ORGANIZATION AND INAUGURAL MEETINGS OF THE COMMITTEES OF CROATIAN REPUBLICAN PEASANT PARTY FROM 1945 TO 1947

Abstract

U radu se analizira organizacijska struktura i uloga osnivačkih skupština odbora HRSS-a u razdoblju od 1943., kada se stranka osniva, do prestanka sazivanja skupština i osnivanja njezinih odbora u drugoj polovici 40-tih godina. Dostupni arhivski dokumenti i tisak, posebno stranačko glasilo Slobodni dom, dopuštaju autorov zaključak da je riječ o stranci bez vlastita identiteta, autonomnosti i izgrađene stranačke strukture, što je bila posljedica potpune ovisnosti od njezina pokrovitelja Komunističke partije, koja je jedina i odlučivala o ulozi HRSS-a. Nakon njegove upotrebe i instrumentalizacije u izborima, posebno onih u 1945. i 1946. godini, HRSS se gasi.Croatian Republican Peasant Party (CRPP) was not accepted by Croatian peasantry, and its activity depended already on the Communist Party of Croatia (CPC), the main aim of which was to destroy Croatian Peasant Party (CPP). CRPP had no members, but its activity manifested through the work of its Executive Committee, publication of Slobodni dom and temporary activities of its lower committees. CRPP rejected the »treacherous« leadership and used the organizational form of CPP for constituting its committees, citing its traditional role and continuity of Radić\u27s policy. Finishing its role in the preelection campaigns in 1945 and 1946 in favour of CPP, which acted under support of the National Front, CRPP, rejected by its potential followers, but also despised by its founder, withered away. Preelection meetings of CRPP had only propaganda purposes, not organizational development of the Party. After 1947 the committees were not founded any more, no sessions convoked. A short revival of CRPP in 1950 only confirmed all its hopelessness and its dependence on Communist Party. The communists became strong enough and had no need of the services of that party, and the danger from revival of CPP was anyway dependent only on threat from the outside. With the development of a strong machinery of the government, the communist regime thought its use to be more efficacious than the tactics of political persuasions through CRPP could be. Finally, fear was present that the party, besides inconvenient reminding of the former multiparty parliamentary system, in an uncertain future could serve for the aims just opposite to those desired - reconstruction of CPP