An Introduction to the History of Western Europe Part 70

[Sidenote: Napoleon III alarmed by the Italian successes.]

Suddenly Europe was astonished to hear that a truce had been concluded, and that the preliminaries of a peace had been arranged which left Venetia in Austria's hands, in spite of Napoleon III's boast that he would free Italy to the Adriatic. The French emperor had begun to fear that, with the growing enthusiasm which was showing itself throughout the peninsula for Piedmont, there was danger that it might succeed in forming a national kingdom so strong as to need no French protector. By leaving Venetia in possession of Austria, and agreeing that Piedmont should only be increased by the incorporation of Lombardy and the little duchies of Parma and Modena, Napoleon III hoped to prevent the consolidation of Italy from proceeding too far.

[Sidenote: The formation of a kingdom of Italy, 1860.]

He had, however, precipitated changes which he was powerless to check.

Italy was now ready to fuse into a single state. Tuscany, as well as Modena and Parma, voted (March, 1860) to unite with Piedmont. Garibaldi, a famous republican leader, sailed for Sicily, where he a.s.sumed the dictators.h.i.+p of the island in the name of Victor Emmanuel, "King of Italy." After expelling the troops of the king of Naples from Sicily, he crossed to the mainland, and early in September he entered Naples itself, just as the king fled from his capital.

[Sidenote: Napoleon III intervenes to prevent the annexation of Rome to the kingdom of Italy.]

Garibaldi now proposed to march on Rome and proclaim the kingdom of Italy from the Quirinal. This would have imperiled all the previous gains, for Napoleon III could not, in view of the strong Catholic sentiment in France, possibly permit the occupation of Rome and the destruction of the political independence of the pope. He agreed that Victor Emmanuel might annex the outlying papal possessions to the north and reestablish a stable government in Naples instead of Garibaldi's dictators.h.i.+p. But Rome, the imperial city, with the territory immediately surrounding it, must be left to its old master. Victor Emmanuel accordingly marched southward and occupied Naples (October).

Its king capitulated and all southern Italy became a part of the kingdom of Italy.

In February, 1861, the first Italian parliament was opened at Turin, and the process of really amalgamating the heterogeneous portions of the new kingdom began. Yet the joy of the Italians over the realization of their hopes of unity and national independence was tempered by the fact that Austria still held one of the most famous of the Italian provinces, and that Rome, which typified Italy's former grandeur, was not included in the new kingdom. Within a decade, however, both these districts became a part of the kingdom of Italy through the action of Prussia. William I and his extraordinary minister and adviser, Bismarck, were about to do for Germany what Victor Emmanuel and Cavour had accomplished for Italy.[450]

[Sidenote: William I of Prussia, 1861-1888.]

269. With the accession of William I in 1858,[451] a new era dawned for Prussia. A practical and vigorous man had come into power, whose great aim was to expel Austria from the German Confederation, and out of the remaining states to construct a firm union, under the leaders.h.i.+p of Prussia, which should take its place among the most powerful of the states of Europe. He saw that war would come sooner or later, and his first business was to develop the military resources of his realms.

[Sidenote: William I's plan for strengthening the army.]

The German army, which was the outgrowth of the early reforms of William I, is so extraordinary a feature of the Europe of to-day, that its organization merits attention. The war of independence against Napoleon in 1813 had led to the summoning of the nation to arms, and a law was pa.s.sed in Prussia making military service a universal obligation of every healthy male citizen. The first thing that William I did was to increase the annual levy from forty to sixty thousand men, and to see that all the soldiers remained in active service three years. They then pa.s.sed into the reserve, according to the existing law, where for two years more they remained ready at any time to take up arms should it be necessary. William wished to increase the term of service in the reserve to four years. In this way the state would claim seven of the years of early manhood and have an effective army of four hundred thousand, which would permit it to dispense with the service of those who were approaching middle life. The lower house of the Prussian parliament refused, however, to make the necessary appropriations for increasing the strength of the army.

[Sidenote: Bismarck and his struggle with the Prussian parliament.]

The king proceeded, nevertheless, with his plan, and in 1862 called to his side one of the most extraordinary statesmen of modern times, Bismarck. The new minister conceived a scheme for laying Austria low and exalting Prussia, which he succeeded in carrying out with startling precision. He could not, however, reveal it to the lower chamber; he would, indeed, scarcely hint its nature to the king himself. In defiance of the lower house and of the newspapers, he carried on the strengthening of the army without formal appropriations, on the theory that the const.i.tution had not provided for a dead-lock between the upper and lower house, and that consequently the king might exercise, in such a case, his former absolute power. For a time it seemed as if Prussia was returning to a pure despotism, for there was a.s.suredly no more fundamental provision of the const.i.tution than the right of the people to control the granting of the taxes. Yet Bismarck was eventually fully exonerated by public opinion, and it was generally agreed that the end had amply justified the means.

[Sidenote: The Schleswig-Holstein affair.]

270. Prussia now had a military force that appeared to justify the hope of victory should she undertake a war with her old rival. In order to bring about the expulsion of Austria from the confederation, Bismarck took advantage of a knotty problem that had been troubling Germany, and which was known as the Schleswig-Holstein affair. The provinces of Schleswig and Holstein, although inhabited largely by Germans, had for centuries belonged to the king of Denmark. They were allowed, however, to retain their provincial a.s.semblies, and were not considered a part of Denmark any more than Hanover was a part of Great Britain in the last century.

In 1847, just when the growing idea of nationality was about to express itself in the Revolution of 1848, the king of Denmark proclaimed that he was going to make these German provinces an integral part of the Danish kingdom. This aroused great indignation throughout Germany, especially as Holstein was a member of the confederation. Frederick William IV consented to go to war with Denmark, but only succeeded in delaying for a few years the proposed absorption of the provinces by Denmark. The constant encroachments of the government at Copenhagen upon the privileges claimed by Schleswig-Holstein aroused new apprehension and much discontent. In 1863 Schleswig was finally incorporated into the Danish kingdom.

[Sidenote: Bismarck's audacious plan for the expulsion of Austria from Germany.]

"From this time the history of Germany is the history of the profound and audacious statecraft and of the overmastering will of Bismarck; the nation, except through its valour on the battlefield, ceases to influence the shaping of its own fortunes. What the German people desired in 1864 was that Schleswig-Holstein should be attached, under a ruler of its own, to the German Federation as it then existed; what Bismarck intended was that Schleswig-Holstein, itself incorporated more or less directly with Prussia, should be made the means of the destruction of the existing Federal system and of the expulsion of Austria from Germany.... The German people desired one course of action; Bismarck had determined on something totally different; with matchless resolution and skill he bore down all the opposition of people and of the [European] courts, and forced a reluctant nation to the goal which he himself had chosen for it" (Fyffe).

[Ill.u.s.tration: Bismarck]

[Sidenote: The working out of the plan.]

Bismarck's first step was to invite Austria to cooperate with Prussia in settling the Schleswig-Holstein difficulty. As Denmark refused to make any concessions, the two powers declared war, defeated the Danish army, and forced the king of Denmark to cede Schleswig-Holstein to the rulers of Prussia and Austria jointly (October, 1864). They were to make such disposition of the provinces as they saw fit. There was now no trouble in picking a quarrel with Austria. Bismarck suggested the nominal independence of the duchies, but that they should become practically a part of Prussia. This plan was of course indignantly rejected by Austria, and it was arranged that, pending an adjustment, Austria should govern Holstein, and Prussia, Schleswig.

[Sidenote: Prussia declares the German Confederation dissolved.]

Bismarck now obtained the secret a.s.surance of Napoleon III that he would not interfere if Prussia and Italy should go to war with Austria. In April, 1866, Italy agreed that, should the king of Prussia take up arms during the following three months with the aim of reforming the German union, it too would immediately declare war on Austria, with the hope, of course, of obtaining Venice. The relations between Austria and Prussia grew more and more strained, until finally in June, 1866, Austria induced the diet to call out the forces of the confederation with a view of making war on Prussia. This act the representative of Prussia declared put an end to the existing union. He accordingly submitted to the diet Prussia's scheme for the reformation of Germany and withdrew from the diet.

[Sidenote: War declared between Prussia and Austria.]

271. On June 12 war was declared between Austria and Prussia. With the exception of Mecklenburg and the small states of the north, all Germany sided with Austria against Prussia. Bismarck immediately demanded of the rulers of the larger North German states--Hanover, Saxony, and Hesse-Ca.s.sel--that they stop their warlike preparations and agree to accept Prussia's plan of reform. On their refusal, Prussian troops immediately occupied these territories, and war actually began.

[Sidenote: Prussia victorious.]

So admirable was the organization of the Prussian army that, in spite of the suspicion and even hatred which the liberal party in Prussia entertained for the despotic Bismarck, all resistance on the part of the states of the north was promptly prevented, Austria was miserably defeated on July 3 in the decisive battle of Koniggratz, or Sadowa,[452]

and within three weeks after the breaking off of diplomatic relations the war was practically over. Austria's influence was at an end, and Prussia had won her right to do with Germany as she pleased.

[Sidenote: The North German Federation.]

Prussia was aware that the larger states south of the Main River were not ripe for the union that she desired. She therefore organized a so-called North German Federation, which included all the states north of the Main. Prussia had seized the opportunity considerably to increase her own boundaries and round out her territory by annexing the North German states, with the exception of Saxony, that had gone to war with her. Hanover, Hesse-Ca.s.sel, Na.s.sau, and the free city of Frankfurt, along with the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein, all became Prussian.

[Sidenote: Requirements of the proposed const.i.tution.]

Prussia, thus enlarged, summoned the lesser states about her to confer upon a const.i.tution that should accomplish four ends. First, it must give all the people of the territory included in the new union, regardless of the particular state in which they lived, a voice in the government. A popular a.s.sembly satisfied this demand. Secondly, the predominating position of Prussia must be secured, but at the same time (thirdly) the self-respect of the other monarchs whose lands were included must not be sacrificed. In order to accomplish this double purpose the king of Prussia was made president of the federation but not its sovereign. The chief governing body was the Federal Council (Bundesrath). In this each ruler, however small his state, and each of the three free towns--Hamburg, Bremen, and Lubeck--had at least one vote; in this way it was arranged that the other rulers did not become _subjects_ of the king of Prussia. The real sovereign of the North German Federation and of the present German empire is not the king of Prussia, but "all of the united governments." The votes were distributed as in the old diet, so that Prussia, with the votes of the states that she annexed in 1860, enjoyed seventeen votes out of forty-three. Lastly, the const.i.tution must be so arranged that when the time came for the southern states--Bavaria, Wurtemberg, Baden, and south Hesse--to join the union, it would be adapted to the needs of the widened empire.

The union was a true federation like that of the United States, although its organization violated many of the rules which were observed in the organization of the American union. It was inevitable that a union spontaneously developed from a group of sovereign _monarchies_, with their traditions of absolutism, would be very different from one in which the members, like the states of the American union, had previously been governed by republican inst.i.tutions.

[Sidenote: Disappointment of the hopes of Napoleon III.]

272. No one was more chagrined by the abrupt termination of the war of 1866 and the victory of Prussia than Napoleon III. He had hoped that both the combatants might be weakened by a long struggle, and that at last he might have an opportunity to arbitrate and incidentally to gain something for France, as had happened after the Italian war. But Prussia came out of the conflict with greatly increased power and territory, while France had gained nothing. An effort of Napoleon's to get a foothold in Mexico had failed, owing to the recovery of the United States from the Civil War and their warning that they should regard his continued intervention there as an hostile act.[453] His hopes of annexing Luxembourg as an offset for the gains that Prussia had made, were also frustrated.

[Sidenote: France declares war upon Prussia, July 19, 1870.]

One course remained for the French usurper, namely, to permit himself to be forced into a war against the power which had especially roused the jealousy of France. Never was an excuse offered for war more trivial than that advanced by the French,[454] never did retribution come more speedily. The hostility which the South German states had hitherto shown toward Prussia encouraged Napoleon III to believe that so soon as the French troops should gain their first victory, Bavaria, Wurtemberg, and Baden would join him. That first victory was never won. War had no sooner been declared than the Germans laid all jealousy aside and ranged themselves as a nation against a national a.s.sailant. The French army, moreover, was neither well equipped nor well commanded. The Germans hastened across the Rhine, and within a few days were driving the French before them. In a series of b.l.o.o.d.y encounters about Metz, one of the French armies was defeated and finally shut up within the fortifications about the town. Seven weeks had not elapsed after the beginning of the war, before the Germans had captured a second French army and made a prisoner of the emperor himself in the great battle of Sedan, September 1, 1870.[455]

[Sidenote: Siege of Paris and close of Franco-Prussian War.]

[Sidenote: Cession of Alsace and Lorraine to Germany.]

The Germans then surrounded and laid siege to Paris. Napoleon III had been completely discredited by the disasters about Metz and at Sedan, and consequently the empire was abolished and France for the third time was declared a republic. In spite of the energy which the new government showed in arousing the French against the invaders, prolonged resistance was impossible. The capital surrendered January 28, 1871, and an armistice was arranged. Bismarck, who had been by no means reluctant to go to war, deeply humiliated France, in arranging the treaty of peace, by requiring the cession of two French provinces which had formerly belonged to Germany,--Alsace and northeastern Lorraine.[456] In this way France was cut off from the Rhine, and the crest of the Vosges Mountains was established as its boundary. The Germans exacted, further, an enormous indemnity for the unjustifiable attack which the French had made upon them. This was fixed at five billion francs, and German troops were to occupy France till it was paid. The French people made pathetic sacrifices to hasten the payment of this indemnity, in order that the country might be freed from the presence of the hated Germans. The bitter feeling of the French for the Germans dates from this war, and the longing for revenge still shows itself. For many years after the war a statue in Paris, representing the lost city of Strasburg, was draped in mourning.

[Sidenote: The insurrection of the Paris commune of 1871.]

Immediately after the surrender of Paris the new republican government had been called upon to subdue a terrible insurrection of the Parisian populace. The insurgents reestablished the commune of the Reign of Terror, and rather than let Paris come again into the hands of the national government, they proposed to burn the city. When, after two months of disorder, their forces were completely routed in a series of b.l.o.o.d.y street fights, the city was actually set on fire; but only two important public buildings were destroyed,--the Palace of the Tuilleries and the city hall.

[Sidenote: The French const.i.tutional laws of 1875.]

A National a.s.sembly had been elected by the people in February, 1871, to make peace with Germany and to draw up a new const.i.tution. Under this temporary government France gradually recovered from the terrible loss and demoralization caused by the war. There was much uncertainty for several years as to just what form the const.i.tution would permanently take, for the largest party in the National a.s.sembly was composed of those who favored the reestablishment of a monarchy.[457] Those who advocated maintaining the republic prevailed, however, and in 1875 the a.s.sembly pa.s.sed a series of three laws organizing the government. These have since served France as a const.i.tution.

[Sidenote: Character of the present French republic.]

While France is nominally a republic with a president at its head, its government closely resembles that of a limited monarchy like Belgium.

This is not strange, since the monarchists were in the majority when its const.i.tutional laws were pa.s.sed. The French government of to-day is therefore a compromise, and since all attempts to overthrow it have proved vain, we may a.s.sume that it is suited to the wants of the nation.

[Sidenote: Permanent character of the French government in spite of changes in the const.i.tution.]

As one reviews the history of France since the establishment of the first republic in 1792, it appears as if revolutionary changes of government had been very frequent. As a matter of fact, the various revolutions produced far less change in the system of government than is usually supposed. They neither called in question the main provisions of the Declaration of the Rights of Man drawn up in 1789, nor did they materially alter the system of administration which was established by Napoleon immediately after his accession in 1800. So long as the latter was retained, the civil rights and equality of all citizens secured, and the representatives of the nation permitted to control the ruler, it really made little difference whether France was called an empire, a const.i.tutional monarchy, or a republic.

[Sidenote: Final unification of Germany.]