Prussia withdraws from the "Bund."

On the day after the signature of the treaty the Prussian project of

reform was presented to the federal diet. It was, however, no more than

a bid for the support of public opinion on the part of Bismarck; for

even while it was under discussion an angry correspondence was being

carried on between Berlin and Vienna on the question of armaments, and

by the beginning of May both powers were making undisguised preparations

for war. On the 21st of April, the very day when the discussion of the

Prussian proposals began in the diet, Austria, alarmed at a threatened

attack by Garibaldi on Venetia, began to mobilize in defiance of an

agreement just arrived at with Prussia. Five days later, in spite of

this, she sent an ultimatum to Berlin, demanding the continuance of the

Prussian disarmament and an immediate settlement of the

Schleswig-Holstein question. The supreme issue was, however, delayed for

a few weeks by the intervention of Napoleon, who, urged on by the loud

alarm of the French people at the prospective aggrandizement of Prussia,

attempted to detach Italy from the Prussian alliance by persuading

Austria to a cession of Venetia. The negotiations broke down on the

refusal of Italy to throw over her ally, and Napoleon's proposal of a

European congress, to reconsider the whole settlement under the treaties

of 1815, proved equally abortive. Meanwhile the preparations for war had

been continued, and on the 1st of June Austria flung down the gage by

declaring her intention of submitting the whole question of the duchies

to the federal diet and of summoning a meeting of the Holstein estates.

This was denounced by Bismarck in a circular note to the powers as a

breach of the convention of Gastein and of the treaty of January 16,

1864, by which Austria and Prussia had agreed to govern the duchies in

common. At the same time he handed in the formal protest of Prussia to

the federal diet. Prussia, he said, would only recognize the right of a

reformed federal power to settle the Schleswig-Holstein question, and

this power must be based on a German parliament, which alone could

guarantee Prussia that any sacrifices she might make would be for the

good of Germany and not of the dynasties. The Prussian plan of reform

laid before the diet included the exclusion of Austria from the

Confederation; the creation of a federal navy; the division of the

supreme command of the army between Prussia and Bavaria; a parliament

elected by manhood suffrage; the regulation of the relations between the

Confederation and Austria by a special treaty. In the event of the

actual constitution of the Bund being shattered by war, the German

states were asked whether they would be prepared to join this new

organization. On the 9th of June Prussian troops had already marched

into Holstein, the Austrians, with Duke Frederick, falling back on

Altona. On the 14th the Prussian scheme of reform was laid before the

diet, together with Austria's counter-proposal for a decree of federal

execution against Prussia. In the event of the rejection of Prussia's

motion, Bismarck had made it clear that Prussia would withdraw from the

Confederation, and that in the event of her being victorious in the

ensuing war those states of northern Germany that voted against her

would cease to exist. In spite of this, the Austrian motion was carried

by nine votes to six. The Prussian delegate at once withdrew from the

diet, and on the following day (June 15) the Prussian troops advanced

over the Saxon frontier.

Austro-Prussian War of 1866.

Treaty of Prague, August 23.

Aggrandizement of Prussia.

The war that followed, conveniently called the Seven Weeks' War (q.v.),

culminated before a month had passed, on the 3rd of July, in the

crushing Prussian victory of Koniggratz. The rapidity and overwhelming

character of the Prussian success ensured the triumph of Bismarck's

policy. The intervention which Napoleon had planned resolved itself into

diplomatic _pourparlers_ of which the result was wholly insignificant;

and even before the war was ended Bismarck was preparing for an

understanding with Austria and with the South German states that should

minimize the risk of a French attack. By the preliminary treaty of peace

signed at Nikolsburg on the 26th of July the great objects for which

Prussia had fought were fully secured. By Article I. the integrity of

the Austrian monarchy was preserved, with the exception of

Lombardo-Venetia; by Article II. Austria consented to "a new

organization of Germany without the participation of the empire of

Austria," consented to "the closer union" to be founded by the king of

Prussia to the north of the Main, and to the German states south of the

Main entering into a union, the national relations of which with the

North German Confederation were to be "the subject of an ulterior

agreement between the two parties"; by Article III. Austria transferred

all her rights in Schleswig and Holstein to Prussia, reserving the right

of the people of north Schleswig to be again united to Denmark should

they "express a desire to be so by a vote freely given"; by Article V.

the territory of Saxony was to remain intact. These Articles, embodying

the more important terms, were included with slight verbal alterations

in the treaty of peace signed at Prague on the 23rd of August. Separate

treaties of peace had been signed with Wurttemberg on the 13th, with

Baden on the 17th and with Bavaria on the 22nd of August; treaties with

Hesse-Darmstadt followed on the 3rd of September, with Saxe-Meiningen on

the 8th of October and with Saxony on the 21st. The other unfortunate

North German states which had sided with Austria were left to their

fate, and on the 20th of September King William issued a decree annexing

Hanover, Hesse-Cassel, Nassau and the free city of Frankfort to the

Prussian monarchy, and bringing them under the Prussian constitution.

Federal constitution.

The return of King William to his capital had been a triumphal progress;

and Bismarck had shared to the full the new-born popularity of his

master. He seized the occasion to make his peace with Liberal sentiment,

and the bill of indemnity for past ministerial breaches of the

constitution was carried in the new Prussian diet with enthusiasm. On

the 24th of February 1867 the constituent diet of the confederation,

elected by universal suffrage and the ballot, met in Berlin, and soon

accepted in its essential features the constitution submitted to it. It

was arranged that the headship of the confederation should be

hereditary, that it should belong to the king of Prussia, and that

legislative functions should be exercised by a federal council

(_Bundesrat_), representative of the various governments, and by a diet

(_Bundestag_) elected by the whole people.

National Liberals.

Customs parliament.

South German hostility to union.

Irritation of France.

The federal parliament began at once the task of consolidating the new

institutions. In the sessions of 1869 and 1870 it established a supreme

tribunal of commerce, sitting in Leipzig, and passed a new penal code.

Great as were these results, they did not satisfy the aspirations of

patriotic Germans, who, having so suddenly and so unexpectedly

approached unity, longed that the work should be completed. A party

called the National Liberals was formed, whose main object was to secure

the union of South with North Germany, and it at once entered into

peculiar relations with Bismarck, who, in spite of his native contempt

for parliaments and parliamentary government, was quite prepared to make

use of any instruments he found ready to his hand. There was, indeed,

plentiful need for some show of concession to Liberal sentiment, if a

union of hearts was to be established between the South and North

Germans. The states south of the Main had issued from the war as

sovereign and independent powers, and they seemed in no great haste to

exchange this somewhat precarious dignity either for a closer alliance

among each other or with the North German Confederation. The peoples,

too, fully shared the dislike of their rulers to the idea of a closer

union with North Germany. The democrats hated Prussia as "the land of

the corporal's stick," and Bismarck as the very incarnation of her

spirit. The Roman Catholics hated her as the land _par excellence_ of

Protestantism and free thought. Nothing but the most powerful common

interests could have drawn the dissevered halves of Germany together.

This sense of common interests it was Bismarck's study to create. An

important step was taken in 1867 by the conclusion of a treaty with the

southern states, by which it was agreed that all questions of customs

should be decided by the federal council and the federal diet, and that,

for the consideration of such questions, the southern states should send

representatives to Berlin. In reality, however, the customs parliament

(_Zollparlament_) was of little service beyond the limits of its special

activity. In the election to the customs parliament in 1868, Wurttemberg

did not return a single deputy who was favourable to the national cause;

in Bavaria the anti-nationalists had a large majority; and even in Baden

and Hesse-Darmstadt, where the opposition to Prussia was less severe, a

powerful minority of the deputies had no liking for Bismarck and his

ways. Thus the customs parliament was kept rigidly to the objects for

which it was founded, greatly to the disappointment of patriots who had

not doubted that it would become an effective instrument for the

attainment of far larger purposes. Had the completion of unity depended

wholly on internal causes, it certainly would not have been soon

achieved; but other forces, not altogether unexpectedly, came to

Bismarck's aid. France had been irritated by the enormous increase of

Prussian power, and even before the treaty of Prague was signed the

emperor Napoleon III. indicated a wish to be "compensated" with the left

bank of the Rhine. This was a claim exactly calculated to play into

Bismarck's hands. The communication of the French emperor's original

proposals to the South German governments, whose traditional policy had

been to depend on France to save them from the ambitions of the German

great powers, was enough to throw them into the arms of Prussia. The

treaties of peace between Prussia and the South German states were

accompanied by secret treaties of offensive and defensive alliance,

under which the supreme command in war was to be given to the Prussian

king. A common war against a common enemy now appeared the surest means

of welding the dissevered halves of Germany together, and for this war

Bismarck steadily prepared. There were soon plentiful signs of where

this enemy was to be sought. On the 14th of March 1867 Thiers in the

French Chamber gave voice to the indignation of France at the bungling

policy that had suffered the aggrandizement of Prussia. The reply of

Bismarck was to publish (March 19) the secret treaties with the South

German states. War was now only a question of time, and the study of

Bismarck was to bring it on at the moment most favourable to Germany,

and by a method that should throw upon France the appearance of being

the aggressor. The European situation was highly favourable. France was

hampered by the Roman question, which divided her own counsels while it

embroiled her with Italy; the Luxemburg question, arising out of her

continued demand for "compensation," had only served to isolate her

still further in Europe. French patriotic feeling, suspicious, angry and

alarmed, needed only a slight provocation to cause it to blaze up into

an uncontrollable fever for war.

The Hohenzollern candidature.

Franco-German War.

Proclamation of the German empire.

The provocation was supplied at the right moment by the candidature of

the prince of Hohenzollern for the vacant crown of Spain. To bring the

Peninsula under French influence had been for centuries the ambition of

French statesmen; it was intolerable that it should fall to a "Prussian"

prince and that France should be threatened by this new power not only

from the east but from the south. High language was used at Paris; and

the French ambassador, Count Benedetti, was instructed to demand from

the king of Prussia the withdrawal of the Hohenzollern candidature. The

demand was politely but firmly refused, and Bismarck, judging that the

moment had come for applying the match to the powder magazine,

published an "edited" version of the telegram from the king describing

the episode, a version which "without the addition of a single word"

turned the refusal into an insult. The "Ems telegram" made the

continuance of peace impossible; on the 14th of July Napoleon III.

signed the declaration of war; and on the 2nd of August the affair of

Saarbrucken opened the struggle which was to cause the downfall of the

French and the creation of the German empire (see FRANCO-GERMAN WAR). On

the 18th of January 1871, ten days before the capitulation of Paris,

William I., king of Prussia, was proclaimed German emperor in the great

hall of the palace of Versailles, on the initiative of the king of

Bavaria, the most powerful of the South German sovereigns, the

traditional ally of France. The cession of Alsace and the greater part

of Lorraine, wrested two centuries before by Louis XIV. from the Holy

Empire, was the heaviest part of the price that France had to pay for

peace (treaty of Frankfort, May 10, 1871). (W. A. P.)

The new empire, 1871.

The foundation of the empire in 1871 begins a new era in the history of

Germany. The rivalry of the dynasties to which for so long the interests

of the nation had been sacrificed now ceased. By the treaties of

Versailles the kingdoms of Bavaria and Wurttemberg, and the grand-duchy

of Baden, as well as the southern provinces of the grand-duchy of Hesse,

were added to the North German Confederation. Henceforward all the

German states that had survived the struggle of 1866, with the exception

of the empire of Austria, the grand-duchy of Luxemburg, and the

principality of Liechtenstein, were incorporated in a permanent federal

state under the leadership of Prussia. The revision in 1871 made no

important alterations in the constitution of 1867. The states retained

their autonomy except in those matters which were expressly transferred

to the imperial authorities; the princes retained their sovereignty; the

king of Prussia, though he now took the title of German emperor, was

only _primus inter pares_; he was president of the confederation, but

had no suzerainty over the other princes. None the less, from this time

the acts of the state governments and parliaments have ceased to have

more than a local importance; the history of the nation is centred in

Berlin, in the Bundesrat or federal council, in which the interests of

the individual states are represented; in the Reichstag, in which the

feelings and wishes of the nation are expressed; and above all, in the

Prussian government and imperial executive.

The empire and the states.

The new constitution has stood the test. The number of states of which

the empire consists has remained unaltered;[3] occasional disputes have

been settled harmoniously in a legal manner. The special rights reserved

to Bavaria and Wurttemberg have not proved, as was feared, a danger to

the stability of the empire. Much apprehension had been caused by the

establishment of a permanent committee for foreign affairs in the

Bundesrat, over which the Bavarian representative was to preside; but

the clause remained a dead letter. There is no record that the committee

ever met until July 1900, when it was summoned to consider the situation

in China; and on that occasion it probably formed a useful support to

the government, and helped to still apprehension lest a too adventurous

policy should be pursued. Another clause determined that in a division

in the Reichstag on any law which did not concern the whole empire, the

representatives of those states which were not concerned should not

vote. This, had it been retained, would have destroyed the coherence of

the Reichstag as representative of the whole nation. It was repealed in

1873. The permission to maintain diplomatic missions has been equally

harmless: most of the states have recalled all their diplomatic

representatives; Saxony, Bavaria and Wurttemberg have maintained only

those at Vienna, the Vatican and at St Petersburg. Bavaria has even

voluntarily adopted many imperial laws from which it was legally

exempted; for instance, the laws of settlement.

Prussia and the empire.

If the states have been loyal to the empire, the imperial government has

also respected the constitutional privileges of the states. The

harmonious working of the constitution depends on the union of policy

between the empire and Prussia, for it is the power of Prussia which

gives strength to the empire. This was practically secured by the fact

that the emperor, who is king of Prussia, appoints the chancellor, and

the chancellor is generally president of the Prussian ministry as well

as minister of foreign affairs--in his person the government of the two

is identified. For twenty years the double office was held by Bismarck,

who, supported as he was by the absolute confidence of the emperor, and

also of the allied princes, held a position greater than that ever

attained by any subject in modern Europe since the time of Richelieu.

For ten months in 1873 he, indeed, resigned the office of

minister-president to Roon; and in the same way Caprivi, during the

years 1893-1894, held the chancellorship alone; but in neither case was

the experiment successful, and Hohenlohe and Bulow adhered to the older

plan. So important is the practical co-operation of the imperial

administration and the Prussian government, that it has become customary

to appoint to seats in the Prussian ministry the more important of the

secretaries of state who administer imperial affairs under the

chancellor. Delbruck, head of the imperial chancery, had held this

position since 1868; in 1877 Bulow, secretary of state for foreign

affairs, was appointed Prussian minister, and this has become the

ordinary practice. One result of this is to diminish the control which

the Prussian parliament is able to maintain over the Prussian ministry.

In the federal council Prussian policy nearly always prevails, for

though Prussia has only seventeen votes out of fifty-eight, the smaller

states of the North nearly always support her; practically she controls

the vote of Waldeck and since 1885 those of Brunswick. A definite defeat

of Prussia on an important question of policy must bring about a serious

crisis; it is generally avoided because, as the meetings are secret, an

arrangement or compromise can be made. Bismarck, knowing that nothing

would more impede the consolidation of the empire than an outbreak of

local patriotism, always so jealous of its rights, generally used his

influence to avoid constitutional disputes, and discouraged the

discussion of questions which would require an authoritative

interpretation of the constitution. It was, however, opposition in the

Bundesrat which obliged him to abandon his scheme for imperial railways,

and when, in 1877, it was necessary to determine the seat of the new

supreme court of justice, the proposal of the government that Berlin

should be chosen was out-voted by thirty to twenty-eight in favour of

Leipzig. On this occasion Bismarck accepted the decision, but when

important interests were at stake he showed himself as ready to crush

opposition as in the older days, as in the case of Hamburg and Bremen.

The great personal qualities of the reigning emperors and the widely

extended family connexions of the house of Hohenzollern have enabled

them to hold with ease their position as leaders among the ruling

families. So far as is known, with one or two unimportant exceptions,

the other princes loyally accepted their new position. It is only as

regards the house of Brunswick that the older dynastic questions still

have some political importance.

Hanover.

The other princes who were dispossessed in 1866 have all been reconciled

to Prussia. The elector of Hesse and the duke of Nassau have formally

relinquished their claims. In 1883 the daughter of the duke of

Augustenburg, the former claimant to the duchies of Schleswig and

Holstein, married the heir to the Prussian throne, who became William

II. On the other hand, the royal family of Hanover has never ceased to

protest against the acts by which they were deprived of their dominions.

King George to the end of his days, whether in Austria or in France,

still regarded himself as in a state of war with Prussia. As he had used

his large personal property to organize a regiment in order to regain

his possessions, the Prussian government had sequestrated that part of

his income, amounting to some L50,000, over which they had control, and

used it as secret service money chiefly for controlling the press; to

this fund the name "Welfen-Fond" was commonly given. After 1870 the

Hanoverian regiment was disbanded, but the sequestration continued. The

death of the old king in 1878 made no difference, for his son in a

letter to the king of Prussia announced that he assumed and maintained

all his father's rights, and that he did not recognize the legal

validity of the acts by which he was, as a matter of fact, prevented

from enjoying them. His protest was supported by a considerable number

of his former subjects, who formed a party in the Reichstag. The

marriage of the duke of Cumberland (the title by which the king called

himself till he could come into his possessions) with Princess Thyra of

Denmark in the same year was made the occasion of a great demonstration,

at which a deputation of the Hanoverian nobility assured the duke of

their continued attachment to his house.

After Bismarck's retirement the emperor attempted to bring about a

reconciliation with the duke and the Hanoverians. His attention had been

drawn to the bad moral effect of the use to which the Welfen-Fond was

applied, and on the duke of Cumberland writing him a letter, in which,

while maintaining his claims to the throne of Hanover, he recognized the

empire and undertook not to support any enterprise against the empire or

Prussia, with the consent of the Prussian parliament the sequestration

of his property was removed. The attitude of passive resistance is,

however, still maintained, and has affected the position of the duchy of

Brunswick.

Duchy of Brunswick.

Waldeck.

In 1884 William, duke of Brunswick, died after a reign of fifty-four

years. The younger son of the duke who fell at Quatre Bras, he had been

called to the throne in 1831 to take the place of his elder brother

Charles, who had been deposed. Duke Charles had died at Geneva in 1873,

and as both brothers were childless the succession went to the duke of

Cumberland as head of the younger branch of the house of

Brunswick-Luneburg. Duke William before his death had arranged that the

government should be carried on by a council of regency so long as the

heir was prevented from actually assuming the government; at the end of

a year a regent was to be chosen from among the non-reigning German

princes. He hoped in this way to save his duchy, the last remnant of the

dominions of his house, from being annexed by Prussia. As soon as he

died the town was occupied by the Prussian troops already stationed

therein; the duke of Cumberland published a patent proclaiming his

succession; the council of state, however, declared, in agreement with

the Bundesrat, that the relations in which he stood to the kingdom of

Prussia were inconsistent with the alliances on which the empire was

based, and that therefore he could not assume the government. The claim

of the duke of Cambridge as the only male heir of full age was referred

to the Bundesrat, but the duke refused to bring it before that body, and

after a year the Brunswick government elected as regent Prince Albert of

Hohenzollern, to hold office so long as the true heir was prevented from

entering on his rights. On the death of Prince Albert in September 1906,

the Brunswick diet petitioned the Bundesrat to allow the youngest son of

the duke of Cumberland to succeed to the duchy on renouncing his

personal claims to the crown of Hanover. This was refused, and on the

28th of May 1907 Duke John Albert of Mecklenburg-Schwerin was elected

regent by the diet. Under the regency of Prince Albert, Brunswick, which

had hitherto steadily opposed all attempts to assimilate and subordinate

its institutions to those of Prussia, though it retained formal

independence, was brought into very close dependence upon Prussia, as is

the case with all the other northern states. In them the armies are

incorporated in the Prussian army; the railways are generally merged in

the Prussian system; indirect taxation, post office, and nearly the

whole of the judicial arrangements are imperial. None, however, has yet

imitated the prince of Waldeck, who in 1867, at the wish of his own

subjects, transferred the administration of his principality to Prussia.

The local estates still meet, and the principality still forms a

separate administrative district, but it is managed by a director

appointed by Prussia. The chief reason for this act was that the state

could not meet the obligations laid upon it under the new system, and

the responsibility for any deficit now rests with Prussia.

Lippe.

A curious difficulty, a relic of an older state of society, arose in the

principality of Lippe, in consequence of the extinction of the elder

ruling line and a dispute as to the succession (see LIPPE). Some

political importance attached to the case, for it was not impossible

that similar difficulties might occur elsewhere, and the open support

given by the emperor to the prince of Schaumburg-Lippe, who had married

his sister, caused apprehension of Prussian aggression.

The Mecklenburg constitution.

A much more serious question of principle arose from the peculiar

circumstances of Mecklenburg. The grand-duchies, which, though divided

between two lines of the ducal house, had a common constitution, were

the only state in Germany in which the parliament still took the form of

a meeting of the estates--the nobility and the cities--and had not been

altered by a written constitution. Repeated attempts of the grand-dukes

to bring about a reform were stopped by the opposition of the

Ritterschaft. Buffing, one of the Mecklenburg representatives in the

Reichstag, therefore proposed to add to the imperial constitution a

clause that in every state of the confederation there should be a

parliamentary assembly. This was supported by all the Liberal party and

carried repeatedly; of course it was rejected by the Bundesrat, for it

would have established the principle that the constitution of each state

could be revised by the imperial authorities, which would have

completely destroyed their independence. It is noticeable that in 1894

when this motion was introduced it was lost; a striking instance of the

decay of Liberalism.

Public affairs: political parties.

The public political history of Germany naturally centres around the

debates in the Reichstag, and also those in the Prussian parliament. In

the Prussian parliament are discussed questions of education, local

government, religion and direct taxation, and though of course it is

only concerned with Prussian affairs, Prussia is so large a part of

Germany that its decisions have a national importance. A very large

number of the members of the Reichstag and of the Prussian parliament

sit in both, and the parties in the two are nearly identical. In fact,

the political parties in the Reichstag are generally directly descended

from the older Prussian parties.

Conservatives.

The first place belongs to the Conservatives, who for twenty years had

been the support of the Prussian government. The party of the feudal

aristocracy in North Germany, they were strongest in the agricultural

districts east of the Elbe; predominantly Prussian in origin and in

feeling, they had great influence at court and in the army, and desired

to maintain the influence of the orthodox Lutheran Church. To them

Bismarck had originally belonged, but the estrangement begun in 1866

constantly increased for the next ten years. A considerable number of

the party had, however, seceded in 1867 and formed a new union, to which

was given the name of the _Deutsche Reichspartei_ (in the Prussian House

they were called the _Frei Conservativen_). These did not include any

prominent parliamentary leaders, but many of the most important

ministers and officials, including Moltke and some of the great nobles.

They were essentially a government party, and took no part in the

attacks on Bismarck, which came from the more extreme Conservatives, the

party of the _Kreuzzeitung_.

National Liberals.

The events of 1866 had brought about a similar division among the

Progressives. A large section, including the most important leaders,

determined to support Bismarck in his national policy and to subordinate

to this, though not to surrender, the struggle after constitutional

development. Under the name of _National-Liberal-Partei_ they became in

numbers as in ability the strongest party both in Prussia and the

empire. Essentially a German, not a Prussian, party, they were joined by

the Nationalists from the annexed provinces of Hanover and Hesse; in

1871 they were greatly strengthened by the addition of the National

representatives from the southern states; out of fourteen

representatives from Baden twelve belonged to them, seventeen out of

eighteen Wurttemberger, and a large majority of the Bavarians. It was on

their support that Bismarck depended in building up the institutions of

the empire. The remainder of the Progressives, the _Fortschrittspartei_,

maintained their protest against the military and monarchical elements

in the state; they voted against the constitution in 1867 on the ground

that it did not provide sufficient guarantees for popular liberty, and

in 1871 against the treaty with Bavaria because it left too much

independence to that state. Their influence was strongest in Berlin, and

in the towns of East Prussia; they have always remained

characteristically Prussian.

These great parties were spread over the whole of Germany, and

represented the great divisions of political thought. To them must be

added others which were more local, as the _Volkspartei_ or People's

party in Wurttemberg, which kept alive the extreme democratic principles

of 1848, but was opposed to Socialism. They had been opposed to Prussian

supremacy, and in 1870 for the time completely lost their influence,

though they were to regain it in later years.

The Centre.

Of great importance was the new party of the Centre. Till the year 1863

there had been a small party of Catholics in the Prussian parliament who

received the name of the _Centrum_, from the part of the chamber in

which they sat. They had diminished during the years of conflict and

disappeared in 1866. In December 1870 it was determined to found a new

party which, while not avowedly Catholic, practically consisted entirely

of Catholics. The programme required the support of a

Christian-Conservative tendency; it was to defend positive and

historical law against Liberalism, and the rights of the individual

states against the central power. They were especially to maintain the

Christian character of the schools. Fifty-four members of the Prussian

parliament at once joined the new party, and in the elections for the

Reichstag in 1871 they won sixty seats. Their strength lay in Westphalia

and on the Rhine, in Bavaria and the Polish provinces of Prussia. The

close connexion with the Poles, the principle of federalism which they

maintained, the support given to them by the Bavarian "patriots," their

protest against the "revolution from above" as represented equally by

the annexation of Hanover and the abolition of the papal temporal power,

threw them into strong opposition to the prevailing opinion, an

opposition which received its expression when Hermann von Mallincrodt

(1821-1874), the most respected of their parliamentary leaders, declared

that "justice was not present at the birth of the empire." For this

reason they were generally spoken of by the Nationalist parties as

_Reichsfeindlich_.

This term may be more properly applied to those who still refuse to

recognize the legality of the acts by which the empire was founded. Of

these the most important were the so-called Guelphs (_Welfen_),

described by themselves as the _Hannoverische Rechtspartei_, member of

the old Hanoverian nobility who represented the rural districts of

Hanover and still regarded the deposed King George V. and, after his

death, the duke of Cumberland as their lawful sovereign. In the

elections of 1898 they still returned nine members to the Reichstag, but

in those of 1903 their representation had sunk to six, and in 1907 it

had practically disappeared. A similar shrinkage has been displayed in

the case of the protesting Alsace-Lorrainers, who returned only two

deputies in 1907. A pleasant concession to Hanoverian feeling was made

in 1899, when the emperor ordered that the Hanoverian regiments in the

Prussian army should be allowed to assume the names and so continue the

traditions of the Hanoverian army which was disbanded in 1866.

Poles.

The government has also not succeeded in reconciling to the empire the

alien races which have been incorporated in the kingdom of Prussia. From

the Polish districts of West Prussia, Posen and Silesia a number of

representatives have continued to be sent to Berlin to protest against

their incorporation in the empire. Bismarck, influenced by the older

Prussian traditions, always adopted towards them an attitude of

uncompromising opposition. The growth of the Polish population has

caused much anxiety; supported by the Roman Catholic Church, the Polish

language has advanced, especially in Silesia, and this is only part of

the general tendency, so marked throughout central Europe, for the Slavs

to gain ground upon the Teutons. The Prussian government has attempted

to prevent this by special legislation and severe administrative

measures. Thus in 1885 and 1886 large numbers of Austrian and Russian

Poles who had settled in these provinces were expelled. Windthorst

thereupon raised the question in the Reichstag, but the Prussian

government refused to take any notice of the interpolation on the ground

that there was no right in the constitution for the imperial authority

to take cognizance of acts of the Prussian government. In the Prussian

parliament Bismarck introduced a law taking out of the hands of the

local authorities the whole administration of the schools and giving

them to the central authority, so as to prevent instruction being given

in Polish. A further law authorized the Prussian government to spend

L5,000,000 in purchasing estates from Polish families and settling

German colonists on the land. The commission, which was appointed for

the purpose, during the next ten years bought land to the amount of

about 200,000 acres and on it settled more than 2000 German peasants.

This policy has not, however, produced the intended effect; for the

Poles founded a society to protect their own interests, and have often

managed to profit by the artificial value given to their property. It

has merely caused great bitterness among the Polish peasants, and the

effect on the population is also counteracted by the fact that the large

proprietors in purely German districts continue to import Polish

labourers to work on their estates.

In the general change of policy that followed after the retirement of

Bismarck an attempt was made by the emperor to conciliate the Poles.

Concessions were made to them in the matter of schools, and in 1891 a

Pole, Florian von Stablewski (1841-1906), who had taken a prominent part

in the Kulturkampf, was accepted by the Prussian government as

archbishop of Posen-Gnesen. A moderate party arose among the Poles which

accepted their position as Prussian subjects, gave up all hopes of an

immediate restoration of Polish independence, and limited their demands

to that free exercise of the religion and language of their country

which was enjoyed by the Poles in Austria. They supported government

bills in the Reichstag, and won the commendation of the emperor.

Unfortunately, for reasons which are not apparent, the Prussian

government did not continue a course of conciliation; in 1901

administrative edicts still further limited the use of the Polish

language; even religious instruction was to be given in German, and an

old royal ordinance of 1817 was made the pretext for forbidding private

instruction in Polish.

All these efforts have been in vain. The children in the schools became

the martyrs of Polish nationality. Religious instruction continued to be

given to them in German, and when they refused to answer questions which

they did not understand, they were kept in and flogged. In 1906, as a

protest, the school children to the number of 100,000 struck throughout

Prussian Poland; and, as a result of a pastoral issued by the

archbishop, Polish parents withdrew their children from religious

instruction in the schools. The government responded by fining and

imprisoning the parents. The efforts of the government were not confined

to the forcible Germanization of the children. Polish newspapers were

confiscated and their editors imprisoned, fines were imposed for holding

Polish meetings, and peasants were forbidden to build houses on their

own land. The country gentlemen could not have a garden party without

the presence of a commissary of police.

The climax, however, was reached in 1907 when Prince Bulow, on the 26th

of November, introduced into the Prussian parliament a bill to arm the

German Colonization Committee in Posen with powers of compulsory

expropriation. He pointed out that though the commission had acquired

815,000 acres of land and settled upon it some 100,000 German colonists,

nearly 250,000 acres more had passed from German into Polish hands. He

proposed, therefore, to set aside a credit of L17,500,000 for this

purpose. On the 26th of February 1908 the discussion on this bill was

continued, Count Arnim defending it on the ground that "conciliation had

failed and other measures must now be tried!" The Poles were aiming at

raising their standard of civilization and learning and thus gradually

expelling the Germans, and this, together with the rapid growth of the

Polish population, constituted a grave danger. These arguments were

reinforced by an appeal of Prince Bulow to the traditions of Bismarck,

and in spite of a strenuous and weighty opposition, the bill with

certain modifications passed by 143 votes to 111 in the Upper House, and

was accepted by the Lower House on the 13th of March. A bill forbidding

the use of any language but German at public meetings, except by special

permission of the police, had been laid before the Reichstag in 1907 by

Prince Bulow at the same time as he had introduced the Expropriation

Bill into the Prussian parliament. The bill, with certain drastic

amendments limiting its scope, passed the House on the 8th of April by a

majority of 200 to 179. This law gave increased freedom in the matter of

the right of association and public meeting; but in the case of the

Poles it was applied with such rigidity that, in order to evade it they

held "mute" public meetings, resolutions being written up in Polish on a

blackboard and passed by show of hands, without a word being said.[4]

Danes.

Compared with the Polish question, that of the Danes in North Schleswig

is of minor importance; they number less than 150,000, and there is not

among them, as among the Poles, the constant encroachment along an

extended line of frontier; there is also no religious question involved.

These Danish subjects of Germany have elected one member to the

Reichstag, whose duty is to demand that they should be handed over to

Denmark. Up to the year 1878 they could appeal to the treaty of Prague;

one clause in it determined that the inhabitants of selected districts

should be allowed to vote whether they should be Danish or German. This

was inserted merely to please Napoleon; after his fall there was no one

to demand its execution. In 1878, when the Triple Alliance was

concluded, Bismarck, in answer to the Guelphic demonstration at

Copenhagen, arranged with Austria, the other party to the treaty of

Prague, that the clause should lapse. Since then the Prussian

government, by prohibiting the use of Danish in the schools and public

offices, and by the expulsion from the country of the numerous Danish

optants who had returned to Schleswig, has used the customary means for

compelling all subjects of the king to become German in language and

feeling.[5]

Alsace-Lorraine.

The attempt to reconcile the inhabitants of Alsace-Lorraine to their

condition proved equally difficult. The provinces had been placed under

the immediate rule of the emperor and the chancellor, who was minister

for them; laws were to be passed by the Reichstag. In accordance with

the treaty of Frankfort, the inhabitants were permitted to choose

between French and German nationality, but all who chose the former had

to leave the country; before the 1st of October 1872, the final day,

some 50,000 had done so. In 1874, for the first time, the provinces were

enabled to elect members for the Reichstag; they used the privilege to

send fifteen _Elsasser_, who, after delivering a formal protest against

the annexation, retired from the House; they joined no party, and took

little part in the proceedings except on important occasions to vote

against the government. The same spirit was shown in the elections for

local purposes. It seemed to be the sign of a change when a new party,

the _Autonomisten_, arose, who demanded as a practical concession that

the dictatorship of the chancellor should cease and local

self-government be granted. To some extent this was done in 1879; a

resident governor or _Statthalter_ was appointed, and a local

representative assembly, which was consulted as to new laws. All the

efforts of Field marshal Edwin von Manteuffel, the first governor, to

win the confidence of the people failed; the anti-German feeling

increased; the party of protestors continued in full numbers. The next

governor, Prince Hohenlohe, had to use more stringent measures, and in

1888, to prevent the agitation of French agents, an imperial decree

forbade any one to cross the frontier without a passport. Since 1890

there has been, especially in the neighbourhood of Strassburg, evidence

of a spread of national German feeling, probably to a great extent due

to the settlement of Germans from across the Rhine.

The presence of these anti-German parties, amounting sometimes to

one-tenth of the whole, in the Reichstag added greatly to the difficulty

of parliamentary government. Gradually, however, as a new generation

grew up their influence declined. In the Reichstag of 1907, Guelphs,

Alsace-Lorrainers and Danes together could muster only five members.

The period 1870 to 1878.

The great work since 1870 has been that of building up the institutions

of the empire. For the first time in the history of Germany there has

been a strong administration ordering, directing and arranging the life

of the whole nation. The unification of Germany was not ended by the

events of 1866 and 1871; it was only begun. The work has throughout been

done by Prussia; it has been the extension of Prussian principles and

Prussian administrative energy over the whole of Germany. It naturally

falls into two periods; the first, which ends in 1878, is that in which

Bismarck depended on the support of the National Liberals. They were the

party of union and uniformity. The Conservatives were attached to the

older local diversities, and Bismarck had therefore to turn for help to

his old enemies, and for some years an alliance was maintained, always

precarious but full of results.

Legal reform.

The great achievement of the first period was legal reform. In nothing

else was legislation so much needed. Forty-six districts have been

enumerated, each of which enjoyed a separate legal system, and the

boundaries of these districts seldom coincided with the frontiers of the

states. Everywhere the original source of law was the old German common

law, but in each district it had been wholly or partly superseded by

codes, text-books and statutes to a great extent founded on the

principles of the Roman civil law. Owing to the political divisions,

however, this legislation, which reached back to the 14th century, had

always been carried out by local authorities. There had never been any

effective legislation applicable to the whole nation. There was not a

state, not the smallest principality, in which some authoritative but

imperfect law or code had not been published. Every free city, even an

imperial village, had its own "law," and these exist down to the present

time. In Bremen the foundation of the civil code was still the statutes

of 1433; in Munich, those of 1347. Most of the states by which these

laws had been published had long ago ceased to exist; probably in every

case their boundaries had changed, but the laws remained valid (except

in those cases in which they had been expressly repealed) for the whole

of the district for which they had been originally promulgated. Let us

take a particular case. In 1591 a special code was published for the

upper county of Katzellenbogen. More than a hundred years ago

Katzellenbogen was divided between the neighbouring states. But till the

end of the 19th century this code still retained its validity for those

villages in Hesse, and in the Prussian province of Hesse, which in old

days had been parts of Katzellenbogen. The law, however, had to be

interpreted so as to take into consideration later legislation by the

kingdom of Westphalia, the electorate of Hesse, and any other state (and

they are several) in which for a short time some of these villages might

have been incorporated.

In addition to these earlier imperfect laws, three great codes have been

published, by which a complete system was applied to a large district:

the Prussian Code of 1794, the Austrian Code of 1811 and the Code

Napoleon, which applied to all Germany left of the Rhine; for neither

Prussia, nor Bavaria, nor Hesse had ever ventured to interfere with the

French law. In Prussia therefore the older provinces came under the

Prussian Code, the Rhine provinces had French law, the newly annexed

provinces had endless variety, and in part of Pomerania considerable

elements of Swedish law still remained, a relic of the long Swedish

occupation. On the other hand, some districts to which the Prussian Code

applied no longer belonged to the kingdom of Prussia--for instance,

Anspach and Bayreuth, which are now in Bavaria. In other parts of

Bavaria in the same way Austrian law still ran, because they had been

Austrian in 1811. In two states only was there a more or less uniform

system: in Baden, which had adopted a German translation of the Code

Napoleon; and in Saxony, which had its own code, published in 1865. In

criminal law and procedure there was an equal variety. In one district

was trial by jury in an open court; in another the old procedure by

written pleadings before a judge. In many districts, especially in

Mecklenburg and some of the Prussian provinces, the old feudal

jurisdiction of the manorial courts survived.

The constant changes in the law made by current legislation in the

different states really only added to the confusion, and though imperial

laws on these points with which the central government was qualified to

deal superseded the state laws, it is obvious that to pass occasional

acts on isolated points would have been only to introduce a further

element of complication. It was therefore convenient, so far as was

possible, to allow the existing system to continue until a full and

complete code dealing with the whole of one department of law could be

agreed upon, and thus a uniform system (superseding all older

legislation) be adopted. Legislation, therefore, has generally taken the

form of a series of elaborate codes, each of which aims at scientific

completeness, and further alterations have been made by amendments in

the original code. The whole work has been similar in character to the

codification of French law under Napoleon; in most matters the variety

of the older system has ceased, and the law of the empire is now

comprised in a limited number of codes.

A beginning had been made before the foundation of the empire; as early

as 1861 a common code for trade, commerce and banking had been agreed

upon by the states included in the Germanic Confederation. It was

adopted by the new confederation of 1869. In 1897 it was replaced by a

new code. In 1869 the criminal law had been codified for the North

German Confederation, and in 1870 there was passed the _Gewerbeordnung_,

an elaborate code for the regulation of manufactures and the relations

of masters to workmen. These were included in the law of the empire, and

the work was vigorously continued.

In 1871 a commission was appointed to draw up regulations for civil and

criminal procedure, and also to frame regulations for the organization

of the law courts. The draft code of civil procedure, which was

published in December 1872, introduced many important reforms,

especially by substituting public and verbal procedure for the older

German system, under which the proceedings were almost entirely carried

on by written documents. It was very well received. The drafts for the

other two laws were not so successful. Protests, especially in South

Germany, were raised against the criminal procedure, for it was proposed

to abolish trial by jury and substitute over the whole empire the

Prussian system, and a sharp conflict arose as to the method of dealing

with the press. After being discussed in the Reichstag, all three

projects were referred to a special commission, which after a year

reported to the diet, having completely remodelled the two latter laws.

After further amendment they were eventually accepted, and became law in

1877. By these and other supplementary laws a uniform system of law

courts was established throughout the whole empire; the position and pay

of the judges, the regulations regarding the position of advocates, and

costs, were uniform, and the procedure in every state was identical. To

complete the work a supreme court of appeal was established in Leipzig,

which was competent to hear appeals not only from imperial law, but also

from that of the individual states.

By the original constitution, the imperial authorities were only

qualified to deal with criminal and commercial law; the whole of the

private law, in which the variety was greatest, was withdrawn from their

cognizance. Lasker, to remedy this defect, proposed, therefore, an

alteration in the constitution, which, after being twice carried against

the opposition of the Centre, was at last accepted by the Bundesrat. A

commission was then appointed to draw up a civil code. They completed

the work by the end of 1887; the draft which they then published was

severely criticized, and it was again submitted for revision to a fresh

commission, which reported in 1895. In its amended form this draft was

accepted by the Reichstag in 1896, and it entered into force on the 1st

of January 1900. The new Civil Code deals with nearly all matters of

law, but excludes those concerning or arising out of land tenure and all

matters in which private law comes into connexion with public law; for

instance, the position of government officials, and the police: it

excludes also the relations of master and servant, which in most points

are left to the control of individual states. It was accompanied by a

revision of the laws for trade and banking.

Commercial reform.

Equal in importance to the legal was the commercial reform, for this was

the condition for building up the material prosperity of the country.

Germany was a poor country, but the poverty was to a great extent the

result of political causes. Communication, trade, manufactures, were

impeded by the political divisions, and though the establishment of a

customs union had preceded the foundation of the empire, the removal of

other barriers required imperial legislation. A common system of weights

and measures was introduced in 1868. The reform of the currency was the

first task of the empire. In 1871 Germany still had seven different

systems; the most important was the _Thaler_ and the _Groschen_, which

prevailed over most of North Germany, but even within this there were

considerable local differences. Throughout the whole of the south of

Germany and in some North German states the gulden and kreuzer

prevailed. Then there were other systems in Hamburg and in Bremen.

Everywhere, except in Bremen, the currency was on a silver basis. In

addition to this each state had its own paper money, and there were over

100 banks with the right of issuing bank-notes according to regulations

which varied in each state. In 1871 a common system for the whole empire

was established, the unit being the _Mark_ (= 11-3/4d.), which was

divided into a hundred _Pfennige_: a gold currency was introduced

(_Doppel-Kronen_ = 20 _M._; _Kronen_ = 10 _M._); no more silver was to

be coined, and silver was made a legal tender only up to the sum of

twenty marks. The gold required for the introduction of the new coinage

was provided from the indemnity paid by France. Great quantities of

thalers, which hitherto had been the staple of the currency, were sold.

The right of coinage was, however, left to the individual states, and as

a special concession it was determined that the rulers of the states

should be permitted to have their head placed on the reverse of the gold

coins. All paper currency, except that issued by the empire, ceased, and

in 1873 the Prussian Bank was converted into the Imperial Bank

(Reichsbank).

Banking laws.

Closely connected with the reform of the currency and the codification

of the commercial law was the reform of the banking laws. Here the

tendency to substitute uniform imperial laws for state laws is clearly

seen. Before 1870 there had been over 100 banks with the right of issue,

and the conditions on which the privilege was granted varied in each

state. By the Bank Act of March 14, 1875, which is the foundation of the

existing system, the right of granting the privilege is transferred from

the governments of the states to the Bundesrat. The existing banks could

not be deprived of the concessions they had received, but unless they

submitted to the regulations of the new law their notes were not to be

recognized outside the limits of the state by which the concession had

been granted. All submitted to the conditions except the Brunswick Bank,

which remained outside the banking system of the empire until the Bank

Act of June 5, 1906, was passed, when it surrendered its right to issue

notes. The experience of Germany in this matter has been different from

that of England, for nearly all the private banks have now surrendered

their privilege, and there remain only five banks, including the

Reichsbank, which still issue bank notes. The other four are situated in

Bavaria, Saxony, Wurttemberg and Baden. The total note-issue was fixed

by the law of 1875, a proposal being assigned to each bank. Any part of

this issue assigned to private banks which might be withdrawn from

circulation, owing to a deficiency in the legal reserve funds, was to be

transferred to the Reichsbank. The result has been the tendency of the

latter gradually to absorb the whole note-issue. By the law of 1906 the

Reichsbank was authorized to issue 20 M. and 50 M. notes. Treasury notes

(_Reichs-Kassenscheine_) for these amounts were no longer to be issued;

but the state reserved the right to circulate notes of the value of 5 M.

and 10 M.

The organization of the imperial post-office was carried out with great

success by Herr von Stephan (q.v.), who remained at the head of this

department from its creation till his death in 1897. Proposals were also

made to Bavaria and Wurttemberg to surrender their special rights, but

these were not accepted.

Railways.

The unification of the railways caused greater difficulties. Nearly

every state had its own system; there was the greatest variety in the

methods of working and in the tariffs, and the through traffic, so

important for the commercial prosperity of the country, was very

ineffective. In Baden, Wurttemberg and Hanover the railways were almost

entirely the property of the state, but in all other parts public and

private lines existed side by side, an arrangement which seemed to

combine the disadvantages of both systems. In 1871 three-quarters of the

railway lines belonged to private companies, and the existence of these

powerful private corporations, while they were defended by many of the

Liberals, was, according to the national type of thought, something of

an anomaly. Bismarck always attached great importance to the improvement

of the railway service, and he saw that uniformity of working and of

tariffs was very desirable. In the constitution of the empire he had

introduced several clauses dealing with it. The independent

administration of its lines by each state was left, but the empire

received the power of legislating on railway matters; it could build

lines necessary for military purposes even against the wish of the state

in whose territory they lay, and the states bound themselves to

administer their lines as part of a common system. In order to carry out

these clauses a law was passed on the 27th of June 1873 creating an

imperial railway office (_Reichseisenbahnamt_) for the purpose of

exercising a general control over the railways. This office has done

much in the matter of unifying the systems of various railways and of

regulating their relations to the military, postal and telegraph

organizations; it also took a leading part in the framing of the

international laws regarding goods traffic; but the imperial code of

railway law which it drafted has never been laid before the Reichstag.

It effectively controls only the privately owned lines in Prussia. Yet,

in setting it up, Bismarck had in mind the ultimate acquisition of all

the railways by the empire. He found, however, that it was impossible to

carry any Bill enforcing this. He therefore determined to begin by

transferring to the imperial authority the Prussian state railways; had

he been able to carry this out the influence of the imperial railways

would have been so great that they would gradually have absorbed those

of the other states. The Bill was carried through the Prussian

parliament, but the opposition aroused in the other states was so great

that he did not venture even to introduce in the Bundesrat a law

empowering the empire to acquire the Prussian railways. In many of the

state parliaments resolutions were carried protesting against the system

of imperial railways, and from that time the preservation of the local

railway management has been the chief object towards which, in Saxony,

Bavaria and Wurttemberg, local feeling has been directed. The only

imperial railways are those in Alsace-Lorraine.

The result of the legal reform and other laws has been greatly to

diminish the duties of the state governments, for every new imperial law

permanently deprives the local parliaments of part of their authority.

Generally there remains to them the control of education and

religion--their most important duty--police, all questions connected

with land tenure, local government, the raising of direct taxes, and, in

the larger states, the management of railways. The introduction of

workmen's insurance, factory legislation, and other measures dealing

with the condition of the working classes by imperial legislation, was

at a later period still further to limit the scope of state legislation.

Army organization.

Meanwhile the government was busy perfecting the administration of the

national defences. From the war indemnity large sums had been expended

on coast defence, on fortifications and on replacing the equipment and

stores destroyed during the war. A special fund, producing annually

about a million pounds, was put aside, from which pensions to the

wounded, and to the widows and orphans of those who had fallen, should

be provided. It was also desirable to complete the military

organization. It must be remembered that technically there is no German

army, as there is no German minister of war. Each state, however small,

maintains its own contingent, subject to its own prince, who has the

right and the obligation of administering it according to the provisions

of the treaty by which he entered the federation. Practically they are

closely tied in every detail of military organization. The whole of the

Prussian military system, including not only the obligation to military

service, but the rules for recruiting, organization, drill and uniforms,

has to be followed in all the states; all the contingents are under the

command of the emperor, and the soldiers have to swear obedience to him

in addition to the oath of allegiance to their own sovereign. It is

therefore not surprising that, having so little freedom in the exercise

of their command, all the princes and free cities (with the exception of

the three kings) arranged separate treaties with the king of Prussia,

transferring to him (except for certain formal rights) the

administration of their contingents, which are thereby definitely

incorporated in the Prussian army. The first of these treaties was

arranged with Saxe-Coburg Gotha in 1861; those with the other North

German states followed at short intervals after 1866. The last was that

with Brunswick, which was arranged in 1885; Duke William had always

refused to surrender the separate existence of his army. Owing to the

local organization, this does not prevent the contingent of each state

from preserving its separate identity; it is stationed in its own

district, each state contributing so many regiments.

The Septennat.

In 1872 a common system of military jurisprudence was introduced for the

whole empire except Bavaria (a revised code of procedure in military

courts was accepted by Bavaria in 1898); finally, in February 1874, an

important law was laid before the Reichstag codifying the administrative

rules. This superseded the complicated system of laws and royal

ordinances which had accumulated in Prussia during the fifty years that

had elapsed since the system of short service had been introduced; the

application to other states of course made a clearer statement of the

laws desirable. Most of this was accepted without opposition or debate.

On one clause a serious constitutional conflict arose. In 1867 the peace

establishment had been provisionally fixed by the constitution at 1% of

the population, and a sum of 225 thalers (L33, 15s.) had been voted for

each soldier. This arrangement had in 1871 been again continued to the

end of 1874, and the peace establishment fixed at 401,659. The new law

would have made this permanent. If this had been done the power of the

Reichstag over the administration would have been seriously weakened;

its assent would no longer have been required for either the number of

the army or the money. The government attached great importance to the

clause, but the Centre and the Liberal parties combined to throw it out.

A disastrous struggle was averted by a compromise suggested by

Bennigsen. The numbers were fixed for the next seven years (the

so-called _Septennat_); this was accepted by the government, and carried

against the votes of the Centre and some of the Progressives. On this

occasion the Fortschrittpartei, already much diminished, split up into

two sections. The principle then established has since been maintained;

the periodical votes on the army have become the occasion for formally

testing the strength of the Government.

Kulturkampf.

The influence of Liberalism, which served the government so well in this

work of construction, brought about also the conflict with the Roman

Catholic Church which distracted Germany for many years. The causes

were, indeed, partly political. The Ultramontane party in Austria,

France and Bavaria had, after 1866, been hostile to Prussia; there was

some ground to fear that it might still succeed in bringing about a

Catholic coalition against the empire, and Bismarck lived in constant

dread of European coalitions. The Polish sympathies of the Church in

Germany made him regard it as an anti-German power, and the formation of

the Catholic faction in parliament, supported by Poles and Hanoverians,

appeared to justify his apprehensions. But besides these reasons of

state there was a growing hostility between the triumphant National

parties and the Ultramontanes, who taught that the pope was greater than

the emperor and the Church than the nation. The conflict had already

begun in Baden. As in every other country, the control of the schools

was the chief object of contention, but the government also claimed a

control over the education and training of the clergy. With the

formation of the empire the conflict was transferred from Baden to

Prussia, where there had been for thirty years absolute peace, a peace

gained, indeed, by allowing to the Catholics complete freedom; the

Prussian constitution ensured them absolute liberty in the management of

ecclesiastical affairs; in the ministry for religion and education there

was a separate department for Catholic affairs, and (owing to the

influence of the great family of the Radziwills) they enjoyed

considerable power at court.

Old Catholics.

The latent opposition was aroused by the Vatican decrees. A small number

of Catholics, including several men of learning and distinction, refused

to accept Papal Infallibility. They were encouraged by the Bavarian

court, which maintained the Febronian tradition and was jealous of any

encroachment of the Papacy (see FEBRIONIANISM); but besides this the

Protestants throughout Germany and all opponents of the Papacy joined in

the agitation. They made it the occasion for an attack on the Jesuits;

even in 1869 there had been almost a riot in Berlin when a chapel

belonging to a religious order was opened there. During 1870 and 1871

meetings were held by the Gustavus Adolphus Verein, and a great

Protestant conference was called, at which resolutions were passed

demanding the expulsion of the Jesuits and condemning the Vatican

decrees. As the leaders in these meetings were men like Virchow and

Bluntschli, who had been lifelong opponents of Catholicism in every

form, the result was disastrous to the Liberal party among the

Catholics, for a Liberal Catholic would appear as the ally of the

bitterest enemies of the Church; whatever possibility of success the Old

Catholic movement might have had was destroyed by the fact that it was

supported by those who avowedly wished to destroy the influence of

Catholicism. No bishop joined it in Germany or in Austria, and few

priests, though the governments were ready to protect them in the

enjoyment of the privileges secured to Catholics, and to maintain them

in the use of the temporalities. There was no great following among the

people; it was only in isolated places that priests and congregation

together asserted their rights to refuse to accept the decrees of the

Church. Without the help of the bishops, the leaders had no legal basis;

unsupported by the people, they were generals without an army, and the

attempt to use the movement for political purposes failed.

None the less this was the occasion for the first proceedings against

the Catholics, and curiously enough the campaign began in Bavaria. The

archbishop of Munich had published the Vatican decrees without the

_Regium placetum_, which was required by the constitution, and the

government continued to treat Old Catholics as members of the Church. In

the controversy which ensued, Lutz, the chief member of the ministry,

found himself confronted by an Ultramontane majority, and the priests

used their influence to stir up the people. He therefore turned for help

to the imperial government, and at his instance a clause was added to

the penal code forbidding priests in their official capacity to deal

with political matters. (This law, which still exists, is popularly

known as the Kanzlei or Pulpit-paragraph.) It was of course opposed by

the Centre, who declared that the Reichstag had no right to interfere in

what was after all a religious question, and the Bavarian Opposition

expressed much indignation that their government should turn for help to

the Protestants of the North in order to force upon the Catholics of

Bavaria a law which they could not have carried in that state.

For twenty years the Old Catholics continued to be a cause of contention

in Bavaria, until the struggle ended in the victory of the

Ultramontanes. In 1875 the parliament which had been elected in 1869 for

six years came to an end. In order to strengthen their position for the

new elections, the Liberal ministry, who owed their position chiefly to

the support of the king, by royal ordinance ordered a redistribution of

seats. By the constitution this was within their power, and by clever

manipulation of the constituencies they brought it about that the

Ultramontane majority was reduced to two. It does not appear that this

change represented any change of feeling in the majority of the people.

The action of the government, however, caused great indignation, and in

a debate on the address an amendment was carried petitioning the king to

dismiss his ministry. They offered their resignation, but the king

refused to accept it, publicly expressed his confidence in them, and

they continued in office during the lifetime of the king, although in

1881 the growing reaction gave a considerable majority to the

Ultramontane party. After the death of the king the prince-regent,

Luitpold, still retained the old administration, but several concessions

were made to the Catholics in regard to the schools and universities,

and in 1890 it was decided that the claim of the Old Catholics to be

regarded officially as members of the Church should no longer be

recognized.

May Laws.

Meanwhile at Berlin petitions to the Reichstag demanded the expulsion of

the Jesuits, and in 1872 an imperial law to this effect was carried;

this was again a serious interference with the control over religious

matters reserved to the states. In Prussia the government, having

determined to embark on an anti-Catholic policy, suppressed the Catholic

division in the ministry, and appointed a new minister, Falk, a Liberal

lawyer of uncompromising character. A law was carried placing the

inspection of schools entirely in the hands of the state; hitherto in

many provinces it had belonged to the clergy, Catholic or Protestant.

This was followed by the measures to which the name _Kulturkampf_ really

applied (an expression used first by Virchow to imply that it was a

struggle of principle between the teaching of the Church and that of

modern society). They were measures in which the state no longer, as in

the school inspection law or in the introduction of civil marriage,

defended its prerogatives against the Church, but assumed itself a

direct control over ecclesiastical matters.

At the end of 1872 and the beginning of 1873 Falk laid before the

Prussian Lower House the draft of four laws. Of these, one forbade

ministers of religion from abusing ecclesiastical punishment; the

second, which was the most important, introduced a law already adopted

in Baden, that no one should be appointed to any office in the Church

except a German, who must have received his education in a German

gymnasium, have studied for three years in a German university, and have

passed a state examination in philosophy, history, German literature and

classics; all ecclesiastical seminaries were placed under the control of

the state, and all seminaries for boys were forbidden. Moreover, every

appointment to an ecclesiastical benefice was to be notified to the

president of the province, and the confirmation could be refused on the

ground that there were facts which could support the assumption that the

appointment would be dangerous to public order. The third law appointed

a court for trying ecclesiastical offences, to which was given the right

of suspending both priests and bishops, and a fourth determined the

procedure necessary for those who wished to sever their connexion with

the Roman Catholic Church.

As these laws were inconsistent with those articles of the Prussian

constitution which guaranteed to a religious corporation the

independent management of its own affairs, it was therefore necessary to

alter the constitution. This was done, and a later law in 1875 repealed

the articles altogether.

The opposition of the bishops to these laws was supported even by many

Protestants, especially by the more orthodox Lutherans, who feared the

effect of this increased subjection of all churches to the state; they

were opposed also by the Conservative members of the Upper House. All,

however, was unavailing. Bismarck in this case gave the Liberals a free

hand, and the laws eventually were carried and proclaimed on the 15th of

May 1873; hence they got the name of the May laws, by which they are

always known. The bishops meanwhile had held a meeting at Fulda, at the

tomb of St Boniface, whence they addressed a protest to the king, and

declared that they would be unable to recognize the laws as valid. They

were supported in this by the pope, who addressed a protest personally

to the emperor. The laws were put into force with great severity. Within

a year six Prussian bishops were imprisoned, and in over 1300 parishes

the administration of public worship was suspended. The first sufferer

was the cardinal archbishop of Posen, Count Ledochowski. He refused to

report to the president of the province appointments of incumbents; he

refused also to allow the government commissioners to inspect the

seminaries for priests, and when he was summoned before the new court

refused to appear. He was then deprived of the temporalities of his

office; but the Polish nobles continued to support him, and he continued

to act as bishop. Heavy fines were imposed upon him, but he either could

not or would not pay them, and in March 1874 he was condemned to

imprisonment for two years, and dismissed from his bishopric. The bishop

of Trier, the archbishop of Cologne, and other bishops soon incurred a

similar fate. These measures of the government, however, did not succeed

in winning over the Catholic population, and in the elections for the

Reichstag in January 1874 the party of the Centre increased in number

from 63 to 91; 1,443,170 votes were received by them. In Bavaria the

Ultramontanes won a complete victory over the more moderate Catholics.

The Prussian government proceeded to further measures. According to the

ordinary practice towards parties in opposition, public meetings were

broken up on the smallest pretence, and numerous prosecutions for insult

to government officials (_Beamtenbeleidigung_) were brought against

members of the party. The Catholic agitation was, however, carried on

with increased vigour throughout the whole empire; over a hundred

newspapers were founded (three years before there had been only about

six Catholic papers in the whole of Germany), and great numbers of

pamphlets and other polemical works were published. The bishops from

their prisons continued to govern the dioceses; for this purpose they

appointed representatives, to whom they transferred their rights as

ordinary and secretly authorized priests to celebrate services and to

perform the other duties of an incumbent. To meet this a further law was

passed in the Prussian parliament, forbidding the exercise of

ecclesiastical offices by unauthorized persons, and it contained a

provision that any one who had been convicted under the law could be

deprived of his rights of citizenship, ordered to live in a particular

district, or even expelled from the kingdom. The result was that in

numerous parishes the police were occupied in searching for the priest

who was living there among the people; although his habitation was known

to hundreds of people, the police seldom succeeded in arresting him.

Bismarck confesses that his doubts as to the wisdom of this legislation

were raised by the picture of heavy but honest _gens d'armes_ pursuing

light-footed priests from house to house. This law was followed by one

authorizing the government to suspend, in every diocese where the bishop

continued recalcitrant, the payment of that contribution to the Roman

Catholic Church which by agreement had been given by the state since

1817. The only result of this was that large sums were collected by

voluntary contribution among the Roman Catholic population.

The government tried to find priests to occupy the vacant parishes; few

consented to do so, and the _Staatskatholiken_ who consented to the new

laws were avoided by their parishioners. Men refused to attend their

ministrations; in some cases they were subjected to what was afterwards

called boycotting, and it was said that their lives were scarcely safe.

Other laws excluded all religious orders from Prussia, and civil

marriage was made compulsory; this law, which at first was confined to

Prussia, was afterwards passed also in the Reichstag.

These laws were all peculiar to Prussia, but similar legislation was

carried out in Baden and in Hesse, where in 1871, after twenty-one years

of office, the particularist and Conservative government of Dalwigk[6]

had come to an end and after the interval of a year been succeeded by a

Liberal ministry. In Wurttemberg alone the government continued to live

peaceably with the bishops.

The government had used all its resources; it had alienated millions of

the people; it had raised up a compact party of nearly a hundred members

in parliament. The attempt of the Liberals to subjugate the Church had

given to the Papacy greater power than it had had since the time of

Wallenstein.

Reaction against Liberalism.

The ecclesiastical legislation and other Liberal measures completed the

alienation between Bismarck and the Conservatives. In the Prussian

parliament seventy-three members broke off from the rest, calling

themselves the "old Conservatives"; they used their position at court to

intrigue against him, and hoped to bring about his fall; Count Arnim

(q.v.) was looked upon as his successor. In 1876, however, the party in

Prussia, reunited on a programme which demanded the maintenance of the

Christian character of the schools, cessation of the Kulturkampf,

limitation of economic liberty, and repression of social democracy, and

this was accepted also by the Conservatives in the Reichstag. This

reunion of the Conservatives became the nucleus of a great reaction

against Liberalism. It was not confined to any one department of life,

but included Protection as against Free Trade, State Socialism as

against individualism, the defence of religion as against a separation

of Church and State, increased stress laid on the monarchical character

of the state, continued increase of the army, and colonial expansion.

The causes of the change in public opinion, of which this was to be the

beginning, are too deep-seated to be discussed here. We must note that

it was not peculiar to Germany; it was part of that great reaction

against Liberal doctrine which marked the last quarter of the 19th

century in so many countries. In Germany, however, it more rapidly

attained political importance than elsewhere, because Bismarck used it

to carry out a great change of policy. He had long been dissatisfied

with his position. He was much embarrassed by the failure of his

ecclesiastical policy. The alliance with the Liberals had always been

half-hearted, and he wished to regain his full freedom of action; he

regarded as an uncontrollable bondage all support that was not given

unconditionally. The alliance had been of the nature of a limited

co-operation between two hostile powers for a definite object; there had

always been suspicion and jealousy on either side, and a rupture had

often been imminent, as in the debates on the military bill and the law

reform. Now that the immediate object had been attained, he wished to

pass on to other projects in which they could not follow him. Political

unity had been firmly established; he desired to use the whole power of

the imperial government in developing the material resources of the

country. In doing this he placed himself in opposition to both the

financial and the economic doctrines of the Liberals.

Official changes.

The new period which now begins was introduced by some alterations in

the official organization. Hitherto almost the whole of the internal

business had been concentrated in the imperial chancery

(_Reichskanzleramt_), and Bismarck had allowed great freedom of action

to Delbruck, the head of the office. Delbruck, however, had resigned in

1876, justly foreseeing that a change of policy was imminent in which

he could no longer co-operate with Bismarck. The work of the office was

then divided between several departments, at the head of each of which

was placed a separate official, the most important receiving the title

of secretary of state. Bismarck, as always, refused to appoint ministers

directly responsible either to the emperor or to parliament; the new

officials in no way formed a collegiate ministry or cabinet. He still

retained in his own hands, as sole responsible minister, the ultimate

control over the whole imperial administration. The more important

secretaries of state, however, are political officials, who are

practically almost solely responsible for their department; they sit in

the Bundesrat, and defend their policy in the Reichstag, and they often

have a seat in the Prussian ministry. Moreover, a law of 1878, the

occasion of which was Bismarck's long absence from Berlin, empowered the

chancellor to appoint a substitute or representative (_Stellvertreter_)

either for the whole duties of his office or for the affairs of a

particular department. The signature of a man who holds this position

gives legal validity to the acts of the emperor.

This reorganization was a sign of the great increase of work which had

already begun to fall on the imperial authorities, and was a necessary

step towards the further duties which Bismarck intended to impose upon

them.

Meanwhile the relations with the National Liberals reached a crisis.

Bismarck remained in retirement at Varzin for nearly a year; before he

returned to Berlin, at the end of 1877, he was visited by Bennigsen, and

the Liberal leader was offered the post of vice-president of the

Prussian ministry and vice-president of the Bundesrat. The negotiations

broke down, apparently because Bennigsen refused to accept office unless

he received a guarantee that the constitutional rights of the Reichstag

should be respected, and unless two other members of the party,

Forckenbeck and Stauffenberg, were given office. Bismarck would not

assent to these conditions, and, even if he had been willing to do so,

could hardly have overcome the prejudices of the emperor. On the other

hand, Bennigsen refused to accept Bismarck's proposal for a state

monopoly of tobacco. From the beginning the negotiations were indeed

doomed to failure, for what Bismarck appears to have aimed at was to

detach Bennigsen from the rest of his party and win his support for an

anti-Liberal policy.

Period after 1878.

The session of 1878, therefore, opened with a feeling of great

uncertainty. The Liberals were very suspicious of Bismarck's intentions.

Proposals for new taxes, especially one on tobacco, were not carried.

Bismarck took the opportunity of avowing that his ideal was a monopoly

of tobacco, and this statement was followed by the resignation of

Camphausen, minister of finance. It was apparent that there was no

prospect of his being able to carry through the great financial reform

which he contemplated. He was looking about for an opportunity of

appealing to the country on some question which would enable him to free

himself from the control of the Liberal majority. The popular

expectations were expressed in the saying attributed to him, that he

would "crush the Liberals against the wall." The opportunity was given

by the Social Democrats.

Social democracy.

The constant increase of the Social Democrats had for some years caused

much uneasiness not only to the government, but also among the middle

classes. The attacks on national feeling, the protest against the war of

1870, the sympathy expressed for the _Communards_, had offended the

strongest feelings of the nation, especially as the language used was

often very violent; the soldiers were spoken of as murderers, the

generals as cut-throats. Attacks on religion, though not an essential

part of the party programme, were common, and practically all avowed

Social Democrats were hostile to Christianity. These qualities, combined

with the open criticism of the institutions of marriage, of monarchy,

and of all forms of private property, joined to the deliberate attempt

to stir up class hatred, which was indeed an essential part of their

policy, caused a widespread feeling that the Social Democrats were a

serious menace to civilization. They were looked upon even by many

Liberals as an enemy to be crushed; much more was this the case with

the government. Attempts had already been made to check the growth of

the party. Charges of high treason were brought against some. In 1872

Bebel and Liebknecht were condemned to two years' imprisonment. In 1876

Bismarck proposed to introduce into the Criminal Code a clause making it

an offence punishable with two years' imprisonment "to attack in print

the family, property, universal military service, or other foundation of

public order, in a manner which undermined morality, feeling for law, or

the love of the Fatherland." The opposition of the Liberals prevented

this from being carried. Lasker objected to these "elastic paragraphs,"

an expression for which in recent years there has been abundant use. The

ordinary law was, however, sufficient greatly to harass the Socialists.

In nearly every state there still existed, as survivals of the old days,

laws forbidding the union of different political associations with one

another, and all unions or associations of working men which followed

political, socialistic or communistic ends. It was possible under these

to procure decisions in courts of justice dissolving the General Union

of Workers and the coalitions and unions of working men. The only result

was, that the number of Socialists steadily increased. In 1874 they

secured nine seats in the Reichstag, in 1877 twelve, and nearly 500,000

votes were given to Socialist candidates.

Legislation against the Socialists.

There was then no ground for surprise that, when in April 1878 an

attempt was made on the life of the emperor, Bismarck used the excuse

for again bringing in a law expressly directed against the Socialists.

It was badly drawn up and badly defended. The National Liberals refused

to vote for it, and it was easily defeated. The Reichstag was prorogued;

six days later a man named Nobiling again shot at the emperor, and this

time inflicted dangerous injuries. It is only fair to say that no real

proof was brought that the Socialists had anything to do with either of

these crimes, or that either of the men was really a member of the

Socialist party; nevertheless, a storm of indignation rose against them.

The government seized the opportunity. So great was the popular feeling,

that a repressive measure would easily have been carried; Bismarck,

however, while the excitement was at its height, dissolved the

Reichstag, and in the elections which took place immediately, the

Liberal parties, who had refused to vote for the first law, lost a

considerable number of seats, and with them their control over the

Reichstag.

The first use which Bismarck made of the new parliament was to deal with

the Social Democrats. A new law was introduced forbidding the spread of

Socialistic opinions by books, newspapers or public meetings, empowering

the police to break up meetings and to suppress newspapers. The

Bundesrat could proclaim a state of siege in any town or district, and

when this was done any individual who was considered dangerous by the

police could be expelled. The law was carried by a large majority, being

opposed only by the Progressives and the Centre. It was applied with

great severity. The whole organization of newspapers, societies and

trades unions was at once broken up. Almost every political newspaper

supported by the party was suppressed; almost all the pamphlets and

books issued by them were forbidden; they were thereby at once deprived

of the only legitimate means which they had for spreading their

opinions. In the autumn of 1878 the minor state of siege was proclaimed

in Berlin, although no disorders had taken place and no resistance had

been attempted, and sixty-seven members of the party were excluded from

the city. Most of them were married and had families; money was

collected in order to help those who were suddenly deprived of their

means of subsistence. Even this was soon forbidden by the police. At

elections every kind of agitation, whether by meetings of the party or

by distribution of literature, was suppressed. The only place in Germany

where Socialists could still proclaim their opinions was in the

Reichstag. Bismarck attempted to exclude them from it also. In this,

however, he failed. Two members who had been expelled from Berlin

appeared in the city for the meeting of the Reichstag at the end of

1878. The government at once asked permission that they should be

charged with breaking the law. The constitution provided that no member

of the House might be brought before a court of justice without the

permission of the House, a most necessary safeguard. In this case the

permission was almost unanimously refused. Nor did they assent to

Bismarck's proposal that the Reichstag should assume power to exclude

from the House members who were guilty of misusing the liberty of speech

which they enjoyed there. Bismarck probably expected, and it is often

said that he hoped, to drive the Socialists into some flagrant violation

of the law, of such a kind that it would be possible for him completely

to crush them. This did not happen. There were some members of the party

who wished to turn to outrage and assassination. Most, a printer from

Leipzig, who had been expelled from Berlin, went to London, where he

founded the _Freiheit_, a weekly paper, in which he advocated a policy

of violence. He was thereupon excluded from the party, and after the

assassination of the emperor Alexander II. of Russia had to leave

England for Chicago. A similar expulsion befell others who advocated

union with the Anarchists. As a whole, however, the party remained firm

in opposition to any action which would strengthen the hands of their

opponents. They carried on the agitation as best they could, chiefly by

distributing reports of speeches made in the Reichstag. A weekly paper,

the _Social-Democrat_, was established at Zurich. Its introduction into

Germany was of course forbidden, but it was soon found possible

regularly to distribute thousands of copies every week in every part of

the country, and it continued to exist till 1887 at Zurich, and till

1890 in London. In August of 1880 a congress of Socialists was held at

the castle of Wyden, in Switzerland, at which about eighty members of

the party met, discussed their policy, and separated before the police

knew anything of it. Here it was determined that the members of the

Reichstag, who were protected by their position, should henceforward be

the managing committee of the party, and arrangements were made for

contesting the elections of 1881. A similar meeting was held in 1883 at

Copenhagen, and in 1887 at St Gallen, in Switzerland. Notwithstanding

all the efforts of the government, though every kind of public agitation

was forbidden, they succeeded in winning twelve seats in 1881. The law,

which had obviously failed, was renewed in 1881; the state of siege was

applied to Hamburg, Leipzig and Stettin, but all to no purpose; and

though the law was twice more renewed, in 1886 and in 1888, the feeling

began to grow that the Socialists were more dangerous under it than they

had been before.

The elections of 1878, by weakening the Liberal parties, enabled

Bismarck also to take in hand the great financial reform which he had

long contemplated.

Financial reform.

Protection.