The Path to the Founding of the German Empire 1849 - 1871

“Unity and Justice and Freedom” - The Path to the Founding of the German Empire 1849 - 1871 Whoever traveled through Europe in the middle of the last century quickly knew: this continent belonged culturally together, and yet was divided into nations, many of which formed a state. The French, the English, the Spaniards, to name only a few examples, lived in nation-states, and had already done so for centuries. But if you asked, in the middle of the continent, about Germany, you got very different answers. Some people thought that Germany was the German Federation with its 39 states. Others answered that the German Empire had died in 1806, when a group of German countries had joined together under Napoleon to form the Rhein Federation, and Emperor Franz II took off the crown of the “Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation”. Still others spoke of the German cultural nation and thought thereby about the common language, poetry, tradition, and history. As different as the answers may have been, in one matter they all agreed: the Germany was not a nation-state, and that the German Federation was not a substitute for such. The German National Movement The “German Question” Arises. Many people considered the situation unsatisfactory. Therefore, the voices multiplied, which wanted Germany to be united and free, but also powerful and respected. At the beginning of the 19th century, the national movement, which wanted a German nation-state, arose. It began as a struggle against Napoleon after 1806. The year 1813 was seen by many as a popular uprising of the Germans, in which the [first] goal was freedom from the French oppression, and [the second goal was] the unity and freedom of the German nation. They were all the more disappointed, when, after the victory over Napoleon, not freedom and unity, but rather orderliness and the restoration of the old conditions became the main concepts of the statesmen. Certainly, the restoration was not completely successful. The German Federation was a more modern organization for the individual German states than the old empire had been, and the constitutions in some of the southern German states indicated great progress. Central Europe from 1849 until 1871, page 1 But the national and liberal hopes of the reform era had gone further. Whoever didn’t like the decisions of the Vienna Congress, and reacted against them, found himself prosecuted. But neither censorship nor oppression, neither prosecutions nor punishments could stop the movement. On the contrary! If it was, in the beginning, intellectuals, academics, and students who had raised the demands for unity and freedom, then soon the national and liberal ideas grasped other factions of the citizenry. There were many opportunities for the citizens to show their national and liberal convictions: in the territorial parliaments, in conventions, in clubs (especially song and gymnastic clubs), at large national gatherings. The German tariff union of 1834 effectively prepared economic union. The national movement got a strong boost from outside. A foreign-policy defeat for the French in 1840 was perceived by the French public as a humiliation, and answered with the demand, that the injured national honor be restored. Thereby, the return to the Rhein-border, the allegedly “natural” border of France, formed the center-point of a loud press campaign. In Germany, there was no lack of a response. A spontaneous counter-movement, which included all classes of the population, denied this demand. Among the many “Rhein-songs” and patriotic poems, which arose in these years, Nikolaus Becker’s poem “The German Rhein” with the inspiring refrain, “they shouldn’t have it, the free, German Rhein”, attained the greatest popularity. “Watch on the Rhein” and “The Song of the Germans” (“Germany, Germany, above all else ... “) by August Heinrich Hoffman von Fallersleben, which later became the national anthem, arose in this era. The strength of the German reaction was an expression of a change in national consciousness. In the 1830’s, the anti-French attitude from the era of the struggle against Napoleon had weakened. Now, German nationalism obtained a re-newed an anti-French attitude, which would last a century. Finally, the revolution of 1848/1849 offered a hope of realizing the ideas of the national and liberal movement: its declared goals had been German unity and German freedom and the German nation-state with a free constitution. But the revolution failed. National unity stumbled on the old powers in Germany, the individual states, which showed themselves as stronger than one had thought, and stumbled on the resistance of the European neighboring nations. And it stumbled at supra-national Austria, which, with its many non-German nationalities, could not be integrated into a German nation-state, and did not want to be integrated without them. Central Europe from 1849 until 1871, page 2.

Load more