I trust the healthy power of the German people, and, counting upon the support of a gracious God, I look out hopefully over the struggles of the day toward the future of the empire. Therefore, at the beginning of a new legislative session, I offer you, Honored Sirs, my greeting in the hope that your activities will be exerted for the benefit of the people and the country.
[BRANDENBURG ONCE AGAIN]
May 30, 1912
The indications of particular good-will which the Emperor had always exhibited for the Brandenburgers and the marks of special favor which he had seemed to accord to them have occasionally aroused a certain suspicion, not to say ill will, in the minds of some of his South German subjects. In his hereditary provinces, Brandenburg and Prussia, it will be noticed that the Emperor had always expressed himself most freely with regard to his personal pretensions that he ruled by divine right alone. The two speeches which have been most criticised in this respect are the ones delivered at Breslau (February 3, 1899) and Königsberg (August 25, 1910). They served, unfortunately, to accentuate the differences which existed between the subjects in various parts of the empire and to remind them that they had a Prussian Emperor. If certain portions of his audiences here acquiesced in these pretensions of their hereditary ruler and were somewhat proud of the particular confidence he vouchsafed to them, critics, and even conservative critics, referred to these ideas of “Gottesgnadentum,” grace-of-Godism, with touches of what was at least irony. After the unfortunate crisis following the Daily Telegraph interview Chancellor von Bülow had felt constrained to request the Emperor “henceforward to observe, even in private interviews, that reserve which is indispensable both to the interests of a consistent policy and to the authority of the crown.” As we have seen, in spite of the Emperor’s seeming acceptance of this necessity, it had not modified to any particular extent the tenor of his speech at Königsberg in 1910. It may be that by this time (1912) he had taken the admonition to heart, for it will be noticed that, though we have the customary reference to Frederick of Hohenzollern and the glorification of his ancestors, and also the marks of special favor and trust in the Brandenburgers, we miss any mention of the theory of divine right.
La Fontaine has said that it is difficult to please every one and his father. The Emperor must have felt this when he learned that certain of his subjects, nevertheless, resented that closing part of his speech which would seem to imply that the Franco-Prussian War was a sort of family affair through which the grateful Brandenburgers decided to present the imperial crown to their beloved overlord. Through such an interpretation the position and interests of Bavaria, for instance, became for Bavarians somewhat too incidental. If, then, foreign critics have drawn a distinction between Prussia and Germany, the distinction has, therefore, a certain warrant, since it seems to be made by the Emperor himself. The heir to the Bavarian crown took occasion to object in one of his speeches to the conception that the affiliated sovereigns are “vassals of the Emperor.” That he should have gone so far would indicate that, in his mind at least, there was a disposition to make them so. He was even more emphatic in a speech delivered in May, 1900, before the Association for the Furtherance of Inland Navigation in Bavaria. “I do not see,” he said, “why we, if we belong to the German Empire should not enjoy precisely the same rights and privileges as North Germany, for the German Empire was welded together just as much through Bavarian blood as through the blood of any other German stock; and for that reason we do not wish to be regarded as minor brothers, but as brothers with full rights and privileges.” So, too, it is said that the King of Würtemberg left the Emperor’s side in anger and withdrew from the army manœuvres in 1894. It will be plain to any one who reads the Emperor’s speeches that very few of them are made in South Germany. Münich, Leipzig, and Stuttgart have been visited by him less frequently than certain foreign capitals. This is due in part, no doubt, to the fact that the reigning sovereigns of these capitals do not wish to see a greater at their side. But it is likewise true that in most of these districts the Emperor’s reception at the hands of the populace would be far less warm than that accorded to him at Breslau and Berlin; for, if the Emperor is warranted in expecting a particular loyalty from his Prussians and Brandenburgers, so, too, are the hereditary rulers of Bavaria, Saxony, and Würtemberg warranted in expecting a particular recognition at home, which must necessarily be deducted from the possible tribute which can be paid the Emperor, who is likewise a rival King and King of a province which has not always enjoyed the favorable consideration of South Germans.
It was on this day, May 30, five hundred years before that the Burgrave Frederick VI of Hohenzollern, the later Elector Frederick I, entered the fortified place of Brandenburg, on the Havel. In commemoration of this fact, a fountain and an equestrian statue of the Elector by Professor Manzel were dedicated. The church of St. Catherine had likewise been restored and was rededicated on this day. After the unveiling, the Emperor proceeded to the old town hall, where he inscribed his name in the city’s Golden Book, and after he had accepted the drink of honor offered him by the burgomaster, he delivered the following address:
I am deeply grateful to the city of Brandenburg for having thought of inviting me to its celebration. It has been a celebration whose importance extends far beyond the walls of Brandenburg, and I rejoice that the Brandenburgers should have wished to have their Elector and Margrave with them, just as it goes without saying that the Elector is pleased when he can tarry among his Brandenburgers. The changes of history which have swept over the German Fatherland have called forth and laid tasks upon many a dynasty, and finally it was the dynasty of my ancestors who first succeeded after many difficulties in laying the corner-stone for the great work and at last in building up the work itself—the establishment of German unity on a Brandenburger basis and under the leadership of Prussia. We must not forget that it must have been a difficult decision for the ruler of the land in those days and the later Elector to undertake the task of coming into this country and of bringing it back again to a flourishing condition. For he came from the sunny south, which had progressed in culture and whose knighthood at that time was also in its fullest flower of cultural development. We have already learned from reliable lips what a frightful situation existed at that time in the unhappy mark. And if he was successful in re-establishing order little by little and in sowing the seeds for new flowers, nevertheless the mark had to pass through many grievous storms and became the arena of foreign powers and foreign lords. But at last the Great Elector and the great King drove away the foreigners once for all and won for the people of the mark and of Prussia the right to live for themselves without having to see the products of their industry and labor fall a prey to the caprices of strangers. And when at last, through the help of God, the Prussian edifice was completed and my grandfather, in the long period of peace, had sharpened the sword which he must needs have in order to achieve German union, then for a second time, on a grander scale, the same work was accomplished which had previously been accomplished for the mark. And he succeeded in finally forbidding the strangers to trample upon our fields and to destroy our labor for the mere sake of following their own interests. The German Empire and the German crown rest upon a Brandenburg basis and a Prussian foundation. On that account we wish on this day to remember the people of the mark and of Brandenburg and not least the Brandenburgers who in 1870 risked their lives and all that was near and dear to them in order to win the imperial crown for the old master. As long as a Hohenzollern lives and as long as there are Brandenburgers both of them will remember Constantine Alvensleben, Vionville, and the Third Corps.[48] This was the old Brandenburger loyalty which had been preserved through all the centuries, and I hope that this loyalty may be the possession of the coming generations of the city of Brandenburg. And I drink this cup in the hope that this loyalty may never be extinguished.
[48] Constantine Alvensleben, commander of the Third (Brandenburg) Army Corps, played an important part in the battle of Vionville, on the 16th of August, 1870. He checked the French army operating from Metz and held it until the arrival of reinforcements.
[HAULING DOWN THE FLAG]
Hamburg, June 18, 1912