Talk:Temporary capital of Lithuania

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Most of this article seems to be about Vilnius not Kaunas. It does not bring up any new information, just repeating the contents of History of Lithuania. Do we need this ? --Lysy (talk) 3 July 2005 11:43 (UTC)

It is an explaination of the term temporary capital (laikinoji sostinė), which is I think significant in Lithuanian history. Also there can be explainations of the juridical position of Kaunas at the time and such. Some edits might be needed however and article can be shortened. DeirYassin 4 July 2005 10:15 (UTC)

Certainly it's good to have this information, but the proper place for it would be in History of Kaunas, History of Vilnius and History of Lithuania articles. In English language "temporary capital" means nothing more but a capital that is temporary, nothing more. It can have more specific meaning in Lithuanian usage but not in English, therefore the title is not correct and misleading. How about moving this contents to the above articles ? --Lysy (talk) 4 July 2005 11:13 (UTC)

It had a juridical basis however and such and the usage of this is explained here. DeirYassin 8 July 2005 10:50 (UTC)

Yes, but not in English language, where its meaning is pretty generic. --Lysy (talk) 8 July 2005 22:03 (UTC)

Hmm well maybe you can vfd it then; that way it'd be possible to hear opinions of more people DeirYassin 9 July 2005 09:52 (UTC)

[edit] New additions

I removed a number of speculations (had no other choice.. unwillingly..). Also, the alleged requirement for speaking good Polish to be elected remark seems highly doubtful, as Lithuanian was one of the state languages of Central Lithuania and there were even Yiddish-speaking MPs there. Also, I doubt that among those 1-2% of Lithuanians there were any politicians who did not speak Polish. Halibutt 07:08, August 16, 2005 (UTC)

My source for Polish language requirement is "Lietuvos istorijos įvykių chronologija 1918-1926" by Aleksandras Vitkus. It states that "December 1st: Elections' regulations were declared, which said that the elections will be done in counties(?) of Švenčionys, Vilnius, Trakai, Ašmena; that is in territory of Central Lithuania (afterwards, in order to get more votes, the electoral territory was extended to include counties of Breslauja and Lyda, which weren't part of Central Lithuania). (...) January 8-9: Elections to the so-called seimas of Vilnius. In the electoral regulations there was a paragraph, which declared, that each Vilnian, werether he/she would live can come in the voting day to Vilnius and cast his/her vote. Passive electoral right (a right to be elected) was granted for people, who had at least 25 years, completed at least primary school education and speaks good Polish. In the time of elections Polish journalists, in order to inform foreign journalists about the going of elections, organised a press bureau. The elections of "seimas" were held in territory, which had 20211 square kilometers size and about 735089 people. Out of all inhabittants of this area, 385'000 were written into those eligible to vote (according to other source, 263'537), 249'325 voted (according to other source - 163'292) or 64,7% of those eligible to vote (other source - 63,9%)" (translation is also not very well due to my bad English). It wouldn't be anything strange a requirement for good Polish, because that was to be language spken during parliament sessions and such; at those times they did not have the translations capabilities which are for example in European Parliament these days. As for Lithuanian minority speaking Polish, I guess those more urban and such did, but I am not sure werether that'd qualify as good Polish (e.g. my grandfather has troubles understanding Poles on TV and such now, but he knows some Polish - just that it's Vilnius region dialect I guess).

Also, could you please say where is from the information that supposedly the peace treaty was signed in exchange for cooperation against Poland. I don't think it was the case, as Lithuanians wer ethemselves fighting bolsheviks up to the peace treaty, and were quite weary to accept help from them later (when they offered support in Vilnius conflict in 1923, Lithuania refused and such). DeirYassin 08:29, 16 August 2005 (UTC)