Silesian independence (Silesian: Samostanowjyńo Ślůnska; Polish: Niepodległość Śląska) is the political movement for Upper Silesia and Cieszyn Silesia to become a sovereign state.
Since the 9th century, Upper Silesia has been part of Greater Moravia, the Duchy of Bohemia, the Piast Kingdom of Poland, again of the Lands of the Bohemian Crown and the Holy Roman Empire, as well as of the Habsburg monarchy from 1526. In 1742 the greater part of Upper Silesia was annexed by the Kingdom of Prussia, and in 1871 it became part of the German Empire. After the First World War the region was divided between Poland (East Upper Silesia) and Germany (West Upper Silesia).
After the Second World War, West Upper Silesia also became Polish as the result of the Potsdam Conference.
From 1920 to 1939 the Silesian Voivodeship (Polish: Województwo Śląskie) was an autonomous province (voivodeship) of the Second Polish Republic with its own parliament. Autonomous powers were formally repealed by a law of 6 May 1945.
Organizations supporting the Silesian independence in 20th century was Silesian People's Party, Association of Defense of Upper Silesians, Union of Upper Silesians. According to some, the party supporting the independence of Upper Silesia is the Silesian Autonomy Movement (RAŚ), established in 1990. Fear of separatism, instead of officially declared autonomy, was flamed up by some publications in RAŚ's official magazine. Articles were published that openly called for a sovereign, independent Silesian state. Also politicians of Silesians Together does not exclude the support of the project of the independent Silesian state in the event that this project is supported by the majority of Silesians. From 2007 to 2010, the Silesian Separatist Movement listed "national and territorial separation of Silesia from Poland" and "the sanctioning of Silesian nationality" as its main goals.
History
Silesian nationality
There have been some debates on whether or not the Silesians (historically, Upper Silesians) constitute a distinct nation. In modern history, they have often been pressured to declare themselves to be German, Polish or Czech, and use the language of the nation which was in control of Silesia. Nevertheless, 847,000 people declared themselves to be of Silesian nationality in the 2011 Polish national census (including 376,000 who declared it to be their only nationality, 436,000 who declared to be their first nationality, 411,000 who declared to be their second one, and 431,000 who declared joint Silesian and Polish nationality), making them the largest minority group. About 126,000 people declared themselves as members of the German minority (58,000 declared it jointly with Polish nationality), making it the third largest minority group in the country (93% of Germans living in Poland are in the Polish part of Silesia). 12,231 people declared themselves to be of Silesian nationality in the Czech national census of 2011 (44,446 in Czechoslovakia in 1991), and 6,361 people declared joint Silesian and Moravian nationality in the Slovak national census.
The Silesian People's Party
The Silesian People's Party was founded in summer of 1908 by the principal of an elementary school, Józef Kożdoń, in Skoczów. On 7 February 1909, the party counted about 2,000 members in 30 local groupsAndrzej Szefer, Współpraca tzw. Ślązakowców z Niemcami, "Zaranie Śląskie", Katowice – Cieszyn 1963; Josef Koždon, Aus der jüngster Geschichte der Teschener Landes – Errinerungen und Erlebnisse, "Schlesisches Jahrbuch", Breslau 1940. in the counties of Bielsko, Cieszyn and Fryštát. Local groups in Frydek county formed later. Members and electors of the SPP came from Protestant circles among the citizens of Cieszyn Silesia, so the largest organizations within the party existed in Bielsko and Cieszyn, where large Protestant communities lived. The party's largest local groups, as of 1913, existed in Skoczów (214 members) and Cieszyn (210 members).
The goals of the SPP were not new – similar sentiments had been present in Cieszyn Silesia since the Revolutions of 1848E. Buława, Od wspólnoty etnicznej do ukształtowania się wspólnot narodowych (1840–1917), [in:] Śląsk Cieszyński. Środowisko naturalne. Zarys dziejów. Zarys kultury materialnej i duchowej pod red. W. Sosny, Cieszyn 2001, s. 185, . – but this was the first time that supporters of Silesian independence were organized into a distinct political party. Silesian nationalist positions were first advocated by the Union of Austrian Silesians, which was founded in 1848 by Silesian deputies of the Austrian Parliament: Franz Hein, Hans Kudlich and Johann Demel von Elswehr. Such sentiments were also voiced informally by community institutions, like the paper Nowy Czas (New Time), edited by preacher Theodor Haase. "The Szlonzakian movement had expanded in the nineties of the 19th century, collecting Slavic people who didn’t want to vote for Poles or Czechs and chose attachment to a separate Silesian nation".Ružena Vyhnalikova w A. Grobelny (red.), K otazkam dějin Slezska, Ostrava 1956. Silesian nationalism achieved successes mainly in the judicial districts of Skoczów, Strumień and Frydek.Józef Chlebowczyk, Nad Olzą. Śląsk Cieszyński w wiekach XVIII, XIX i XX, Katowice 1971.
In July 1910, the non-political cultural base of Silesian People's Party was formed: the Union of Silesians (Polish: Związek Ślązaków, German: Bund der Schlesier, Czech: Svaz Slezanů), founded by Kożdoń, Cichy, and Paul Wania, originally under the name Silesian People's Union "Our Homeland" (Polish: Śląski Związek Ludowy "Nasza Ojczyzna", German: Schlesischer Volksverband "Unsere Heimat"). From 1909 to 1923 the official paper of the Silesian People's Party was the weekly Ślązak (Silesian).
In 1911 there were local elections in Austria. The SPP won in 39 municipalities of the counties of Bielsko and Cieszyn: Jaworze and Jasienica in the judicial district of Bielsko; Bładnice Dolne, Cisownica, Goleszów, Godziszów, Górki Wielkie, Harbutowice, Hermanice, Kozakowice Górne, Kozakowice Dolne, Łączka, Międzyświeć, Nierodzim, Simoradz, Wieszczęta, Wilamowice and Ustroń (here with a coalition of Szlonzakians and Germans) in the judicial district of Skoczów; Bąków, Drogomyśl, Pruchna, Zaborze and Rudzica (here with a coalition of Szlonzakians and Poles) in the judicial district of Strumień; Bażanowice, Dzięgielów, Gumna, Konská, Leszna Górna, Komorní Lhotka, Nebory, Puńców, Svibice, Zamarski, Horní Žukov and Šumbark (here with a coalition of Szlonzakians and Poles) in the judicial district of Cieszyn; Lyžbice, Mosty u Jablunkova and Oldřichovice in the judicial district of Jablunkov.Piątkowski Kazimierz, Stosunki narodowościowe w Księstwie Cieszyńskim, Cieszyn 1918.
In 1911 there were also elections to the Austrian Parliament in Vienna. SPP candidates lost many socialist votes and were defeated by Polish and Czech candidates. Kożdoń did not even win in majority municipalities that his party had ruled in local elections. Eight municipalities around Bielsko, called a "German language island", which had voted for Kożdoń in the Silesian Parliament elections in 1909, constituted an exception within the rural Bielsko electoral district. Kożdoń won 26% of the votes in the Bielsko electoral district and 19% of the votes in the Cieszyn electoral district. Louis Schindler took 7.5% votes in the Frydek electoral district.
In the period when Cieszyn Silesia belonged to Austria-Hungary, the Silesian People's Party reached the largest popularity in the triangle between Cieszyn, Wisła and Strumień, centering on Skoczów, Jaworze, Ustroń and Goleszów. After World War I members of Silesian People's Party hoped to get Austrian Silesia a place as a free state in the federation of Austrian states. When this effort failed, they pushed for the independence of Cieszyn Silesia and probably a union with the formerly Prussian Upper Silesia. Upper Silesia's independence was advocated by the Upper Silesian Committee (which, beginning in January 1919, was called the Union of Upper Silesians).
Kożdoń, along with Richter and Fulda – the leaders of the Delegation of German Parties of East Silesia – wrote "Petition regarding an independent Republic of East Silesia – Cieszyn". During the Paris Peace Conference, this petition was presented by a member of the town council in Bielsko – Robert Piesch – to a member of the Austrian delegation in Paris. The International Commission in Cieszyn had received "Petition regarding the rights of Cieszyn Land’s people to self-determination",Schroeder Eduard August, Denkschrift zum Selbstbestimmungsrechte des Teschner Landes (mit Beilage Die Neutralitätserklärung des Herzogtums Teschen vom 5. März 1779. Denkschrift zur völkerrechtlichen und staatsrechtlichen Stellung des Teschener Landes) Teschen 1919 whose author, Silesian economist and theoretical lawyer Eduard August Schroeder,Spyra, Janusz, Uczony spod Beskidów, "Kalendarz Cieszyński" 1991. supported the independence of Cieszyn Silesia. This option was supported by three members of the International Commission: Dubois from the United States, Tissi from Italy and Coulson from the United Kingdom, but the fourth – Grenard, the representative of France – was opposed to even including independence as an option in the planned plebiscite. The plebiscite was supposed to decide whether Cieszyn Silesia would belong to Poland or Czechoslovakia. Soon the leader of the SPP gained close contacts with leading Czechoslovak politicians: president Tomáš Garrigue Masaryk, prime minister Karel Kramář, foreign affairs minister Edvard Beneš and future prime minister Vlastimil Tusar. They promised Kożdoń that if Silesia lay within the borders of Czechoslovakia it would have political autonomy. Even when the SPP officially supported Czechoslovakia, the party did not abandon the option of independence, which was still advocated by its allies, the Germans of Cieszyn Silesia. Kożdoń cooperated with the leader of the Upper Silesian independence advocates, Ewald Latacz, the chairman of the Union of Upper Silesians,Vogel Rudolf, Deutsche Presse und Propaganda des Abstimmungkampfes in Oberschlesien, Beuthen O.S. 1931. which had about half a million members.Andrea Schmidt-Rösler, Autonomie und Separatismusbestrebungen in Oberschlesien 1918–1922, „Zeitschrift für Ostmitteleuropa-Forschung" 1999, Heft 1
In this period the Szlonzakian movement had a broad base of support. The SPP had more than 10,000 members and the Union of Silesians had 52,000.Protest „Śląskiej Partyi Ludowej, „Ślązak" nr 31, 6.08.1920. At this time, the Plebiscite Committee of the Silesian People's Party was founded in Karwina, along with 139 communal plebiscite committees in the counties of Bielsko (50 committees), Cieszyn (61 committees) and Fryštát (28 committees).Andrzej Stępniak, Kwestia narodowa a społeczna na Śląsku Cieszyńskim pod koniec XIX i na początku XX wieku, Katowice 1986. In the winter of 1920 in Fryštat, František Janku and Paweł Bajtek founded the Silesian Social-Democratic Party, formed from Silesian workers, who were mainly former members of the Polish Socialist Party and the Silesian People's Party from Wisła, Ustroń and Goleszów. Karol Smyczek, Kożdoń's personal secretary, was important in the formation of this new party's local organizations. Taken together, the members and supporters of the Szlonzakian movement numbered about 100,000 in 1920.Arnulf Hein, Vor 55 Jahren starb der Schlonsakenführer Josef Koždoň, "Unser Oberschlesien" nr 23-24 von Dezember 2004.