A History of the Nineteenth Century, Year by Year. Volume 2 (of 3)Emerson, Edwin
History
A History of the Nineteenth Century, Year by Year. Volume 2 (of 3)
Emerson, Edwin
History, Modern -- 19th century
For future sessions of the Diet the votes were so regulated that the
eleven States of first rank alone held a full vote, the secondary States
merely holding a half or a fourth of a vote, as, for instance, all the
Saxon duchies collectively, one vote; Brunswick and Nassau, one; the two
Mecklenburgs, one; Oldenburg, Anhalt, and Schwartzburg, one; the petty
princes of Hohenzollern, Lichtenstein, Reuss, Lippe, and Waldeck, one; all
the free towns, one; forming altogether seventeen votes. In constitutional
questions the six States of the highest rank were to have each four votes;
the next five States each three; Brunswick, Schwerin, and Nassau, each two;
and all the remaining princes each, one vote. This arrangement, as it
turned out, proved fruitful of endless trouble.
[Sidenote: Unfair representation]
Austria and Prussia at that time contained forty-two million inhabitants;
the rest of Germany merely twelve million. The power of the two predominant
States, therefore, really were in proportion to that of the rest of Germany
as seven to two, whereas their votes in the Diet stood merely as two to
seventeen, and in the plenary assembly as two to fifteen.
[Sidenote: Prussia predominant]
Though Prussia had lost Hanover and East Friesland, she had received
sufficient compensation still--thanks to Hardenberg's diplomacy--to start
her on her future career as the predominant German State. Incorporated with
the Prussian provinces now were half of Saxony, the Grandduchy of Posen, a
portion of Westphalia, nearly all of the Lower Rhine region from Mainz to
Aix-la-Chapelle, and Swedish Pomerania, for which Prussia paid some eight
million thalers by way of indemnity.
[Sidenote: Restoration of the Netherlands]
In Holland, the new Stadtholder, Prince William Frederick of Orange-Nassau,
having incorporated Belgium as an integral part of the kingdom of the
Netherlands, set himself to nullify the French racial traits of his Belgian
subjects. A suggestion of future strife on this score could already be
found in Van der Palm's memorial on "The Restoration of the Netherlands,"
published during this year.
[Sidenote: England's commanding position]
[Sidenote: Industrial depression]
[Sidenote: Art and Letters]
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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