They Were Divided - Miklos Banffy [110]
He had no doubt that the policy of forced votes would win the day. If Tisza managed to by-pass the Rules of the House and succeeded in getting the necessary legislation passed, he would be applauded by the majority and, though the opposition might rant and rave, that was all it would amount to. But afterwards? What would come later? All Balint could see was that Tisza would pile up such a mountain of hatred against himself that he would find himself permanently consigned to a political no-man’s-land. What a tragedy if his powerful presence were to be forever lost to Hungarian public life, especially if that loss came about because he had been sold down the line by his own followers, maybe even by this present government, or by its successor, as soon as it might seem expedient to return to the rule of law! Nothing would ever wash away that legacy of hatred, for not only would the opposition do all it could to keep it alive but the government’s own supporters would do the same if only to make sure that the most eligible candidate for the office of Minister-President was squeezed out of the race. No one else would suffer in the same way, but Tisza could find himself excluded for life from any high office. Could it be coincidence, Balint wondered, that this fate was reserved for the man Slawata had declared to be the most serious obstacle to the Belvedere’s adventurous plans?
But what other solution was there? At present effective government was impossible for, if the rule of law was to be respected, then this irresponsible handful of obstructionists could continue indefinitely to hold up implementation of everything the country so urgently needed. To break down this obstruction, the only course seemed to be to ignore those very rules which for centuries had guaranteed the freedom and integrity of the Hungarian Parliament. The pity was that it looked as if no one but Tisza would shoulder the responsibility for doing this and that he and he alone would afterwards be blamed. Was it not possible that some other courageous, hard-headed politician could be found? Someone not so important to the state, who would not be such a loss if he found himself cast out into the wilderness? That would at least be better; for the cynical truth is that the man who acts is blamed, not he who gave the order. The man on the platform gets the rotten eggs, the brains behind him are forgotten.
Balint thought he should speak to Tisza on the subject.
For a long time he wondered if he really should mix himself up in all this. Wouldn’t Tisza think he was just pushing himself forward? But what he had thought made him so anxious that it seemed more important to pass it on to Tisza himself. The next morning he asked when he could see him and was given an appointment that afternoon.
Balint talked at length. He told the ex-Minister-President that he agreed with the need for bringing an end to the present impasse and that to by-pass the Rules of the House was perhaps the only way. He told the older man of the hatred for him that was already being shouted out loud and which would become far worse if he put his plan into execution. Taking into account Tisza’s well-known puritan disregard of his own best interests, he said nothing about personal unpopularity and indeed emphasized what he honestly believed, that personal advantage must always give way to the nation’s best interests. But, and he said this roughly lest it might be taken as an ill-judged attempt at flattery, there was another aspect to this matter which was of over-riding importance. The question was not whether Tisza would suffer personally by being cast out of political life, but whether the country would suffer by losing him. He was, said Balint, the only man of sufficient stature and experience to stand up to the demagogues who surrounded him. Therefore a man so important