Table of Contents
Long before the issue of the War of Liberation had been finally
decided, diplomacy had been at work in an endeavour to settle
the future constitution of Germany. In this matter, as in others,
the weakness of the Prussian government played into the hands
of Austria. Metternich had been allowed to take the initiative
in negotiating with the princes of the Confederation of the Rhine,
and the price of their adhesion to the cause of the allies had been
the guarantee by Austria of their independent sovereignty. The
guarantee had been willingly given; for Metternich had no
desire to see the creation of a powerful unified German empire,
but aimed at the establishment of a loose confederation of weak
states over which Austria, by reason of her ancient imperial
prestige and her vast non-German power, would exercise a
dominant influence. This, then, was the view that prevailed,
and by the treaty of Chaumont (March 1, 1814) it was decided
that Germany should consist of a confederation of sovereign
states.
The new constitution of Germany, as embodied in the Final
Act of the congress of Vienna (June 9, 1815) was based on this
The German
confederation.
|
principle. It was the work of a special committee of
the congress, presided over by Metternich; and,
owing to the panic created by Napoleon's return from
Elba (March 5), it remained a mere sketch, the hasty
output of a few hurried sessions, of which the elaboration was
reserved for the future. In spite of the clamour of the mediatized
princes for the restoration of their “liberties,” no attempt was
made to reverse the essential changes in the territorial disposition
of Germany made during the revolutionary epoch. Of the
300 odd territorial sovereignties under the Holy Empire only
39 survived, and these were readjusted on the traditional
principles of “compensations,” “rectification of
frontiers” and
“balance of power.” The most fateful arrangements were
naturally those that affected the two leading powers, Austria
and Prussia. The latter had made strenuous efforts, supported
by Alexander I. of Russia, to obtain the annexation of the whole
of Saxony, a project which was defeated by the opposition of
Great Britain, Austria and France, an opposition which resulted
in the secret treaty of the 3rd of January 1815 for eventual
armed intervention. She received, however, the northern part
of Saxony, Swedish Pomerania, Posen and those territories —
formerly part of the kingdom of Westphalia — which constitute
her Rhine provinces. While Prussia was thus established on
the Rhine, Austria, by exchanging the Netherlands for Lombardo-Venetia
and abandoning her claims to the former Habsburg
possessions in Swabia, definitively resigned to Prussia the task
of defending the western frontier of Germany, while she
strengthened her power in the south-cast by recovering from
Bavaria, Salzburg, Vorarlberg and Tirol. Bavaria, in her turn,
received back the greater part of the Palatinate on the left bank
of the Rhine, with a strip of territory to connect it with the main
body of her dominions. For the rest the sovereigns of Württemberg
and Saxony retained the title of king bestowed upon them
by Napoleon, and this title was also given to the elector of
Hanover; the dukes of Weimar, Mecklenburg and Oldenburg
became grand dukes; and Lübeck, Bremen, Hamburg and
Frankfort were declared free cities.
As the central organ of this confederation (Bund) was established
the federal diet (Bundestag), consisting of delegates of
the several states. By the terms of the Final Act
this diet had very wide powers for the development
of the mutual relations of the governments in all
matters of common interest. It was empowered to
arrange the fundamental laws of the confederation; to fix the
organic institutions relating to its external, internal and military
arrangements; to regulate the trade relations between the
various federated states. Moreover, by the famous Article
13, which enacted that there were to be “assemblies of
estates” in all the countries of the Bund, the constitutional
liberties of the German people seemed to be placed under its
aegis. But the constitution of the diet from the first condemned
its debates to sterility. In the so-called narrower assembly
(Engere Versammlung), for the transaction of ordinary business,
Austria, Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, Hanover, Württemberg,
Baden, Hesse-Cassel, Hesse-Darmstadt, Holstein and Luxemburg
had one vote each; while the remaining twenty-eight states
were divided into six curiae, of which each had but a single
vote. In this assembly a vote of the majority decided. Questions
of more than usual importance were, however, to be settled in
the general assembly (Plenum) where a two-thirds majority
was necessary to carry a resolution. In this assembly the voting
power was somewhat differently distributed; but the attempt
to make it bear some proportion to the importance of the various
states worked out so badly that Austria had only four times
the voting power of the tiny principality of Liechtenstein.
Finally it was laid down by Article 7 that a unanimous vote
was necessary for changing “fundamental laws, organic institutions,
individual rights, or in matters of religion,” a formula
wide enough to embrace every question of importance with
which the diet might be called upon to deal. Austria, in virtue
of her tradition, received the perpetual presidency of the diet.
It was clear that in such a governing body neither Austria nor
Prussia would be content with her constitutional position, and
that the internal politics of Germany would resolve themselves
into a diplomatic duel for ascendancy between the two powers,
for which the diet would merely serve as a convenient arena.
In this duel the victory of Austria was soon declared. The
Prussian government believed that the effective government
of Germany could only be secured by a separate understanding
between the two great powers; and the indiscretion of the
Prussian plenipotentiary revealed to the diet a plan for what
meant practically the division of Germany into Prussian and
Austrian spheres of influence. This threw the lesser princes,
already alarmed at the growth of Prussian military power, into
the arms of Austria, which thus secured a permanent majority
in the diet. To avoid any possible modification of a situation
so satisfactory, Count Buol, the Austrian president of the diet,
was instructed to announce that the constitution as fixed by the
Final Act, and guaranteed by Europe, must be regarded as
final; that it might be interpreted, but not altered.
The conception of the diet as a sort of international board of
control, responsible in the last resort not to Germany but to
Europe, exactly suited Metternich's policy, in which the interests
of Germany were subordinate to the wider ambitions of the
Habsburg monarchy. It was, moreover, largely justified by
the constituent elements of the diet itself. Of the German
states represented in it even Prussia, by the acquisition of Posen,
had become a non-German power; the Habsburg monarchy
was predominantly non-German; Hanover was attached to
the crown of Great Britain, Holstein to that of Denmark, Luxemburg
to that of the Netherlands. The diet, then, properly
controlled, was capable of being converted into an effective
instrument for furthering the policy of “stability” which
Metternich sought to impose upon Europe. Its one effort to
make its authority effective as the guardian of the constitution,
in the matter of the repudiation of the Westphalian debt and of
the sale of the domains by the elector of Hesse, was crushed
by the indignant intervention of Austria. Henceforth its sole
effective function was to endorse and promulgate the decrees
of the government of Vienna.
In this respect the diet fairly reflected the place of Germany
in Europe. The constitution was the work of the powers,
The question
of constitutions.
|
which in all matters arising out of it constituted the
final court of appeal. The result was not wholly
one-sided. Until the congress of Troppau in 1820
“Jacobinism” was still enthroned in high places
in the person of Alexander I. of Russia, whose “divine mission,”
for the time, included a not wholly disinterested advocacy of the
due carrying out of Article 13 of the Final Act. It was not
to Russia's interest to see Austrian influence supreme in the
confederation. The lesser German princes, too, were quick to
grasp at any means to strengthen their position against the
dominant powers, and to this end they appealed to the Liberal
sentiment of their peoples. Not that this sentiment was very
deep or widespread. The mass of the people, as Metternich
rightly observed, wished for rest, not constitutions; but the
minority of thoughtful men — professors, students, officials,
many soldiers — resented the dashing of the hopes of German
unity aroused by the War of Liberation, and had drunk deep
of the revolutionary inspiration. This sentiment, since it could
not be turned to the uses of a united Germany, might be made
to serve the purposes of particularism. Prussia, in spite of the
promises of Frederick William in the hour of need, remained
without a central constitution; all the more reason why the
states of second rank should provide themselves with one.
Charles Augustus, the enlightened grand duke of Weimar, set
the example, from the best of motives. Bavaria, Baden,
Württemberg and others followed, from motives less disinterested.
Much depended on the success of these experiments.
To Metternich they were wholly unwelcome. In spite of the
ring-fence of censors, and custom-house officers, there was danger
Metternich and
the constitutions.
|
of the Liberal infection spreading to Austria, with
disintegrating results; and the pose of the tsar as
protector of German liberties was a perpetual menace.
The zeal and inexperience of German Liberals played
into his hands. The patriotism and Pan-Germanism of the
gymnastic societies (Turnvereine) and students' associations
(Burschenschaften) expressed themselves with more noise than
discretion; in the South-German parliaments the platitudes and
catchwords of the Revolution were echoed. Soon, in Baden, in
Württemberg, in Bavaria, the sovereigns and the chambers
were at odds, united only in a common opposition to the central
authority. To sovereigns whose nerves had been shattered by
the vicissitudes of the revolutionary epoch these symptoms
were in the highest degree alarming; and Metternich was at
The Wartburg
festival, 1818.
|
pains to exaggerate their significance. The “Wartburg
festival” of October 1818, which issued in nothing
worse than the solemn burning, in imitation of Dr
Martin Luther, of Kamptz's police law, a corporal's
cane and an uhlan's stays, was magnified into a rebellion; drew
down upon the grand duke of Weimar a collective protest of the
powers; and set in motion the whole machinery of reaction.
The murder of the dramatist Kotzebue, as an agent of this
reaction, in the following year, by a fanatical student named
Karl Sand, clinched the matter; it became obvious to the governments
that a policy of rigorous repression was necessary if a
fresh revolution were to be avoided. In October, after a preliminary
meeting between Metternich and Hardenberg, in the
course of which the latter signed a convention pledging Prussia
to Austria's system, a meeting of German ministers was held at
Carlsbad, the discussion of which issued in the famous Carlsbad
Decrees (October 17, 1819). These contained elaborate provisions
for supervising the universities and muzzling the press, laying
down that no constitution “inconsistent with the monarchical
principle” should be granted, and setting up a central commission
at Mainz to inquire into the machinations of the great
revolutionary secret society which existed only in the imagination
of the authorities. The Carlsbad Decrees, hurried through
the diet under Austrian pressure, excited considerable opposition
among the lesser sovereigns, who resented the claim of the diet
to interfere in the internal concerns of their states, and whose
protests at Frankfort had been expunged from the records.
The king of Württemberg, ever the champion of German
“particularism,” gave expression to his feelings by issuing a
new constitution to his kingdom, and appealed to his relative,
the emperor Alexander, who had not yet been won over by
Metternich to the policy of war à outrance against reform, and
took this occasion to issue a fresh manifesto of his Liberal creed.
At the conference of ministers which met at Vienna, on the 20th
of November, for the purpose of “developing and completing
the Federal Act of the congress of Vienna,” Metternich found
himself face to face with a more formidable opposition than at
Carlsbad. The “middle” states, headed by Württemberg,
had drawn together, to form the nucleus of an inner league of
“pure German States” against Austria and Prussia, and of
“Liberal particularism” against the encroachments of the diet.
With Russia and, to a certain extent, Great Britain sympathetic,
it was impossible to ignore their opposition. Moreover, Prussia
was hardly prepared to endorse a policy of greatly strengthening
the authority of the diet, which might have been fatal to the
Customs Union of which she was laying the foundation. Metternich
realized the situation, and yielded so gracefully that he gave
his temporary defeat the air of a victory. The result was that
the Vienna Final Act (May 15, 1820), which received the sanction
of the diet on the 8th of June, was not unsatisfactory to the
lesser states while doing nothing to lessen Austrian prestige.
This instrument merely defined more clearly the principles of
the Federal Act of 1815. So far from enlarging the powers of
the diet, it reaffirmed the doctrine of non-intervention; and,
above all, it renewed the clause forbidding any fundamental
modification of the constitution without a unanimous vote.
On the vexed question of the interpretation of Article 13
Metternich recognized the inexpediency of requiring the South
German states to revise their constitutions in a reactionary sense.
By Articles 56 and 57, however, it was laid down that constitutions
could only be altered by constitutional means; that the
complete authority of the state must remain united in its head;
and that the sovereign could be bound to co-operate with the
estates only in the exercise of particular rights. These provisions,
in fact, secured for Metternich all that was necessary for the
success of his policy: the maintenance of the status quo. So
long as the repressive machinery instituted by the Carlsbad
Decrees worked smoothly, Germany was not likely to be troubled
by revolutions.
The period that followed was one, outwardly at least, of
political stagnation. The Mainz Commission, though hampered
by the jealousy of the governments (the king of Prussia refused
to allow his subjects to be haled before it), was none the less
effective enough in preventing all free expression of opinion;
while at the universities the official “curators” kept Liberal
enthusiasts in order. The exuberance of the epoch of Liberation
gave place to a dull lethargy in things political, relieved only by
the Philhellenism which gave voice to the aspirationsof Germany
under the disguise of enthusiasm for Greece. Even the July
revolution of 1830 in Paris reacted but partially and spasmodically
on Germany. In Hanover, Brunswick, Saxony and
Hesse-Cassel popular movements led to the granting
of constitutions, and in the states already constitutional
Liberal concessions were made or promised.
But the governments of Prussia and Austria were unaffected;
and when the storm had died down Met ternich was able, wit h the
aid of the federal diet , to resume his task of holding “the
Revolution” in check. No attempt was, indeed, made to restore the
deposed duke of Brunswick, who by universal consent had
richly deserved his fate; but the elector of Hesse could reckon
on the sympathy of the diet in his struggle with the chambers
(see Hesse-Cassel), and when, in 1837,
King Ernest Augustus
of Hanover inaugurated his reign by restoring the old illiberal
constitution abolished in 1831, the diet refused to interfere.
It was left to the seven professors of Göttingen to protest;
who, deprived of their posts, became as famous in the constitutional
history of Germany as the seven bishops in that of
England.
Yet this period was by no means sterile in developments
destined to produce momentous results. In Prussia especially
the government continued active in organizing and
consolidating the heterogeneous elements introduced
into the monarchy by the settlement of 1815. The
task was no easy one. There was no sense of national
unity between the Catholics of the Rhine provinces, long submitted
to the influence of liberal France, and the Lutheran
squires of the mark of Brandenburg, the most stereotyped class
in Europe; there was little in common between either and the
Polish population of the province of Posen. The Prussian
monarchy, the traditional champion of Protestant orthodoxy,
found the new Catholic elements difficult to assimilate; and
premonitory symptoms were not wanting of a revival of the
secular contest between the spiritual and temporal powers which
was to culminate after the promulgation of the dogma of papal
infallibility (1870) in the Kulturkampf. These conditions formed
the excuse for the continual postponement of the promised
constitution. But the narrow piety of Frederick William III.
was less calculated to promote the success of a benevolent
despotism than the contemptuous scepticism of Frederick the
Great, and a central parliament would have proved a safety
valve for jarring passions which the mistaken efforts of the king
to suppress, by means of royal decrees and military coercion,
only served to embitter. Yet the conscientious tradition of
Prussian officialism accomplished much in the way of administrative
reform.
Above all it evolved the Customs-Union (Zollverein), which
gradually attached the smaller states, by material interests if
not by sympathy, to the Prussian system. A reform
of the tariff conditions in the new Prussian monarchy
had been from the first a matter of urgent necessity,
and this was undertaken under the auspices of Baron
Heinrich von Bülow (1791-1846), minister in the foreign department
for commerce and shipping, and Karl Georg Maassen
(1769-1834), the minister of finance. When they took office
there were in Prussia sixty different tariffs, with a total of nearly
2800 classes of taxable goods: in some parts importation was
free, or all but free; in others there was absolute prohibition,
or duties so heavy as to amount to practical prohibition. Moreover,
the long and broken line of the Prussian frontier, together
with the numerous enclaves, made the effective enforcement
of a high tariff impossible. In these circumstances it was decided
to introduce a system of comparative free trade; raw materials
were admitted free; a uniform import of 10% was levied on
manufactured goods, and 20% on “colonial wares,” the tax
being determined not by the estimated value, but by the weight
of the articles. It was soon realized, however, that to make
this system complete the neighbouring states must be drawn
into it; and a beginning was made with those which were
enclaves in Prussian territory, of which there were no less than
thirteen. Under the new tariff laws light transit dues were
imposed on goods passing through Prussia; and it was easy
to bring pressure to bear on states completely surrounded by
Prussian territory by increasing these dues or, if need were,
by forbidding the transit altogether. The small states, though
jealous of their sovereign independence, found it impossible to
hold out. Schwarzburg-Sondershausen was the first to succumb
(1819); Schwarzburg-Rudolstadt (1822), Saxe-Weimar and
Anhalt-Bernburg (1823), Lippe-Detmold and Mecklenburg-Schwerin
(1826) followed suit so far as their “enclaved”
territories were concerned; and in 1826 Anhalt-Dessau and
Anhalt-Cöthen, after several years' resistance, joined the
Prussian Customs-Union. In 1828 Hesse-Cassel entered into
a commercial treaty with Prussia. Meanwhile, alarmed at this
tendency, and hopeless of obtaining any general system from
the federal diet, the “middle” states had drawn together; by
a treaty signed on the 18th of January 1828 Württemberg and
Bavaria formed a tariff union, which was joined in the following
year by the Hohenzollern principalities; and on the 24th of
September 1828 was formed the so-called “Middle German
Commercial Union” (Handelsverein) between Hanover, Hesse-Cassel,
the Saxon duchies, Brunswick, Nassau, the principalities
of Reuss and Schwarzburg, and the free cities of Frankfort and
Bremen, the object of which was to prevent the extension of
the Prussian system and, above all, any union of the northern
Zollverein with that of Bavaria and Württemberg. It was
soon, however, found that these separate systems were unworkable;
on the 27th of May 1829 Prussia signed a commercial
treaty with the southern union; the Handelsverein was broken
up, and one by one the lesser states joined the Prussian Customs-Union.
Finally, on the 22nd of March 1833, the northern and
southern unions were amalgamated; Saxony and the Thuringian
states attached themselves to this union in the same year;
and on the 1st of January 1834 the German Customs- and
Commercial-Union (Deutscher Zoll- und Handelsverein) came
into existence, which included for tariff purposes within a single
frontier the greater part of Germany. Outside this, though not
in hostility to it, Hanover, Brunswick, Oldenburg and Schaumburg-Lippe
formed a separate customs-union (Steuerverein) by
treaties signed on the 1st of May 1834 and the 7th of May 1836,
and to this certain Prussian and Hessian enclaves were attached.
Subsequently other states, e.g. Baden and Nassau (1836), Frankfort
and Luxemburg (1842), joined the Prussian Zollverein, to
which certain of the members of the Steuerverein also transferred
themselves (Brunswick and Lippe, 1842). Finally, as a countermove
to the Austrian efforts to break up the Zollverein, the latter
came to terms with the Steuerverein, which, on the 1st of January
1854, was absorbed in the Prussian system. Hamburg was to
remain outside until 1883; but practically the whole of what
now is Germany was thus included in a union in which Prussia
had a predominating influence, and to which, when too late,
Austria in vain sought admission.
Even in the earlier stages of its development the Zollverein
had a marked effect on the condition of the country. Its
growth coincided with the introduction of railways, and enabled
the nation to derive from them the full benefit; so that, in spite
of the confusion of political powers, material prosperity increased,
together with the consciousness of national unity and a tendency
to look to Berlin rather than to Vienna as the centre of this
unity.
This tendency was increased by the accession to the throne
of Prussia, in 1840, of Frederick William IV., a prince whose
conspicuous talents and supposed “advanced” views
raised the hopes of the German Liberals in the same
degree as they excited the alarm and contempt of
Metternich. In the end, however, the fears were more
justified than the hopes. The reign began well, it is true,
notably in the reversal of the narrow ecclesiastical policy of
Frederick William III. But the new king was a child of the
romantic movement, with no real understanding of, and still
less sympathy with, the modern Liberal point of view. He
cherished the idea of German unity, but could conceive of it
only in the form of the restored Holy Empire under the house
of Habsburg; and so little did he understand the growing
nationalist temper of his people that he seriously negotiated
for a union of the Lutheran and Anglican churches, of which
the sole premature offspring was the Protestant bishopric of
Jerusalem.
Meanwhile the Unionist and Liberal agitation was growing
in strength, partly owing to the very efforts made to restrain
it. The emperor Nicholas I. of Russia, kept informed by his
agents of the tendencies of opinion, thought it right to warn his
kinsman of Prussia of the approach of danger. But Frederick
William, though the tsar's influence over him was as great as
over his father, refused to be convinced. He even thought the
time opportune for finishing “the building begun by Papa”
by summoning the central assembly of the diets, and wrote to
the tsar to this effect (December 31, 1845); and he persevered
in this intention in spite of the tsar's paternal remonstrances.
On the 13th of February 1847 was issued a patent summoning
the united diet of Prussia. But, as Metternich had prophesied,
this only provided an organ for giving voice to larger constitutional
aspirations. The result was a constitutional dead-lock;
for the diet refused to sanction loans until its “representative”
character was recognized; and the king refused to allow “to
come between Almighty God in heaven and this land a blotted
parchment, to rule us with paragraphs, and to replace the
ancient, sacred bond of loyalty.” On the 26th of June the diet
was dissolved, nothing having been done but to reveal the
widening gulf between the principle of monarchy and the growing
forces of German Liberalism.
The strength of these forces was revealed when the February
revolution of 1848 in Paris gave the signal for the outbreak of
popular movements throughout Europe. The effect of the
revolution in Vienna, involving the fall of Metternich (May 13)
and followed by the nationalist movements in Hungary and
Bohemia, was stupendous in Germany. Accustomed to look to
Austria for guidance and material support, the princes everywhere
found themselves helpless in face of the popular clamour.
The only power which might have stemmed the tide was Prussia.
But Frederick William's emotional and kindly temperament
little fitted him to use “the mailed fist”; though the riot
which broke out in Berlin on the 15th of March was suppressed
by the troops with but little bloodshed, the king shrank with
horror from the thought of fighting his “beloved Berliners,”
and when on the night of the 18th the fighting was renewed,
he entered into negotiation with the insurgents, negotiations
that resulted in the withdrawal of the troops from Berlin. The
next day, Frederick William, with characteristic histrionic
versatility, was heading a procession round the streets of Berlin,
wrapped in the German tricolour, and extolling in a letter to the
indignant tsar the consummation of “the glorious German
revolution.”
The collapse of the Prussian autocracy involved that of the
lesser German potentates. On the 30th of March the federal
diet hoisted the German tricolour and authorized
the assembling of the German national parliament at
Frankfort. Arrangements for this had already been
made without official sanction. A number of deputies,
belonging to different legislative assemblies, taking it upon themselves
to give voice to the national demands, had met at Heidelberg,
and a committee appointed by them had invited all
Germans who then were, or who had formerly been, members
of diets, as well as some other public men, to meet at Frankfort
for the purpose of considering the question of national reform.
About 500 representatives accepted the invitation. They constituted
themselves a preliminary parliament (Vorparlament),
and at once began to provide for the election of a national
assembly. It was decided that there should be a representative
for every group of 50,000 inhabitants, and that the election
should be by universal suffrage. A considerable party wished
that the preliminary parliament should continue to act until
the assembly should be formed, but this was overruled, the
majority contenting themselves with the appointment of a
committee of 50, whose duty it should be in the interval to guard
the national interests. Some of those who were discontented
with this decision retired from the preliminary parliament, and
a few of them, of republican sympathies, called the population
of Upper Baden to arms. The rising was put down by the
troops of Baden, but it did considerable injury by awakening
the fears of the more moderate portion of the community.
Great hindrances were put in the way of the elections, but, as
the Prussian and Austrian governments were too much occupied
with their immediate difficulties to resist to the uttermost, the
parliament was at last chosen, and met at Frankfort on the
18th May. The old diet, without being formally dissolved,
(an omission that was to have notable consequences) broke up,
and the national representatives had before them a clear field.
Their task would in any case have been one of extreme difficulty.
The new-born sentiment of national unity disguised
a variety of conflicting ideals, as well as deep-seated
traditional local antagonisms; the problem of
constructing a new Germany out of states, several of
which, and those the most powerful, were largely composed of
non-German elements, was sure to lead to international complications;
moreover, the military power of the monarchies had
only been temporarily paralysed, not destroyed. Yet, had the
parliament acted with promptitude and discretion it might have
been successful. Neither Austria nor Prussia was for some
time in a position to thwart it, and the sovereigns of the smaller
states were too much afraid of the revolutionary elements
manifested on all sides to oppose its will. But the Germans
had had no experience of free political life. Nearly every deputy
had his own theory of the course which ought to be pursued,
and felt sure that the country would go to ruin if it were not
adopted. Learned professors and talkative journalists insisted
on delivering interminable speeches and on examining in the
light of ultimate philosophical principles every proposal laid
before the assembly. Thus precious time was lost, violent
antagonisms were called forth, the patience of the nation was
exhausted, and the reactionary forces were able to gather
strength for once more asserting themselves. The very first
important question brought out the weaknesses of the deputies.
This related to the nature of the central provisional executive.
A committee appointed to discuss the matter suggested that
there should be a directory of three members, appointed by the
German governments, subject to the approval of the parliament,
and ruling by means of ministers responsible to the latter
body. This elaborate scheme found favour with a large number
of members, but others insisted that there should be a president
or a central committee, appointed by the parliament, while
another party pleaded that the parliament itself should exercise
executive as well as legislative functions. At last, after a vast
amount of tedious and useless discussion, it was agreed that the
parliament should appoint an imperial vicar (Reichsverweser)
who should carry on the government by means of a ministry
selected by himself; and on the motion of Heinrich von Gagern
the archduke John of Austria was chosen by a large majority
for the office. With as little delay as possible he formed an
imperial cabinet, and there were hopes that, as his appointment
was generally approved both by the sovereigns and the people,
more rapid progress would be made with the great and complicated
work in hand. Unfortunately, however, it was necessary
to enter upon the discussion of the fundamental laws, a subject
presenting many opportunities for the display of rhetoric and
intellectual subtlety. It was soon obvious that beneath all
varieties of individual opinion there were two bitterly hostile
tendencies — republican and constitutionalist. These two parties
attacked each other with constantly growing animosity, and in
a few weeks sensible men outside the parliament gave up all hope
of their dealing satisfactorily with the problem they had been
appointed to solve.
In the midst of these disputes the attention of the nation
was occupied by a question which had arisen before the outbreak
of the revolutionary movements the so-called
“Schleswig-Holstein question” (q.v.). In 1846
Christian VIII. of Denmark had officially proclaimed
that Schleswig and the greater part of Holstein were
indissolubly connected with the Danish monarchy. This excited
vehement opposition among the Germans, on the ground that
Holstein, although subject to the king of Denmark, was a member
of the German confederation, and that in virtue of ancient treaties
it could not be severed from Schleswig. In 1848 the German
party in the duchies, headed by Prince Frederick of Augustenburg,
rose against the Danish government. Frederick VII., who had
just succeeded Christian VIII., put down the rebellion, but
Prussia, acting in the name of the confederation, despatched
an army against the Danes, and drove them from Schleswig.
The Danes, who were supported by Russia, responded by
blockading the Baltic ports, which Germany, having no navy,
was unable effectually to defend. By the mediation of Great
Britain an armistice was concluded, and the Prussian troops
evacuated the northern districts of Schleswig. As the Danes
soon afterwards took possession of Schleswig again, the Prussians
once more drove them back, but, in view of the threatening
attitude of the powers, Frederick William summoned up courage
to flout the opinion of the German parliament, and on the 26th
of August, without the central government being consulted, an
armistice of seven months was agreed upon at Malmoe.
The full significance of this event was not at once realized.
To indignant patriots it seemed no more than a piece of perfidy,
Disputes in the
Frankfurt assembly.
|
for which Prussia should be called to account by united
Germany. The provisional government of the duchies
appealed from Prussia to the German regent; and
the Frankfort parliament hotly took up its cause. A
large majority voted an order countermanding the withdrawal
of the Prussian troops, in spite of the protest of the ministry,
who saw that it would be impossible to make it effective. The
ministry resigned, but no other could be found to take its place;
and the majority began to realize the situation. The central
government depended ultimately on the armed support of the
two great powers; to quarrel with those would be to ruin the
constitution, or at best to play into the hands of the extreme
revolutionists. On the 14th of September the question of the
convention of Malmoe again came up for discussion, and was
angrily debated. The democrats called their adherents to arms
against the traitors who were preparing to sell the Schleswig-Holsteiners.
The Moderates took alarm; they had no stomach
for an open war with the governments; and in the end the
convention was confirmed by a sufficient majority. The result
was civil war in the streets of Frankfort; two deputies were
murdered; and the parliament, which could think of no better
way of meeting the crisis than by continuing “with imposing
calm” to discuss “fundamental rights,” was only saved from
the fury of the mob by Prussian troops. Its existence was
saved, but its prestige bad vanished; and the destinies of the
German people were seen to be in the hands that held the
sword.
While these events were in progress, it seemed not impossible
that the Austrian empire would fall to pieces. Bohemia and the
The revolution
in Austria.
|
Italian states were in revolt, and the Hungarians
strove with passionate earnestness for independence.
Towards the end of 1848 Vienna was completely in
the hands of the revolutionary party, and it was retaken
only after desperate fighting. A reactionary ministry,
headed by Prince Schwarzenberg, was then raised to power,
and in order that a strong policy might be the more vigorously
pushed forward, the emperor Ferdinand resigned, and was
succeeded by his nephew, Francis Joseph.
The prospects of reform were not much more favourable
in Prussia. The assembly summoned amid the revolutionary
excitement of March met on the 22nd of May. Demands
for a constitutional system were urged with
great force, and they would probably have been
granted but for the opposition due to the violence of politicians
out of doors. The aristocratic class saw ruin before it if the
smallest concession were made to popular wishes, and it soon
recovered from the terror into which it had been plunged at
the outbreak of the revolution. Extreme antagonism was excited
by such proposals as that the king should no longer be said to
wear his crown “by the grace of God”; and the animosity
between the liberal and the conservative sections was driven to
the highest pitch by the attack of the democratic majority of
the diet on the army and the attempt to remodel it in the direction
of a national militia. Matters came to a crisis at the end of
October when the diet passed a resolution calling on the king to
intervene in favour of the Viennese revolutionists. When, on
the evening of the 30th, a mob surrounded the palace, clamouring
for the king to give effect to this resolution, Frederick William
lost patience, ordered General Wrangel to occupy Berlin with
troops, and on the and of November placed Count Brandenburg,
a scion of the royal house and a Prussian of the old school, at
the head of a new ministry. On the pretext that fair deliberation
was impossible in the capital, the assembly was now ordered
to meet in Brandenburg, while troops were concentrated near
Berlin and a state of siege was proclaimed. In vain the assembly
protested and continued its sittings, going even so far as to
forbid the payment of taxes while it was subjected to illegal
treatment. It was forced in the end to submit. But the
discussions in Brandenburg were no more successful than those
in Berlin; and at last, on the 5th of December, the king dissolved
the assembly, granted a constitution about which it had not
been consulted, and gave orders for the election of a representative
chamber.
About the time that the Prussian parliament was thus
created, and that the emperor Ferdinand resigned, the Frankfort
The question of
the constitution.
|
parliament succeeded in formulating the fundamental
laws, which were duly proclaimed to be those of Germany
as it was now to be constituted. The principal
clauses of the constitution then began to be discussed.
By far the most difficult question was the relation in which
Austria should stand to the Germany of the future. There
was a universal wish that the Austrian Germans should be
included in the German state; on the other hand, it was felt
that if all the various nationalities of Austria formed a united
monarchy, and if this monarchy as a whole were included in
the confederation, it would necessarily overshadow Germany,
and expose her to unnecessary external dangers. It was therefore
resolved that, although a German country might be under the
same ruler as non-German lands, it could not be so joined to
them as to form with them a single nation. Had the parliament
adopted this resolution at once, instead of exhausting itself by
pedantic disquisitions on the abstract principles of jurisprudence,
it might have hoped to triumph; but Austria was not likely
to submit to so severe a blow at the very time when she was
strong enough to appoint a reactionary government, and had
nearly re-established her authority, not only in Vienna, but in
Bohemia and in Italy. Prince Schwarzenberg took the earliest
opportunity to declare that the empire could not assent to any
weakening of its influence. Bitter strife now broke out in the .
parliament between the Great German (Gross-Deutsch) and
Little German (Klein-Deutsch) parties. Two of the ministers
resigned, and one of those who took their place, Heinrich von
Gagern (q.v.), proposed that, since Austria was to be a united
state, she should not enter the confederation, but that her
relations to Germany should be regulated by a special act of
union. This of course meant that Prussia should be at the head
of Germany, and recommended itself to the majority of the
constitutional party. It was resisted by the Austrian members,
who were supported by the ultramontanes and the democrats,
both of whom disliked Prussia, the former because of her
Protestantism, the latter because of her bureaucratic system.
Gagern's proposal was, however, adopted. Immediately afterwards
the question as to the character of the executive was
raised. Some voted that a directory of princes should be
appointed, others that there should be a president, eligible from
the whole German nation; but the final decision was that the
headship of the state should be offered by the parliament to
some particular German prince, and that he should bear the
title of German emperor.
The whole subject was as eagerly discussed throughout the
country as in Frankfort. Austria firmly opposed the idea of
a united German state, insisting that the Austrian
emperor could not consent to be subordinate to any
other prince. She was supported by Bavaria, but on
the other side were Prussia, Brunswick, Baden, Nassau, Mecklenburg
and various other countries, besides the Hanseatic towns.
For some time Austria offered no counter scheme, but she
ultimately proposed that there should be a directory of seven
princes, the chief place being held alternately by a Prussian
and an Austrian imperial vicar. Nothing came of this suggestion,
and in due time the parliament proceeded to the second reading
of the constitution. It was revised in a democratic sense, but
the imperial title was maintained, and a narrow majority
decided that it should be hereditary. Frederick William IV.
of Prussia was then chosen emperor.
All Germany awaited with anxiety the reply of Frederick
William. It was thought not improbable that he would accept
the honour offered him, for in the early part of his reign he
had spoken of German unity as enthusiastically as of liberty,
and, besides, the opportunity was surprisingly favourable. The
larger number of the North-German states were at least not
unwilling to submit to the arrangement; and Austria, whose
opposition in ordinary circumstances would have been fatal,
was paralysed by her struggle with Hungary. Frederick
William, however, whose instincts were far from democratic,
refused “to pick up a crown out of the gutter”; and the
deputation which waited upon him was dismissed with the answer
that he could not assume the imperial title without the full
sanction of the princes and the free cities.
This answer was in reality a death-blow to the hopes of German
patriots, but the parliament affected to believe that its cause
End of Frankfort
parliament.
|
was not yet lost and appointed a committee to see
that the provisions of the constitution were carried
out. A vigorous agitation began in the country for
the acceptance of the constitution by the governments.
The king of Württemberg was forced to accede to it; and in
Saxony, Baden and Rhenish Bavaria armed multitudes kept the
sovereigns in terror. Prussia, which, following the example
of Austria, had recalled her representatives from Frankfort,
sent her troops to put down these risings, and on the 21st of
May 1849 the larger number of the deputies to the parliament
voluntarily resigned their seats. A few republican members
held on by it, and transferred the sittings to Stuttgart. Here
they even elected an imperial government, but they had no longer
any real influence, and on the 18th of June they were forcibly
dispersed by order of the Württemberg ministry.
(Walter Alison Phillips)
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