The man was without doubt utterly tactless

The alleged persecution in Carniola of civil servants who supported the Constitution

Abstract

The author describes a case, which, regardless of its trivial nature, attracted much public attention as it caused heated Parliamentary debates and newspaper polemics. In spring of 1886, the national MP Tomaszczuk presented Winkler's decree in the Vienna Parliament, which, in his opinion, proved (in addition to a number of other accusations) that the government (and in particular the provincial president Winkler) were suppressing the Germans of Carniola. According to Tomaszczuk, the decree implemented »inquisitional« methods by forcing all civil servants who supported the Constitution to express their personal opinions on government policy, i.e. forcing them to reply in writing to very specific questions on the matter. The Slovenes refuted the accusations, arguing that that there were only three civil servants in question, who were never sacked, the intent of the entire investigation having been only to drop them a hint to curb themselves and not to proclaim their anti-government opinions publicly. At the same time, the Slovenes also exposed the mistakes of the former German-Liberal government, which had implemented punitive transfers of Slovene civil servants to the remotest parts of the Monarchy on no solid grounds.