The Confederation of Nineteen Cantons
1803 Napoleon’s Act of Mediation is made the constitution of “Switzerland.” This name for the first time is used as the official name of the country. The thirteen members of the old confederation are set up again and six new cantons are added. There are to be no more privileged classes or subject lands. Switzerland enjoys ten years of peace and prosperity.
1804 Insurrection breaks out at Horgen in the canton Zurich.
1806 Neuchâtel is given to Marshal Berthier.
1810 Valais, which has been a separate republic, is made into the French department of the Simplon. The Swiss Society of the Public Good is founded. Pestalozzi and Fellenberg work out an educational system.
1813 Austrian and Russian troops, supported by the reactionary party, enter Switzerland; the diet abolishes the constitution of 1803.
1814 “The long diet” at Zurich attempts to adjust party differences. Bern heads a party anxious to restore the old order. Zurich and the majority stand out for the nineteen cantons of Napoleon. The allies enter Switzerland.
The League of Twenty-two States
1815 The Swiss diet accepts the decisions of the congress of Vienna and a new constitution, the Federal Pact, is adopted. The league of States (Staatenbund) is made to include twenty-two members. The sovereign rights of each canton are recognised. The federal diet exercises supreme sovereignty only in purely national concerns. The great powers at the congress of Vienna guarantee the neutrality of Switzerland. Switzerland is freed from subserviency to France. New aristocracies make themselves felt.
1817 Switzerland becomes a party to the Holy Alliance.