INSTITUTE FOR THE STUDIES OF GALICIA

West Ukrainian National Republic proclaimed independence on 19th of October 1918 in the territories of Austrian provinces of East Galicia and Bukovina, the former Russian West Volhynia and the Hungarian (former Austro-Hungarian) province of Carpatho-Ruthenia. On the 1stof November 1918, Ukrainian military units stationed in Lviv took power over the capital city of Galicia, thus implementing the Declaration into reality. Ukrainian National Council extended  jurisdiction of the Republic over the ethnic Ukrainian territories of the former Austrian empire. 

Since October of 1918, Ukrainian and Polish political elites had been preparing grounds for transition of power. Ukrainians politicians acted in Lviv and Vienna while the Polish politics advanced in Warsaw and Craców. For the Poles Galicia was not under special consideration as a contesting region. They regarded it a-priori an integral part of the independent Polish state. The Ukrainian claims for its statehood and sovereignty for the time being were merely dismissed as unrealistic. During the preparatory period, the respective parliamentary representations championed national causes. Vienna still remained the center of influence, mostly for the Ukrainians, while the Polish politics shifted priorities to the Central (former under Russian) provinces. Polish parliamentary representation had been distancing form the imperial authorities in Vienna and aligned itself with the provisional Polish government in Craców. 

East Galician Ukrainian parliamentary representation and regional political elites, seemingly, remained on of a few loyal subjectivities of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. In the end of October 1918, Austro-Hungary was still formally a dual Empire ruled by the Emperor Karl I (Charles I). 

Ukrainian National Council was established in mid-October 1918. It largely comprised parliamentarians of the regional Diet in Lviv and of the Austrian State Council (parliament) in Vienna. Interim national councils had been established in October 1918 in almost all crown lands and provinces of the Monarchy. The Ukrainian Council seemingly was the last one that continued to coordinate a prospective Galician independence with the Austrian administration in Vienna and Lviv.  

If compared with Polish and Czech provisional governments the Ukrainian National Council in Lviv still acted in accord with the Central Government in Vienna. In inertia motion Ukrainian Parliamentary Representation in Vienna and Ukrainian National Council in Lviv continued to act in unison with imperial administration and synchronize the transfer of power. It should be noted that most of other recently established in the former imperial territories national councils and provisional governments were not inhibited by the coordination with Austrian government in Vienna. 

Ukrainian political elites perhaps unconsciously institutionalized veneration to the Monarchy and its institutions. They accepted the Imperial Manifesto as an implicit guidance for federalization of the Empire. Overall, Ukrainian politicians continued to correlate attainment of independence while not denying plausibility for the reformation of Monarchy. De-facto, the Imperial Manifesto, a long-awaited Document outlining plans for a broad federalization, was factually running against the ‘Historic Time.’ 

The Emperor Charles I (Karl)  and his Government attempted to reorganize the Monarchy into a confederated state. According to the Emperor Karl’s plan, federalization of the Empire was conceived as a provisional and interim stage, merely granting the time to ensure peaceful conditions for the establishment of independent nation-states in the Austro-Hungarian lands. According to the Austrian plan, a political transition should have been actualized and reified by the new political institutions composed of the former National Parliamentary Representations. In this regard, the Austrian Government was seeking international support in accordance with the Wilsonian Thirteen Points Plan. 

Fig. 1. Special edition of Wiener Zeitung: October Manifesto of Emperor Karl I (Charles I) outlining

the plan of federalization of Austrian Empire into nation-states. October 16, 1918. Published on October

17, 1918. Public domain. 

In October-November of 1918, parliamentary representations of the former Austrian crownlands and provinces had established themselves as National Councils, de facto provisional governments for the new political entities that soon should replace the Empire on European political map. The Manifesto was the Document of its Own Time and perhaps no longer a mere Austrian imperial narrative. The Emperor appealed to all his subjects:

Austria, following the will of its peoples should become a federated State, in which every

national entity is entitled to creating in its own ethnic territory a state of their own. 

Unification of those Polish regions that are presently located in the borders of Austria with

the independent Polish state is not by any means predetermined 

Until the state reconstruction (reorganization) in legislative order is complete, all the existing

laws and regulations remain unchanged and valid for the sake of common interests. 

I am appealing to all Peoples of Austria, on whose self-determination the new states will be

built, to work on this great cause under guidance of their National Councils. The latter are 

to be created out of the respective parliamentary representations (Reichsrat deputies) of 

every national entity.

These National Councils should be working in cooperation with my Government for the 

good of their Peoples.

Vienna, 16 October 1918

Karl I (Charles I)[1]

On October 19, 1918, Ukrainian National Council proclaimed independent Ukrainian State in the ethnic Ukrainian territories of Austria and Hungary. Although the Proclamation de-facto inferred only a declarative character, this Document provisioned implementation of the fundamental principles of self-determination. The future independent Ukrainian state should guarantee equal civil and political rights to all national minorities, in its territories. Ukrainian State confirms the rights of nation to the Jews.[2]

Fig. 2. Ukrainian Independent State has been declared in the ethnic Ukrainian territories of Austria and Hungary, Dilo, October 20, 1918, p. 1. 

Proclamation of the Ukrainian State in the Ethnic Ukrainian Territories 

of Austria and Hungary

Stemming from the  premise of self-determination of peoples, Ukrainian National 

Council as a constituent entity issues this Ruling, 

The entire ethnographic Ukrainian territory in Austro-Hungary, such as Eastern Galicia 

bordering by the River San, including Lemkovshchyna, the west-north of Bukovyna 

and the Ukrainian-inhabited territory of the south-east Hungary constitute singular 

Ukrainian territory. 

Hereby this Ukrainian national territory constitutes the Ukrainian State. It is so decreed 

to prepare by all means the implementation of the given Ruling.  

We are calling upon all national minorities in these territories, emphasizing that 

the Jews are recognized as a distinct national entity, to establish themselves as constituent 

entities and to delegate representatives to Ukrainian National Council in proportions 

corresponding to the populations’ numbers.[3] 

Two days earlier, before the independent Ukrainian State was proclaimed, Ukrainian daily Dilo published an editorial article “Jews and Germans.” It was a sort of a political manifesto, evincing Ukrainian politics in respect to national minorities in Eastern Galicia.

Ukrainian society, under the given circumstances, consider not only its own rights but it

also is aware of the corresponding obligations to the national minorities. We shall not 

follow the practice exercised earlier in our lands by the Poles and Hungarians. We shall 

not resemble their politics. Ukrainian state will implement full equality for Jewish, 

German and Polish national minorities. The declared principles shall become the

fundamental postulates of the Ukrainian national politics. The time when only Jewish-Polish 

assimilators could have some political rights and Jewish nationalists (Zionists – V.M.) 

were persecuted only for identifying themselves as Jews, not as Poles, by answering 

the census questionnaires. This Time has gone. Jews, Germans, as well as Poles, are 

entitled on equal with the Ukrainians civil and political rights within the borders of the 

Ukrainian state sovereignty. Correspondingly, all national minorities are expected 

to send their representatives to public offices of the Republic.[4] 

[1]Imperial October Manifesto of October 16, 1918, was published in special edition of Wiener Zeitung, October 17, 1918, No. 240. Collection of Austrian National Library. 

[2]Dilo, October 20, 1918, p. 1. 

[3]Dilo, October 20, 1918, 2, my translation   

[4] Dilo, October 17, 1918, No. 236, 1, my translation