When Kossuth came to England in 1848, he was hailed as the champion of freedom and liberty, and entranced his audiences in London and other English cities by his remarkable oratory. As a matter of fact Kossuth, though called "the father of the Magyars," was himself a denationalised Slovak; instead of a "champion of liberty," he might with much greater justification have been called the champion of the greatest racial tyranny in Europe. For even then, while fighting for their own liberty and for the independence of Hungary, the Magyars denied the most elementary political and national rights to the other peoples living in Hungary. In 1910 there were 2,202,165 Slovaks in Hungary according to the official census. These two million Slovaks had only two deputies (Dr. Blaho and Juriga), while the 8,651,520 Magyars had 405 seats, so that every Slovak deputy represented one million electors, every Magyar deputy, however, 21,000. As regards administration, all civil service officials in Hungary have to be of Magyar nationality. The cases of persecution for political offences are innumerable: Slovak candidates were prevented from being elected by being imprisoned. Corruption and violence are the two main characteristics of all elections in "democratic" Hungary. Even to-day when some Radicals in Budapest talk of electoral reform, they want suffrage to be extended to Magyar electors only, and also stipulate that the candidates shall be of Magyar nationality. No Magyar politicians will ever abandon the programme of the territorial integrity of Hungary, their aims being expressed in the words of Koloman Tisza: "For the sake of the future of the Magyar State it is necessary for Hungary to become a state where only Magyar is spoken. To gain the Slovaks or to come to a compromise with them is out of the question. There is only one means which is effective--Extirpation!" And this aim the Magyars have faithfully kept before them for at least the last hundred years. In the same way also the economic development of the non-Magyar nationalities has been systematically hampered, because the Magyars know that economic dependence means also political subservience. The Slovaks and Rumanians are not allowed to found co-operative societies or banks on the ground that such institutions "are opposed to the interests of the elements which hold the Magyar State together." But it is not only the non-Magyars who suffer. The Magyar working classes and the majority of the Magyar country people themselves are deprived of political rights, for Hungary is ruled by an oligarchy and scarcely 5 per cent. of the population has the suffrage right.