One
of the joys of living in or near Washington, D.C., is the opportunity to
meet people from all nations of the world. Over the years, friends from
a wide variety of countries have helped me understand mankind’s universal
pursuit of personal liberty and national freedom. Everywhere and always,
man has sought to liberate himself from the yoke of spiritual, political,
and economic tyranny. Almost invariably in Western culture, this impetus
has been advanced by Freemasonry.
Only recently, for instance, a good friend of mine, knowing my lifelong dedication to Freemasonry, excitedly showed me a book she had discovered while visiting her homeland, Hungary. To her amazement, many of the great men who had labored to free her country from Austrian, Russian, and other political dominations had been Freemasons. The most prominent of these was Lajos (Louis) Kossuth (1802-1894). His life is an eloquent, dramatic testimony to Freemasonry and its influence for good on the world scene in the 19th century.
As early as 1837, Bro. Kossuth, then age 35, was imprisoned by the Austrian government on political charges. During his three years in prison, he taught himself English, and, upon his release, he became the editor of a prominent Hungarian daily newspaper, Pesti Hirlap. The publication became a forum for his liberal views and a major influence on the public, leading to significant constitutional changes as a result of the bloodless revolution in Hungary in March 1848. Kossuth was made minister of finance in the first Hungarian government which was responsible to an elected Parliament.
When the Habsburg “camarilla” repealed the new laws and sent an army to crush Hungary, Kossuth raised a defense force which defeated and expelled the invaders by May 1849. The Hungarian Parliament dethroned the Habsburg dynasty in 1849 and elected Kossuth Governor of the country. All that prompted the Russian Czar, the leading member of the “Unholy Alliance,” to dispatch 300,000 soldiers to help his imperial brother, Francis Joseph. That intervention settled the fate of an independent Hungary. On August 11, 1849, Kossuth fled first to Turkey, where he was under government supervision for a year, and then to England.
The fame of his cause circled the globe, and the United States pressed for his release, even sending the U.S.S. Mississippi to bring him to London. Greeted there as a hero of liberty, Kossuth campaigned for Hungarian freedom at every opportunity. His military bearing and oratorical ability won audiences to his cause, and in 1851, he journeyed to America, which he saw as the birthplace of modern liberty. Reflective of the popularity he enjoyed, Kossuth was greeted as “Freedom’s Angel” by the famous American writer Ralph Waldo Emerson who welcomed him to Concord, Massachusetts. Horace Greeley, the famed journalist, called Kossuth a leader “of the first rank,” and the poet John Greenleaf Whittier hailed him as “the noblest guest the Old World’s wrong has given to the New World of the West.”1 Little wonder that a monumental statue of Kossuth, according to its inscription, was “Erected by a Liberty Loving Race of Americans of Magyar Origin to Louis Kossuth, the Great Champion of Liberty” on Riverside Drive in New York City.2
Kossuth was the first foreigner after Lafayette to be invited to address both Houses of Congress in January 1851. Speaking everywhere to large audiences, Kossuth traveled throughout the United States and was naturally drawn to Freemasonry. In 1851, he wrote an extraordinary letter to Brother Ferdinand Bodmann, Worshipful Master of Lodge No. 133, Cincinnati, Ohio. He wrote:
To the Worshipful Master, Wardens and Brethren of Cincinnati Lodge No. 133 of Free and Accepted Masons. The petition of the subscriber respectfully showeth that having long entertained a favorable opinion of your ancient institutions, he is desirous of being admitted as member thereof if found worthy. Being an exile for liberty’s sake, he has now no fixed place of residence, is now staying in Cincinnati; his age is 49 ½ years, his occupation is to restore his native land, Hungary, to its national independence, and to achieve by community of action with other nations, civil and religious liberty in Europe.”3
The petition made the case of emergency, and the very next day, February 19, 1852, Kossuth, along with four members of his group (Col. Count Gregory Bethlen, Peter A. Nagy, Paul Hajnik, and Julius Utasy Strasser), were initiated, passed to Fellowcraft and then raised as Master Masons the following day. Today, Kossuth’s certificate of Masonic Lodge membership is preserved in the Hungarian National Archives.4
During his speaking tour of America, Bro. Kossuth made it a point, whenever possible, to speak to the Brethren of at least one of the Lodges in the city he was visiting. For instance, he spoke to Center City Lodge No. 23, Indianapolis, Indiana, and to St. John’s Lodge No. 1, Newark, New Jersey. Also, on May 10, 1852, he addressed the Grand Lodge of Massachusetts saying: “It will be the great aim and effort of my life to walk worthy of the character of a Mason and to fulfill the Masonic duties which devolve, according to his ability and rank, upon every member of our noble institution.”5
Such was Kossuth’s popularity in America and worldwide that in Mississippi a town was named after him as were two Lodges, now disbanded, in New York, one in Argentina, and four in Hungary before Freemasonry was prohibited in 1920 and, again, in 1950 by Soviet Communists. Today, however, Hungary is at last the free nation Bro. Kossuth envisioned, and there are eight Lodges, seven in the capital of Budapest and one in Szeged.6 There is also a Supreme Council, 33°, of the Scottish Rite for Hungary led by Ill. Peter Kozma, 33°.
Unfortunately, Bro. Kossuth passed away in exile long before this rebirth of Freemasonry and freedom in his homeland. After his year in America, he returned to England, traveled throughout Europe, especially Italy, and died in Turin in 1894. Bro. Louis Kossuth will always be honored in Hungary and among Freemasons everywhere, for he truly deserves the title of “the Washington of Hungary.”7
Similarly, Americans honor Louis Kossuth, and there is a bust of him in one of the doorways of the United States Capitol which was dedicated by Congress on March 15, 1990. It bears the inscription:
David
Kruger