German revolutions of 1848–1849
The German revolutions of 1848–1849 (German: Deutsche Revolution 1848/1849), the opening phase of which was also called the March Revolution (German: Märzrevolution), were initially part of the Revolutions of 1848 that broke out in many European countries. They 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, demonstrated 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 after its dismantlement as a result of the Napoleonic Wars. This process began in the mid-1840s.
For other revolutions in Germany, see German revolution (disambiguation).The middle-class elements were committed to liberal principles, while the working class sought radical improvements to their working and living conditions. As the middle class and working class components of the Revolution split, the conservative aristocracy defeated it. Liberals were forced into exile to escape political persecution, where they became known as Forty-Eighters. Many emigrated to the United States, settling from Wisconsin to Texas.
Events leading up to the revolutions[edit]
The groundwork of the 1848 uprising was laid as early as the Hambacher Fest of 1832, when public unrest began to grow in the face of heavy taxation and political censorship. The Hambacher Fest is also noteworthy for the Republicans adopting the black-red-gold colours used on today's national flag of Germany as a symbol of the Republican movement and of the unity among the German-speaking people.
Activism for liberal reforms spread through many of the German states, each of which had distinct revolutions. They were also inspired by the street demonstrations of workers and artisans led in Paris, France, from 22 February through 24, 1848, which resulted in the abdication of King Louis-Philippe of France and his exile in Britain.[1] In France the revolution of 1848 became known as the February Revolution.
The revolutions spread from France across Europe; they erupted soon thereafter in Austria and Germany, beginning with the large demonstrations on 13 March 1848, in Vienna. This resulted in the resignation of Prince von Metternich as chief minister to Emperor Ferdinand I of Austria, and his going into exile in Britain.[1] Because of the date of the Vienna demonstrations, the revolutions in Germany are usually called the March Revolution (German: Märzrevolution).
Fearing the fate of Louis-Philippe, 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 parliament.
Bavaria[edit]
In Bavaria, King Ludwig I lost prestige because of his open relationship with his favourite mistress Lola Montez, a dancer and actress unacceptable to the aristocracy and the Church.[12] She tried to launch liberal reforms through a Protestant prime minister, which outraged the state's Catholic conservatives. On 9 February, conservatives came out onto the streets in protest. This 9 February 1848, demonstration was the first in that revolutionary year. It was an exception among the wave of liberal protests. The conservatives wanted to be rid of Lola Montez, and had no other political agenda. Liberal students took advantage of the Lola Montez affair to stress their demands for political change.[12] All over Bavaria, students started demonstrating for constitutional reform, just as students were doing in other cities.
Ludwig tried to institute a few minor reforms but they proved insufficient to quell the storm of protests. On 16 March 1848, Ludwig I abdicated in favor of his eldest son Maximilian II.[12] Ludwig complained that "I could not rule any longer, and I did not want to give up my powers. In order to not become a slave, I became a lord." Although some popular reforms were introduced, the government regained full control.[71]
In Heidelberg, in the Grand Duchy of Baden, on 6 March 1848, a group of German liberals began to make plans for an election to a German national assembly. This provisional Parliament met on 31 March, 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 18 May 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 John of Austria was chosen as a temporary head of state ("Reichsverweser"). 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 9 November, 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 events.
In December 1848 the "Basic Rights for the German People" proclaimed equal rights for all citizens before the law. On 28 March 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.
Backlash in Prussia[edit]
By late 1848, the Prussian aristocrats 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 Prussian National Assembly and put forth a constitution of his own which was based upon the work of the Assembly yet maintained the ultimate authority of the king. Revised in 1850 and amended frequently in the following years, the constitution provided for an appointed upper house, the House of Lords, and a lower house, the House of Representatives, elected by universal manhood 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. Otto von Bismarck was a member of the first Landtag elected under the new constitution.
On 2 April 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 a crown "from the gutter", "disgraced by the stink of revolution, defiled with dirt and mud".
Austria and Prussia withdrew their delegates from the Assembly, which was now little more than a debating club. The radical members were forced to go to Stuttgart, where they sat from 6–18 June 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 militaries, 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 marshal popular support and the overwhelming superiority of the monarchist forces.
Many disappointed German patriots went to the United States,[72] among them most notably Carl Schurz, Franz Sigel and Friedrich Hecker. Such emigrants became known as the Forty-Eighters.
Failure of the revolution[edit]
The Revolution of 1848 failed in its attempt to unify the German-speaking states because the Frankfurt Assembly reflected the many different interests of the German ruling classes. Its members were unable to form coalitions and push for specific goals. The first conflict arose over the goals of the assembly. The moderate liberals wanted to draft a constitution to present to the monarchs, whereas the smaller group of radical members wanted the assembly to declare itself as a law-giving parliament. They were unable to overcome this fundamental division, and did not take any definitive action toward unification or the introduction of democratic rules. The assembly declined into debate. While the French revolution drew on an existing nation state, the democratic and liberal forces in Germany of 1848 were confronted with the need to build a nation state and a constitution at the same time, which overtaxed them.[73]
When the Frankfurt Assembly opened on 18 May 1848, the deputies elected Heinrich von Gagern as the first President of the Assembly. He had strong support from the Center-Right Unionist party and some influence with moderates of the left, such that he could control perhaps 250 of the deputies of the Frankfurt Assembly.[74] Gagern strongly supported unification of the German states. He insisted, however, that the Assembly needed to gain agreement of the monarchs, who were highly reactionary. In addition, only the Kingdom of Prussia had the military force necessary to effect this unification. Many in the Assembly, including Gagern, distrusted the intentions of the Prussian state and its absolutist government. Fearful of losing their positions as servants of the monarchs, the moderate liberals quickly concluded that only negotiations would lead to political progress. The Prussian army ignored the demands for reforms 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 provincial positions, their reluctance to call for radical reforms or annoy their employers meant that they could not raise funds for armed forces, nor enforce laws they might pass. The hundred or so radicals, who believed that an armed uprising was necessary, lost interest and left the assembly to try to raise forces at a local level to bring about a 'real' revolution. Without a bureaucracy, they could not raise any money.
The Assembly members were highly motivated for reform, but the major divides among them became obvious and inhibited progress; for instance, advocates of Großdeutschland versus advocates of Kleindeutschland, Catholics versus Protestants, supporters of Austria versus supporters of Prussia. The major conflict that caused the collapse of the Assembly was the stand-off between demands of the moderates to write a democratic constitution and liberals' reliance on negotiation with reactionary monarchs to produce reforms. The various interest groups began to gather outside the Assembly to decide on their tactics.
Meanwhile, the rulers of the German states gradually realised that their positions were no longer under threat. The King of Bavaria had stepped down, but that was only partly the result of pressure from below. As the threat of an armed uprising receded, the monarchs realized unification would not be realized. They were unwilling to give up any power in its pursuit. As princes quelled rebellions in their territories, they followed the example of Prussia, recalling their elected deputies from the Assembly. Only Prussia, with its overwhelming military might, was able to protect the Frankfurt Assembly from military attack by the princes. But Prussia had its own interests in mind.
The Frankfurt National Assembly did agree to found the Reichsflotte, the German Navy, on 14 June 1848, which was significant to Germany's future power and reach.
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 21 March 1848, the people of Copenhagen protested in the streets to demand a liberal Constitution.[75] The majority in the Duchy of Holstein and in the southern part of the Duchy of Schleswig were German-speaking. However, the Duke of both duchies was King Frederick VII of Denmark, the last absolute monarch of Denmark. The citizens of Kiel and Holstein were unsure of what was occurring in Copenhagen. They revolted to found a separate and autonomous province with closer relations with the German states. On 24 March 1848, they set up a new provisional, autonomous government in Holstein and raised a Schleswig-Holstein army of 7,000 soldiers. Unification opinion in the German states supported annexing the provinces of Schleswig and Holstein.
Prussia sent an army to support this independence movement, and ignored the Frankfurt National Assembly when Great Britain and Russia applied international pressure to end the war. The Prussians signed a peace at Malmö, requiring them to remove all Prussian troops from the two duchies and agree to all other Danish demands.[76] The Armistice of Malmö was greeted with great consternation in Germany, and debated in the Assembly, but it was powerless to control Prussia. On 16 September 1848, the Frankfurt National Assembly approved of the Malmö Treaty by a majority vote.[77] Public support for the National Assembly declined sharply following this vote, and the radical republicans publicly stated their opposition to the Assembly.[76]
The Frankfurt National Assembly had been founded partly following the revolutionary events in Vienna, Austria, which resulted in the fall of Prince Metternich. Its strongest support came from the southern provinces, where there was a tradition of opposition to the local rulers. After Austria crushed the Revolutions of 1848 in the Italian states, the Habsburgs were ready to deal with the German states. Unable to muster an army and lacking broader support, the Assembly could not resist Austrian power. The Frankfurt National Assembly was dissolved on 31 May 1849.
Peasant success of the revolution[edit]
Nationalism did not become the usual way of founding and legitimising states across Europe until after World War I. In the mid-19th century, over 90% of the population in the Austrian Empire and the German Confederation were peasants. Most of them suffered the indignity of serfdom or some lingering elements of the system of forced labor. Peasant revolts in 1848–1849 involved more participants than the national revolutions of the period. Most importantly, they were successful bringing the final abolition of serfdom or its remnants across the German Confederation, the Austrian Empire and Prussia.[78] The leader of the anti-serfdom peasant movement was Hans Kudlich, subsequently revered as Bauernbefreier ('liberator of peasants').[79][80][81][82]