Page 66 - The Voyage of Hungarian Christian Democracy - Edited by Mária Rita Kiss

From the autumn of 1988 to that of 1989 , József Antall was seeking the possible
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combinations of a broad “national integration”. His endeavour was made easier by his close
ties to the FKgP’s historical wing and to the KDNP’s organizers, plus he was a member of the
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Áron Márton Society and the MDF alike. What is more, it was an actual possibility for some
time that Antall would lead the KDNP. In the spring of 1989, he not only attended KDNP
organizing committee sessions but in March he was requested by the body to be the party’s
leader. He responded to the request with a long (nearly four-page) letter dated May 6,
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outlining his political views in detail along with his concept relating to a future Christian
democratic party. Backing up his views, he reviewed the possible paths that the KDNP could
follow in the attachment to the letter, titled “Pro Memoria”. Thus with the accuracy so
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characteristic of him, Antall outlined the essential and worldview-related identity elements of
a Christian democratic party that he could undertake to lead. Christian democratic ideas
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fully fit his people’s party concept: “It is obvious that beside social democracy, [Christian
democracy] is the biggest trend”. However, Antall made it very clear in both documents that
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only German and Dutch model of Christian democracy is an acceptable form of worldview-
based politics for him. Contrary to these models, he firmly rejected the Belgian model and that
applied by the CSU, describing them as “narrow-minded” Christian democratic solutions. For
Antall’s political taste, even the KDNP’s predecessor, the party of Barankovics was not as
“firmly open interconfessionally” as the CDU – the party that he considered the benchmark.
Antall believed that the objective was not the creation of Catholic party with a few Protestants
and some non-faithful supporters, but rather to establish a genuine, integrating people’s party.

The Christian democratic party in Antall’s vision would not simply be the legal successor of
the Barankovics party, but a new political unit created from various sources. As the KDNP
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was strongly focusing on defining itself as a historical party at the time, the precondition set
by Antall was unacceptable for them, but Christian democratic leaders interpreted his reply as
a rejection anyway, as they considered the condition impossible to fulfil. Thus the concept
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of a people’s party to emerge on the KDNP’s basis was taken off the agenda relatively quickly.

subsequent memoir, he spoke about his endeavours upon the change of the political system as follows: “These three political forces must be brought together,
that’s what I believed was the way of alignment to the European party structure, and I obsessively held on to this view back then already... so there should be a
centre-left party and a centre-right party, too.” Judit Osskó: Antall József. Kései memoár. Publikálatlan írások. [József Antall. A Belated Memoir. Unpublished
Writings.] Corvina. 2013. p. 212. Hereinafter: Belated Memoir.
309 He was elected as MDF’s president in October 1989.
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Only fragmented information is available on the relations between the three parties. On behalf of the MDF’s leaders in a letter dated 5 April 1989, Zoltán
Bíró greeted the KDNP organizing committee, expressing his confidence that the “movement, after defining its identity” would strengthen the political unity
that existed between the two groups. Further, he proposed that the MDF executive board and the KDNP’s re-founders should set up a joint committee to
harmonize activities. Cf. Documents of Sándor Keresztes at the Hungarian National Archives. In his response letter dated 26 April 1989, on behalf of the KDNP’s
organizers, Sándor Keresztes expressed “solidarity” with the MDF’s activities but did not address Bíró’s specific proposal. Cf. Ibid. In a letter to his friends in
June, Zoltán K. Kovács mentioned that they received an informal offer from the MDF that they should join that party and get “limited autonomy” there, which
he did not consider timely. Cf. Zoltán K. Kovács’s letter to friends dated 12 June 1989. p. 4. MNL OL P2246 Heritage of Zoltán K. Kovács. Item 41 (Box 32)
Documents on activities in the KDNP.
311 Response letter from József Antall to the KDNP’s request. Documents of Sándor Keresztes at the Hungarian National Archives. Hereinafter: Antall’s response
letter.
312 József Antall: Pro memoria about Christian democratic alternatives in Hungary (page 5). 5 May 1989. Documents of Sándor Keresztes at the Hungarian
National Archives. (Under sorting.) Hereinafter: Pro memoria
313 In a subsequent memoir, he said the following about this: “When the Christian democratic People’s Party decided in the spring to transform into a party
from the Áron Márton Society, I was one of those whom they invited to the general secretary position. I attended a few of their sessions and outlined my
views, that I have a centre party in mind. If the small holders’ party becomes unsuitable for that, the Christian democratic [party] must be set up in a way that
holds these organizations together in one unit. … I scrutinized the Christian Democratic People’s party, too, seeing whether we can transform them into
something like that, but [having seen them] I developed doubts. I wrote down all this, so they have it in writing and I have it in writing. These are historical
documents describing my plans.” Belated memoir. op. cit. p. 210.
314 Pro memoria op. cit. p. 3.
315 Antall’s concept in relation to Christian democracy is also outlined in: The Prime Minister. op. cit. pp. 43-44. According to the author, the Christian
democrats took the reply as a rejection.
316 Antall “responded negatively” to KDNP’s March invitation – wrote Zoltán K. Kovács to his friends. Cf. The Prime Minister. op. cit. p. 44.

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