The state bordered with Austria to the north, Hungary to the east, and the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes to the west and south.

Slovene ethnic territory was once more extensive than today, extending from Friuli in northeast Italy to Lake Balaton in Hungary.

After the collapse of Austria-Hungary, together with secular leaders (but with diverging political views), the Catholic Prekmurje clerics sided with the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes.

Soon, the Truce of Belgrade in 1918 gave Mura and Raba Country to Hungary, but the Serbs had second thoughts and sought to extend their area of control northwards to create a Yugoslav-Czechoslovak border.

In Murska Sobota the socialist Vilmos Tkálecz, a former schoolmaster and soldier in the first World War, was involved in illegal trade, which the communist statutes forbade.

The Prekmurje Republic sought to expand its boundaries and received minute pieces of land: In Murska Sobota, the Republic received the territory of the districts of Murska Sobota, Lendava, Szentgotthárd, and some villages in the Őrség area, and already possessed the northern, central, and southwestern Mura march districts.

In addition, a five million crown indemnity was laid upon the people and a harsh Red Terror was continued by the occupying militia.

[citation needed] On August 1, 1919, the Hungarian Soviet Republic was overthrown by Romanian forces, and soon the Yugoslav Army marched into Prekmurje, ending communist rule there.