationalities: among the Czechoslovaks in 1910 the percentage was 2-4; a little higher among the Germans (3-1) in consequence of the difficulties of school attendance in the Alpine territories; among the Italians IO-O, and among the Slovenes 14-7- The percentages were much higher among the peoples situated on the E. (Poles 27-4, Magyars 36-4, Rumanians 60-4, Ruthenians 61-0, Serbo-Croatians 63-7). It is their influence which explains the high average for the whole state.
Universities. The higher educational establishments, which in the middle of the igth century had had a predominantly German character, underwent in Galicia a conversion into Polish national institutions, in Bohemia and Moravia a separation into German and Czech ones. Thus Germans, Czechs and Poles were provided for. But now the smaller nations also made their voices heard: the Ruthenians, Slovenes and Italians. The Ruthenians demanded at first, in view of the predominantly Ruthenian character of East Galicia, a national partition of the Polish university existing there. Since the Poles were at first unyielding, Ruthenian demonstrations and strikes of students arose, and the Ruthenians were no longer content with the reversion of a few separate professorial chairs, and with parallel courses of lectures. By a pact concluded on Jan. 28 1914 the Poles promised a Ruthenian university; but owing to the war the question lapsed. The Italians could hardly claim a uni- versity of their own on grounds of population (in 1910 they num- bered 783,000), but they claimed it all the more on grounds of their ancient culture. All parties were agreed that an Italian faculty of laws should be created ; the difficulty lay in the choice of the place. The Italians demanded Trieste; but the Government was afraid to let this Adriatic port become the centre of an irredenta; moreover the Southern Slavs of the city wished it kept free from an Italian educational establishment. Bienerth in 1910 brought about a com- promise; namely, that it should be founded at once, the situation to be provisionally in Vienna, and to be transferred within four years to Italian national territory. The German National Union (National- verband) agreed to extend temporary hospitality to the Italian university in Vienna, but the Southern Slav Hochschule Club demanded a guarantee that a later transfer to the coast provinces should not be contemplated, together with the simultaneous founda- tion of Slovene professorial chairs in Prague and Cracow, and preliminary steps towards the foundation of a Southern Slav uni- versity in Laibach. But in spite of the constant renewal of negotia- tions for a compromise it was impossible to arrive at any agree- ment, until the outbreak of war left all the projects for a Ruthenian university at Lemberg, a Slovene one in Laibach, and a second Czech one in Moravia, unrealized.
HISTORY
During the period from the assembly of the first Parliament elected by universal equal suffrage (1907) to the break-up of the Dual Monarchy, Austria itself had nine Governments under the following premiers:
Baron Beck June 2 1906 Nov. 4 1908
Baron Bienerth Nov. 1908 June 19 191 1
Baron Gautsch . . . June 26 1911 Oct. 281911
Count Stiirgkh . Ernst von Korber Count Clam-Martinitz Ritter von Seidler Baron Hussarek Heinrich Lammasch .
Nov. 3 1911 Oct. 21 1916 Oct. 28 1916 Dec. 20 1916 Dec. 20 1916 June 23 1917 June 23 1917 July 25 1918 July 25 1918 Oct. 27 1918 Oct. 27 1918 Oct. 31 1918
All these ministries may be characterized as Cabinets composed of Government officials. Not one of their heads was drawn from the Chamber of Deputies. The Government was no longer the expression of the majority of the House, but had to be a non- party Government standing outside the House. An objective and non-party application of the laws, and equal rights for all nationalities, were in consequence the ever-recurring heads of their programme. From time to time, naturally, these Govern- ments required a majority for the budget. They tried to arrive at it by negotiations with the parties, and by admitting to the Cabinet representatives of every nationality willing to cooperate. By this means the Cabinets acquired at least a measure of control over Parliament. A representative of Polish interests was generally to be found in every ministry, and usually too a minister of Czech and of German nationality. The political characteristics of these ministers are hardly distinguishable one from another; they all took their stand on a middle course of loyalty to the state and party impartiality. Beck, however, was held to be a shade more Slavophil, Bienerth Germanophil, Gautsch dynastic, Stiirgkh a Conservative Socialist; Korber and: Seidler were mere officials, Clam-Martinitz an old aristocrat, Hussarek and Lammasch Clericals. They regarded it as their principal task to bring about a compromise between the national- ities, and this again depended on .the outcome of the German- Czech negotiations which were always being started afresh. In this none of these Austrian ministers succeeded.
Beck 1 Ministry. With the carrying through of suffrage reform the Beck Ministry, which started in June 1906, had exhausted its strength. On June 17 1907 a promising speech from the throne opened the first universal suffrage Parliament and promised " to leave to the peoples as a secure heritage the integrity of their national territories"; "to solve the language question ... on a foundation of equality of rights"; "to organize education with an equal consideration for all races"; " to introduce insurance against old age and infirmity . . . social reforms with regard to female and night labour, and an extension of the participation of the State in the exploitation of the coal-mines." Beck's next success was in reaching an under- standing as to the language to be employed in Parliament. He also succeeded (July 12 1908) in bringing about an imposing procession in honour of the Emperor as an opening to the festiv- ities of his diamond jubilee (Dec. 1848-1908). But apart from this celebration the second period of the Beck Ministry was attended by unfortunate incidents. On April 12 1908 Count Potocki, the governor of Galicia, was shot by a Ruthenian student. Then there was the Wahrmund affair. The Clericals started an agitation because Wahrmund, the professor of canon law at the university of Innsbruck, subjected the dogma of the Immaculate Conception to critical examination. They demanded from the Liberal Minister of Education, Marchet, that dis- ciplinary measures should be used against him. The Minister endeavoured on the one hand to safeguard the principle of freedom of instruction, and on the other hand to avoid anything resembling a Kulturkampf. A general strike at the universities was averted by a compromise, by which Wahrmund was trans- ferred from the pious land of Tirol to Prague, which was more than he had desired. In July a Pan-Slavonic congress took place at Prague, accompanied by anti-German excesses which had a serious sequel in Laibach. The Germans thereupon paralyzed the Prague Diet by means of obstruction, upon which the Czech members of the Beck Cabinet left it, and the prime minister, seeing himself abandoned by both Germans and Czechs, resigned on Nov. 14 1908. Shortly before this Beck had intro- duced yet another bill dealing with industrial insurance, to supplement the already existing sickness and accident insurance. The bill only received the assent of Parliament just before the break-up of the monarchy.
1 Baron Max Vladimir Beck (b. 1854) entered the service of the State in 1876, in 1900 became head of a section in the Ministry of Agriculture, in 1906-8 Prime Minister; in 1907 he got universal parliamentary suffrage accepted ; he was responsible also for far- reaching measures of railway nationalization.
