[8] German jurists get much pleasure in pointing out the following constitutional curiosity: the condition necessary for a law enacted by a parliament to become operative is that this law shall be promulgated, that is to say, authenticated and published. But these operations suppose a government. Now, the law of February 10, created the government; but this law could not be promulgated by a government which this very promulgation would create. It was decided, therefore, that the law should become operative immediately and be authenticated by the President of the National Assembly.
[9] These concepts of “unitarism” and “federalism” must be compared with “centralism” and “particularism,” which correspond to them, but which, nevertheless, also differ from them. When one speaks of “particularism” one means, beyond the legal and political differences which may exist between the member states of a federated state, the peculiarities of race, special traits of culture, geographic and ethnographic characteristics which give to populations their own stamp and a distinct collective sentiment. Political “particularism” and federalist tendencies may co-exist naturally; but “particularism” is not necessarily anti-centralistic: a “particularism” inspired by the love of a little fatherland and its individuality gives to the population a certain national consciousness which is not necessarily antagonistic to the establishment of a strong central power. On the other hand “unitarism,” if it preserves for the state the character of a federated state and does not tend to a complete fusion of the member states, may well recognize that races and provinces wish for individual existence and may be ready to accord them corresponding liberty.
[10] See Preuss, Deutschlands republikanische Reichsverfassung, p. 8.
[11] See Jacobi, Einheitsstaat oder Bundesstaat, Leipzig, 1919.
[12] Since the Revolution, Coburg has detached itself from Saxe-Coburg-Gotha and become a distinct state without the decision of any authority whatsoever sanctioning this situation.
[13] There was in this a true provisionally federated state within a federal German state. For several months there was thus, in central Germany, a triple superposition of states.
[14] It must be recognized nevertheless that with the exception of the Hanseatic cities the monarchical form was implied. For Prussia it was obligatory.
[15] See Giese, Die Reichsverfassung, vom II, August, 1919, p. 65; Jacobi, Einheitsstaat oder Bundesstaat, p. 6, et seq.; Poetsch, Handausgabe der Reichsverfassung, p. 25, et seq.; Wenzel, Festgabe für Bergbohn, 1919, p. 159, et seq.
[16] See Stier-Somlo, op. cit., p. 79, et seq.; Walter Jellinek, Revolution und Reichsverfassung, in Jahrbuch des öffentlichen Rechts, p. 81; Arndt, Reichsverfassung, 1919, p. 35.
[17] In reality the states still exchange ambassadors and, in the official German language, the agreements reached either between two states or several carry the name of Staatsverträge (international treaties). See particularly the international treaty adopted between the Reich on the one hand, and Prussia, Bavaria, Saxony, Wurtemberg, Baden, Hesse, Mecklenburg-Schwerin and Oldenburg on the other, concerning the transfer to the Reich of the railroads of these states, the treaty approved by the National Assembly, April 30, 1920.