Arhivski vjesnik, Vol. 65 No. 1, 2022.
Izvorni znanstveni članak
https://doi.org/10.36506/av.65.7
The minutes of the so-called conference of the Croatian Peasant Party's officials in Zagreb's Esplanade hotel in September 1945
Tomislav Jonjić
Sažetak
Until World War II made its way to the territory of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia, Croatian Peasant Party had been the central and most powerful Croatian political party. Since its leadership declined to proclaim a Croatian state under German protection in April 1941, and to certain extent because party political activity was prohibited in the newly established Independent State of Croatia, the party split into several parts. One part of the membership joined the new Croatian regime, but most party officials remained loyal to the pre-war leadership gathered around Dr Vladko Maček and some of his associates in the Yugoslav government in exile.
The military-political development in the following years brought furtherdisintegration in that part of the party which objectively legitimized the efforts for Yugoslavia’s renewal, so some Maček’s adherents openly declared for the resistance led by the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, while others searched for a modus vivendi with the communists, hoping to preserve at least basic elements of democratic order in the renewed Yugoslavia with a proclaimed federative organization, and with it, preserve the positions of their own party. Gradually realizing that they served as „useful fools“ to the communists in imposing and solidifying their rule, the supporters of that party current faced ever-growing pressure of the new regime after the war.
In order to set a new course for the party, and to reach a decision of participating in the forthcoming elections, several meetings of party officials had been held in the post-war months. The best known and most attended was the meeting held at the beginning of September 1945 in Esplanade Hotel in Zagreb. The paper reveals the majority of minutes from the conference which had been privately preserved and had so far been unknown. It is, so far, the only known non-communist written source on those events. The minutes themselves illustrate and document political deliberations and discrepancies of minister Ivan Šubašić and a part of party leaders under the circumstances of the newly founded Yugoslav communist dictatorship in the summer of 1945, and also contains numerous interesting information about post-war persecution, killings and the positions of supporters of the Croatian Peasant Party and Croats in general in the renewed Yugoslavia.
Ključne riječi
Croatian Peasant Party; Ivan Šubašić; the Esplanade Hotel conference; the Executive Committee of the Croatian (Republican) Peasant Party; Vladko Maček; elections for the Constitutional Assembly of the Democratic Federative Yugoslavia
Hrčak ID:
287247
URI
Datum izdavanja:
14.12.2022.
Posjeta: 603 *