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Chapter 2.3 Aristocratic Notions Of This is a post-print version. Please refer to the published version: Charlotta Wolff, ’Aristocratic Notions of Liberty and Patriotism in the Age of Liberty’, Scandinavia in the Age of Revolution: Nordic Political Cultures, 1740–1820, ed. Pasi Ihalainen, Michael Bregnsbo, Karin Sennefelt & Patrik Winton, Ashgate, Farnham & Burlington, 2011, p. 121– 132. Chapter 2.3 Aristocratic Notions of Liberty and Patriotism in the Age of Liberty Charlotta Wolff In Sweden, as in other European countries in the early modern period, the nobility adopted the double role of both collaborator and opponent of the strengthening monarchical state. When opposing royal absolutism, the Swedish nobility would defend their liberty with arguments and concepts borrowed from a general European tradition that has often been called republican, but which could also be called patriotic.1 In the Sweden of the eighteenth century, the nobility dominated the Diet, the Council of the Realm and the highest administration. The noblemen who were active at the Diet were generally well educated, familiar with ancient Roman authors and recent French and English political literature. Their writings abound with literary references and classical commonplaces such as ‘liberty’, ‘republic’, ‘salus publica’ and ‘patriotic zeal’. The strongly European features of the Swedish nobility make the first estate of the realm a particularly interesting object of study. Although the form of government implied equal freedom and rights for all four estates, during the Age of Liberty political power was to a large extent concentrated in the aristocratic Council of the Realm and the Noble estate, while the monarchy remained weakened. The impression of Sweden being a republican monarchy governed 1 Jouanna 1989; Wolff 2008. This is a post-print version. Please refer to the published version: Charlotta Wolff, ’Aristocratic Notions of Liberty and Patriotism in the Age of Liberty’, Scandinavia in the Age of Revolution: Nordic Political Cultures, 1740–1820, ed. Pasi Ihalainen, Michael Bregnsbo, Karin Sennefelt & Patrik Winton, Ashgate, Farnham & Burlington, 2011, p. 121– 132. by aristocrats was all the stronger as the Hat party dominated the Diet from 1738 to 1765 and power thus remained in the hands of a rather small circle. As in other states with a free constitution, liberty was celebrated by the nobility as the foundation stone of the political community. On one hand, the danger of a return to either royal absolutism or aristocratic oligarchy was always present; on the other, the celebration of the freedom from oppression also served to compensate for the relative lack of liberty in society, especially in the lower orders. Liberty and constitutional issues were of course debated in all estates, with many divergences of opinion. In this chapter, we shall take a closer look at the particular ways in which liberty was defended in the Noble estate (for the use of the concept in the other estates, see chapter 2.7). The Ideal of Liberty For most European nobilities in the early modern era, the ideal regime was a mixed constitution, where the powers of the monarch were limited by the existence of representative assemblies and constitutional liberties that granted political participation and physical immunity to free men, noble or non-noble. The Swedish Instruments of Government of 1719 and 1720 were to a large extent drawn up according to this ideal. The aristocratic jurists and political actors behind the texts have been said to have been so impregnated by natural law and English political theory that the form of government of the Age of Liberty could be regarded as a kind of social contract put on paper.2 In the constitutionalist rhetoric of the middle of the century, the time of the birth of the Instruments of Government was described as the beginning of an entirely ‘new age in government’, a new era of regained liberty.3 The reigns of Charles XI and Charles XII 2 Lindroth 1978, pp. 532–3; Nilsén 2001, pp. 114–17. 3 [Carl Gustaf Tessin], TAL, Til Samtelige Riksens Högloflige Ständer, Af Herr Riks-Rådet, Cantzli-Rådet, Öfwerste-Marskalken och Academiae Cancelleren, Höfwälborne Grefwe CARL GUSTAV TESSIN, Tå Riksens Ständer in Pleno Plenorum uppå Stora Riddarhus Salen woro församlade, then 31. Martii 1747 This is a post-print version. Please refer to the published version: Charlotta Wolff, ’Aristocratic Notions of Liberty and Patriotism in the Age of Liberty’, Scandinavia in the Age of Revolution: Nordic Political Cultures, 1740–1820, ed. Pasi Ihalainen, Michael Bregnsbo, Karin Sennefelt & Patrik Winton, Ashgate, Farnham & Burlington, 2011, p. 121– 132. had ended in military, financial and reputational disaster for the realm. The experience of absolutism had awakened a hatred of arbitrariness, lawlessness and all forms of ‘sovereignty’, that is autocratic rule. The official discourse of the new regime would thus focus on liberty and legality. The mixed constitution meant a weak monarchy, a strong four-estate Diet and an aristocratic Council. The regime was based on the notion of the ‘right and liberty of the estates’, mentioned in the preamble of the form of government, and on the balance between the power of the estates, the authority of the Council and the majesty of the monarch.4 The new freedom of the estates gave birth to the particular political culture and ideology that characterized this period: despite the sacredness of the Instrument of Government, constitutional matters were debated at the Diet in a lively manner, and in these debates ‘liberty’ was one of the words used to defend almost any interpretation of the Instrument of Government. The result was an apparently republican discourse in the spirit of old aristocratic constitutionalism. Some time after the transition to estate rule, Swedish politicians started to call the new regime their ‘Age of Liberty’. The term usually referred to an epoch in history, particularly the Roman Republic, during which the people governed itself. It was used in this sense by men such as Count Carl Gustaf Tessin, the poet Olof Dalin, Count Anders Johan von Höpken and Professor Niklas von Oelreich in the late 1740s and the early 1750s.5 With reference to a political situation and to the new nature of the regime, (Stockholm 1747); [Eric Brahe], Öfwerste-Lieutenantens Högwälborne Grefwe ERIC BRAHES TAL, Hållit på Riks-Salen I Stockholm, När Riksdagen slöts then 4. Junii, 1752 (Stockholm 1752). 4 Frihetstidens grundlagar och konstitutionella stadgar, ed. Axel Brusewitz (Stockholm: Riksarkivet 1916), p. 23. 5 Wolff 2008, pp. 49–51. This is a post-print version. Please refer to the published version: Charlotta Wolff, ’Aristocratic Notions of Liberty and Patriotism in the Age of Liberty’, Scandinavia in the Age of Revolution: Nordic Political Cultures, 1740–1820, ed. Pasi Ihalainen, Michael Bregnsbo, Karin Sennefelt & Patrik Winton, Ashgate, Farnham & Burlington, 2011, p. 121– 132. ‘liberty’ alone had already been used in the 1730s.6 Generally speaking, liberty was continuously celebrated in a manner that borderd on self-assurance in official speeches at solemn occasions as well as in normal, everyday Diet sessions and even in private correspondence. The defence of liberty as the pillar of Swedish political ideology was presented as an ancient tradition. The often repeated concept of ‘a free people’ referred to the tradition of a free peasantry, but it was also and above all a way of emphasizing the political independence of the estates. For the best educated rhetors of the Diet, the central place given to liberty allowed allusions to the Roman Republic and other, modern polities without ruling sovereigns, such as the Italian city states. The realization of a Swedish republic without a ruler, however, was too radical an idea for most of these aristocratic politicians, who needed the graces of the court to maintain their social and economic status. What we could call ‘republicanism’ was thus mainly a way of underlining certain political values, a patriotic code of ethics built on the love of liberty and the fatherland.7 The expression ‘right and liberty’ used in the preamble to the Instrument of Government of 1720 proclaimed the Diet’s independence from royal or ministerial interference and thus reflected a perception of liberty that could be defined as an immunity against any sovereign power, including the regal state.8 As time passed, the 6 [Carl Emil Lewenhaupt], Til Hennes Kongl. Maj:t Wår Allernådigste Drottning, Af Grefwen och LandtMarschalken Högwälborne Herr General Majoren CARL EMIL LEWENHAUPT, Uppå Samtel. Riksens Ständers wägnar håldne Tahl wid Riksdagen A. 1734 (Stockholm 1734); [Carl Gustaf Tessin], Landt-Marskalkens Högwälborne Grefwe CARL GUSTAF TESSINS Tal, Hållit til Ridderskapet och Adeln Wid Landt-Marskalks Stafwens emottagande Den 17. Maii 1738 (Stockholm 1738). 7 Wolff 2008. 8 Skinner 2003, pp. 11–25; Lindberg 2006, pp. 171–3. This is a post-print version. Please refer to the published version: Charlotta Wolff, ’Aristocratic Notions of Liberty and Patriotism in the Age of Liberty’, Scandinavia in the Age of Revolution: Nordic Political Cultures, 1740–1820, ed. Pasi Ihalainen, Michael Bregnsbo, Karin Sennefelt & Patrik Winton, Ashgate, Farnham & Burlington, 2011, p. 121– 132. liberty of the estates became a synonym for their extensive power, while, at the same time, the estates themselves merged with the state.9 In 1760, when the power of the estates was at its zenith, Carl Fredrik Scheffer, writing an interpretation of the Swedish form of government for Prince Gustavus, went so far as to translate the ‘right and liberty’ of the estates as ius et imperium.10 The translation is all the more remarkable in that classical political theory had argued over which, ius or imperium, was the precondition of the other and to what extent they were antipodes.11 By replacing libertas with imperium, Scheffer made a silent ideological statement, translating liberty as ‘sovereign power’ without using the forbidden word libertas [liberty].
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