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# The Diets

The political activity of the Habsburg government did not go much beyond seeking legislative approval for tax bills and promoting the Counter-Reformation. Vienna repeatedly urged the diet to conduct a judicial reform, then, in 1735, settled for a reorganization of the royal court of appeal. It also took some steps to modernize the structure and operations of government, by redefining the functions of the national high commission, establishing a central auditing office, and reviving the Treasury administration; but these measures were more cosmetic than fundamental. Vienna's only venture into social legislation consisted of some relevant clauses in the 1747 mining laws. Even in the case of the status of villeins, the initiative for reform came from the estates.

The diet was the estates' principal representative institution, but it had little useful experience to draw on. At the time when the principality was loosely subordinated to the Porte and essentially self-governing in domestic affairs, the prince had exercised virtually unlimited powers, which is not to say that he was an absolute monarch. The estates had become invigorated whenever there was {2-578.} a change of dynasty or princely election, but the new ruler would soon impose his will on them. Most significant legislative initiatives would come from the prince, who generally obtained the diet's approval. Given this legacy, it could hardly be expected that the Transylvanian estates would take bold initiatives after 1711, when they had to contend with the central government of one of Europe's great powers and represented a province that was strategically important for the empire.

There was no fundamental change in the structure of the diet. It remained unicameral. Apart from the Gubernium (the governor, councillors, and even secretaries), which took the place of the princely council, the ex officio members included judges of the royal bench, the principal local officials, and, under new provisions, the Uniate bishop, the canon of Gyulafehérvár, a representative of the Kolozsmonostor monastery, and, at the end of the period, the Jesuit rector from Kolozsvár. The diet also included between 55 and 110 regalists (royal appointees) and delegates from local government and the municipalities of the Hungarian and Saxon 'nations' (the so-called tax-paying localities). Thus the government could have readily outvoted its opponents in the diet if the majority principle had been applied, which was no more the case now than before 1690. If the government wanted to override the express wish of the estates, it could simply refuse to promulgate a law, or impose by decree any proposal that the estates had rejected. Only in cases of clear political necessity did it take into account the opinion of the estates.

In these circumstances, not much could be expected from the estates. Until 1750, the diet was convened at least once, and often twice a year, but its agenda consisted largely of routine matters: taxation, maintenance of the army, appointments to the posts under its jurisdiction, and lawsuits. Only seldom did it deal with other, more significant issues.

{2-579.} Although the estates developed an economic program only once, in 1725, even this was a noteworthy achievement, for the Habsburg government had no comprehensive economic policy. The program was devised, or, at least, drafted by the prothonotary Gergely Sándor. The impetus came from the fact that Transylvania was suffering from a shortage of money. Factors limiting the circulation of money included a low volume of foreign trade (Transylvania had little to export apart from cattle), the low price of agricultural products and high price of industrial goods, the transfer to Vienna of the revenues from crown estates, and the limited recirculation within the country of money raised by the war-tax. Sándor proposed to foster domestic industries and constrain spending on luxury goods by way of a protective tariff; he also revived an old demand of the feudal estates, for free domestic trade in salt. The remedy was naively mercantilist, but at least it had the semblance of a policy. Although the proposal had no immediate consequences, the estates revived, in 1735, the idea of a protective tariff, and elements of Sándor's plan reemerged in the approaches to economics taken by the estates in the 1750s and 1760s.

The estates were also responsible for the modest progress made until 1750 in the regulation of villeinage. The first law regulating the services of Transylvanian villeins was passed by the diet in early 1714. It provided that perpetual villeins serve four days, and the cotters, three days a week, leaving it up to the landowner whether they would perform this labour with or without their draught animals. A villein could not be compelled to do more; the cotters, on the other hand, could not provide less than the prescribed amount of labour. Although this burden may seem excessive, J. Berlász is correct in noting that it represented progress over the previously unlimited obligation to service. The law had to wait for promulgation until 1742. At that time, clauses were added stipulating that cotters could be required to pay caution money or otherwise guarantee that they would not move away, and requiring that {2-580.} the draught animals provided for cartage should not be overworked on long journeys. In the 1740s, the landed gentry grew apprehensive that the cotters' freedom to move (which may well have amounted to what the estates, in a petition dated July 1746, called vagandi licentia) and low service obligations would make bound villeins even more dissatisfied with their condition. In the remedial measure taken by the 1746 diet, the villeins' service obligation remained limited to four days a week, with the proviso that if urgency required more work during a certain week, this should subtracted in subsequent weeks, and that villeins who lived at some distance from the manorial fields could work off some of their obligation with several weeks of labour at one stretch. The obligations of cotters, on the other hand, were considerably increased: those who lived on a villein-plot would have to work for three, rather than two days a week; those who were previously bound to serve for one day saw their obligation doubled; and those who had a contractual or customary obligation to serve for two weeks, or a month, each year would now have to give one day's work per week. The 1746 diet tried to regulate the rate at which these peasants could work off their debts: a reaper or vine-dresser for one Hungarian forint, a mower for one and a half forints, three to four days' labour with plough and ox for four forints, and six to eight days' worth for six forints. It also proposed that interest on must (grape-juice) be paid at the rate of 50 percent. The central government felt impelled to moderate these demands. A royal decree, issued on 25 February 1747, set at two days' work per week (with or without draught animals) the socage of cotters whose outlying plots were the same size as that of villeins, and who had sufficient draught animals; and at one day per week the socage of those cotters who had neither proximate nor outlying plots. Moreover, contracts that provided for a lesser amount of work could not be altered. The decree also prohibited several common abuses by landowners. In the event, neither the regulations of 1742 nor those of 1747 were systematically implemented.

{2-581.} Otherwise, the estates expended their political energies in venting grievances, though only rarely did they do so with much force. In the compendium of complaints forwarded to the monarch by Bishop Mártonffy around 1719, the major points were issues of long standing; thus, taxes should not exceed the country's capacities; there should be free commerce in salt; qualified Transylvani-ans should be appointed to Treasury posts; the privileges of Transylvanian merchants should be preserved, and their foreign competitors restrained; Armenians, Bulgarians, and other foreigners should pay their share of taxes; and military barracks should be raised in some of the larger towns to lighten the obligation to quarter soldiers privately.

The next set of complaints, submitted in 1725, concentrated on military abuses. When prices were low, the military paid cash for produce, but when prices were high, they wanted to be supplied in kind. The charges against officers were that they grazed horses on the fields of some communities, or requisitioned the hay from such fields; doubled their demands for quarters and other services when they performed both military and civil functions; imposed an illegal tax on peasants who brought their produce to market; and perpetrated abuses when their troops requisitioned produce, or when their mounts were relayed. The estates also demanded that discharged soldiers who settled in Transylvania should come under the authority of local government, as was the case with German and Serb immigrants. The next petition, drawn up in 1735, was inspired by the notion of a protectionist tariff system.

The opposition mounted a major protest on the occasion of the 1741 diet. Its long list of grievances was similar to those of the 1710s, with some modifications and additions. The country should not be compelled to pay a surtax or other extraordinary subsidies to the central government; there should be free access to the salt deposits and freedom to market this commodity. With regard to public appointments, the queen should take into account the nominations {2-582.} forwarded by the estates and the Gubernium; the vacant posts in the chancellery should be filled; when the post of governor fell vacant, it should be filled by a Transylvanian, and not by the military commander or some other foreigner; the Treasury should be reestablished and staffed by native Transylvanians (on this point, Maria Theresa yielded to the extent of appointing a loyal aristocrat as treasurer); the powers of the national high commission, which had been reduced, should be restored in full; and those seeking the status of a Transylvanian should obtain the approval of the estates and pay a tax of 1,000 gold pieces. The estates had earlier protested at the acquisition by Armenians of a domain at Szamosújvár, and they wanted this group to come under the authority of the county, bear its share of taxes, and give up its exemption from quartering troops. Reacting to the rash of arrests that occurred back in 1738, the estates insisted that cases of high treason and disloyalty be prosecuted in a lawful manner, and that no one be arrested on the basis of simple suspicion or denunciation. The raising of such grievances had become customary for the estates, and, in this instance, their reward was a single, superficial concession.

The petition delivered by the estates in 1746 taught them a hard lesson. The diet had protested against several aspects of the new regulations governing the operations of the Treasury. It requested that the bancalis repraesentans not be allowed to impinge on the authority of the treasurer, and that this office be held by a Transylvanian. The diet also called for an end to abuses in regard to customs duties and salt; for the return of the Apafi estates to the rightful heirs, i.e. a branch of the Bethlen family; for the Gubernium to play a leading role in the filling of posts at the Treasury; and for the appointment of some Transylvanians to the Hofkammer.

In the event, the estates made themselves vulnerable to attack by a less substantial protest, one involving public health, which at this time essentially meant disease control at the borders and came {2-583.} under the jurisdiction of the military commander. Franz Kolowrat was chairman of the Hofcommission in Bannaticis, Transylvanicis, et Illyricis, which supervised Transylvania's government. Taking umbrage at the sharp wording of the protest (de nobis sine nobis), he advised Maria Theresa that this passage was disrespectful to her as well as to himself and the head of the Bergkolleg, Count Karl-Ferdinand Königsegg-Erps; the signatories, charged Kolowrat, were questioning the monarch's way of having matters debated at court. The court chancellery for Transylvania did not dare to challenge these two prominent figures of the central government, and the Ministerialkonferenz rebuked the diet's chairman, Ádám Bethlen, as well as Governor János Haller for having forwarded the petition. The Transylvanian opposition's pursuit of grievances was proving less and less productive, for the central government was intent in making the estates conduct themselves as humble subjects.

Some of the estates' initiatives in the diet testified to the survival of some elements of the absolutist features that marked the Transylvanian state in the 16th and 17th centuries — repeated, but fruitless demands for the regulation of prices, measures, and wages, and criticism of the wasteful practice of putting Treasury estates out on lease.