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August 24th, 2005 issue

Historians will struggle one day to describe the current Constitutional Court's position on property restitution claims by aristocrats, predicts Tomás Nemecek in the Aug. 22 edition of Hospodárské noviny. Some will point to the court's January ruling against Kristina Colloredo-Mansfeld, whose family estate was first confiscated by the Nazis in 1942 and again by the Czechoslovak authorities in 1945. The Constitutional Court overturned the rulings of lower courts that found unjust the postwar confiscation of "German-owned" property from people the Nazis had regarded as enemies of the Reich. With its strict interpretation of the law, the Constitutional Court seemed to be bent on finally closing the door on any further restitution claims. However, the court's recent ruling in favor of the descendants of Hugo Salm-Reifferscheidt, a historically more controversial figure, would seem to disprove that view. The court upbraided the Interior Ministry for refusing Salm's claim to Czechoslovak citizenship in an effort to prevent any property restitution by his family and urged interpretation "in favor of the claimant, when in doubt." The Constitutional Court has never been a monolithic institution and two separate three-member panels decided the two cases. Incidentally, President Václav Klaus had appointed the judge who ruled on the first case, while his predecessor, Václav Havel, had appointed the judge ruling on the second case. It is still unclear which panel represents the Constitutional Court's overall majority opinion on this issue, concludes Nemecek.

The 37th anniversary of the 1968 invasion of Czechoslovakia was distinguished by the appearance of former Polish President Wojciech Jaruzelski on Czech Television, notes Jirí Hanák in the Aug. 22 edition of Právo. Jaruzelski, who was Polish defense minister at the time the Warsaw Pact armies came to put an end to the so-called Prague Spring, apologized for his role in the event. What was unexpected, however, was that he spontaneously also denounced the 1938 Polish takeover of the Cesky´ Tesín border area that took place just as Czechoslovakia was being strangled by Hitler. This now all-but-forgotten land grab demonstrates how the public's perception of some events has become skewed and as a result, other events aren't accorded the weight they actually carried. It was the 1938 annexation of Tesín that robbed Czechoslovakia of its last hopes of resisting Hitler militarily. And though the 1968 invasion was a tragedy that deserves to be commemorated, it is commemorated much more massively than the 1948 communist takeover. While 1968 brought harassment and humiliation, 1948 brought political executions and the elimination of the rural landowning class. The unspoken reason for the disparity in the way each date is commemorated is that while the 1968 invasion couldn't have been prevented, Czechoslovak democracy did have a chance in 1948 but failed, and communists were allowed to infiltrate its institutions. The year 1968 was merely a repeat performance — the opening night had taken place 20 years earlier, concludes Hanák.

— Compiled by Dan Macek


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