Chapter 23: Ideologies and Upheavals
- The Peace Settlement
- The European Balance of Power
- The conservative, aristocratic monarchies, with their armies and economies (Great Britain exception), appeared firmly in control once again; great challenge for political leaders in 1814 was to construct a peace settlement that would last and not start war
- The allied powers were concerned with the defeated enemy, France and agreed to the restoration of the Bourbon dynasty (Peace of Paris with Louis XVIII; May 30, 1814)
- The allies were lenient toward France, gave them boundaries it possessed in 1692 and France lost the territories conquered in Italy, Germany, and Low Countries
- France did not have to pay any war damages; when the four allies met at the Congress of Vienna, they agreed to raise a number of formidable barriers against French aggression and the Low Countries were united and Prussia received more territory on France’s eastern border to stand as a “sentinel” against France
- In their moderation toward France, the allies (the Great Powers) were motivated by self-interest and traditional ideas about the balance of power
- To Klemens von Metternich and Castlereagh (foreign ministers of Austria and Britain) as well as their French counterpart Charles Talleyrand, the balance of power meant an internal equilibrium of political and military forces that would preserve the freedom and Austria, Britain, Prussia, Russia, and France
- They had to arrange international relations so that none of the victors would be tempted to strive for domination in its turn
- The victors used the balance of power to settle dangerous disputes at the Congress of Vienna and agreed that each of them should receive compensation in the form of territory for their successful struggle against the French
- Great Britain won and retained colonies and strategic outposts during the war
- Austria gave up territories in Belgium and southern Germany but took in rich provinces in northern Italy as well as Polish possessions
- Prussia and Russia deserved to be compensated but almost led to war in 1815
- Alexander I of Russia had taken Finland on his northern border and Bessarabia on his southern border but wanted to restore kingdom of Poland and Prussians were willing to give up their Polish territories as long as they could take in Saxony
- Castlereagh and Metternich feared an unbalancing of forces in central Europe
- On January 3, 1815, Great Britain, Austria, and France signed a secret alliance directed against Russia and Prussia; the outcome was compromise rather than war because threat of war caused rulers of Russia and Prussia to moderate demands
- They accepted Metternich’s proposal and Russia established a small Polish kingdom and Prussia received two-fifths of Saxony; France had regained its Great Power status and ended its diplomatic isolation by siding with Metternich
- When the peace settlement had been almost complete, Napoleon reappeared and after Napoleon was defeated, the resulting peace—the second Peace of Paris—was still relatively moderate toward France and Louis XVIII was restored to his throne
- France lost some territory and had to pay an indemnity of 700 million francs and had to support a large army of occupation for five years
- The Quadruple Alliance agreed to meet periodically to discuss their interest and consider appropriate measures of the maintenance of peace in Europe
- Intervention and Repression
- In 1815 under Metternich’s leadership, Austria, Prussia, and Russia embarked on a crusade against the ideas of politics of the dual revolution (lasted until 1848)
- The Holy Alliance, formed by Austria, Prussia, and Russia in September 1815 proclaimed intention of the three eastern monarchs to rule on the basis of Christian principles and to work together to maintain peace and justice on all occasions (soon became symbol of repression of liberal and revolutionary movements across Europe)
- In 1820 revolutionaries succeeded in forcing the monarchs of Spain and Italian kingdom of the Two Sicilies to grant liberal constitutions against their wills
- Calling a conference at Troppau in Austria under the provisions of the quadruple Alliance, Metternich and Alexander I proclaimed the principle of active intervention to maintain all autocratic regimes whenever they were threatened
- Austrian forces marched into Naples and restored Ferdinand I to the throne of the Two Sicilies and the French armies of Louis XVIII restored the Spanish regime
- Great Britain remained aloof, arguing that intervention in the domestic politics of foreign states was not an object of British diplomacy and opposed any attempts by the Spanish monarchy to reconquer its former Latin American possessions (market)
- Encouraged by the British position, the United States proclaimed its celebrated Monroe Doctrine in 1823, which declared that European powers were to keep their hands off the New World and in no way attempt to re-establish their political system
- Metternich continued to battle liberal political change but sometime she could do little as in the new Latin American republics nor the dynastic changes of 1830 and 1831 in France and Belgium; Metternich’s system proved effective until 1848
- Metternich’s policies dominated entire German Confederation, which was composed of thirty-eight independent German states, including Prussia and Austria and theses states met in complicated assemblies dominated by Austria, with Prussia a willing junior partner in the planning and execution of repressive measures
- Metternich had the infamous Carlsbad Decrees issued in 1819 and required German member states to root out subversive ideas in their universities and newspapers
- Metternich and Conservation
- Born into the middle ranks of the landed nobility of the Rhineland, Prince Klemens von Metternich was an internationally oriented aristocrat and marriage to Eleonora von Kaunitz opened the door to the highest court circles and a diplomatic career
- Austrian ambassador to Napoleon’s court in 1806 and Austrian foreign minister from 1809 to 1848, Metternich remained loyal to his class
- Metternich defended the rights of his class with a clear conscience; the nobility was one of Europe’s most ancient institutions and regarded tradition as the basic source of human institutions (monarchy, bureaucracy, aristocracy, commoners)
- Metternich’s commitment to conservatism was coupled with a passionate hatred of liberalism; liberal demands for representative government and civil liberties had captured some of the middle-class lawyers, business people, and intellectuals
- Metternich believed these groups had been and still were engaged in a vast conspiracy to impose their beliefs on society and destroy existing order
- Like many other conservatives, Metternich blamed liberal revolutionaries for stirring up the lower classes, which he believed to be indifferent to liberal ideas
- The threat of liberalism appeared doubly dangerous to Metternich because it went with national aspirations and liberals, believed that each national group, had a right to establish its own independent government and seek to fulfill its own destiny
- Metternich thought national self-determination threatened the existence of the aristo-cracy and threatened to destroy the Austrian Empire and revolutionize central Europe
- The vast Austrian Empire of the Habsburgs were a great dynastic state
- Germans had supported and profited by the long-term territorial expansion of Austria; Germans accounted for a quarter of the population
- The Magyars, a substantially smaller group, dominated the kingdom of Hungary
- The Czechs, the third major group were concentrated in Bohemia and Moravia
- The various Slavic peoples, together with the Italians and the Rumanians, represented a widely scattered and completely divided majority in an empire dominated by Germans and Hungarians
- Different parts of provinces of the empire differed in languages, customs, and institutions but were held together by their ties to the Habsburg emperor
- The multinational state Metternich served was both strong and weak
- Austria was strong because of its large population and vast territories
- Austria was weak because of its many and potentially dissatisfied nationalities
- In those circumstances, Metternich had to oppose liberalism and nationalism for Austria was unable to accommodate those ideologies of the dual revolution
- Other conservatives supported Austria because they could imagine no better fate
- Radical Ideas and Early Socialism
- Liberalism
- Revived conservatism, with stress on tradition, a hereditary monarchy, a strong and privileged landowning aristocracy, and an official church, was rejected by radicals
- The principal ideas of liberalism—liberty and equality—were not defeated in 1815
- Political and social philosophy continued to challenge to revived conservatism
- Liberalism demanded representative government as opposed to autocratic monarchy, equality before the law as opposed to legally separate classes
- The idea of liberty continued to mean specific individual freedoms: freedom of press, freedom of speech, freedom of assembly, and freedom of arbitrary arrest
- Louis XVIII’s Constitutional Charter and Great Britain with its Parliament and historic rights of English people had realized much of the liberal program in 1815
- Liberalism faced more radical ideological competitors in the early nineteenth century and that liberalism resolutely opposed government intrusion in social and economic affairs even if the need for action seemed great to social critics and reformers
- This form of liberalism is often called “classical” liberalism in the United States in order to distinguish it sharply from modern American liberalism, which favors more government programs to meet social needs and to regulate the economy
- Opponents of classical liberalism criticized its economic principles, which called for unrestricted private enterprise and no government interference (laissez faire)
- The idea of a free economy had first been formulated by Adam Smith (Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations) who founded modern economics
- Smith was highly critical of eighteenth-century mercantilism
- Smith argued that freely competitive private enterprise would result in greater income for everyone, no just the rich (general economic development)
- British economy was liberalized as old restrictions on trade and industry were relaxed or eliminated; this liberalization promoted continued economic growth in the I.R.; economic liberalism and laissez-faire economy were embraced by business groups and became a doctrine associated with business interest; labor unions outlawed
- Thomas Malthus, who argued that population would always grow faster than supply of food and Ricardo, who said that wages would be just high enough to keep workers from starving, helped make economic liberalism an ideology of business interests
- Liberal political ideals became more closely associated with narrow class interests
- Early-nineteenth-century liberals favored representative government, but generally wanted property qualifications attached to the right to vote
- Liberalism became increasingly identified with the middle class after 1815 and inspired by memories of the French Revolution and Jacksonian democracy, they called for universal voting rights, at least for males (would lead to democracy)
- Many people who believed in democracy also believed in the republican form of government; they detested the power of the monarchy, the privileges of the aristocracy, and the great wealth of the upper middle class (democrats and republi-cans were also more willing than most liberals to endorse violent upheaval for ideals)
- Nationalism
- Nationalism was the second radical idea that came after 1815, with three major points
- Nationalism has normally evolved from a real or imagined cultural unity, manifesting itself especially in a common language, history, and territory
- Nationalists have usually sought to turn this cultural unity into political reality so that the territory of each people coincides with its state boundaries; explosive in central and eastern Europe where there were too many states or too little states
- Modern nationalism’s immediate origins in French Revolution and Napoleonic wars; people used nationalism to repel foreign foes during the Reign of Terror
- Between 1815 and 1850, most people who believed in nationalism also believed in either liberalism or radical, democratic republicanism (love of liberty and nation)
- A common faith in the creativity and nobility of the people was perhaps the single most important reason for the linking of the love of liberty and the love of nation
- Liberals and democrats saw people as ultimate source of all government; people elected officials and governed themselves within framework of personal liberty
- Common loyalties rested above all on a common language; liberals and nationalists agreed that a shared language forged the basic unity of a people
- Early nationalists usually believed that every nation, like every citizen, had the right to exist in freedom and to develop its character and spirit (freedom of other nations)
- Symphony of nations would promote the harmony and ultimate unity of peoples
- Jules Michelet (The People) wrote each citizen “learns to recognize his country” and Italian patriot Giuseppe Mazzini believed that “in laboring according to true principles of our country we are laboring for Humanity.”
- Liberty of the individual and the love of free nation overlapped greatly
- Early nationalists talked of helping humanity but stressed differences among people
- German pastor and philosopher Johann Herder argued that every people has its own particular spirit and genius, which it expresses through culture and language
- Early nationalism developed a strong sense of “we” and “they” (often enemy)
- Leader of the Czech cultural revival, the passionate democrat Francis Palacky, praised the Czech people’s achievements, which he characterized as a long struggle against brutal German domination; to this “we-they” outlook, they added highly volatile ingredients: a sense of national mission and a sense of national superiority
- German and Spanish nationalists had a very different opinion of France and to them, the French seemed as oppressive as the Germans seemed to the Czechs (mission)
- Early nationalism was ambiguous and its main thrust was liberal and democratic; but below, ideas of national superiority and national mission lurked (aggressive crusades)
- French Utopian Socialism
- Almost all socialists were French and were aware that the political revolution in France and rise of modern industry in England had been a transformation of society
- Socialists believed there was an urgent need for reorganization of society to establish cooperation and a new sense of community (searched past and analyzed present)
- Early French socialists believed in economic planning and argued the government should organize the economy and not depend on destructive competition
- Socials shared an intense desire to help the poor and protect them from the rich
- Socialists believed private property should be regulated by the government or that it should be abolished and replaced by state or community ownership
- One of the most influential early socialist was Count Henri de Saint-Simon who believed the key to progress was proper social organization, which required the “parasites”—court, aristocracy, lawyers, churchmen—give way to the “doers”—leading scientists, engineers, and industrialists (improved conditions for the poor)
- Charles Fourier, socialists critique of capitalism, envisaged self-sufficient communities of people living on acres devoted to agriculture and industry (utopian)
- Fourier advocated total emancipation of women and called for the abolition of marriage, free unions based only on love, and sexual freedom (socialist program)
- Louis Blanc (Organization of Work) urged workers to agitate for universal voting rights and to take control of the state peacefully (right to work became sacred)
- Pierre Joseph Proudhon (What is Property?) believed that property was theft stolen from the worker (unlike most socialists Proudhon feared the power of the state)
- The message of French utopian socialists interacted with the experiences of French urban workers (opposed laissez-faire laws; socialist movement in 1830s and 1840s)
- The Birth of Marxian Socialism
- Karl Marx was an atheistic who was influenced by the French socialist thought
- Early French socialists often appealed to the middle class and the state to help the poor but Marx thought such appeals were naïve and argued that the interests of the middle class and those of the working class were inevitably opposed to each other
- In 1848, Karl Marx (1818-1883) and Friedrich Engels (1820-1895) published the Communist Manifesto, which became the bible of socialism
- In Marx’s view, one class had always exploited the other and with the advent of modern industry, society was split even more now (bourgeoisie and proletariat)
- Marx predicted the proletariat would conquer the bourgeoisie in a revolution as the poorer proletariat was constantly growing in size and class consciousness
- Communist Manifesto ends with “Working Men of All Countries, Unite!”
- Marx united sociology, economics, and human history in a vast and imposing edifice
- Marx, following Ricardo, argued that profits were really wages stolen from the workers and incorporated Engels’s charges of oppression of the new factory workers
- Marx’s theory of historical evolution was built on the philosophy of the German Georg Hegel who believed that history was “ideas in motion”: each age is characterized by a dominant set of ideas, which produces a synthesis
- Marx retained Hegel’s view of history as a dialectic process of change but made economic relationships between classes the driving force; Marx believed it was the bourgeoisie’s turn to give way to the socialism of revolutionary workers (secular)
- The Romantic Movement
- Romanticism’s Tenets
- The romantic movement was in part a revolt against classicism and the Enlightenment
- Romanticism was characterized by belief in emotions, unrestrained imagination, and spontaneity in both art and personal life (“Storm and Stress” 1770-80s in Germany)
- Romantics lived lives of tremendous emotional intensity (suicides and strange illnesses common); many led bohemian lives, wearing hair long and uncombed
- Romantic artists rejected materialism and wanted to escape to lofty spiritual heights through their art (full development of one’s unique human potential)
- Romantics driven by yearning for the unattained, unknown, and unknowable
- Romanticism’s general conception of nature totally different of classicism
- Nature was portrayed by classicists as beautiful and chaste (like formal garden)
- The romantics were enchanted by nature, seeing it as awesome and tempestuous and others saw nature as a source of spiritual inspiration
- Most romantics saw the growth of modern industry as an attack on their beloved nature and human personality and sought escape to “unspoiled” lands
- Some romantics found awesome moving power in the new industrial landscape
- Fascinated by color and diversity, the romantic imagination turned toward the study of history with a passion (history was beautiful and important in its own right)
- History was believed to by the art of change over time (organic and dynamic)
- Historical studies supported the development of national aspirations and encourage entire peoples to seek in the past their special destinies (European thought)
- Literature
- Britain was the first country where romanticism flowered fully in poetry and prose and the British romantic writers were among the most prominent in Europe
- Romanticism found its distinctive voice in poetry, as the Enlightenment had in prose
- William Wordsworth was the leader of English romanticism and was influenced by the philosophy of Rousseau and the spirit of the early French Revolution
- Wordsworth and Coleridge published Lyrical Ballads, one of the most influential literary works in the history of English language (language of ordinary speech)
- Wordsworth’s romantic conviction that nature has power to elevate and instruct
- Walter Scott personified the romantic movement’s fascination with history; he was influenced by German romanticism, particularly by Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
- The strength of classicism in France inhibited the growth of romanticism there at first but between 1820 and 1850 the romantic impulse broke through in poetry and prose
- Victor Hugo was the greatest in both poetry and prose in France
- Hugo achieved an amazing range of rhythm, language, and image in his lyric poetry
- Powerful novels exemplified the romantic fascination with fantastic characters
- In his play Hernani, Hugo renounced his early conservatism and equated freedom in literature with liberty in politics and society (broke all the old rules)
- Amandine Dupin, known as George Sand, defied the narrow conventions of her time in an unending search for self-fulfillment (romantic love of nature, moral idealism)
- In central and eastern Europe, literary romanticism and early nationalism often reinforced each other and romantics plumbed their own histories and cultures
- Art and Music
- The greatest and most moving romantic painter in France was Eugene Delacroix who was a master of dramatic, colorful scenes that stirred the emotions (Liberty Leading the People celebrated the nobility of popular revolution in general and revolution)
- The most notable romantic painters in England was Joseph M. W. Turner and John Constable and both were fascinated by nature; while Turner depicted nature’s power and terror, Constable painted landscapes in which humans were with environment
- Great romantics transformed the classical orchestra and gave range and intensity to music (achieved the most ecstatic effect and realized endless yearning of the soul)
- The composer Franz Liszt vowed to do for the piano what Nicolo Paganini
- Ludwig can Beethoven used contrasting themes and tones to produce dramatic conflict and inspiring resolutions and his range was tremendous (richness and beauty)
- Reforms and Revolutions
- National Liberation in Greece
- National, liberal revolution succeeded in Greece after 1815 (had been under control by the Ottoman Turks since the fifteenth century; united under language and religion)
- The rising national movement led to the formation of secret societies and then to revolt in 1821, led by Alexander Ypsilanti, Greek patriot and general in Russian army
- The Great Powers were opposed to all revolution and refused to back Ypsilanti
- Educated Europeans were in love with the culture of classical Greece
- Russians were stirred by the piety of the Greek Orthodox brethren
- Writers and artists, moved by romantic impulse, responded to the Greek struggle
- In 1827 Great Britain, France, and Russia responded to popular demands and directed Turkey to accept an armistice but when Turkey refused, navies defeated the Turkish fleet and Russia established a protectorate over land that had been under Turkish rule
- Russia finally declared Greece independent in 1830 and installed a German prince as king of the new country in 1832 (nation had gained independence against empire)
- Liberal Reform in Great Britain
- Eighteenth-century British society was dominated by the landowning aristocracy
- The Tory party, controlled by landed aristocracy, was fearful of radical movements and the same intense conservatism motivated the Tory government (balance)
- After 1815 the aristocracy defended its ruling position by repressing popular protest
- In 1815, they began with the Corn Laws, which had regulated the foreign grain trade before (shortages of grain had occurred and agricultural prices skyrocketed but peace meant that grain could be imported again and prices went down)
- The new regulation prohibited the importation of foreign grain unless the price at home rose above 80 shillings per quarter (class-based interpretation)
- The Corn Laws led to protests and demonstrations by urban laborers and were supported by radical thinkers who campaigned for a reformed House of Commons
- In 1817, government responded by temporarily suspending the rights of peaceable assembly and habeas corpus; two years later, Parliament passed the Six Acts controlling heavily taxed press and practically eliminated all mass meetings
- These acts followed an orderly protest at Saint Peter’s Fields (‘Battle of Peterloo’)
- Ongoing industrial development strengthened the upper middle class
- In the 1820s the Tory government moved in the direction of better urban direction, greater economic liberalism, and civil equality of Catholics (heavy tariff)
- The Whig party introduced an act to amend the representation of people
- The Reform Bill of 1832 allowed the House of Commons to emerge as the all-important legislative body and new industrial areas of the country gained representation in the Commons and electoral districts were eliminated
- As a result, the number of voters increased by about 50 percent, giving about 12 percent of the total population the right to vote
- The principal radical program was embodied in the “People’s Charter” of 1838 and Chartist movement (core demand was universal male suffrage, not female suffrage)
- Parliament rejected petitions for male suffrage and many working-class people joined with middle-class manufacturers in the Anti-Corn Law League (1839)
- The climax of the movement came in 1845, the year of the Ireland’s famine and to avert catastrophe Robert Peel and the Whigs repealed the Corn Laws in 1846
- In 1847, the Tories passed the Ten Hours Act of 1847, which limited the workday for women and young people in factories to ten hours and healthy competition between the aristocracy and strong middle class was a factor in the peaceful evolution
- Exploited and growing in numbers, Irish peasants had come to depend on the potato crop and its economy was a subsistence economy, which lacked network of trade
- Potato crop failure in 1846, 1848, and 1851 caused the Great Famine and widespread starvation and mass fever epidemics followed (many immigrants died or fled)
- The Revolution of 1830 in France
- Louis XVIII’s Constitutional Charter of 1814 was basically a liberal constitution
- Louis appointed moderate royalists his ministers who sought to obtain the support of a majority of the representations elected to the lower Chamber of Deputies
- Louis’s charter allowed only about 100,000 of the wealthiest people to vote for deputies, who with the king and his ministers, made the laws of the nation
- Charles X, Louis’s successor, wanted to re-establish the old order in France
- Charles repudiated the Constitutional Charter in 1830, issued decrees stripping much of the wealthy middle class of its voting rights and censored the press
- The immediate reaction was an insurrection in capital by printers and in “three glorious days,” the government collapsed and the upper middle class skillfully seated Charles’s cousin, Louis Philippe, duke of Orleans on the vacant throne
- Louis Philippe accepted the Constitutional Charter of 1814 and was merely “king”
- The wealthy notable elite actually tightened its control as the old aristocracy retreated
- For the upper middle class, there had been a change in dynasty in order to protect the status quo and narrowly liberal institutions of 1815
- The Revolutions of 1848
- A Democratic Republic in France
- Pre-Revolutionary” outbreaks occurred all across Europe (revolution in Paris)
- Louis Philippe’s “bourgeois monarchy” was characterized by stubborn inaction
- Lack of social, legislation, and politics was dominated by corruption
- The king’s chief minister in the 1840s, Francois Guizot, was personified and satisfied with the electoral system were only rich could vote for deputies
- Barricades went up on the night of February 22, 1848 and by February 24, Louis Philippe had abdicated in favor of his grandson but refusal led to the proclamation of a provisional republic, headed by a ten-man executive committee supported by public
- A generation of writers had praised the First French Republic and revolutionaries were firmly committed to a republic as opposed to any form of constitutional monarchy and they immediately set about drafting a constitution for France’s Second
- Government truly wanted the forces of the common people (could reform society)
- Revolutionary compassion and sympathy for freedom were expressed in the freeing of all slaves in French colonies, the abolition of the death penalty, and the establishment of a ten-hour workday for workers in Paris
- The revolutionary coalition were the moderate, liberal republicans of the middle class
- They viewed universal male suffrage as the ultimate concession; but they opposed any further radical social measures but on the other hand, were radical republicans
- The radical republicans were committed to socialism (various degrees)
- Worsening depression and rising unemployment raised issues
- Louis Blanc represented the republican socialists in the provincial government
- Blanc argued for permanent government-sponsored cooperative workshops
- Moderate republicans were willing to provide only temporary relief and the resulting compromise set up national workshops and established a special commission under Blanc to “study the question” (nobody satisfied)
- French masses went to election polls and the people elected to the new Constituent Assembly 500 moderate republics, 300 monarchists, and 100 radicals—socialists
- This socialist revolution was a violent reaction among the peasants and according to Alex de Tocqueville (Democracy in America) the peasants were bond with land
- The clash of ideologies of liberal capitalism and socialism became a clash of classes
- The government’s executive committee dropped Blanc and included no representative of the Parisian working class (workers invaded Constituent Assembly on May 15 and tried to proclaim a new revolutionary state)
- On June 22, the government dissolved the national workshops in Paris, giving the workers the choice of joining the army or going to workshops in the provinces
- The result was a spontaneous and violent uprising and barricades sprang up
- Class war had begun and working people fought with the courage of utter desperation but the government had the army and the support of peasant France
- After three terrible “June Days” and the republican army stood triumphant
- In place of a generous democratic republic, the Constituent Assembly completed a constitution featuring a strong executive; allowed Louis Napoleon to win election
- The Austrian Empire in 1848
- News of the upheaval in France evoked liberals to demand written constitutions, representative government, and greater civil liberties from authoritarian regimes; monarchs collapsed after popular revolts but traditional forces recovered and reasserted their authority and reaction was everywhere victorious
- The revolution in the Austrian Empire began in Hungary and in 1848, under the leadership of Louis Kossuth, the Hungarians demanded national autonomy, full civil liberties, and universal suffrage but the monarchy in Vienna hesitated
- Viennese students and workers took to the streets on March 13 and added their own demands and the Habsburg emperor Ferdinand I capitulated and promised reforms and a liberal constitution (Metternich fled to London)
- On March 20, the monarchy abolished serfdom and newly free men and women of the land then lost interest in the political and social questions in the urban areas
- The Hungarian revolutionaries were also nationalists and wanted the ancient Crown of Saint Stephen transformed into a unified, centralized, Hungarian nation; the Habsburg monarchy exploited the fears of the minority groups and locked in combat
- Czech nationalists based in Bohemia, led by Czech historian Palacky, came into conflict with German nationalists and saw their struggle for autonomy as a struggle against a dominant group and peoples of the empire came into sharp conflict
- Throughout Austrian and the German states the middle class wanted liberal reform complete with constitutional monarchy limited voting rights, and social measures
- When the urban poor rose in arms presenting their own demands for socialist workshops and universal male suffrage, the middle classes recoiled in alarm
- Conservative aristocratic forces gathered around Emperor Ferdinand I, who was encouraged by the archduchess Sophia to abdicate in favor of her son Francis Joseph
- Prince Alfred Windischgratz bombarded Prague and crushed a working class revolt in Prague on June 17; Austrian armies reconquered Austria’s possessions
- At the end of October, the Austrian army attacked the student and working-class radicals in Vienna and retook the city (Austrian aristocracy and loyalty of army)
- Francis Joseph was crowned emperor of Austria in December 1848 and Nicolas I of Russia let 130,000 Russian troops; on June 6, 1849, the army subdued the country
- Prussia and the Frankfurt Assembly
- Prior to 1848, the goal of middle-class Prussian liberals had been to transform absolutist Prussia into a liberal constitution (then merging German states into nation)
- After the fall of Louis Philippe, Prussian liberals pressed for the creation of liberal constitutional monarchy and the artisans and factory workers exploded
- Frederick William IV hesitated and on March 21, he promised to grant Prussia a liberal constitution and to merge it into a new national German state to be created
- Urban workers wanted a more radical revolution and the Prussian aristocracy wanted no revolution at all and joined the conservative group to urge a counter-reformation
- A self-appointed group of liberals from various states met for the first time on May 18 in Frankfurt to write a federal constitution for a unified German state
- The Frankfurt National Assembly was absorbed with the issue of the provinces of Schleswig and Holstein (provinces in Germany but ruled by the king of Denmark)
- When Frederick VII, the new king of Denmark tried to integrate both of these provinces, the Germans there revolted (called on Prussian army to help)
- In March 1849 the National Assembly completed its draft constitution and elected Frederick William of Prussia the new emperor of the German national state
- Frederick William rejected the National Assembly and retook control of the state
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Aboukhadijeh, Feross. "Chapter 23: Ideologies and Upheavals" StudyNotes.org. Study Notes, LLC., 04 Jan. 2014. Web. 06 Oct. 2024. <https://www.apstudynotes.org/european-history/outlines/chapter-23-ideologies-and-upheavals/>.