Kossuth and his friends naturally argued that as the only member of the House of Hapsburg who claimed the throne of Hungary was admittedly in an illegal position, the only logical course was to depose the House of Hapsburg from the throne of Hungary; and that as the only Constitution by which the rulers of Austria would consent to link themselves to Hungary was admittedly an illegal Constitution, the only logical course was to separate Hungary from Austria. Görgei and his friends, on the other hand, shrank with horror from the idea of fighting without the authority of a King. They had sworn to obey Ferdinand, and to accept the Constitution of March 1848; they therefore insisted on ignoring the abdication of Ferdinand, and the abolition of that Constitution, and continued to fight, in the name of a King who did not wish to reign, and on behalf of a Constitution which had ceased to exist. Kossuth and his friends, however, were resolved to assert their principles; and on April 14 they issued the celebrated "Declaration of Independence."
The strongly legal and historical character which had marked the whole Hungarian movement since the time of the meeting of the Diet in 1825, still shows itself even in this semi-revolutionary document. The Declaration goes back to the first connection of the House of Hapsburg with the throne of Hungary, and declares that no House had ever had so good a chance of governing successfully, and had so misused it. After mentioning some of the tyrannies of the earlier Kings of this House, the Declaration dwells on the fact that while Hungary had often had to fight for its freedom, it had always been so moderate in its demands that it had laid down its arms as soon as the King gave a new oath to preserve its freedom; but these oaths had never been kept, and for three hundred years this policy had never been changed. The people, after each promise, had forgotten the wounds of past years, in exaggerated magnanimity; but now the time had come to break the union. The House of Hapsburg had united itself with the enemies of the people, and with robbers and agitators, in order to oppress the people. It had attacked those of its subjects who would not combine against the Constitution which it had sworn to protect, or against the independent life of the nation. It had attacked with violence the integrity of the country, though it had sworn to preserve it. It had used a foreign Power to murder its own subjects and suppress their lawful freedom. Any one of these crimes was sufficient reason for depriving the Dynasty of its throne. The Declaration then goes on to consider the excuses which the Dynasty offered for its conduct. As for the independence secured by Hungary in March, 1848, that was only the confirmation of an old tradition; for the Pragmatic Sanction showed that neither Hungary nor any of the provinces connected with it had ever been absorbed in Austria. Joseph II. alone had ignored this fact, and his name, therefore, never appeared in the list of the kings of Hungary. As for the laws which the Diet had passed in March, Ferdinand had sanctioned them; but he now wished to suppress them. Yet the Hungarians had taken no advantage of the disturbances in different parts of the Austrian Empire to secure greater independence for themselves, but had remained content with what had been granted in March. They had supported the monarchy; but Ferdinand had tried to break his oath as soon as it was made. The Government at Vienna had at first tried to act through the Count Palatine; but, as this combination had weakened their power, they had gradually withdrawn more and more power from him. They had tried to impose customs duties which would have cut off Hungary from the rest of the world; and when this method failed they tried to stir up the different nationalities against the Hungarian Ministry. The proclamation proceeds to say that dates and documents prove that the Archduke Louis, the Archduke Francis Charles, and the Archduchess Sophia had stirred up the movements in Croatia and Slavonia. They attribute Ferdinand's first denunciation of Jellaciç as a traitor to the difficulties caused by the war in Italy; but they accuse him of having played a double part, both in Croatia and Slavonia, and of having helped the Croats and Serbs with money and ammunition at the very time when he was denouncing them as rebels. They charge the Serbs with having committed great cruelties in their rising. They denounce, as illegal, the scattering of Hungarian troops in different provinces of the Austrian Empire, and they declare that it was in consequence of this arrangement that they were unable to save Fiume from Jellaciç. They complain of the order given to the soldiers and commanders of fortresses not to obey the Hungarian Ministry, and to take orders only from Vienna. They complain that the Emperor had made a general of the Slavonic priest who had headed the rising of the Slovaks in North Hungary. They complain of their desertion by the Archduke Stephen, after his promises of support, and of the intrigues of Latour with Jellaciç and with other generals against the liberties of Hungary. Lastly, they complain of the abdication of Ferdinand in favour of Francis Joseph. Yet even Francis Joseph they would have accepted had he claimed his rights in a legal manner; but he had threatened to conquer Hungary by force, and had, for the conquest of Transylvania, called in those Russians who had crushed out the liberties of Roumania. They further stated that, although at first the Hungarians had been driven back, they had now recovered their ground in Transylvania, cleared North Hungary of foes, suppressed the Serb rising, and defeated the Austrians in five battles. Under these circumstances they now declared Hungary independent of the House of Hapsburg, and appointed Kossuth as their President.
Kossuth's supremacy in Hungary had been an important fact for a considerable time past, and had been due, not only to his personal qualities, but to the gradual retirement from public life of most of the leading statesmen who had played a part in the earlier phases of the struggle against the ruling powers in Vienna. Batthyanyi had abandoned all direct initiative in Hungarian politics ever since his resignation of the Premiership, and had only attempted to mediate between the contending armies, a mediation which had been scornfully rejected by Windischgrätz. Deak had, from the first, announced that he was unfit for revolutionary propaganda; and, after devoting himself, in the early days of the March Ministry, to the compilation of a code of laws and the administrative work of his office, he had gradually assumed the same position of mediator which Batthyanyi had desired, and with equal want of success. Wesselenyi was now old and blind; and, though he had consented to go with Eötvös on that deputation to the Vienna Assembly which had been repulsed by the Bohemian Deputies, neither he nor Eötvös now took any regular part in public affairs. Szechenyi, horrified at the results which, as he considered, had flowed from his early encouragement of Magyar feeling, lost his reason, and was at this time under restraint. Thus, of the statesmen who had been prominent in Hungary during the struggle against Metternich, Kossuth was the only one who could still be said to be before the public.
Kossuth's unrivalled eloquence, and his keen sympathy, both with the intensity and the narrowness of Magyar feeling, had given him a force which none of the other leaders of the movement had ever possessed; and his discovery of the military genius of Bem had secured him an influence in Transylvania which considerably increased the strength of his position. On the other hand, his intolerant attitude towards the subject races of Hungary had marked him out in a special manner as the object of their hatred; while his contempt for ordinary military arrangements, his growing distrust of Görgei, and last, but perhaps not least, the belief among many military men that he was deficient in physical courage, tended to strengthen against him a formidable party in the army which was eventually to prove too strong for him. But, if the divided state of Hungarian feeling threw formidable difficulties in the way of Kossuth, he could find compensations in the condition of the forces opposed to him. Windischgrätz does not seem to have been reckoned, by military critics, a considerable general. Stratimiroviç, whatever military qualities he may have possessed, was continually held in check by the cautious policy of Rajaciç. Puchner, who had succeeded in giving such force to the Roumanian rising, was becoming an object of suspicion to the more conventional Austrian generals, and was shortly to be removed from Transylvania; while a cause of weakness, which was perhaps still more important, was to be found in the withdrawal from the country of a large body of Austrian and Croatian soldiers, who were being despatched against the new Government of the Roman States.
For in Italy, too, the champions of liberty were preparing for their final struggle, though under rather different auspices from those under which it was being fought out in Hungary. On the very day when the Declaration of Independence was published in Hungary, Mazzini, Saffi, and Armellini, who had been elected Triumvirs of the Roman Republic, after the failure of Charles Albert's final war, appeared in the Assembly for the first time in their new capacity. They had no light task before them. Apart from the enemies who were threatening the Republic from outside, there were dangers arising from the feelings of the different parties within the Roman State. The deposition of the Pope had undoubtedly given a shock to the feelings of many strong Liberals, of a much keener, and if one may say so, more intelligible kind, than the deposition of the House of Hapsburg could possibly give to any Hungarian leader. Even Castellani, the Ambassador of the Venetian Republic, hesitated to identify the cause of his city with that of the opponents of the Pope; while the feeling among the priests of the Roman States had been shown by a formidable conspiracy in Imola and Ascoli. General Zucchi, who had taken part in this conspiracy, had even attempted to force his way into the Neapolitan territory, in order to put himself under the authority of the Pope. Garibaldi had defeated this attempt, and Zucchi had been sent as a prisoner to Rome; but the conspiracy was not forgotten; and, when the Triumvirs came into power, they found that these outbursts of priestly opposition were provoking savage reprisals on the part of the Republicans.
While Saffi had been only Minister of the Interior, and Mazzini only a private member of the Assembly, they had both warned the Government of the probability of this danger; and they now found that a Society had been formed at Ancona which threatened death to the enemies of Liberalism. The Triumvirs first sent down two officers, who tried to organize the local leaders into a committee for preserving public order; but, though their emissaries were satisfied with their own action, the Triumvirs were less easily contented. Felice Orsini was sent down with full powers to put down the insurrection; and, if necessary, to declare Ancona in a state of siege. He at once arrested twenty men, called out the National Guard, put down opposition by force, and carried off his prisoners to Rome, where they were shut up in the Castle of St. Angelo. From Ancona Orsini went on to Ascoli, where he condemned three of the most dangerous persons to be shot, and sequestrated the goods of a cardinal, who had stirred up the clerical insurrection. But the Austrian forces were now advancing into the Roman territory; and Orsini was compelled to retire to Rome.
Even in the capital the Triumvirs had to use strong measures to check the fierce feeling against the priests. This feeling had just been roused to an unusual height by special discoveries of priestly cruelty. In sweeping away the various irregular tribunals, which had grown up under the papal tyranny, the Triumvirs had to deal with the question of the Inquisition. They appropriated the former offices of that celebrated institution, as dwellings for the poor; but, in making the buildings available for this purpose, they threw open the secret dungeons, and discovered prisoners who were slowly dying of their imprisonment. One bishop, who had remained there since the time of Leo XII., had absolutely lost the power of walking. The horrible instruments of torture, which were found in the same place, excited still further the indignation of the people; and that feeling found yet a new cause for its expression, when a book was discovered in the library of the Inquisition, containing the secrets of the principal families of Italy, which had been obtained through the revelations of confessors. Several of the fiercer spirits in Rome at once made an attack on the pulpits and confessionals, and burnt some of them in the Piazza del Popolo. These tumults were sternly checked by the Triumvirs; and they succeeded in protecting from the popular vengeance the convent in which the chief Inquisitor lived. But while they protected the persons and private property of the priests, they appropriated the greater part of the ecclesiastical lands to the support of the poor, arranging that every family of three persons should have as much land as could be managed by a pair of oxen. At the same time the jurisdiction of the clergy over the universities and schools was taken away.
While the attention of the Government was thus devoted to the restoration of internal order, and the carrying out of necessary reforms, they did not neglect the vigorous measures which were needed for the resistance to foreign enemies. The forces which had been rather carelessly scattered in the outlying provinces of the Roman State, were concentrated by the Triumvirs near Bologna. That gallant little city had been in a state of alarm ever since the early part of February, when the Austrian forces had again attacked Ferrara; and the difficulties of communication between these two cities had increased the alarm of the Bolognese, though it had also strengthened their eagerness for resistance. But even before this Austrian invasion, the Roman Republicans had been alarmed at the threats issued by another Power. Three days after the flight of the Pope, General Cavaignac announced in the French Assembly that he had sent three frigates to Civita Vecchia to secure the safety of His Holiness. This expedition had excited much opposition in France; and, during the subsequent contest for the Presidency, the following letter was addressed by one of the candidates to the editor of a French newspaper:—
"Mr. Editor,
"Knowing that my agreement to the vote for the Expedition to Civita Vecchia has been remarked upon, I think myself bound to declare that, whatever may have been decided about the arrangements suitable for guaranteeing the liberty and authority of the chief Pontiff, nevertheless I cannot approve by my vote a military demonstration that appears dangerous both to the sacred interests that they pretend to protect, and that has a tendency to compromise European peace.
"Yours respectfully,
"Louis Napoleon Buonaparte."December 2, 1848."
As this pacific candidate had been shortly after elected President of the French Republic, there seemed little fear that an expedition "tending to compromise European peace," would again be entered upon by France; and the Mountain of the French Assembly had lately sent greetings to the Roman Republic.