Page - 859 - in THE FIRST WORLD WAR - and the End of the Habsburg Monarchy, 1914 – 1918

The Turn of the Year, 1918 859 and counter-declarations, and in the dispute over the upholding of certain judgements made in military courts, forgets the real desperation among the people […].’2036 The lack of interest in parliamentary proceedings may have been true to a certain ex- tent, but there is certainly no doubt that the population was not particularly encouraged by what emerged from the sessions of the Austrian Reichsrat (Imperial Assembly). In the Reichsrat, in light of the victories in Italy, and above all following the re-conquering of Gorizia (Görz), something akin to obligatory jubilation had arisen, although then it was necessary to run through the order of business, and there was no time left for celebrating. There were equally few positive signals from the Hungarian Reichstag (Imperial Diet). The Reichsrat and Reichstag were increasingly becoming platforms for national agitation, which was also directed against the state overall. The prime ministers were unable to prevent this development through regular invocations, nor by developing visions of their own. On 25 September 1917, the autumn session of parliament had begun in Vienna. In his inaugural address, Prime Minister Baronet Ernst von Seidler had sketched out his programme of government. Economic, cultural and political reconstruction were named as goals. For the first time since the beginning of the war, the ‘Upper House’ was presented with a budget recommendation to be passed. Seidler had talked of the problems feeding the people, of youth criminal law, public welfare, teacher training, an improved agricultural policy, the demobilisation of the farmers, the nationalisation of the private railways and much more before, with clever tactics, he moved on to an area where not only the hardships of the war and their alleviation were reflected, but also where the impression inevitably arose that this organism, Austria, would still certainly be in a position to take on large projects, to shape the future and to present itself as a dynamic state. Seidler proposed an initiative to begin the ‘systematic, far-reaching or- ganisation of our water management’. The government wished to promote initiatives in order to remove ‘all technically feasible sources of power’ from the barrages … ‘The final goal remains that all of Austria will be spanned by a broad mains system in the same way that it is traversed by a railway network, which with manifold distribution will bring cheap light and cheap power to the largest and the smallest enterprises, to localities and peoples’ homes.’2037 At that time, Austria certainly needed visions, but least of all technical ones. By comparison, the political programme had less content : the continuation of dualism, the division of the crown lands into administrative dis- tricts and loyalty to the alliance were the main issues addressed. The former Prime Minister, Koerber, commented on the government programme that it made him think of someone who wanted to persuade ‘a Catholic and an evangelical cleric to reconcile their religious views by inviting them both to an opulent dinner’.2038 And for Josef Redlich, what most stood out was how hateful the mood among the German deputies