An Introduction to the History of Western Europe

by James Harvey Robinson

Requirements of the proposed constitution.

Prussia, thus enlarged, summoned the lesser states about her to confer upon a constitution that should accomplish four ends. First, it must give all the people of the territory included in the new union, regardless of the particular state in which they lived, a voice in the government. A popular assembly satisfied this demand. Secondly, the predominating position of Prussia must be secured, but at the same time (thirdly) the self-respect of the other monarchs whose lands were included must not be sacrificed. In order to accomplish this double purpose the king of Prussia was made president of the federation but not its sovereign. The chief governing body was the Federal Council (Bundesrath). In this each ruler, however small his state, and each of the three free towns—Hamburg, Bremen, and Lübeck—had at least one vote; in this way it was arranged that the other rulers did not become subjects of the king of Prussia. The real sovereign of the North German Federation and of the present German empire is not the king of Prussia, but "all of the united governments." The votes were distributed as in the old diet, so that Prussia, with the votes of the states that she annexed in 1860, enjoyed seventeen votes out of forty-three. Lastly, the constitution must be so arranged that when the time came for the southern states—Bavaria, Würtemberg, Baden, and south Hesse—to join the union, it would be adapted to the needs of the widened empire.

The union was a true federation like that of the United States, although its organization violated many of the rules which were observed in the organization of the American union. It was inevitable that a union spontaneously developed from a group of sovereign monarchies, with their traditions of absolutism, would be very different from one in which the members, like the states of the American union, had previously been governed by republican institutions.

Disappointment of the hopes of Napoleon III.

272. No one was more chagrined by the abrupt termination of the war of 1866 and the victory of Prussia than Napoleon III. He had hoped that both the combatants might be weakened by a long struggle, and that at last he might have an opportunity to arbitrate and incidentally to gain something for France, as had happened after the Italian war. But Prussia came out of the conflict with greatly increased power and territory, while France had gained nothing. An effort of Napoleon's to get a foothold in Mexico had failed, owing to the recovery of the United States from the Civil War and their warning that they should regard his continued intervention there as an hostile act.[453] His hopes of annexing Luxembourg as an offset for the gains that Prussia had made, were also frustrated.

France declares war upon Prussia, July 19, 1870.

One course remained for the French usurper, namely, to permit himself to be forced into a war against the power which had especially roused the jealousy of France. Never was an excuse offered for war more trivial than that advanced by the French,[454] never did retribution come more speedily. The hostility which the South German states had hitherto shown toward Prussia encouraged Napoleon III to believe that so soon as the French troops should gain their first victory, Bavaria, Würtemberg, and Baden would join him. That first victory was never won. War had no sooner been declared than the Germans laid all jealousy aside and ranged themselves as a nation against a national assailant. The French army, moreover, was neither well equipped nor well commanded. The Germans hastened across the Rhine, and within a few days were driving the French before them. In a series of bloody encounters about Metz, one of the French armies was defeated and finally shut up within the fortifications about the town. Seven weeks had not elapsed after the beginning of the war, before the Germans had captured a second French army and made a prisoner of the emperor himself in the great battle of Sedan, September 1, 1870.[455]

Siege of Paris and close of Franco-Prussian War.

Cession of Alsace and Lorraine to Germany.

The Germans then surrounded and laid siege to Paris. Napoleon III had been completely discredited by the disasters about Metz and at Sedan, and consequently the empire was abolished and France for the third time was declared a republic. In spite of the energy which the new government showed in arousing the French against the invaders, prolonged resistance was impossible. The capital surrendered January 28, 1871, and an armistice was arranged. Bismarck, who had been by no means reluctant to go to war, deeply humiliated France, in arranging the treaty of peace, by requiring the cession of two French provinces which had formerly belonged to Germany,—Alsace and northeastern Lorraine.[456] In this way France was cut off from the Rhine, and the crest of the Vosges Mountains was established as its boundary. The Germans exacted, further, an enormous indemnity for the unjustifiable attack which the French had made upon them. This was fixed at five billion francs, and German troops were to occupy France till it was paid. The French people made pathetic sacrifices to hasten the payment of this indemnity, in order that the country might be freed from the presence of the hated Germans. The bitter feeling of the French for the Germans dates from this war, and the longing for revenge still shows itself. For many years after the war a statue in Paris, representing the lost city of Strasburg, was draped in mourning.