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First Republic of Czechoslovakia

Czechoslovak Republic
Československá republika
1918–1938
Flag (since 1920) Coat of arms
Motto
Pravda vítězí / Pravda víťazí
"Truth prevails"
Anthem
The Czechoslovak Republic in 1938.
Capital Prague
Languages Czech, Slovaka
Government Parliamentary republic
President
 •  1918–1935 Tomáš Masaryk
 •  1935–1938 Edvard Beneš
Prime Minister
 •  1918–1919 Karel Kramář (first)
 •  1935–1938 Milan Hodža (last)
Legislature National Assembly
 •  Upper house Senate
 •  Lower house Chamber of Deputies
Historical era Interwar period
 •  Independence declared 28 October 1918
 •  Constitution adopted 29 February 1920
 •  Munich Agreement 30 September 1938
Area
 •  1938 140,800 km² (54,363 sq mi)
Population
 •  1938 est. 14,800,000 
     Density 105.1 /km²  (272.2 /sq mi)
Currency Czechoslovak koruna
Preceded by
Succeeded by
Austria-Hungary
Republic of German-Austria
German Empire
Second Czechoslovak Republic
Sudetenland
Kingdom of Hungary (1920–46)
Second Polish Republic
Today part of
a. German, Hungarian, Polish, Romani, Ruthenian, and Yiddish had regional status.

The first Czechoslovak Republic (Czech / Slovak: Československá republika) was the Czechoslovak state that existed from 1918 to 1938. The state was commonly called Czechoslovakia (Československo). It was composed of Bohemia, Moravia, Czech Silesia, Slovakia and Subcarpathian Ruthenia.

After 1933, Czechoslovakia remained the only functioning democracy in central and eastern Europe. Under pressure from its Sudeten German minority, supported by neighbouring Nazi Germany, Czechoslovakia was forced to cede its Sudetenland region to Germany on 1 October 1938 as part of the Munich Agreement. It also ceded southern parts of Slovakia and Subcarpathian Ruthenia to Hungary and the Zaolzie region in Silesia to Poland. This, in effect, ended the First Czechoslovak Republic. It was replaced by Second Czechoslovak Republic, which lasted less than half a year before Germany occupied the rest of Czechoslovakia.

The independence of Czechoslovakia was proclaimed on October 28, 1918, by the Czechoslovak National Council in Prague. Several ethnic groups and territories with different historical, political, and economic traditions had to be blended into a new state structure. The origin of the First Republic lies in Point 10 of Woodrow Wilson's Fourteen Points: "The peoples of Austria-Hungary, whose place among the nations we wish to see safeguarded and assured, should be accorded the freest opportunity to autonomous development."


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