Cultural-Struggle Character of Jutro in the 1920s – Critical Reflections

The cultural struggle (Kulturkampf) was one of the key elements of Slovenian politics in the modern era. In this respect, it represents an indispensable research challenge that can be observed in various stages of development, especially also in the period between the world wars and in the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats and Slovenes/ Yugoslavia. It was most tellingly expressed in the leading medium of the time – the political press, which was continuously used by both the Catholic and the liberal sides to justify and emphasise their ideological and political positions. Our paper presents, with critical reflections, the ideological-political character of the leading liberal political newspaper Jutro in the 1920s, when political life in the Yugoslav kingdom was conducted within the framework of classical representative democracy. The implacable determination of political Catholicism to completely ‘conquer the nation’ gave rise, on the liberal side, to an extreme preoccupation with so-called clericalism, the clergy and the Catholic Church, which are, in principle, unconditional enemies, and against which there can be only a permanent fighting attitude in all spheres of public and private life. Jutro has marked the liberal aspect of the cultural struggle so fiercely, persistently and consistently that it has fed on itself and lived out its ideological passion, founded in this way. This, for him, meant a fulfilled existential attitude, which was also a pattern that, on the liberal side, was blindly passed down from generation to generation and did not allow for any concessions. In the 1920s, Jutro was the most prominent herald of this continuity. It was a factor that shaped one of the most extreme ideological and political views of the Slovenes in the period between the two world wars, and these in turn influenced his painful experiences in the further course of history.