The Revolutions of 1848 in the German states, also called the March Revolution – part of the Revolutions of 1848 that broke out in many countries of Europe – were a series of loosely coordinated protests and rebellions in the states of the German Confederation, including the Austrian Empire. The revolutions, which stressed pan-Germanism, emphasised popular discontent with the traditional, largely autocratic political structure of the thirty-nine independent states of the Confederation that inherited the German territory of the former Holy Roman Empire. Furthermore, they demonstrated the popular desire for increased political freedom, liberal state policies, freedom from censorship, democracy, and nationalism. The middle class elements were committed to liberal principles while the working class sought radical improvements to their working and living conditions. However, the middle class and working class components of the Revolution split, and in the end the conservative aristocracy defeated it, forcing many liberals into exile.
The campaigners in the German rehad been unable to form a coordinated defence against Napoleon. The Rhine crisis caused a new wave of anti-French sentiment and the composition of patriotic Rheinlied songs. In addition, Denmark's declaration that it would occupy part of Schleswig-Holstein provoked widespread opposition. Nationalistic poems and songs were written, such as the Deutschlandlied ("Deutschland über alles", 1841) which eventually became the national anthem. New journals, magazines, and papers arose, such as Die Deutsche Zeitung (The German Newspaper)", widening awareness of events in France and Denmark. From 1840 on there was a consensus among German liberals that only the dual aim of unity and freedom was worth fighting for.[1]
Disastrous economic conditions also played a part. A cholera epidemic led to widespread death and suffering in Silesia. Population growth and the failures of harvests in 1846 and 1847 caused famine and misery. Many people moved to the cities in order to survive, but wages were very low and living conditions were appalling.
In 1828 the Prussian-Hessian Customs Union was formed, which was designed to make trade in Prussian goods more efficient. Austria was the only state that did not join and it was a powerful motor for the unification of the states within the federation. The Zollverein set standards for taxes for goods and made travel between states much easier. Initially, the union area outside of Prussia was rather small, yet by 1834 it had grown into the Zollverein which encompassed most of what was to become Germany. Amongst other achievements it established standards for weights and currency in Germany.
Events across Europe in 1848 had an impact also on the Germans. In February 1848, King Louis-Phillipe of France abdicated the throne, triggering revolutions across the entire European continent, especially in the German provinces.
The ground work of the 1848 uprising in Germany was laid long beforehand. Hambacher Fest of 1832, for instance, reflected growing unrest in the face of heavy taxation and political censorship. The Hambacher Fest is particularly noteworthy for the fact that it resulted in the origination of the black-red-gold colours (which form today's flag of Germany) as a symbol of the republican movement and of a unity among the German-speaking people.
Liberal pressure spread through many of the German states, each of which experienced the revolutions in its own way. The street demonstrations of workers and artisans in Paris, France, from February 22 through 24, 1848 resulted in the abdication of King Louis Philippe of France and his departure from France to live in Britain, was the immediate spur to revolt in Germany.[2] In France the revolution of 1848 became known as the February Revolution.
The revolution spread across Europe and started in Germany with the large demonstrations on March 13, 1848, in Vienna, Austria, which resulted in the resignation of Prince von Metternich as chief minister to Emperor Ferdinand I of Austria and his departure from Austria to live in Britain.[2] Because of the date of these demonstrations, the revolutions in Germany are usually called the March Revolution (German: Märzrevolution).
Fearing the fate of Louis-Philippe of France, some monarchs in Germany accepted some of the demands of the revolutionaries, at least temporarily. In the south and west, large popular assemblies and mass demonstrations took place. They demanded freedom of the press, freedom of assembly, written constitutions, arming of the people and a national German parliament.
Baden had had a liberal constitution from 1811 until reaction revoked the constitution in 1825.[3] In 1830, Leopold of Baden became Grand Duke of the duchy. His reign brought liberal reforms in constitutional, civil and criminal law and in education. In 1832 Baden joined the (Prussian) Customs Union.[3] After news broke of revolutionary victories in February 1848 in Paris, uprisings occurred throughout Europe, including the German states. However, the first state in Germany to be affected by the French Revolution in February 1848 was Baden.[4] Baden happened to be one of the most liberal states in Germany.[5] The liberal reforms that Baden had instituted did not allow Baden to escape the uprisings of 1848.[3] After the news of the February Days in Paris reached Baden, there were several unorganized instances of peasants burning the mansions of local aristocrats and threatening them.[5]
Events began rolling on February 27, 1848, in Mannheim, where an assembly of the people from Baden adopted a resolution demanding a bill of rights. Similar resolutions were adopted in Württemberg, Hesse-Darmstadt, Nassau, and other German states. The surprisingly strong popular support for these movements forced rulers to give in to many of the Märzforderungen (demands of March) almost without resistance.
The March Revolution in Vienna further fueled the flames of revolution all across Germany. Popular demands were made for an elected representative government and for the unification of all Germany. Fear on the part of the princes and rulers of the various German states caused them to concede in the demand for reform. Consequently, a preparliament was convened from March 31, 1848 until April 4, 1848 in St. Paul's Church in Frankfurt am Main, charged with the task of drafting a new constitution called the "Fundamental Rights and Demands of the German People."[6] The majority of the delegates to the preparliament were constitutional monarchists.[6]
Baden, however, sent two democrats, Friedrich Karl Franz Hecker and Gustav von Struve, to the preparliament.[7] In the minority and frustrated with the lack of progress at the preparliament, Hecker and Struve walked out of the preparliament in protest on April 2, 1848.[7] The walkout and the continuing revolutionary upsurge in Germany spurred the preparliament to action and they passed a resolution calling for an All-German National Assembly to be formed. On April 8, 1848, a law allowing universal suffrage and an indirect (two stage) voting system was agreed by the assembly.[8] Pursuant to this law, a new National Assembly was selected and on May 18, 1848, 809 delegates (585 of which were elected) were seated at St. Paul's Church in Frankfurt to convene the Frankfurt National Assembly. Karl Mathy, a right-center journalist was one of the persons elected as deputy to the Frankfurt National Assembly.[9]
Disorder fomented by republican agitators, nonetheless, continued in Baden. The continuing revolutionary upsurge in Baden cause fear within Baden government, which then began to increase the size of its own army and to seek assistance from neighboring states.[7] The Baden government sought to suppress the revolts by arresting Joseph Fickler, a journalist, and the leader of the Baden democrats.[7] The arrests brought the democratic protests in favor of reform to a peak. A full-scale uprising broke out on April 12, 1848.[7] The Bavarian government suppressed the revolutionary forces led by Friedrich Hecker with the aid of Prussian troops at Kandern on April 20, 1848, ending what became known as the Hecker Uprising.
In May 1849, a resurgence of revolutionary activity occurred in Baden. However, this resurgent uprising was closely linked with the uprising in the Palatinate. Thus, this resurgent uprising in Baden in 1849 is described, below, in the section of this article called "The Palatinate."
Like the Rhineland (see below), the Palatinate, today, is a heavily industrial area. Naturally, in 1848, the Palatinate tended to be more agricultural than industrial. Indeed, the Palatinate in 1848 was one of the premier wine growing areas of Germany.[10] Unike the other areas of southern Germany, more wine was consumed in the Palatinate than beer.
When the revolutionary upsurge renewed itself in the spring of 1849, the uprisings started in Elberfeld in the Rhineland on May 6, 1848.[11] However, the uprisings soon spread to the state of Baden, when a riot broke out in Karlsruhe.[12] The states of Baden and the Palatinate border each other, separated only by the Rhine River. The uprising in Baden and the Palatinate took place, largely, in the Rhine Valley along the border between Baden and the Palatinate. Thus, the uprisings in Baden and the Palatinate were basically the same uprising. In May 1849, the Grand Duke was forced to leave Karlsruhle, Baden and seek help from Prussia.[3] Provisional governments were declared in both the Paltinate and in Baden. While in Baden conditions for the provisional government were ideal—the public, including the army, strongly in support of constitutional change and democratic reform in the government, there was a ready army, which also strongly supported the demands for a constitution, amply supplied arsenals and a full exchequer—conditions in the Palatinate were somewhat less ideal.[13]
While Baden had the near unanimous support of its population, the Palatinate traditionally contained more upper class citizens that other areas of Germany.[14] Accordingly the populace of the Palatinate was more divided with regard to support for the provisional government and the demands for constitutional change in the government. In Baden the army supported the provisional government.[15] However, in the Palatinate, this was not the case. When the insurrectionary government took over in the Palatinate, they did not find the same abundantly supplied arsenals a full organized state machinery a full exchequer that were to be found in Baden.[16] Instead there were limited number of privately held muskets, rifes and sporting guns available in the Palatinate.[17] To solve this problem of the shortage of arms the provisional government of the Palatinate sent agents to France and Belgium to purchase arms. However, nothing resulted from these forays. France banned sales and export of arms to either Baden or the Palatinate.[18]
The provisional government first appointed Joseph Martin Reichardt, a lawyer, democrat and deputy in the Frankfurt Assembly, as the head of the military department in the Palatinate.[19] First Commander in Chief of the military forces of the Palatinate was Daniel Fenner von Fenneberg, a former Austrian officer who commanded the national guard in Vienna during the 1848 uprising.[20] He was soon replaced by Felix Raquilliet, a former Polish staff general in the Polish insurgent army of 1830-1831.[21] In the end, Ludwik Mieroslawski was given supreme command of the armed forces in the Palatinate and field command of the troops was given to Franz Sznayde.[22] Other noteworthy military officers providing assistance to the provisional government in the city of Kaiserlautern in the Palatinate, were Friedrich Strasser, Alexander Schimmelpfennig, Captain Rudolph von Manteuffel, Albert Clement, Herr Zychlinski, Friedrich von Beust, Eugen Oswald, Amand Goegg, Gustav von Struve, Otto Julius Bernhard von Corvin-Wiersbitzki, Joseph Moll, Johann Gottfried Kinkel, Herr Mersy, Karl Emmermann, Franz Sigel, Major Nerlinger, Colonel Kurz, Friedrich Karl Franz Hecker and Hermann von Natzmer. Hermann von Natzmer was the former Prussian officer who had been in charge of the arsenal of Berlin. Natzmer had become a hero to the insurgents all across Germany, when he refused to shoot the insurgent forces that had stormed the Berlin arsenal on June 14, 1848.[23] Natzmer had been sentenced to 15 years in prison for refusing orders to shoot the crowd, but in 1849, he escaped prison and fled to the Palatinate to join the insurgent forces there. Also in Kaiserlautern aiding the provisional government of the Palatinate was Gustav Adolph Techow another former Prussian officer and democrat who had served with Natzmer at the Berlin arsenal.[24] Organizing the artillery and providing services in the ordinance shops for the Palatinate forces was Lieutenant Colonel Freidrich Anneke, who was also a member of the Communist League, one of the founders of the Cologne Workers Association in 1848, editor of the Neue Kölnische Zeitung and a Rhenish District Committee of Democrats.[25]
Democrats of the Palatinate and across Germany saw the Baden-Palatinate insurrection as more than a local uprising. To them it was part of the wider all-German struggle for constitutional rights. Because of this, Franz Sigel a second lieutenant in the Baden army, a democrat and a supporter of the provisional government, developed a plan for the protection of the reform movement in Karlsruhe and the Palatinate.[26] Lieutenant Sigel's plan recommended using a corps of the Baden army to advance on the town of Hohenzollern and declare the Hohenzollern Republic, then to march on Stuttgart. After having incited Stuttgart and the surrounding state of Württemberg, the plan recommended that the military corp march on to Nuremburg and set up a camp in the state of Franconia. The plan did not take into account the necessity dealing with the Town of Frankfurt, the home of the Frankfurt Assembly, in order to establish an All-German character to the military campaign for the German constitution.[27]
Despite the plan presented to the provisional government by Lieutenant Segal, the new insurgent government did not go on the offensive. Sitting on the defensive, the uprising in Karlsruhl and the state of Baden was eventually suppressed by the Bavarian Army. At the head of the Baden provisional insurgent government was Lorenz Peter Brentano, a lawyer and democrat from Baden.[28] Brentano wielded absolute power in the provisional government.[29] He appointed Karl Eichfeld as War Minister of the new insurgent provisional government.[30] Later, Eichfeld was replaces as War Minister for the provisional government by Rudolph Mayerhofer. Florian Mördes was appointed as Minister of the Interior.[31] Other members of the provisional government included Joseph Fickler a journalist and a democrat from Baden.[20] Other leaders of the constitutional forces in Baden were Karl Blind, a journalist and a democrat in Baden; and Gustav von Struve, another journalist and democrat from Baden.[32] John Phillip Becker was placed in charge of the peoples militia.[30] Ludwik Mieroslawski, a Polish born national who had taken part in the military operations during the Polish uprising of 1830-1831, was placed in charge of the military operation on the Palatinate side of the Rhine River.[33] Whereas, the provisional government, under the virtual dictatorship of Brentano tended to administer the day-to-day affairs of the uprising on the Baden side of the Rhine River, Mieroslawski ran things under military jurisdiction on the Palatinate sid of the Rhine River. There was, however, an unfortunate lack of coordination between the two sides of the River. Take for instance, Mieroslawski's decision to abolish the long standing toll on the Mannheim-Ludwigshaven bridge over the Rhine River. The toll was not collected on the Palatinate side of the River, yet Brentano continued to collect the toll on the Baden side of the river.[34] Due to the continued lack of coordination between the two sides of the River, Mieroslawski lost battles in Waghausle and Ubstadt on the Baden side of the River and he and his troops were forced to retreat across the mountains of southern Baden where they fought one last battle against the Prussians in the town of Murg on the frontier between Baden Switzerland.[35] Murg was the last battle of the uprising in Baden and the Palatinte. Mieroslawski and the other survivors of the battle escaped across the frontier to Switzerland. Mieroslawski fled to Paris.
Frederick Engels actually took an active role in this renewed uprising in Baden and the Palatinate. On May 10, 1848, Engels left Cologne, Germany, with Karl Marx to observe, for themselves, the events that were taking place in Baden and the Palatinate. Since June 1, 1848, Engels and Marx had been editing the Neue Rhenische Zeitung.[36] However, on May 19, 1849 the Prussian authorities had closed down the newspaper because of its support for constitutional and democratic reforms. Marx and Engels also wanted to find Karl Ludwig Johann D'Ester who was now serving as a member of the provisional government in Baden and the Palatinate.[37] D'Ester was a physician, a democrat and a socialist who had been a member of the Cologne community chapter of the Communist League. D'Ester had been elected as a deputy to Prussian National Assembly in 1848.[38] The reason Marx and Engels wanted to find D'Ester was that he had been elected to the Central committee of the German Democrats together with Reichenbach and Hexamer at the Second Democratic Congress held in Berlin from October 26 through October 30, 1848.[39] Because of his commitments to the provisional government D'Ester was not going to be able to attend an important meeting in Paris on behalf of the German Central Committee. Accordingly he was wanting to provide Marx with the mandate to attend the meeting in his place. Marx and Engels finally caught up with D'Ester in the town of Kaiserlautern in the Palatinate. Marx obtained the mandate from D'Ester and headed off to Paris.[40]
Engels remained in the Palatinate to join the citizens gathering on the barricades of the city of Elberfeld in the Rhineland, to fight the anticipated Prussian troops that were expected to arrive and suppress the uprising.[41] On his way to Elberfeld, Engels took two cases of rifle cartridges which had been gathered by the workers of Solingen, Germany, when those workers had stormed the arsenal at Gräfrath, Germany.[41] The anticipated Prussian troops arrived and, despite the resistance from the citizens on the barricades, crushed the uprising in August 1849.[42] Engels and some other participants in the uprising escaped to Kaiserlautern, Germany.[43] While in Kaiserlautern on June 13, 1849, Engels joined an 800 member group of workers that was being formed into a military corps by August Willich a former Prussian military officer, who was also a member of the Communist League and was fighting for revolutionary change in Germany.[44] The newly formed Willich Corps combined with other revolutionary groups to form an army of about 30,000 strong which fought to support the uprising in the Palatinate from being crushed by the Prussian troops.[45] Engels fought with the Willich Corps for the whole of the campaign in the Palatinate. However, the Prussians defeated the revolutionary army and the survivors of Willichs Corps crossed over the frontier from Baden into the safety of Switzerland. Engels was one of the last survivors to reach Switzerland on July 25, 1849. Only then was he able to send word to Marx and his friends and comrades in London, England that he was alive and well.[46] Once he was safe in Switzerland, Engels began writing down his memories of the experiences he had been through in Baden and the Palatinate.[47] These writings eventually became the article "The Campaign for the German Imperial Constitution."[48] The quick and effortless way in which the Prussian troops succeeded in crushing this uprising convinced many South German states that Prussia, not Austria, was the nation to watch.[49] The suppression of the uprising in Baden and the Palatinate spelled the final end of the revolutionary uprisings in Germany that had begun in the spring of 1848.
In 1848, Austria was the predominate German state. Austria was seen as the successor to the Holy Roman Empire which had been dissolved by Napoleon in 1806 and was not resurrected by the Congress of Vienna in 1815. German Austrian chancellor Metternich had dominated the German Confederation from 1815 until 1848. On March 13, 1848 a large street demonstration of university broke out in Vienna. Following the important, but relatively minor, demonstrations against Lola Montez in Bavaria on February 9, 1848 (see below), the first major revolt of 1848 in German lands occurred in Vienna on March 13, 1848.[50] The demonstrating students in Vienna had been restive since hearing an encouraging sermon during Mass from a liberal priest--Anton Füster--on Sunday, March 12, 1848 in their university chapel.[4] The student demonstrators demanded a constitution and a constituent assembly elected by universal male suffrage.[51] Emperor Ferdinand and his chief advisor called out the troops to crush the demonstration. When the demonstration moved to the streets near the emperor's palace, the troops fired on the students and killed several students.[5] At this time the new proletariat of Vienna joined the student demonstrations and the street demonstrations turned into a full blown armed insurrection. The Diet of Lower Austria demanded Metternich's resignation. With no forces rallying to Metternich's defense, Ferdinand reluctantly complied and dismissed him.[52] Metternich fled to London and Ferdinand appointed new, nominally liberal, ministers. A constitution was drafted by the Austrian government in late April 1848.[53] However, this constitution proved to be unacceptable to the people because the majority of the people were denied the right to vote under that constitution. As a result, the citizens of Vienna once again came out on the streets on May 26 through 27, 1848 and threw up barricades preparing for another fight with the army. Ferdinand and his family fled to Innsbruck where they spent the next few months surrounded by the loyal peasantry of the Tyrol.[54] Ferdinand issued two manifestos on May 16, 1848 and June 3, 1848 which gave concessions to the people. Among these concessions was the conversion of the Imperial Diet into a Constituent Assembly elected by the people.[55] Other concessions were less substantial and merely contained some generalizations regarding the reorganizing and unification of Germany.[56] Ferdinand returned to Vienna from Innsbruck on August 12, 1848.[57] However shortly after his arrival in Vienna, the working class populace again poured into the streets of Vienna on August 21, 1848 to protest the unemployment situation and the government's decree on the reduction of wages.[57] On August 23, 1848, Austrian troops opened fire on the unarmed demonstrators shot several of them.[57]
In late September 1848, Emperor Ferdinand, who was also King Ferdinand V of Hungary, decided to send Austrian and Croatian troops to Hungary to crush a democratic rebellion there.[58] On September 29, 1848 the Austrian troops sustained a defeat at the hands of the Hungarian revolutionary forces. On October 6 through 7, 1848, the citizens of Vienna poured into the streets to protest this decision on the part of Ferdinand I.[59] As a result of this popular uprising, Emperor Ferdinand I fled Vienna on October 7, 1848 and took up residence in fortress town of Olomouc in Moravia.[60] On December 2, 1848, Ferdinand was forced to abdicate in favour of his nephew Franz Joseph.[61]
In March 1848, crowds of people gathered in Berlin to present their demands in an "address to the king". King Frederick William IV, taken by surprise, yielded verbally to all the demonstrators' demands, including parliamentary elections, a constitution, and freedom of the press. He promised that "Prussia was to be merged forthwith into Germany."
On March 13, after warning against manifestations by the prefect of the police, a charge by the army on people returning from a meeting in the Tiergarten, left one person dead and made many injured. On March 18, a large demonstration occurred and two shots fired led a quickly spreading fear that force was to be used by the 20,000 soldiers to end the demonstrations. Barricades were erected, fighting started, and blood flowed until troops were ordered 13 hours later to retreat, leaving hundreds dead. Afterwards, Frederick William attempted to reassure the public that the reorganization of his government would proceed. The king also approved arming the citizens. On March 21, he paraded through the streets of Berlin to the Friedrichshain cemetery where the civil victims were buried, accompanied by some ministers and generals, all wearing the revolutionary tricolor of black, red, and gold. The Polish prisoners were liberated and paraded through the city under acclaim of the people. The Polish people had been incarcertated for planning a rebellion in their part of the country under occupation of the Prussians. The 254 combatants, killed in action during the riots, were laid out on catafalques on the Gendarmenmarkt and were brought, accompanied by 40,000 people, to their burial place at Friedrichshain.
A Constituent National Assembly was elected and gathered in the St. Paul's Church in Frankfurt am Main on May 18, 1848.[62] Officially called the all-German National Assembly the assembly was composed of deputies democratically elected from various German states in late April and early May 1848.[63] The assembly was composed of 122 deputies who were government officials, 95 were judges, 81 were lawyers, 103 were teachers, 17 were manufacturers and wholesale dealers, 15 were physicians and 40 were landowners.[63] A majority of the Assembly were liberals It became known as the 'professors' parliament' and indeed most of its members were academics. There was one working class member who had the added disadvantage of being Polish and like his colleagues from the Tyrol was never taken seriously by the other members. "Learn to speak German!" was the call of Turnvater Jahn.
Starting on May 18, 1848, the Frankfurt Assembly set about trying to find ways to unite the various German states into a single nation and to write a constitution.[63] However, the Assembly proved to be unable to make any resolute decisions and degenerated into a mere debating club.[64]
On May 22, 1848, another elected assembly sat for the first time in Berlin.[8] Elected under the law of electoral law of April 8, 1848, which allowed for universal suffrage and a two-stage voting system.[8] Most of the deputies elected to the Berlin Assembly, called the Prussian National Assembly, were members of the bourgeoisie or liberal bureaucracy. They set about the task of writing a constitution "by agreement with the Crown."[8] King Frederick William IV of Prussia unilaterally imposed a monarchist Constitution on Prussia as a way to undercut the democratic forces. This Constitution took effect on December 5, 1848.[65] Also on December 5, 1848, the Berlin Assembly was dissolved and replaced with the bi-cameral legislature allowed under the monarchist Constitution. This legislature was composed of a Herrenhaus and a Landtag which are described above. Otto von Bismark was elected to the very first Landtag elected under the new monarchical constitution.
In Dresden, the capital of the Kingdom of Saxony, the people took to the streets asking King Frederick Augustus II of Saxony to engage in electoral reform, social justice and for a constitution.[66]
The famous German composer, Richard Wagner passionately engaged himself in the revolution in Dresden, supporting the democratic-republican movement. Later during the May Uprising in Dresden from May 3–9, 1849, he supported the provisional government.[67] Others participating in the Uprising were the Russian revolutionary Michael Bakunin and the German working class leader Stephen Born.[68] In all, about 2,500 combatants manned the barricades during the May Uprising.[66] On May 9, 1849, together with the leaders of the uprising, Wagner left Dresden for Switzerland to avoid arrest. He spent a number of years abroad, in Switzerland, Italy, and Paris, before the ban was lifted, and he returned to Germany.
Ever since the revolutionary events of 1830, Saxony had been ruled as a constitutional monarchy with a two-chamber legislature and a responsible ministry. This constitution continued to serve as the basis of the Saxon government until 1918. However the Revolution of 1848 brought more popular reforms in the government of Saxony.[69]
In 1849, other residents left for destinations across the Atlantic. Many natives of Saxony, such as Michael Machemehl, left for Texas where they joined other Germans in creating a German Texan community.
The Rhineland shares a common history with the Rhenish Hesse, Luxembourg and the Palatinate in that in 1795 these areas came under the control of Napoleonic France. Napoleon's armies smashed armies of the Holy Roman Empire and then the social, administrative and legislative measures taken by Napoleon in the area smashed the feudal rule that the priests and the nobility had exercised over the area previously.[70] The soil of the Rhineland is not the best for agriculture.[71] Forestry has traditionally been a strong industry in the Rhineland.[72] Thus, the combination of the lack of good agriculture and the early elimination of the feudal structure and the fact that a logging industry was traditionally strong in the Rhineland meant that industrialization was destined to come to the Rhineland. Additionally, the close proximity of coal in the Mark and fact that the Rhine River was excellent for transportation to the North Sea meant that the west bank of the Rhine River in the Rhineland became the premier industrial area in Germany in the nineteenth century. Thus by 1848, the towns of Aachen, Cologne and Düsseldorf were heavily industrialized with a number of different industries represented.[73] The impact of industrialization on the Rhineland was quick and quite thorough. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, over the 90% of the population of the Rhineland was engaged in agriculture however by 1933 only 12% was still involve in agricultural occupations.[74] Accordingly in 1848, there was a large proletarian class in the Rhineland and because of the influence of Napoleonic France they were educated and politically active. While in other German states the liberal petty bourgeoisie led the uprisings of 1848, in the Rhineland the proletariat was already aserting its interests openly against the bourgeoisie as early as 1840.[75]
In 1848, Prussia controlled the Rhineland as part of "West Prussia." Prussian holdings in the Rhineland had first been acquired in 1614.[76] During the Napoleonic Era, as noted above, the Rhineland west of the Rhine River was incorporated into France and feudal structures were crushed. However, following the defeat of Napoleon in 1814, the west bank of the Rhineland was given over to Prussia. Prussia treated the Rhinelanders as subjugated and alien peoples and began to reinstate the hated feudal structures again.[77] Accordingly, much of the revolutionary impulse in the Rhineland in 1848 was colored by a strong anti-Prussian feeling. However, as Prussians the Rhinelanders took careful note of the announcement by King Frederick William IV on March 18, 1848 in Berlin that a United Diet would be formed and that other democratic reforms would be instituted.[78] Elections for the United Diet were indirect. Electors were elected by universal male suffrage and it was these electors that would choose the members of the United Diet. The Rhinelanders remained hopeful regarding this progress and did not participate in the early round of uprisings that were occurring in other parts of Germany.
The Prussian government mistaked this quietude in the Rhineland for loyalty to the autocratic Prussian government. The Prussian government began offering military assistance to other states in suppressing the revolts in their territories and cities, i.e. Dresden, the Palatinate, Baden, Wűrttemberg, Franconia, etc. Soon however, the Prussians discovered that they needed additional troops in this effort. Presuming on the loyalty of the Rhineland, in the spring of 1849, the Prussian government called up a large portion of the army reserve—the Landwehr in Westphalia and the Rhineland.[75] This cause a reaction in the Rhineland, because the order to call up the Landwehr affected all males under the age of 40 year and because the call up was to be done only in time of war and to order the call up in peacetime was illegal.[79] The Prussian King also dissolved the Second Chamber of the United Diet because on March 27, 1849 that chamber passed a version of the Constitution which the King disliked.[80] The entire citizenry of the Rhineland, including the petty bourgeoisie, the bigger bourgeoisie and the proletariat, rose up to protect the political reforms that they felt were slipping away.[75]
On May 9, 1849, uprisings occurred in the Rhenish towns of Elberfeld, Düsseldorf, Iserlohn and Solingen. However, the uprising that broke out in Düsseldorf was suppressed the following day on May 10, 1849. In the town of Elberfeld, the uprising showed strength and endurance as 15,000 workers took to the streets and erected barricades and confronted the Prussian troops that were sent to suppress the unrest and to collect quota of Landwehr conscripts from the town.[81] In the end only about 40 conscripts for the Landwehr were collected in the town of Elberfeld.[82] A Committee of Public Safety was formed in Elberfeld to organize the citizens who were now in revolt. Members of the Committee of Public Safety included Karl Nickolaus Riotte, a democrat and a lawyer in Elberfeld; Ernst Hermann Höchster another lawyer and democrat, who became chairman of the Committee, and even Alexis Heintzmann, a lawyer and a liberal who was also the public prosecutor in Elberfeld.[83] Members of the Palatinate provisional government included Nikolaus Schmitt, serving as Minister of the Interior, and Theodor Ludwig Greiner. Karl Hecker, Franz Heinrch Zitz and Ludwig Blenker were among the other of the leaders of the Elberfeld uprising.[84] The members of the Committee for Public Safety could not agree on a common plan, let alone control the various groups that were participating in the uprising. The now awakened working classes were pursuing their goals with single minded determination. However, citizen-military forces sprung up to support the uprising. Military leaders of these military forces included August Willich and Feliks Trociński and Captain Christian Zinn On May 17 through 18, 1849, a group of workers and democrats from Trier and neighboring townships stormed the arsenal at Prüm to obtain arms for the insurgents of the uprising.[85] Workers from Solingen stormed the arsenal at Gräfrath and obtained arms and cartidges for the insurgents. (As noted above under the heading on "The Palatinate" Frederick Engels played a role in the uprising in Elberfeld from May 11, 1849 until the end of the revolt. On May 10, 1849, he was in Solingen and making his way toward Elberfeld. Along the way. Engels carried two cases of cartridges that had been obtained from the arsenal at Gräfrath.)
The sight of working classes carrying out these military actions scared the big bourgeoisie.[86] They began to separate themselves from the whole movement for constitutional reform and the Elberfeld Committee of Public Safety. They began to label Karl Hecker, Ernst Höchster, Karl Riotte and even public prosecutor, Alexis Heintzmann as bloodthirsty terrorists.[87] In actuality, these members of the Committed of Public Safety, as members of the petty bourgeoisie were starting vacillate. Rather than seeking to organize and direct the various factions of the protest activity, the Committee of Public Safety began to disassociate itself from the revolutionary movement and especially those actions that were destructive of property. The whole goal of the Committee of Public Safety became one of trying to calm the reformist movement and quell the demonstrations.[87]
In Bavaria, King Ludwig I lost prestige because of his support for his favourite mistress Lola Montez, a dancer and actor unacceptable to the aristocracy or the Church.[88] She tried to launch liberal reforms using a Protestant prime minister, which outraged the Catholic conservatives of Bavaria. On February 9, the conservative public of Bavaria came out onto the streets in protest. This conservative protest on February 9, 1848 was the first demonstration in that revolutionary year of 1848. However this was an exception among the wave of liberal protests in 1848. The conservatives merely wanted rid of Lola Montez. They had no political agenda or demands for change. Nonetheless, liberal students took advantage of the Lola Montez affair to stress their demands for political change.[88] All over Bavaria, students started demonstrating for constitutional reform, just as students were doing in as in cities all over Germany. Ludwig tried to institute a few minor reforms but they proved insufficient to quell the storm of protests and on March 16, 1848, Ludwig I abdicated in favor of his eldest son Maximilian II.[88] Ludwig complained that "Govern I could no longer, and to give up an underwriter I did not wish. In order not to become a slave, I became a lord." Ludwig was the only German prince forced to abdicate in the 1848 revolutions. Although some popular reforms were introduced, the government regained full control.[89]
While technically Greater Poland was not a German state, the roughly corresponding territory of the Grand Duchy of Posen was under Prussian control since the First and Second Partition of Poland in the late 18th century. The Greater Poland Uprising of 1848, also known as the Poznań (German: Posen) Uprising was an unsuccessful military insurrection of Polish troops under Ludwik Mierosławski against the Prussian forces that begun on 20 March 1848. As a result the Greater Polish region was incorporated as the Prussian Province of Posen.
In Heidelberg, in the state of Baden (southwest Germany), on March 6, 1848, a group of German liberals began to make plans for an election to a German national assembly. This prototype Parliament met on March 31, in Frankfurt's St. Paul's Church. Its members called for free elections to an assembly for all of Germany - and the German states agreed.
Finally, on May 18, 1848 the National Assembly opened its session in St. Paul's Church. Of the 586 delegates of the first freely elected German parliament, so many were professors (94), teachers (30) or had a university education (233) that it was called a "professors' parliament" ("Professorenparlament").
There were few practical politicians. Some 400 delegates can be identified in terms of political factions - usually named after their meeting places:
Under the chairmanship of the liberal politician Heinrich von Gagern, the assembly started on its ambitious plan to create a modern constitution as the foundation for a unified Germany.
From the beginning the main problems were regionalism, support of local issues over pan-German issues, and Austro-Prussian conflicts. Archduke Johann of Austria was chosen as a temporary head of state ("Reichsverweser" i.e. imperial vicar). This was an attempt to create a provisional executive power, but it did not get very far since most states failed to fully recognize the new government. The National Assembly lost reputation in the eyes of the German public when Prussia carried through its own political intentions in the Schleswig-Holstein question without the prior consent of Parliament. A similar discrediting occurred when Austria suppressed a popular uprising in Vienna by military force.
Nonetheless, discussions on the future constitution had started. The main questions to be decided were:
Soon events began to overtake discussions. Delegate Robert Blum had been sent to Vienna by his left-wing political colleagues on a fact-finding mission to see how Austria's government was rolling back liberal achievements by military force. Blum participated in the street fighting, was arrested and executed on November 9, despite his claim to immunity from prosecution as a member of the National Assembly.
Although the achievements of the March Revolution were rolled back in many German states, the discussions in Frankfurt continued, increasingly losing touch with society.
In December 1848 the "Basic Rights for the German People" proclaimed equal rights for all citizens before the law. On March 28, 1849, the draft of the Paulskirchenverfassung constitution was finally passed. The new Germany was to be a constitutional monarchy, and the office of head of state ("Emperor of the Germans") was to be hereditary and held by the respective King of Prussia. The latter proposal was carried by a mere 290 votes in favour, with 248 abstentions. The constitution was recognized by 29 smaller states but not by Austria, Prussia, Bavaria, Hanover and Saxony.
By late 1848, the Prussian aristocrats including Otto von Bismarck and generals had regained power in Berlin. They had not been defeated permanently during the incidents of March, but had only retreated temporarily. General von Wrangel led the troops who recaptured Berlin for the old powers, and King Frederick William IV of Prussia immediately rejoined the old forces. In November, the king dissolved the new Prussian parliament and put forth a constitution of his own which was based upon the work of the assembly, yet maintaining the ultimate authority of the king. Elaborated in the following years, the constitution came to provide for an upper house (Herrenhaus), and a lower house (Landtag), chosen by universal suffrage but under a three-class system of voting ("Dreiklassenwahlrecht"): representation was proportional to taxes paid, so that more than 80% of the electorate controlled only one-third of the seats.
On April 2, 1849, a delegation of the National Assembly met with King Frederick William IV in Berlin and offered him the crown of the Emperor under this new constitution.
Frederick William told the delegation that he felt honoured but could only accept the crown with the consent of his peers, the other sovereign monarchs and free cities. But later, in a letter to a relative in England, he wrote that he felt deeply insulted by being offered "from the gutter" a crown, "disgraced by the stink of revolution, defiled with dirt and mud."
Austria and Prussia withdrew their delegates from the Assembly, which was little more than a debating club. The radical members were forced to go to Stuttgart, where they sat from June 6–18 as a rump parliament until it too was dispersed by Württemberg troops. Armed uprisings in support of the constitution, especially in Saxony, the Palatinate and Baden were short-lived, as the local military, aided by Prussian troops, crushed them quickly. Leaders and participants, if caught, were executed or sentenced to long prison terms.
The achievements of the revolutionaries of March 1848 were reversed in all of the German states and by 1851, the Basic Rights had also been abolished nearly everywhere. In the end, the revolution fizzled because of the divisions between the various factions in Frankfurt, the calculating caution of the liberals, the failure of the left to martial popular support and the overwhelming superiority of the monarchist forces.
Many disappointed German patriots went to the United States, among them most notably Carl Schurz, Franz Sigel and Friedrich Hecker. Such emigrants became known as the Forty-Eighters.
The Revolution of 1848 failed in its attempt to unify the German speaking states into a single nation because the Frankfurt Assembly (officially the All-German National Assembly) as an elected body, reflected the many different interests of the German ruling classes and it was difficult, if not impossible to form coalitions in order to push for specific goals. The first conflict arose over the aim of the assembly. The moderate liberals wanted to draw up a document that would be presented to the monarchs as a constitution, whereas the small radical group of members wanted the assembly to declare itself a law-giving parliament. With such a fundamental division within the assembly it was not possible to take any definitive action toward unification or the introduction of democratic rules, and so the assembly became little more than a debating society. While the French revolution could draw on a nation state, the democratic and liberal forces in Germany of 1848 were confronted with the need to build a nation state and a constitutional state at once, which overstrained them.[1] When the Frankfurt Assembly first opened on May 18, 1848, the deputies elected Heinrich von Gagern as the first President of the Assembly. Gagern had strong support from the Center-Right Unionist party and had some influence with some of the moderates of the left, such that he could control perhaps 250 of the deputies of the Frankfurt Assembly.[90] Gagern was a strong supporter of unification of all the German states into a single nation. He insisted however that progress towards unity could only be achieved with the agreement of the monarchs, all of whom were died in the wool reactionaries. Only the Kingdom of Prussia had the military force necessary to effect this unification. Many in the Frankfurt National Assembly, including Gagern, were distrustful of the motives of the Prussian state and their absolutist government. The moderate liberals, fearful of losing their positions as servants of the monarchs whom they wished to convince of the need for reforms, quickly came to the conclusion that only negotiations would lead to some form of political progress. Their caution later turned into a self-fulfilling prophecy when the Prussian army ignored the demands for reforms of any kind and chased the rump assembly out of Frankfurt in 1849.
The Frankfurt Assembly had no powers to raise taxes and relied completely on the goodwill of the monarchs. As many of the members held influential positions in provincial governments, their reluctance to call for radical reforms or annoy their employers in any way meant that it was never possible for the assembly to raise the funds necessary for raising an army or even to enforce any laws that were passed. Dominated by the moderate liberals, there was no chance that a more militant mood would take over and the hundred or so radicals, who believed that an armed uprising was necessary if the old powers were to be defeated, lost interest and left the assembly to try and raise forces at a local level to bring about a 'real' revolution. Without a bureaucracy they could not raise any money and without any money they could not raise a bureaucracy. The assembly started strongly with a great deal of motivation to get things done. This impetus was soon dissipated, however, as the various major divides between the various factions of the Frankfurt Assembly came to the fore—advocates of Grossdeutschland versus advocates of Kleindeutschland, Catholics versus Protestants, supporters of Austria versus supporters of Prussia. As various issues arose before the Frankfurt Assembly, the splits between the various factions became evident. The major conflict that later caused the collapse of the whole assembly was the demands from the left that the assembly declare its sovereign rights and write a democratic constitution, while the cautious liberals believed until the end that negotiations with the reactionary monarchs could lead to some small reforms. The various interest groups began to gather in local meeting places in order to decide on tactics in the assembly, ranging from royalist conservatives to radicals, these were not in a position to formulate coherent policies and membership was at best tenuous.
Meanwhile, outside the Frankfurt Assembly, the rulers of the German states gradually realised that their positions were no longer under threat. The King of Bavaria had stepped down, it was true, but that was only partly the result of pressure from below. As the threat of an armed uprising receded it was clear that German unification was a dead letter. The princes were unwilling to give up any power in the pursuit of unification of the whole country. Some princes were so firmly opposed to the Frankfurt Assembly that they had only tolerated its existence while they quelled rebellions in their respective territories. As soon as they had crushed the rebels, they followed the example of Prussia, recalling their deputies from the Assembly. Only Prussia, with its overwhelming military might, was able to overcome the objections of local princes to the unification of Germany and protect the Frankfurt Assembly from military attack by the princes. But Prussia's motives with regard to the very existence of the Frankfurt National Assembly were always questionable at best.
There were few things on which the deputies of the Frankfurt National Assembly could agree to act. One measure of the Assembly that was significant for the future of Germany was the founding of the Reichsflotte, the German Navy, on June 14, 1848.
The powerlessness of the Frankfurt Assembly, however, was reflected in the debate over the Danish Conflict of 1848. Like many other events of 1848, the Danish conflict was sparked by a street demonstration. On March 21, 1848, the people of Copenhagen poured out into the streets to demand a liberal Constitution.[91] The majority in the Danish province of Holstein and in the southern part of the province of Schleswig was German-speaking. The citizens of the city of Kiel located in the Danish province of Holstein, where a majority of the population spoke German, were unsure of what was occurring in Copenhagen and revolted themselves to establish a separate and autonomous province with closer relations with the German states. On March 24, 1848, they set up a new provisional, autonomous government in Holstein and raised a Schleswig-Holstein army of 7,000 soldiers. The broad range of national/unification opinion in the German states supported joining both provinces of Schleswig and Holstein to a new unified state of Germany. Prussia sent an army in support of the independence movement in Schleswig and Holstein. Prussia ignored the Frankfurt National assembly altogether when Great Britain and Russia applied international pressure to end the war. The Prussians signed a peace reached at Malmo which required the removal of all Prussian troops from the two duchies and agreed to all other Danish demands.[92] The Treaty of Malmo was greeted with extreme public consternation in Germany, as reflected in the debate over the treaty in Frankfurt National Assembly. Because the Frankfurt National Assembly had no army of its own, it could do nothing about the unilateral actions on the part of Prussia. On September 16, 1848, the Frankfurt National Assembly approved of the Malmo Treaty by a majority vote.[93] Public support for the National Assembly declined sharply following the vote on the Malmo Treaty. Indeed, the Radical Republicans came out in opposition to the Assembly itself as a result of the vote on the Malmo Treaty.[92]
After many diversions, the Frankfurt National Assembly was finally able to take up the issue of a German constitution. In October 1848, King Frederick William IV of Prussia unilaterally issued a monarchist constitution.[94] Under this new monarchist Constitution a Prussian Assembly was established.[95] The Assembly was a bicameral legislature, consisting of a Herrenhaus (House of Lords) or upper house, whose members were selected by the provincial governments, and a Landtag (Country Diet) whose members were elected by male suffrage but were seated only through a complicated system of electoral committees.[95] Otto von Bismarck was elected to this first Landtag.[95] The Landtag was an attempt to directly undercut the authority of the Frankfurt National Assembly. In an attempt to regain some authority, the Frankfurt Assembly dispatched a delegation to offer King Frederick William IV the crown of German emperor in April 1849.[94] King Frederick William, however, turned down the offer, because he would accept a crown only by the grace of God, not "from the gutter".
The Frankfurt National Assembly came into existence partly because of events that had begun in Vienna, Austria, which resulted in the fall of Prince Metternich from power. The support for the Assembly came mainly from the southern provinces, where there was a tradition of opposition to the local tyrants. After Austria had crushed the Italian revolts of 1848/1849, the Habsburgs were ready to turn their attention back to Germany. Unable to muster an army and lacking support from the German states, the Assembly could not resist Austrian power. The Frankfurt National Assembly was dissolved on May 31, 1849.
<ref> tag; no text was provided for refs named Winkler; see Help:Cite errors/Cite error references no text
|
|||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||