Revolutionary Europe, 1789-1815

by H. Morse Stephens

Hitherto a sketch has been given of states, which in 1789 possessed a certain unity, and were able to play a part as independent countries of more or less weight in European politics. It was otherwise with the Holy Roman Empire, which still remained in the same condition, and was ruled in the same manner, as had been arranged at the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648. True Germany, that is Germany to the west of the Oder, had been under this arrangement split up into a number of independent sovereignties, loosely bound together as the Holy Roman Empire. The number of these petty states caused the Empire to be, from a military point of view, utterly inefficient; the bond was too loose to allow of general internal reforms or of a consistent foreign policy; and the federal arrangements were too cumbrous and unwieldy to allow of Germany ranking as a great power. The Imperial Diet or Reichstag consisted of three colleges, and a majority was required in each of the upper colleges to agree to a resolution, which, when confirmed by the Emperor, became a conclusum of the Empire. The first of these colleges was that of the eight Electors, three ecclesiastical, the Elector-Archbishops of Mayence, Trèves, and Cologne, and five lay, the Electors of Bohemia, Brandenburg, and Hanover, who were also Kings of Hungary, Prussia, and England, the Elector of Saxony, and the Elector Palatine, who in 1789 was also Elector of Bavaria. The president of this college was the Elector-Archbishop of Mayence, as Chancellor of the Empire. The second college was that of the Princes, which consisted of one hundred voices, thirty-six ecclesiastical and sixty-four lay. In this college all the Electors had voices under different designations; Hanover possessed six for different principalities, Prussia six for the duchy of Guelders, the county of Mœurs, etc., Austria three, and so on, while the Kings of Denmark and Sweden also were represented as Dukes of Holstein and of Pomerania. Less important princes differing in power from the Landgraves of Hesse, the Margraves of Baden, and the Duke of Würtemburg to the petty princes of Salm and Anhalt, possessed single voices, and made up the number of temporal voters in the college to sixty. The ecclesiastical princes included thirty-four of the wealthiest bishops and abbots, many of whom ruled over considerable territories, and of whom the most important were the Archbishop of Salzburg, the Bishops of Bamberg, Augsburg, Würtzburg, Spires, Worms, Strasbourg, Basle, Constance, Paderborn, Hildesheim, and Münster, and the Abbots of Elwangen, Kempten, and Stablo. The other six voices were called collegiate, and representatives to hold them were elected by the petty lay and ecclesiastical sovereigns who abounded in Franconia, Swabia, and Westphalia, to the number of four lay and two ecclesiastical representatives. The presidency of this college was held alternately by the Archduke of Austria and the Archbishop of Salzburg. The third or inferior college was that of the free cities, and any opposition on its part could prevent a decision arrived at by the two upper or superior colleges being presented to the Emperor for his assent as a conclusum of the Empire. It consisted of the representatives of fifty-two imperial free cities, divided into two ‘benches,’ of which the Bench of Westphalia included Frankfort-on-the-Main, Cologne, Aix-la-Chapelle, Hamburg, Bremen, and Lübeck, and the Bench of Swabia included Nuremberg, Ratisbon, Ulm, and Augsburg. The presidency of this college belonged to the city of Ratisbon, in which the Diet held its sittings. By this elaborate federative system, all sense of German unity was lost; the electors, princes, and free cities were represented only by delegates; the smaller states felt themselves swamped and were obliged to look to a great power, Austria or France, Prussia or Hanover, to preserve their political independence.

The Imperial Tribunal.

The Emperor.

The Aulic Council.

The Circles.

The other important institution of the Empire, the Imperial Tribunal or Reichskammergericht, which sat at Wetzlar and was intended to settle disputes between the German sovereigns, had also fallen into desuetude. Its venality and procrastination became proverbial, and it possessed no machinery to put its decrees into force. At the head of the Empire was the Emperor, who was elected and crowned with all the elaborate ceremonial of the Middle Ages. The office had been, with one exception, conferred on the head of House of Austria, since the Treaty of Westphalia, but it brought little actual authority on the holder. It was as ruler of the hereditary dominions of the House of Hapsburg that the Emperor exerted some influence, not as an Emperor. Joseph II., indeed, endeavoured to be Emperor in more than name, with the result that Frederick the Great was enabled to form the League of Princes against him. As the chief Catholic state, Austria, however, possessed a great influence in the Imperial Diet, for the ecclesiastical members of the Colleges of Electors and Princes naturally inclined to support her, and it was on their votes that she relied. She even went so far as to establish the Aulic Council at Vienna, which intervened in cases between sovereign princes, and usurped some of the prerogatives of the Imperial Tribunal of Wetzlar. The executive power of the Empire, when it had come to a decision, was entrusted to the circles. These circles each had their own Diet, and it was their duty, for instance, to raise money and troops when the Empire decided to go to war. Of the ten circles of the Empire, originally created, one, that of Burgundy, had been extinguished or nearly so by the conquests of Louis XIV., and those situated in the eastern portion were entirely controlled by the important states of Prussia, Saxony, and Austria. It was only in Western Germany, in the circles of Westphalia, Franconia, and Swabia that the organisation was fairly tried, and the result was signal failure, whenever those circles put their contingents in the field. It could hardly be otherwise, when, owing to minute subdivision and divided authority, a single company of soldiers might be raised from half a dozen different petty sovereigns, each of whom would try to throw the burden of their maintenance on his colleagues. The Holy Roman Empire, in short, like other mediæval institutions, had fallen into decay with the mediæval systems of warfare and religion; some of its component states, such as Austria and Prussia, or in a lesser degree Bavaria, might possess a real power; but, as a whole, it was utterly inefficient to defend itself, and formed a feeble barrier between France and the kingdoms of Eastern Europe.

The Princes of Germany.

Bavaria.

Baden.

Würtemburg.