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A HISTORY OF THE HABSBURG EMPIRE 1526-1918

A HISTORY OF THE HABSBURG EMPIRE

1526-1918

Robert A. Xann

UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA PRESS Berkeley

/

Los Angeles /

London

University of California Press Berkeley and Los Angeles, California University of California Press, Ltd. London, England Copyright © 1974, by The Regents of the University of California ISBN: 0-520-02408-7 Library of Congress Catalog Card Number: 72-97733 Printed in the United States of America

Jo JVlady

Contents PREFACE

xi

Chapter 1. TOWARD THE UNION OF THE HABSBURG LANDS

i

A. The political evolution of the Alpine Hereditary lands be¬ fore 1526

*

4

B. Social and cultural conditions in the Hereditary lands be¬ fore 1526

12

C. The evolution of the Eastern crowns and their status at the time of the union of 1526-1527 Chapter 11. TURKS AND PROTESTANTS (1526-1648) A. The beginnings of political integration

18 25 25

B. Sovereignty in the Austro-German and Eastern Habsburg lands

32

C. Principles of foreign policy

34

D. The Turkish wars

37

E. The Thirty Years’ war; Protestantism and the Habsburg cause

45

Chapter 111. AN EMPIRE EVOLVES AND ASSERTS ITSELF (1648-1748)

54

A. Common succession and common institutions

54

B. Resumption of the Turkish wars

62

C. Hungary, Transylvania, Croatia, and the Habsburg scepter

70

D. The struggle about the balance of power

77

E. Stalemate and decline

90

F. The Great-Power position is tested

96

vii

viii

History of the Habsburg Empire

Chapter IV. LATE RENAISSANCE AND BAROQUE AGE IN THE HABSBURG LANDS (1526-1740)

102

A. Over-all issues

102

B. Reformation and Counter Reformation

104

C. Socioeconomic trends

ny

D. Estates and princely absolutism

125

E. Administration

129

F. Judicial system

131

G. Defense system

132

H. Church-State relations

*33

I. Cultural evolution Chapter V. AN EMPIRE REASSERTS ITSELF (1740-1815)

*35 156

A. Foreign policy (1740-1792)

156

B. The Reform era

170

C. Feudalism versus centralism in the Reform era D. Economic policies

*74 181

E. Josephinism

183

F. Church-state relations

187

G. Education

192

H. The peasant question I. Hungary and the end of the first Reform era

*95 199

J. Foreign policy (1792-1815)

208

K. Domestic administration of Francis 1 (1792-1815)

235

Chapter VI. STANDSTILL, DECLINE AND STABILIZA¬ TION (1815-1879) A. Foreign policy (1815-1879)

243

B. Domestic affairs from 1815 to the revolution of 1848-1849

243 282

C. The revolution of 1848-1849

299

D. Neoabsolutism

318

E. Transition to constitutional government (1860-1867)

326

F. Domestic affairs (1860-1879)

342

G. The end of an era

365

Chapter VII. CULTURAL TRENDS FROM LATE ENLIGHT¬ ENMENT TO LIBERALISM (from mid-eighteenth century to the 1860’s)

367

A. The Austro-German orbit

37°

B. The Magyars

379

Contents

ix

C. The Czechs

384

D. The Slovaks

389

E. The Poles

390

F. The Ruthenians

391

G. The Southern Slavs H. The Latins

394 400

I. Summary

404

Chapter VIII. DECLINE AND DISCORD (1879-1914)

406

A. Politics in Austria-Hungary

406

B. Cisleithanian Austria

424

C. Hungary

452

,

D. Economic developments in Austria-Hungary Chapter IX. WORLD WAR AND DISSOLUTION (1914-1918)

461 468

A. Conduct of the war

469

B. Domestic developments in Austria-Hungary

487

C. The conflict between the national groups comes to a head

497

D. A final reflection on the dissolution process

517

Chapter X. NEW BEGINNINGS: CULTURAL TRENDS FROM THE 1860’s TO 1918

521

A. The Latins (Italians and Roumanians)

524

B. The Ruthenians and Poles

526

,

C. The Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes

529

D. The Slovaks

532

E. The Czechs

533

F. The Magyars

538

G. The Austro-German orbit

544

H. Conclusions

5^T

Chapter XI. BIBLIOGRAPHICAL ESSAY I.The Habsburg empire, general works II. Literature on the history of the national groups appendix

1. Population and nationality statistics

565 568 587 603

appendix 11. The Austrian Habsburg and Habsburg-Lorraine rulers from the middle of the 15th century to 1918

609

appendix hi. Chronology appendix iv. Maps INDEX

616 623

Preface The history of the Habsburg empire began with the union of the Alpine hereditary lands and the crowns of Bohemia, Hungary, and Croatia in 1526-1527. The first background chapter discusses the late medieval history of the hereditary lands more broadly than that of the eastern (Hungarian, Croatian, and Bohemian) crowns, because they were for two and a half centuries the heartlands of Habsburg rule and the nucleus of the evolving empire. From then on the various political units and national groups of the Habsburg lands are covered on a completely equal footing. A Habsburg empire existed in name but not in fact throughout modern history, long before the proclamation of the Austrian empire of 1804. This declaratory imperial act as a consequence of the French political and military advance into Central Europe was indeed the mere external confirmation of a social and political evolution that had gone on throughout modern history. The succession treaties which came into effect in the sixteenth century could merely institute the premises for this step-by-step evolution of an empire. Not before the end of the first quarter of the seventeenth century was Habsburg rule in the Bohemian lands firmly established and not before the last decade of that century in the Hungarian-Croatian orbit. Consequently this study has to meet several demands. It has to show the rise of the Habsburg power, in Oswald Redlich’s words, “Das Werden einer Grossmacht,” its subse¬ quent status and action as a great power, and finally its dissolution. It be¬ longs to the paradoxes of which the history of the Habsburg empire is so rich that its official birthday in 1804 does not mark the beginning of an era of leadership in Central Europe. On the contrary, this date is close to the beginning of the disintegration of Habsburg power. This volume attempts to give equal attention to political, cultural, and socioeconomic history. This has been attempted before, and only the one xt

xii

History of the Habsburg Empire

who sets about this task again, knows the difficulties which the historian has to face when he struggles with the problems of the multinational, multicultural empire. Yet in some respects the approach of this study differs from previous ones. Generally students of Austrian history have tried to give their undertaking as far as possible unified structure by pressing the many-faced problems into the frame of a centralized empire. Such method follows the philosophy of a German-directed centralism, which after 1867 had to yield to a German-Magyar diarchy. In some studies written from this viewpoint a German national and later also Magyar national bias is expressed. Yet in most cases criticism of this kind would be unfair. Frequently authors adopted this centralistic method not as a result of national preference but of methodical convenience. Some works which follow such patterns are outstanding. Their authors have perceived the empire from the-center, not because they were biased but because it seemed to them the best way to give structure and coherence to their story. Just the same, such a presentation leads, however un¬ wittingly, to a distorted structure. The problems of the Habsburg empire can be fully understood only if equal attention is given to the various political entities and ethnic groups which formed it. There is no one stage of action but several stages, which have to be presented in a synchronistic view. This does not mean that all arenas are necessarily of equal importance, and certainly not at the same time. The part of the stage where the action takes place is illuminated, and then it falls back into darkness when history shifts to some other place. It is necessary, however, to keep in mind that specific aspects of history have to be viewed in the first place from the angle of particular groups. This method applies to national and cultural problems but also to political and socioeconomic events. Due attention will be paid to the task of the central administration, and not only in regard to foreign policy, defense, and legal institutions. These are important aspects of the history of the Habsburg empire but not the essence of this history. It rests in the synthesis between supranational and national problems. In cor¬ relating them as seen from different angles this study has tried to break new ground. The most formidable difficulty in a work of limited size and wide scope is the presentation of the cultural evolution of the various national groups. Partly this difficulty results from the fact that the whole book is based primarily on works available in western languages. On the other hand, in the past two decades studies in eastern and central European history and literature, and translations from eastern languages, have in-

Preface

xiii

creased in quantity and quality, thus diminishing language limitations. More difficult to solve is the problem of selecting significant authors and artists representative for a national culture. Here one has to navigate between the Scylla of a superabundant number of outstanding works and the Charybdis of heaping name upon name in the manner of a telephone directory without proper evaluation. A perfect solution to this problem, particularly in works of limited size, has to my knowledge not yet been found. An author is bound either to discuss too few significant person¬ alities or to list too many names without necessary analysis. In this dilemma of choice between evils the former seems to me the lesser one and I have acted accordingly. Several technical problems require brief comment. One is the use of geographical names which in line with the principles traced above can¬ not be necessarily or uniformly German. I tried to adopt a middle ground between the ethnic-linguistic name of a place and the historical name used throughout an important period of development. In many in¬ stances, therefore, more than one name had to be used. The one primarily in use at the time under discussion is stated first, the other, or in some in¬ stances others, in parenthesis. The main consideration is that the names used are or become familiar to the reader. Automatic consistency has to yield to this consideration. This flexible approach pertains also to the use of anglicized or vernacular names of individuals. The same principle is ap¬ plied to the terminology used in referring to the political body with which we are concerned, the Habsburg empire. In another work, The Multina¬ tional Empire, Vol. I, I discussed the legal and political question to what extent the term “Habsburg empire”—at some times a controversial one— may be used. Furthermore, whether “Austria” refers to the western parts of the Habsburg lands or to the whole, whether “Austria-Hungary” after 1867 stands for two unequal halves of one great power or for one single power, and other debatable questions of this kind were discussed there. The deductions drawn in the quoted work apply to this volume as well. From the point of view of semantics, as distinguished from politics and law, the problem shrinks indeed to manageable size. The empire is generally understood as the whole area and the total of peoples with which we are concerned. What the term Austria means in specific places can generally be understood within the context. Where doubt exists, the meaning is clarified. Dates are used sparingly throughout the book but I hope frequently enough to serve as scaffold for the understanding of political history. In the chapters on cultural history, biographical dates have been used where

xiv

History of the Habsburg Empire

they are helpful to place the efforts of a person with precision within the intellectual currents of his time. They have purposely been omitted where this does not seem necessary. Here the line has to be drawn between a textbook, which this volume is not, and a historical introduction to the problems of the Habsburg empire which it hopes to be. At this point it is a pleasant duty to express my sincere thanks for con¬ tinued support of this study to the Research Council of Rutgers Uni¬ versity, The American Council of Learned Societies, and the American Philosophical Society. I am obliged to Columbia University Press for permission to have five maps from my study The Multinational Empire: Nationalism and National Reform in the Habsburg Monarchy 1848-1918 (2 vols., 3rd ed., 15S70) reproduced in this book. I am greatly indebted to Mrs. Sophia Kurzweg for her never-failing help in the preparation of a difficult manuscript. Dr. Zdenek David, Slavic bibliographer of Prince¬ ton University, advised me on questions of spelling of Slavic names, bibliographical problems, and selection of Slavic literature. I am indebted to Dr. Denes Koppanyi, Princeton, for advice concerning spelling in Hungarian. Finally and above all my thanks are due to Max Knight, editor of the University of California Press. I have benefited as much from his wise counsel as I have enjoyed our many battles in which he has deployed an impressive array of weapons of critical acumen and wit to make this a better book. R.A.K.

CHAPTER I Toward the Union oj the UahsburcJ Lands The permanent affiliation of the Habsburg dynasty, the ruling house in the German Alpine hereditary lands, with the lands of the Bohemian and Hungarian-Croatian crowns in 1526-1527 initiates the beginning of the history of these realms as an over-all political entity. The designation given to the study of this process indicates the position of the historian. We could speak either of the history of the Habsburg monarchy or of the Habsburg empire. To speak of the Habsburg “monarchy” implies that the bond between the eastern crowns and the hereditary lands (the Erblande, that is, the Alpine domains from the spurs of the Alps in the north to the shores of the Adriatic in the south, from the Bavarian frontier in the west to the Hungarian plains in the east) is the monarchical principle. Seen from the point of view that in 1526-1527 three political systems begin to merge under the rule of the same dynasty, the basic element in the joint history of the Habsburg realms is the common allegiance to the Habsburg scepter. To speak of the Habsburg “empire,” however, as this writer does, im¬ plies a closer affiliation. What is an empire? It covers many political, cultural, and social factors of great significance without concentrating unduly on the dynastic element, important as it is as one factor among others. Webster calls such empire “an extended territory usually compris¬ ing a group of nations, states, or peoples under the control or domination of a single sovereign power.” Such an empire “has a great extent of terri¬ tory and a great variety of peoples under one rule and often has a ruler with the title of emperor.” According to Webster, empire in its original

2

History of the Habsburg Empire

Latin meaning of imperium stands also for “supreme or absolute power, especially of an emperor,” and finally the concept empire represents “an extended territory . . . dominated or successfully controlled by a single person, family, or group of interested persons.” 1 If we thus accept the term empire which in our case means Habsburg empire, we can avoid terminological pitfalls of perceiving the history of our subject as that of Austria or of the Austrian lands. In doing so we would neglect the fact that at the time when this history commences only a large part of the Alpine hereditary Habsburg lands was associated with the name of Austria. Subsequently it was extended, by custom rather than by law, to the major, primarily western portions of the lands under the German Habsburg line. Finally the concept of Austria was used also as frequently as incorrectly for all the lands under the rule of the German Habsburgs, (“the house of Austria”).2 By using the term Habsburg em¬ pire we can thus steer clear of these contradictions which in a sense are in themselves a characteristic element in the story presented here. The Habsburgs, beginning with the union of 1526-1527, ruled over wide territories and a great variety of peoples, including Germans, Magyars, Carpatho-Ruthenians, Czechs, Croats, Slovaks, Slovenes, Italians, and Roumanians. The question has been raised whether these peoples, to whom within three centuries Poles, Serbs, and more Italians and Ruthenians were added, lived actually under the control of a single sovereign power, that is, whether they lived in an empire under a sovereign generally re¬ ferred to as emperor. The title “emperor” of the Habsburgs referred until August 14, 1804 not to the rule over their own lands but to the crown of the Holy Roman Empire. Only afterward can we speak of an Austrian empire under an Austrian emperor. Yet this empire, created by a mere declaratory 1 Webster’s Third New International Dictionary of the English Language (Springfield, 1965). 2 Robert A. Kann, The Multinational Empire, Nationalism and National Reform in the Habsburg Monarchy, 1848-1918, 2 vols. (New York, 1950, 2nd reprint 1970), I, 4-28 “Empire and Nationalities.” For the literature on the subject see ibid., pp. 346-349. For a revised and enlarged version, brought up to date to the bibliographical state of 1964, see Robert A. Kann, Das Nationalitdtenproblem der Habsburgermonarchie: Geschichte und Ideengehalt der nationalen Bestrebungen vom Vorm'drz bis zur Auflosung des Reiches im fahre 1918 (Graz-Cologne, 1964, 2nd ed.), I, 17-

39, 344-350 “Das Reich und die Volker.” See also Alphons Lhotsky, “Was heisst Haus Osterreich?” Anzeiger der Philosophisch-Historischen Klasse der osterreichischen A\ademie der Wissenschaften (Vienna, 1956), XI, 155-173. The concept of Austria for the western part of the Habsburg empire was officially introduced only in 1917, one year prior to the empire’s dissolution.

Toward the Union of the Hahshurg Lands

3

act in the face of the pending dissolution of the Holy Roman empire un¬ der the duress of the Napoleonic wars, had to yield within two generations to the dualistic union of the two states of the Austro-Hungarian mon¬ archy in 1867. These legal-political qualifications do not invalidate the social and ideological concept of empire. Neither is it nullified by the fact that the imperial crown never fully absorbed the royal honors and privi¬ leges of the various Habsburg domains, of which one, the lands of the Holy Hungarian crown of St. Steven, remained for a major part of the history until 1918, fully coordinated and not subordinated to the Habsburg imperial power.3 The salient issue of this imperial power is the uniformity of the raison d’etre of Habsburg rule in all domains and the common institutions and values in these lands. This kind of unity—if it exists—gives meaning to the idea of a centuries-old empire. Differences of the constitutional status of the ruler in his various lands and their diverse historical traditions recede thereupon into the background as secondary issues. The Habsburgs ruled from the time when imperial history unfolds in the early sixteenth century to the end of 1918 in their German lands, for all practical purposes, by the law of hereditary succession. The same holds true for most future acquisitions outside of the Hungarian borders and those of the Bohemian lands. But in the lands of the Bohemian crown un¬ til 1620, and those of the Holy Hungarian crown of St. Steven until 1687, the Habsburgs ruled by election through the estates. Actually, hereditary succession in the Bohemian and Hungarian lands remained by law and in the Hungarian lands in fact as well conditioned by estates rights.4 Tech¬ nically no common, but only individual, allegiances of various political 3 Ernst R. Huber, Deutsche Verfassungsgeschichte seit ij8g (Stuttgart, 1957), I, 61-74. Kann, The Multinational Empire, I, 18-28, 349-355 and of the same author Das Nationalitatenproblem, I, 30-39, 349-356. 4 Richard Plaschka, “Das bohmische Staatsrecht in tschechischer Sicht,” in Ernst Birke and Kurt Oberndorffer, eds., Das bohmische Staatsrecht in den deutschtschechischen Auseinandersetzungen des ig. und 20. Jahrhunderts (Marburg/Lahn, i960), pp. 5-14; Ernst C. Hellbling, Osterreichische Verf assungs- und Verwaltungsgeschichte (Vienna, 1956), pp. 248-58; S. Harrison Thomson, Czechoslova\ia in European History (Princeton, 1953), pp. niff; Dominic C. Kosary, A History of Hungary (Cleveland, 1941), pp. 33 fT., 94 ff., 132 ff.; Henry Marczali, Hungary in the Eighteenth Century (Cambridge, 1910), pp. xvii-lxiv; see also Josef Polisensky, Robert A. Kann, Fran Zwitter, Der osterreichisch-ungarische Ausgleich 1867 in Ludovft Holotik and Anton Vantuch, eds. (Bratislava, 1971), pp. 14-23, 24-44, 45-75; Stanco Guldescu, The Croatian-Slavonian Kingdom i$26-iyg2 (The Hague, 1:970), pp. 9—18; L. von Siidland, Die Siidslawische Frage und der Welthrieg (Vienna, 1918), pp. 30-70.

4

History of the Habsburg Empire

domains to the Habsburg sovereignty existed. This distinction is reflected before 1526-1527 in the diversity of customs and laws of the peoples under the Habsburgs and in the paucity of common institutions thereafter. Yet the fact that this joint structure operated throughout four centuries, in spite of pressure from foreign powers and domestic conflicts, indicates the existence of substantial cohesive factors. What they were, how they evolved, worked, weakened, and failed is the concern of this study. A.

The political evolution of the Alpine HEREDITARY LANDS BEFORE 1526

The Erblande, the hereditary lands of the Habsburgs, have to be per¬ ceived as the heartland of the future empire. Beginning with the reign of Rudolf of Habsburg in the late 13th century, these lands formed the his¬ toric and political nucleus of- the dynasty’s power. Due to the initially intermittant and later practically permanent connection of Habsburg rule with the crown of the Holy Roman Empire, the dynasty possessed in the eastern Alps and the valley of the Upper Danube a core area and base for her great-power aspirations. Although western central Hungary rather than the eastern parts of the hereditary lands stood for the geographical center of the empire in the last two centuries of its existence, Vienna, the capital of the Austrian Habsburgs, and the immediately surrounding area represented the political, administrative, and economic hub of Habsburg power. The combination of these three factors—the historic-traditional weight of the hereditary lands, their interrelationship with the crown of the Holy P.oman Empire, and the administrative-economic power center in Vienna—established a fourth one: the German-speaking Austrians, henceforth referred to as Austro-Germans, who are settled in this area. In terms of political and economic power they became the leading national group of the empire. This primacy was contested only in political matters by the Magyars in the last half century of the empire’s existence. The Austro-Germans claimed this leadership by right basing it primarily on their unquestionable cultural advantages as part of the large German na¬ tion over the other peoples under Habsburg rule. This bold assertion, gener¬ ally upheld in German historiography to varying degrees, but pervasive also in western languages beyond the German orbit, is not acknowledged in this study, unlike the other factual reasons for German supremacy previ¬ ously referred to. We reject the notion of ideological, cultural, or racial superiority of any people, Germanic, Slavic, or Romance. In 976, at the time when the Bloly Roman emperor Otto II invested a member of the house of Babenberg with the Carolingian Eastern March

Toward the Union of the Hahshurg Lands

5

established by Charlemagne in the later years of his reign, it included only the larger part of what is today Lower Austria. By the middle of the twelfth century the march included a part of the future crownland of Upper Austria as well. Perhaps more important, the so-called privilegium minus of 1156 granted by Frederick Barbarossa to Henry II (Jasomirgott) of Babenberg raised the march to a largely autonomous duchy, and limited its obligations to participating in imperial wars and to attending imperial diets. The weakening of the bonds between the empire and its advanced domain to the southeast started with this act of state.5 The trend accelerated with the enlargement of the Babenberg possessions, in Styria by the end of the twelfth century, in—what is called today—Lower and Upper Austria, Carinthia, Friuli, and Carniola in the first half of the thirteenth. By the end of the century Tirol, a major part of Vorarlberg and Istria, Trieste, were added by successive treaties. The remainder of the Litoral (borderlands on the Adriatic Sea) was gained by 1500. This evolutionary development stretching over more than three centuries was interrupted when the house of Babenberg expired with the death of the belligerent duke Frederick II in the battle against an invading Magyar force in 1246. Because of its close connection with other developments in Central Europe, this event turned out to be of far-reaching significance. The vacancy of the Babenberg fiefs in the east coincided practically with the great interregnum in the empire brought about by the death of Frederick II, the last Ghibeline (Hohenstaufen) emperor, in 1252. Hungarian at¬ tempts to advance toward the west and expansionist policies by the new king of Bohemia, Premysl Ottokar II, who moved into the vacated Baben¬ berg fiefs, created a dynamic new situation. It was cleared up only when in 1273

princes of the empire elected a king Rudolf of Habsburg, a

lord endowed with considerable possessions in southwestern Germany.6 The great showdown between the imperialist ruler of Bohemia and the first Habsburg led to the former’s defeat in 1278 and to the joint accession of Rudolf’s sons in the Austrian lands and in Styria in 1282. This rule by 5 See particularly Heinrich Fichtenau, Von der Mar\ zum Herzogtum (Munich, 1958), pp. 36-54; see also Heinrich Mitteis, Der Staat des hohen Mittelalters: Grundlinien einer vergleichenden Verjassungsgeschichte des Lehnszeitalters (Weimar, 1968), pp. 254-257. 6 The rulers of the Holy Roman empire who were not crowned in Rome are properly referred to as king, rex Romanorum, of the Holy Roman empire. Those who were crowned in Rome by the Pope are designated as emperors. This dis¬ tinction becomes, however, meaningless after the last coronation of an emperor in Rome, that of Frederick III in 1453. All rulers of the Holy empire afterwards, al¬ though none of them was crowned in Rome, are generally referred to as emperors.

6

History of the Habsburg Empire

the Habsburg dynasty lasted until the disintegration of the Habshurg empire in 1918. Yet the decisive importance of the events between 1273 and 1282 goes beyond its dynastic aspects. Rudolf’s rule as German king from 1273 to 1291 helped to restore law and order in the empire. But the strengthening of imperial judicial and general administrative institutions, in particular military defense, the collection of custom duties, and the pro¬ tection of urban development, was not brought about directly by imperial power but by the newly established hereditary dynastic powers of the Habsburgs in the southeast and those of other princes in the west and north. Imperial power was strengthened only when it did not collide with princely power; in a conflict of interests it had to yield. Thus while the Habsburg accession intermittently strengthened imperial power, it did so only in a supplementary way. In the long run, Habsburg power absorbed imperial power and not the other way round. This means a further weak¬ ening of ties to the empire. Was this true also in the national sphere? Using the term national in the late Middle Ages with caution, the question is still legitimate, whether the entrenchment of a new German dynasty in the hereditary lands for more than six centuries meant a strengthening of the German impact in eastern Central Europe. Was such impact not even further strengthened by the fact that the Habsburgs bore the imperial crown for more than five of these six centuries? Ottokar II with German help might have ad¬ vanced Czech economic and cultural development faster and perhaps further had he not been stopped by Rudolf. German national-oriented his¬ toriography, on the other hand, has held that the breakdown of Ottokar’s great design to establish the rule of his Czech dynasty in the Austrian and imperial lands actually put a stop to a complete Germanization of the core lands of the Bohemian crown—Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia—since this brilliant ruler had made the widest possible use of the skill of German professional men and craftsmen in his domains.7 Such far-reaching con¬ clusions, which underrate the solid foundations of Czech national culture and overrate the importance of a superstructure of a highly selective im¬ migration, are hardly warranted. There is indeed little evidence in Otto¬ kar’s policy or that of his heirs, who ruled for another generation in the 7 Typical for this line of thought are the interpretations of Adolf Bachmann, Geschichte Bohmens, 2 vols. (Gotha, 1899-1905), I, 556-658, see particularly 593608; Berthold Bretholz, Geschichte Bohmens und Mahrens, 4 vols. (Reichenberg, 1924), I, 76-160. Fully objective is the presentation by Karl Richter, “Die bohmischen Lander im Friih- und Hochmittelalter” in Handbuch der Geschichte der bohmischen Lander, Karl Bosl, ed. (Stuttgart, 1967), I, 272-305.

Toward the Union of the Habshurg Lands

7

Bohemian lands, that a radical wholesale Germanization policy was ever contemplated. The supremacy and extension of Habsburg rule between the Danube, the Adriatic, and the Little Carpathians in the following century strength¬ ened Germanic influence. Yet this influence in turn was not only shaped by the evolving autonomous power of the Habsburg hereditary lands, but also the social and cultural influence of Czech, Magyar, Slovene, and Italian peoples. The German character of the Habsburg lands in the south¬ east of the Holy Roman Empire had thus become a complex composite concept, different from that of the southwest, whence the Habsburgs and their entourage had come. These southwestern lands were German, the southeastern were predominantly German, but the ethnic features of many people were superimposed on the German structure. In the fourteenth century, Habsburg rule was extended to Carinthia and Tirol, and the noncontiguous Breisgau and Trieste. The privilegium mains of Duke Rudolf the Founder of 1359, further strengthened the autonomous power of the Habsburgs versus the empire in regard to heredity of fiefs, exemption from taxation, military obligation, and recog¬ nition of supreme judicial power.8 The fact that the privilegium mains was in essence a forgery, emphasizes its significance; the privilegium is a triumph over legal objections. Within another century the Habsburgs had the rights claimed by the privilegium recognized by an emperor from their own house. This proves that Rudolf, shortly after 1359 recognized as archduke, a title which assimilated his status in some respects with that of the seven electors of the empire, had foreseen—and, indeed, influenced— the course of future events. There were setbacks. By the end of the century the Habsburgs had lost their domains in Switzerland. More important, internal dissension within the dynasty lead to several partition treaties of the Habsburg lands be¬ tween 1379 and 1396; they delayed the rise of the Habsburg power in Germany. However, from 1438, beginning with the election of Albrecht V of Austria as German king to the extinction of the male line in 1740, only Habsburgs were Holy Roman emperors. The brief reign of the gifted Albrecht, as king the second of his name, is also insofar significant, as his marriage to the daughter of the last Luxemburg emperor established 8 See particularly “Epilegomena zu den osterreichischen Freiheitsbriefen,” in Alphons Lhotsky, Vortrage und Aufsdtze, edited by Hans Wagner and Heinrich Roller (Vienna, 1970), I, 265-282. Ernst K. Winter, Rudolf IV. von Osterreich, 2 vols. (Vienna, 1934-1936), I, 309-395.

History of the Habshurg Empire

8

for the first time long-range Habsburg claims to the crowns of Bohemia and Hungary. Similar demands were made before, but now the Habs¬ burg power was sufficiently strong to raise them seriously, though not yet strong enough to have them met in full. The long reign of the un¬ distinguished but tenacious Frederick III (1440-1493), the last emperor crowned in Rome, is filled by a continuous struggle to come into the Bohemian and Hungarian heritage. These claims were blocked at first by the mere existence of Albrecht’s late-born son, Ladislas [Posthumus] (1440-1457). Frederick could prevent the son’s accession, but he could not secure his own. Foiled later by the powerful Hussite regent and eventually king, George of Podebrady in Bohemia (1452-1471), the Hun¬ garian regent John Hunyady (as such 1446-1452), and, above all, by his great son, King Matthias Corvinus (1458-1490), Habsburg rule even in Austria was put on the defensive. The victorious Matthias resided in Vienna after 1484. The new feuds about the succession between the various Habsburg lines were resolved in favor of the emperor only in 1490, after the Hungarian king’s death. Yet even if Matthias Corvinus had left a legitimate heir and had not been threatened by the advancing OttomanTurkish power, an empire approximating the Habsburg power of the coming generations could hardly have been established under Hungarian leadership. The Hungarian power potential, squeezed between Germans and Turks, as later between Germans and Russians, was too narrow. At the same time, the imperial connections of the Habsburgs in the west were strengthened by the political marriage of Emperor Frederick’s son Max¬ imilian with the heiress of Burgundy and the Netherlands in 1577. Ac¬ cordingly, the new Polish Jagiello dynasty in Bohemia and Hungary had little chance to conduct an active policy against the rising Habsburg power. Besides, Frederick Ill’s son Maximilian I (1493-1519) was a ruler of greater capabilities than his indecisive, unreliable, but stubborn father. Maximilian’s over-all policy was more German-oriented than that of the old emperor but it was characteristic of Habsburg power that foreign policy objectives might have been neglected for a time but hardly ever abandoned. This applies to Maximilian’s eastern objectives. In the south the only tangible achievement of the new reign was the succession in Gorizia and Gradisca after the ruling house there had become extinct. The so-called Holy League, in which Maximilian joined the pope and the Republic of Venice against the expansive policy of Charles VIII of France and his successor Louis XII, marked the beginnings of a quarter

Toward the Union of the Hahsburg Lands

9

of a millennium of wars between the Habsburgs and the French. The Holy League failed as completely as a few years later the League of Cambrai, directed now against Venice and cosponsored by the emperor. Only some small Italian domains, until then under Venetian rule, could be joined to Tirol. On the whole, the conflict with France could be side¬ tracked temporarily as long as merely northern Italy was the issue. Taking a long-range view, developments in the east were more serious. Turkish forays had threatened southern and western Hungary, and even Styria, during the later years of Frederick Ill’s reign. These hit-and-run attacks could not be stopped under Maximilian, either. Only ten years after his death, the Turks swept through Hungary and laid siege to Vienna in 1529. And yet the Turkish danger is as closely related to the rise of the Habsburgs as the ultimate victory in the east. In this respect one thinks first of Maximilian’s marriage policy, which made the Habsburgs heirs to the crown of Hungary, vacated in the strug¬ gle against the Turks. Thereby they became also the chief carriers of the fight against the Turkish advance. When Maximilian concluded the pact of Wiener Neustadt with the Jagiello king Ladislas II of Hungary (Vladi¬ slav V of Bohemia) in 1506, according to which Ladislas’ daughter should marry the emperor’s grandson, Ferdinand, and Ladislas’—not yet born— son Louis was supposed to marry the emperor’s granddaughter Maria, he hoped to establish Habsburg claims to the crowns of Bohemia and Hun¬ gary.9 The unexpected death of Louis II of Hungary in the swamps of Mohacs in battle against the Turks in 1526 changed the situation radi¬ cally. Hungary ceased to be a functioning political body and the Habs¬ burg succession moved from the sphere of speculation into that of reality. Considering the steamroller power and speed of the Turkish advance, the unrest in an anti-foreign, and this meant largely anti-Habsburg Hungary, and the religious division in Bohemia, the Habsburgs did not seem to be exactly in luck when Ferdinand succeeded to the crowns of Hungary, Croatia, and Bohemia. Yet the formidable power of the Habsburgs, with its claims to the three crowns, was the only political force in its time and 9 The actual conclusion of the double marriages in 1515 and 1516 carried him one step further. Yet these rights to succession were mutual and a scion of the house of Jagiello might have succeeded with equal probability in the hereditary lands as the Habsburgs did in Hungary. In fact, the law passed by the Hungarian diet of 1505, according to which a born Hungarian would have to succeed Wladislaw on the throne, seemed to be a major stumbling block for Habsburg ambitions, since its provisions might easily be extended into the future. As to the important peasant riots in Tyrol see Josef Macek, Der Tiroler Bauern\rieg und Michael Gaismair (Berlin, 1965), (transl. from the Czech).

History of the Habshurg Empire

10

place which could have resisted the Turkish advance with or without rights established by marriage. These rights in themselves would have meant nothing without the right constellation of geography, cultural af¬ finity between Christian nations, and corresponding military and political power. To trace the rise of the Habsburg empire to the marriage policy of the dynasty is a patent oversimplification of history. Where the component geopolitical factor did not exist, as in the two western political marriages—that of Maximilian to the heiress of Bur¬ gundy in 1477 and that of his son Philip to Juana, heiress to Castile and Aragon, in 1496—the interrelationship between political marriage and evolution toward empire failed to work. This point has frequently been obscured. Many historians have traced the world position of the house of Habsburg to the Burgundian and Iberian unions of 1477 and 1496 rather than to the ties with the Jagiellons in the east. This is true only to a point. The Burgundian marriage brought the Netherlands under the Habsburg scepter. The Iberian marriage made Charles, the grandson of Ferdinand the Catholic of Aragon and Isabella of Castile, and also of Emperor Maximilian, sovereign of three of the most powerful political entities of his time: the Holy Roman empire, Spain (formed out of the union of Castile and Aragon), and only lastly the crowns of Bohemia, Hungary, and Croatia. They were first linked merely by geographic con¬ tiguity to the ancient Habsburg hereditary lands, which had become a political unit beside, rather than of, the empire. These marriages established the world power of the Habsburgs, unques¬ tionably the greatest, but also the most complex of its time. Within a few years, by the family compact of Brussels of 1522, the Austrian hereditary lands, though still part of the Holy Roman Empire, were transferred from the emperor’s to his brother Ferdinand’s administration

and

princely sovereignty. In 1526-1527, the three eastern crowns were added to this new power structure. Within another generation, in 1556, the abdiction of Charles V (as king of Spain Charles I) led to the permanent separation of the crown of the Holy Roman Empire from that of Spain. The Netherlands remained a noncontiguous and isolated appendage of the Habsburg crowns, changing from Maximilian’s eastern realm to that of Charles V and his heirs in the west. After the richer northern part of the Netherlands was lost less than two generations after Charles’ accession, the major portion of the southern half was returned after the War of the Spanish Succession, by the peace of Rastatt of 1714, to eastern control. Farts of the Italian appendages of the Spanish empire came at the same time under the rule of the eastern Habsburg line, usually referred to as

Toward the Union of the Habshurg Lands

II

the German line. The power which the German Habsburgs derived from the temporary union with the Spanish crown and its immense colonial empire was impressive, and influenced European power politics. Yet the inheritance which the Habsburgs secured through the western political marriages did not lead to the evolution of a specific Habsburg empire. The crowns of Charles V in east and west remained disparate in an ad¬ ministrative, economic, and cultural sense, even when they were united under one head. After his death, until the extinction of the Spanish line in 1700, the bonds between the two branches of the house were reduced to diplomatic and military alliances. The appendages in the Netherlands and Italy, which after the War of the Spanish Succession accrued to the German-Austrian Habsburgs, were never fully integrated into their em¬ pire. The last remainders of this heritage were lost in the process of Italian unification in the mid-nineteenth century. The Jagiello marriages, on the other hand, had supplemented and cemented the contingencies of geographic, economic, and military af¬ finities and also of cultural needs. The western marriages could not sup¬ plement bonds that did not exist before; the marriages attempted to create those bonds. Lacking the geographic, social, and cultural prerequi¬ sites, they failed to create integration, although they succeeded in increas¬ ing political power. The eastern empire began to emerge under the rule of Maximilian’s grandson Ferdinand I. It is necessary to survey here its component parts, first the hereditary lands, that is, predominatly German-speaking posses¬ sions of the Habsburgs. Their political evolution in the Middle Ages has already been traced. They included roughly the territories of the present Republic of Austria and most of the German part of former South Tirol and Italian domains as far as Lake Garda. In the south, Carniola, Gorizia and Gradisca, and Trieste were part of the hereditary power and, in line with the provisions of the privilegia minus and maius of 1156 and 1359, loosely affiliated with the Holy Roman Empire. Inasmuch as the Habs¬ burgs, in addition to their rule in the hereditary lands and the west Ger¬ man possessions (Vorlande),10 bore the crown of the Holy Roman Empire 10 The Vorlande, generally referred to also as Vorderosterreich, included Upper Alsatia, the Breisgau, until the 14th century domains in Switzerland, and after the middle of the 18th century also Suebian possessions. The Alsatian territories were lost in the Westphalian peace treaty of 1648, the remainder in the peace of Pressburg of 1805. Actually the terms Vorlande and Vorderosterreich are not fully identical but overlapping. The latter is the wider one. See also Otto Stolz, Grundrifi der osterreichischen Verfassungs- und Verwaltungsgeschichte (Innsbruck, 1951), pp. 71 ff.

History of the Habsburg Empire

72

from the accession of Albrecht II to the death of Charles VI in 1740 for three centuries without interruption, the extent of this affiliation created no constitutional problem. An emperor from another dynasty would hardly have confirmed the pnvilegium maius as the Habsburg ruler Frederick III did in 1453. A problem, however, v/as the question of the division of rule in the hereditary lands between the various lines of the Habsburg dynasty themselves; but in 1490 all possessions of the house were reunited under Frederick III, and the Austrian hereditary lands remained united until the death of Ferdinand I in 1564. When the prob¬ lem of partition reappeared at that time, it affiected the struggle between Reformation and Counter Reformation in the hereditary lands. B.

Social and cultural conditions in the HEREDITARY LANDS BEFORE 1526 H.

The hereditary lands represented, in historical terms, the cradle of the future Habsburg empire. For this reason their social and cultural institu¬ tions in the transition period from late medieval to early modern history are discussed in this section, whereas similar developments in regard to the eastern crowns, apart from predominantly political issues, will be taken up later. Institutions and conditions in the hereditary lands in the last century before the union with Hungary were subject to frequent change. The estates, particularly in the Alpine lands, played an increasingly active part in government. They consisted of the high clergy as the first curia, the lords and knights as the second, and the princely towns and markets as the third. Only in Tirol could the free peasants join this third curia. The right of convocation of the diets, in the Alpine lands occasionally also that of general diets of several lands, belonged to the sovereign. The estates were convoked to approve extraordinary taxes, particularly in wartime, rarely regular taxes; the estates had some say in the allocation and collec¬ tion of taxes. Otherwise, the regalia (mining, minting, hunting, fishing privileges, industrial and commercial semimonopolies, special taxes on Jews etc.) and the income from the princely domains, represented the main financial sources of the administration. Courts, (Lcindrechte), nominated by the estates and appointed by the sovereign, had jurisdiction over nobles and in general over those who owned lordly estates. Another court, the Chamber Court, (Hof- or Kammergericht), composed of counselors selected by the prince, officiated at his residence. It adjudicated issues of direct importance to him. Lower

Toward the Union of the Habsburg Lands

13

courts (Landgerichte) in towns and markets increased in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries in number and importance. They were still to be distinguished from the mere patrimonial jurisdiction of the lords. The right to judge capital crimes (high crimes) had to be conferred on every single court by the sovereign. Town courts, established by princely priv¬ ileges, corresponded to the Landgerichte in the countryside. The reintro¬ duction, the so-called Reception of Roman law, enters the Austrian lands relatively late, in substance not before the middle of the fifteenth century. Secular and ecclesiastic lords held considerable power in a country where more than four-fifths of the population lived outside of towns. Yet apart from the autonomy granted to ecclesiastics and from the estates rights, this power in the late medieval period was more socioeconomic than political. The peasantry, the largest class, lived in various subject relation¬ ships to the lords: Feudal contracts between lords and tenants were in¬ creasingly restricted to one year and renewed only with one-sided con¬ cessions to the lord. Lifelong covenants were more favorable to the peas¬ ants and could be transmitted to the heirs or sold. A still more rigid form of lord-subject relationship called for personal services, either by personal labor or by payment of rent in kind, frequently both. Only a small group of free lieges were exempted from such obligations and restricted to pay¬ ment of rents. Money payments took their place gradually besides those in kind—a change within a very incomplete money economy—to the disad¬ vantage of the peasantry. The peasant riots and revolts in the late fifteenth and sixteenth century in the Austrian lands, resulted to a large extent from the advance of the money economy, for which the commercial towns were better prepared than the lords and peasants.11 From the fourteenth to the end of the fifteenth century, a large number of towns were founded in the Alpine lands. Few increased to substantial size, although the flight from the land on the part of the impoverished peasantry favored their growth. Attacks by knights in the thirteenth cen¬ tury, later the threat of Hungarian, Bohemian, Hussite, and Turkish in¬ cursions, widespread and deadly plagues, frequently checked their further expansion for a long time. Political power in the towns was shared by the 11 See Alphons Huber and Alphons Dopsch, Osterreichische Reich s geschichte (Vienna, 1901), pp. 61-90; Arnold Luschin v. Ebengreuth, Osterreichische Reichsgeschichte (Bamberg, 1901), pp. 189-287; Otto Brunner, Land und Herrschaft: Grundfragen der territorialen Verfassungsgeschichte Osterreichs im Mittelalter (Vienna, 1959, 4th revised ed.), pp. 240-356 and Alphons Lhotsky, Geschichte Osterreichs seit der Mitte des 13. ]ahr-hunderts (1281-1338), (Vienna, 1967), passim.

id

History of the Habshurg Empire

wealthy burghers with hereditary citizenship rights. They, above all, were represented in the town councils, although the guilds and brotherhoods of craftsmen also exercised substantial influence. In the late fifteenth century the influence of hereditary patricians was in decline. The two violent con¬ flicts between sovereign and burghers in Vienna at the beginning and after the middle of the fifteenth century, which led to the execution of two mayors, Konrad Vorlauf and Wolfgang Holzer, involved different strata of the burghers: the first, patricians; the second, primarily wealthy immi¬ grant merchants.12 In both cases Emperor Frederick III violated the rights of the burghers, as he did those of the noble estates in Styria. Industry and commerce were on the rise. The iron foundries in Styria and glass industry in Tyrol are worth mentioning. Salt, silver, and gold mining in the Alpine lands were significant. A main commerce route be¬ tween Germany, Bohemia, and Hungary was the Danube. Cloth and salt were being transported downstream, wine and cattle up the river. The hereditary lands profited more from transit traffic—including that from Germany to Italy—than from exports of their own limited industrial goods. In fact, exports of domestic lumber and silver13 were restricted to protect domestic needs. Except for the fine arts, medieval culture was on the decline in the hereditary lands in the fifteenth century. Only in the last years did the new humanism, in particular Renaissance culture, show promise at the court of Maximilian I. The great days of knightly chivalry and min¬ nesingers had ended in the fourteenth century. Ecclesiastic chronicles in Latin were frequently historically significant, but the verse novels and rhyme chronicles in German were of greater social than literary interest, except for the poetry of Oswald von Wolkenstein (about 1377-1445). More important were the scholarly chronicles of the historian and one-time rector of the University of Vienna, Thomas Ebendorfer (1387-1464). In his Austrian chronicles, the Kaiser and papal chronicles, he transcended in method and scope considerably the work of other contemporary chron¬ iclers. Still, he belonged to the late medieval world, like the famous astronomers of the University of Vienna in the early fifteenth century, Georg von Peuerbach, Johannes Muller (Regiomontanus), and Johann 12 See Franz von Krones, Handbuch der Geschichte Osterreichs, 4 vols. and index vol. (Berlin, 1880-1881), see particularly II, 224 f., 375-391; Hans Tietze, Wien: Kultur, Kunst, Geschichte (Vienna, 1931), pp. 100-107. 13 Ferdinand Tremel, Der Vruh\apitalismus in Innerosterreich (Graz, 1953), pp. 96-147 and by the same author Wirtschafts- und Sozialgeschichte Osterreichs: Von den Anjangen bis 7955 (Vienna, 1955), pp. 142-229.

Toward the Union of the Hahshutg Lands

75

von Gmunden. Only the mystical genius of the Copernicus’ precursor, Nicolas of Cusa (1401-64), later bishop of Brixen and cardinal, pointed to modern times. The University of Vienna, founded by Rudolf IV in 1365, developed undl the mid-fifteenth century in a fairly satisfactory way, although the crisis of Frederick Ill’s wars and domestic disorders paralyzed the intel¬ lectual climate for the next generations. As yet it had been little affected by new ideas evolving farther west. The coming era of Austrian Renaissance and Humanism is closely related to the personality of the long-time private secretary and diplo¬ matic adviser of Frederick III, Eneas Silvius Piccolomini of Siena (14051464), as pope from 1458 to 1464 known as Pius II. Eneas Silvius’ literary writings, whether amatory literature, didactic tracts, or travelogues on Bohemia, the Rhineland, Austria, and particularly Vienna, reveal ele¬ gance, charm, and keen observation. The Sienese pope may well be called a friend of Austrian culture. Conrad Celtes (1459-1508), the South German poeta laureatus at the courts of Frederick III and Maximilian I, was an Austrian by choice. Neither his Latin poetry and epigrams nor his his¬ torical study on Nuremberg are of the first order, but his break with the scholastic method and the direct turn to Humanism were significant. Celtes’ colleague and successor, Johannes Cuspinian (1473-1529), who came from the same homegrounds, was an important historian though his work did not have the same breadth as that of Celtes. The Renaissance in Austria was centered in the court; its spread to the burghers and urban culture was more limited than in Germany. Yet it was significant enough to perceive Emperor Maximilian I as the first great Renaissance patron in in the hereditary lands rather than as the cliche of the last knight. Architecture, sculpture, and painting at the turn from the fifteenth to the sixteenth century, as in the Gothic period earlier, were sponsored by the dynasty, the aristocracy, and, particularly at the height of Gothic art, by the Church. This holds fully true for the great Austrian Gothic art. Even the artistic achievements of urban culture were not primarily de¬ termined by the activities of the burghers, despite the dedicated coopera¬ tive efforts of the craft guilds. Because of this only slowly changing social structure, bourgeois Renais¬ sance architecture, sculpture, and painting which in western countries were furthered by a powerful urban upper middle class, played only a minor, though attractive part in Austrian culture. The fine arts, even later, throughout the Baroque age, prospered because of the sponsorship of a counter-reformatory ecclesia triumphans and the rising secular power

16

History of the Habsburg Empire

of the house of Austria and its aristocracy. The social forces which favored this art were still little affected by the demands and values of bourgeois culture.14 Feudal and ecclesiastic influence remained dominant in the cultural field. The Church in Austria retained its eminence of status, although it could not be unaffected by the crises of the Babylonian captivity of the popes, papal schism, Waldensian and Hussite heresies in south, west, and north. The foundation of Church-state relations in Austria was the Con¬ cordat of Vienna of 1448, the preliminaries of which were negotiated by two of the truly great and greatly different representatives of the Church, Nicholas of Cusa for the Pope Nicholas V, and Eneas Silvius for Em¬ peror Frederick III. The Concordat, which in its principal features re¬ mained valid until the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire, provided for free election of bishops by the cathedral chapters, but subject to con¬ firmation by the pope. The papacy on its part agreed in the next genera¬ tion to the establishment of the bishoprics of Vienna and Wiener Neustadt, which strengthened the imperial power against the mighty bishop of Passau and the archbishop of Salzburg.15 This diocesan church or¬ ganization was the first pillar of ecclesiastic power in the cultural as well as in the political sphere. The second was monasticism. Yet the great times of monastic culture in Austria were the High Mid¬ dle Ages and the Baroque period. The fifteenth and sixteenth centuries belong to the intermediate period of crisis in monastic life and of fre¬ quent violations of the three vows in orders and secular clergy. Rapid changes may have been partly due to the diminished prestige of the Church, which had suffered from schism and heresies. The liberalizing influence of Italian Renaissance life played a part too. Extremes in the opposite direction, religious craze and zealotry, were manifested in flagellantism and later witchcraft trials. Between these two currents stood the great reformers and crusaders Nicholas of Cusa and Johannes of Capistran, who fought simony and heresy. The powers of the Church in secular affairs were in slow retreat. Church jurisdiction in matters effecting clergy and laymen was frequently contested, even in marital affairs. Of even greater importance were the restrictions imposed on the Church for eco14Alphons Lhotsky, Thomas Ebendorfer: Ein osterreichischer Geschichtsschreiber (Stuttgart, 1957) 5 Hans Ankwicz-Kleehofen, Der Wiener Humanist Johannes Cuspinian (Graz-Cologne, 1959); Otto Rommel, ed., Wiener Renaissance (Vienna,

1947)16 Josef Wodka, Kirche in Osterreich (Vienna, 1959), pp. 170-179; Alois Knopfler, Lehrbuch der Kirchengeschichte (Freiburg i. B., 1920, 6th ed.), pp. 503 f.

Toward the Union of the Hahsburg Lands

iy

nomic reasons, above all in regard to acquisition of landed estates. Further¬ more clerical tax exemptions were frequently challenged on the local level. The prohibition of the promulgation of papal bulls and decrees of excommunication ex cathedra without consent by the secular authority as part of the centuries-old conflict between state and Church power existed in the Habsburg lands as in all Catholic countries. But unlike conditions in many of them, it implied here no decline of religious feelings. Two basic facts should be added to this sketch of social and cultural conditions in the hereditary lands. The first is the scope and objectives of Maximilian Fs sweeping administrative reforms. They represented a step in the transition from the feudal state of lord-liege relations to the bureaucratic state of appointed office holders. This transition reached only the higher levels of administration and even here economic matters re¬ mained still primarily part of the feudal system. Yet the over-all reor¬ ganization of the hereditary lands was based on the new principles of administrative expediency as from now on modified but not voided by historic tradition. Two major administrative units were established, Lower and Upper Austria. The former included the Lower and Upper Austria of today, only approximately within their present boundaries, as well as Styria, Carinthia, and Carniola. Upper Austria then comprised Tirol, Vorarlberg, the Windisch Mark (roughly, the Slovene territories between Styria and Carniola), Gorizia, Istria, Trieste, and the noncon¬ tiguous southwestern German domains, the Vorlande or Vorderosterreich. The government of the Lower Austrian unit was in Vienna, that of the Upper Austrian in Innsbruck. The individual lands of which the main units were composed were subdivided into major administrative and smaller judicial districts. The sovereign appointed the chiefs of gov¬ ernment of the individual lands, who were to be supported by likewise appointed counselors. Symbol of the preservation of some unity of the administratively divided hereditary lands was the general diet of 1518, convoked by Maximilian the year before his death. The second fact was the over-all political and national orientation of the regime. Of the two main units, the Lower Austrian lands were clearly German in character; Upper Austrian had a predominantly Slovene and Italian population in the south and southeast. Since the Slovenes lacked a nationally conscious nobility and urban middle class and the Italian domains were fragmentized, these ethnic factors were as yet politically insignificant. Maximilian’s political philosophy was clearly

18

History of the Habsburg Empire

German-oriented. Here, as so often in this imaginative emperor’s plan¬ ning, his designs outran the adminstrative potentialities of the day. The establishment of the Aulic Council (Hofrat) as common supreme court for the hereditary lands and the empire, and the Court Chamber (Hof\ammer) as joint supreme financial body, met opposition from the im¬ perial estates and proved to be unworkable. The same was true for the division of the Holy Roman Empire into ten imperial districts, of which the combined hereditary lands should form just one. The plan was re¬ jected by the electors but also by lesser princes of the empire and by the estates in the hereditary lands. It was no longer compatible with their autonomous development that had begun with the privilegium minus.16 C.

The evolution of the eastern crowns and their status at the TIME OF THE UNION OF I526-I527

The German-ruled and German-oriented lands represented and re¬ mained the nucleus of the Habsburg power, to which in 1526-1527 the Bohemian, Hungarian, and Croatian crowns were joined. The lands of the Bohemian crown and those of the Hungarian crown (including its unequal union with the Croatian crown), were more distinct political entities than the hereditary lands. The latter were separated from each other by family compacts that divided sovereignty between the branches of the dynasty for the major part of the high and late medieval period. All hereditary lands were held together, however, by a loose associa¬ tion with the Holy Roman Empire. This flexible concept of the hereditary lands favored political and administrative adjustments when the Habs¬ burg domains became the basis of an evolving new empire. The greater rigidity of the state concepts of the Bohemian and Hungarian-Croatian crowns made such adjustment more difficult, as the history of the follow¬ ing centuries shows. The hereditary lands had a particularly close connection with the Habsburg-empire concept and its envisaged social structure, in contrast with the greater constitutional and cultural distinctiveness of the eastern crowns. The lands of the Bohemian crown had been under Habsburg rule twice before 1526-1527, in 1306-1307 and in 1437-1439.17 The first union, under Rudolf III (grandson of Rudolf I, first Habsburg king of 16 Heinrich Ullmann, Kaiser Maximilian 1, 2 vols. (reprint), (Vienna, 1967), see I, 292-403, II, 561-657. Huber and Dopsch, Osterreichische Reichsgeschichte, pp. 87-90. 17 In theory the Habsburgs’ claims in this respect continued until the death of Ladislas Posthumus in 1457.

Toward the Union of the Habshurg hands

ig

the Holy Roman Empire), would not be important except that the con¬ nection between the young king’s accession and the extinction of the house of the Premyslids which had ruled in the Bohemian lands for four centuries gave his brief reign significance. The Premyslids, raised to royalty by the German counter king Philip of Swabia at the end of the twelfth century, pursued a policy of close affiliation with the empire and of the influx of German culture into the Bohemian lands. This policy was confirmed by Ottokar IPs aspirations to the crown of the Holy Roman Empire, which ended on the battlefield of Diirnkrut in 1278. The house of Luxemburg, which succeeded the Premyslids in 1310 after a short interlude, made an equally strong contribution to Czech history as the Premyslids and one not less influenced by German cultural con¬ tacts. In fact, the synthesis between Czech and German institutions and achievements from inside and outside the Bohemian lands was elevated under Emperor Charles IV (1347-1378) to the highest levels of national culture in Czech history. Under Charles and his sons until the extinction of the German-Bohemian branch of the house in 1437, the lands of the Bohemian crown, Bohemia, Moravia, Silesia, and Lusatia, unlike the situation under the Premyslids, were not mere appendages of the Holy Roman Empire. For a brief period they had become its center of power and in many ways also of culture, even under an unworthy king like Vaclav IV, the older son of Charles IV. Under the last Luxemburg rulers the curious combination of a Bohemian geographic fringe position and a central power position in relation to the empire accentuated the incipient conflict between Czechs and Germans, which was interwoven with the religious aspects of the Hussite movements.18 The election of Duke Albrecht V of Austria as king of Bohemia in 1437, ^1S investiture with Moravia, and in the following year his corona¬ tion as king of Hungary and election as Roman king in Frankfurt, pre¬ ceded this development. Albrecht died soon, in 1439. The fact that for the first time the imperial crown and those of the Bohemian and Hungarian lands could be claimed by the same ruler was thus of the very short duration. Moreover, Albrecht’s rule was merely based on a relationship through marriage. It was heavily contested by all Hussite factions. And yet we face in this second affiliation of the Bohemian lands with Habsburg rule a chain of events of great historical significance.

18 Particularly

important were in this context the social conflicts between the rela¬ tively moderate Calixtines or Utraquists, the social revolutionary Taborites and, later, the Bohemian Brethren, in whose doctrines the religious and social tenets of both trends merged in some measure.

History of the Habshurg Empire

20

In the first place, Albrecht’s possession of the three crowns: of the em¬ pire, Bohemia and Hungary, in addition to the rule in the hereditary lands, was not a mere transitory event like Rudolf Ill’s brief kingship one and a half centuries before. Albrecht’s claim lived on in his son Ladislas Posthumus (1440-1457), born after the king’s death. Had it not been for the personal aspirations of his guardian Frederick of Styria, the later emperor Frederick III, the union of 1526-1527 could have been con¬ ceivably established already under a boy king in mid-fifteenth century. More important were two other themes during Albrecht’s brief reign. First, the Turkish threat in the east. Albrecht, who died while prepar¬ ing for a campaign against the Turks in Hungary, represented one of the major reasons for the later union of the crowns: the necessity to ward oflf the threatening holocaust of the advancing Turks. Second, Albrecht’s contested rule in Bohemia represented the idea of a kind of Counter Reformation there, which throughout the centuries was related to Habsburg rule. For another two decades this particular brand of Counter Reformation was checked by the rule of the truly national Czech king and moderate Hussite leader, George of Podebrady. After his death, the election in 1471 of Ladislas II, son of the king of Poland from the house of Jagiello, revived the counterreformatory idea. The elevation of Ladislas to the throne of Hungary after the death of Matthias Corvinus accentu¬ ated again the common defense interests of Bohemia, Hungary, and now also Poland, against the advancing Turks. Ladislas II and his young son Louis II, the last Jagiello king of Hungary and Bohemia, who died on the battlefield of Mohacs in 1526, were too weak to see either policy— defense against the Turks and counterreformatory objectives—through to a successful end. Jointly with the national issue of the struggle between Czechs and Germans, unresolved through the centuries, we face here the ever more accentuated main problems of Czech development within the •

new union.

1 ft

The Hungarian crown, under the last Luxemburg ruler Sigismund, after 1386 and throughout the reign of Albrecht II until 1439, was worn also by the king of Bohemia. Here, too, the succession was the result of a marriage. Like the election of Albrecht V of Austria as king of Bo¬ hemia, the coronation of Vladislav III, the king of Poland from the house 19 Karl Richter, “Die bohmischen Lander im Friih- und Hochmittelalter,” pp. 257~347 and Ferdinand Seibt, “Die Zeit der Luxemburger und der hussitischen Revolution,” pp. 351-568, both in Karl Bosl, ed., Handbuch, Vol. I; Count Franz von Liitzow, Bohemia, revised by H. A. Pichler (London, 1939), pp. 38-202; Robert W. Seton-Watson, A History of the Czechs and Slovaks (Hamden, 1941), pp. 23-88; Ernest Denis, Fin de Vlndependance Boheme (Paris, 1890), II, 3-29.

Toward the Union of the Habsburg Lands

21

of Jagiello, as king of Hungary in 1440 20 indicated the evolution of a defensive alliance system of the eastern nations against the Turks. The three-cornered struggle for the crown of Hungary among Emperor Fred¬ erick III, his ward Ladislas Posthumus, and John Hunyady (and Hunyady’s son Matthias Corvinus), presented the further development of this alliance. Although Matthias remained victorious, Frederick after the death of Fadislas Posthumus appropriated the deceased king’s claims to the Hungarian crown. Yet Frederick’s election as Hungarian king—or rather counter king—against Matthias in 1459 never led to the assump¬ tion of power. Just the same, the ambitions of the slow, indecisive, but stubborn and ruthless Frederick paved the way for the double marriages between Jagiellos and Habsburgs, on which the further political destiny of Hungary and Bohemia was to be based. The significance of the struggle between Frederick and Matthias Corvinus went further. In the first place, the rule of the Hungarian king relied on his support of lesser nobility and towns, but also of the upper strata of the peasant population. They all had much to gain from further centralization of the kingdom. Matthias’ opponents were the powerful landed aristocrats who succeeded in securing the election of the weak Jagiello king of Bohemia, who ruled in Hungary henceforward as Ladi¬ slas II. Under his son, Louis II, the last Hungarian king before the Plabsburg accession, early Protestant thought was studied and cultivated at the court, an incipient development to which Louis’s successor Fer¬ dinand I, the first Habsburg ruler in Hungary, put a stop. Yet the late Jagiello rulers of Hungary had made their peace with the Habsburgs, who soon would be heirs to the crowns of Hungary and Bohemia. Like their Jagiello predecessors after the death of Matthias in 1490, the Habs¬ burgs became identified at the beginning of their rule with the interests of the Magyar magnates, who had been opposed to the major reforms associated with the reign of Matthias. Yet neither Jagiellos nor Habsburgs could rely on the gratitude of the national aristocracy. On the contrary, either dynasty had to face increasingly stiffened opposition by the mag¬ nates. The weakness of the Jagiello regime had shaken the defense capa¬ bilities of Hungary against the Turks. This weakness went back to the reign of Matthias. Had this truly national king not felt that the defeat of the emperor was necessary to establish a workable alliance between Hungary, Bohemia, and Poland, he might not, as often charged, have conducted an offensive western policy at the cost of the neglect of ade¬ quate defense against the east.

20 As

king of Hungary Ladislas I.

History of the Hahshurg Empire

22

All this does not mean that Matthias’ policy was free of imperialist designs and in that respect very different from that of Frederick III, but he had the ability to appeal successfully to broader strata of the eastern European peoples than Frederick. However, the crushing of the Hun¬ garian peasant revolt of 1514, undid much of Matthias’ reform legislation. The great law code of the new Hungary, the Tripartitum of the brilliant but narrow-minded lawyer Stephan Verboczi, identified the political na¬ tion for centuries to come with the nobility. Although this concept of nobility included the gentry, it was still narrower than the political and social stratification of Hungary evolved between the Hungarian Magna Charta—the Bulla Aurea of 1222—and Matthias’ death. At the eve of the Turkish onslaught, which was to engulf Hungary for one and a half centuries after 1526, the Habsburgs, a foreign dynasty preceded by an¬ other foreign one, became heirs to a divided and weakened political na¬ tion. They were faced by the threefold evil of foreign occupation, and in a sense deriving from it religious and ethnic division and conflict. This last conclusion pertained in more than one way also to CroatiaSlavonia-Dalmatia, the triune vassal kingdom of Hungary.21 The Habs¬ burgs succeeded here in 1527 after due election by the Croatian estates as heirs to the Hungarian rule established in the early twelfth century. They had to face a Turkish occupation with social consequences even more farreaching than in Hungary proper, and a gradually evolving Southern Slav ethnic problem which was to engulf Hungary and eventually the rising Habsburg power altogether. The union had started under inauspi¬ cious beginnings.22 The question may be raised at this point whether one can speak of political and institutional bonds between the political entities of the heredi¬ tary lands and the lands of the Bohemian and Hungarian-Croatian crowns in 1526-1527. Did any social-political premises exist, furthering the coming process of integration? Undoubtedly the rising Turkish danger from the east accentuated the problem of common defense needs of Christian Europe, as they had existed at the time of the Magyar invasions of Central Europe in the tenth century and of the Mongolian forays into eastern Central Europe in the thirteenth. Both dangers resulted in a measure of political integration. The Turkish advance in the early sixteenth cen21 The rule over Croatia was contested by claims of the Venetian republic. 22 Balint Homan, Geschichte des ungarischen Mittelalters (Berlin, 1943), Vol. II; Kosary, A History of Hungary, pp. 44-91. Laslo Makkai, in Ervin Pamlenyi, ed., Die Geschichte Ungarns, (Budapest, 1971), Chapter II, pp. 23-127. Stanko Guldescu, History of Medieval Croatia (The Hague, 1964), pp. 215 f. and by the same author The Croatian-Slavonian Kingdom is,26-ijc)2 (The Blague, 1970), pp. 9-28.

Toward the Union of the Habsburg Lands

23

tury represented a more lasting and better organized offensive than pre¬ vious invasions, yet it might have been fought equally well by mere de¬ fensive alliances between the threatened countries. Cultural ties between the Hungarian and the hereditary lands did exist to some extent under the reign of Matthias Corvinus. His death in 1490 and the hit-and-run attacks of the Turks were not conducive to further cultural progress and to the strengthening of cultural bonds with the west. As for Bohemia, fairly close ties between the Bohemian and hereditary lands had existed as long as the cultural center of Prague was furthered by the German-Luxemburg rulers, who valued both, the imperial crown and the Czech national tradition. Yet the Hussite wars and the con¬ comitant social upheavals in Bohemia strained cultural relations with Habsburg Austria (and Jagiello Hungary) even more than the political instability brought upon Hungary by the Turkish offensive. The fact that the Jagiello kings ruled in Hungary and the Bohemian lands at the same time changed little in this respect. Basic experiences, the Turkish danger, and the struggle between

Matthias Corvinus and Frederick III

in western Hungary and eastern Austria, and the social and religious impact of the revolution in Bohemia, were not shared. In the socioeconomic field Hungary after the death of Matthias was too exposed to the eastern danger to be considered a reliable trading partner with west and north. As for the peasant situation, the reform movement of Matthias was stopped and the peasant revolt of 1514 headed by George Dozsa in the rural towns, although put down with savage ferocity by the authorities, revealed the continuing instability of existing conditions. Undoubtedly this social crisis weakened resistance against the Turkish conquerors.

oq

The union of 1526-1527 occurred at a time when cultural relations be¬ tween the hereditary lands and the Bohemian crown were weaker than in the late fourteenth century. Strong ties between the hereditary lands and Hungary developed under Matthias Corvinus but they ended with his death. Bohemian, Hungarian, and Austro-German social conditions in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries showed many similarities. The superiority of the Bohemian urban social structure in the fourteenth century, however, was less marked in the time of troubles of the fifteenth

23 Peasant

revolts followed also in the Habsburg domains of lower Styria, Carinthia, and Carniola, but they did not coincide there with an immediate threat of foreign aggression. Accordingly the impact of these revolts on international re¬ lations was limited.

2^

History of the Hahshurg Empire

century. Social progress in Hungary, which advanced considerably under Matthias had no chance to develop further. This becomes apparent in the socially backward law code of the Tripartitum Verboczi. Croatia was now almost fully absorbed by the Turkish invasion and had for a long time no major role to play in the social-cultural relationship between the historico-political entities which were to form the Habsburg empire. Peasant unrest in the Austrian Hereditary and Hungarian lands was similar, although the peasants primarily affected in Hungary in the last decades preceding the union of 1526 belonged to a higher order than the revolutionary peasants in Austria; in Bohemia similar social problems were tackled if not solved almost a century earlier. Yet common problems do not necessarily make for common solutions. The conditions for the union of 1526-1527 were unfavorable because of external threats and internal resistance in the various units and because the social and cultural structures of the major historico-political entities were different. Political history, however, worked for integration. His¬ torical developments in the two centuries following the union of 1526-1527 will be discussed in the next two chapters, social-cultural issues in Chap¬ ter IV. The mentioned major social and cultural differences in the heredi¬ tary and the newly gained Habsburg lands bode ill for the prospects of durability of the new union. The problem which we have to discuss in the following is, to what extent these impediments could be overcome by political association.

CHAPTER II Turks and Protestants fl526-ioisj

A.

The beginnings of political integration

The succession of the Habsburgs to the crowns of Bohemia and Hungary-Croatia established merely the dynastic premises for the evolu¬ tion of an eastern Central European empire. These premises were as yet feeble. Only in the German Alpine lands was their hereditary basis un¬ challenged, while in Hungary recognition of the king by the diet and in the Bohemian lands his formal election by the estates were necessary. Considering the political rifts inside Hungary, which followed the di¬ saster of Mohacs and the religious and social division within the lands of the Bohemian crown, one has to look for deeper reasons than succes¬ sion pacts to explain the integration process toward the formation of an empire. Four such reasons will be advanced here: First, the Turkish advance into Central Europe, which coincided with the Habsburg succession in Hungary, created common defense needs. They could be met in the long run only in an empire-like organization. Second, the fight between the rapidly spreading Reformation and the incipient and ultimately victorious Counter Reformation established a political bond between the Habsburg domains. These two issues have been mentioned before. Third, it is said that the hereditary lands and the new Habsburg crowns supplemented each other economically. Lastly, geographic conditions were claimed to be conducive to integration. All these advanced reasons are controversial. The relatively most con¬ vincing one is the Turkish danger since the needs for defense against it were sound enough. Yet this is something rather different from the fre¬ quently proclaimed Austrian mission to defend Christianity against the 25

26

History of the Habsburg Empire

Ottoman onslaught. It is, of course, true that ideological reasons played a part, but primarily we face here just a common European defense policy against imperialist aggression. Austria’s contribution to it was great, and particularly so in view of underhand French attempts to support her enemies, but by no means exclusive. As for consequences of the Turkish wars, seen in the more modest frame of the Danube basin, the almost two centuries of Turkish inroads into Hungary, and particularly the first 150 years of them, had exacer¬ bated previously existing differences between Hungary and the hereditary lands. Moreover, a number of new ones, clearly traceable until the end of the empire, were created by the impact of the Turkish wars. The Counter Reformation established, indeed, common bonds between new and old Habsburg lands, but it could do so only at the price of humiliating and alienating the Czech people for centuries to come. More¬ over a sharply divisive issue in Hungary and the Alpine lands surfaced. Consequences of all these developments, particularly those in the Bo¬ hemian lands, were apparent until 1918 and, indeed, beyond. That the western and eastern Habsburg lands ideally complemented each other economically is frequently considered an axiom. Yet an axiom is based on impossibility of proof and on self-evidence. Only the first holds at least partly true for the Habsburg empire. The factor of self-evidence is entirely lacking. Not until the second half of the eighteenth century did the industrial economic structure of Bohemia begin to differ markedly from that of the hereditary lands. About the same time the difference be¬ tween their mixed agricultural-industrial character and Hungarian agri¬ culture became more conspicuous. Then only, and only in a limited way did the process of economic complementation between the historico-political units of the Habsburg lands gradually assume significance. Before the reign of Maria Theresa these structural differences in economic condi¬ tions were not distinctive enough to explain the integration of an empire on economic grounds. This applies in particular also to the Polish ter¬ ritories acquired by the empress.1 The argument that the Habsburg empire formed a natural geographic unit seems to be even weaker. The lands of Galicia-Bukovina in the northeast were almost completely separated from the bulk of the Habs1 Oscar Jaszi, The Dissolution of the Habsburg Monarchy (Chicago, 1929), pp. 185-212; Robert A. Kann, Werden und Zerfall des Habsburgerreiches (Graz, Vienna, Cologne, 1962), pp. 121-135, revised edition of Robert A. Kann, The Habs¬ burg Empire: A Study in Integration and Disintegration (2nd ed. New York, 1973), pp. 94-106.

Tur\s and Protestants

27

burg domains by the Carpathians. Dalmatia in the southeast, which covered most of the monarchy’s coastal territories, was separated by the Karst mountains from Croatia and the Hungarian plains. Of the two prin¬ cipal rivers, the Danube led from the main routes of European traffic into the practically land-locked Black Sea. Navigation in several places, above all at the Iron Gate (Orsova) and at the delta was very cumbersome and demanded unloading of freight. The Elbe, originating in Bohemia, on the other hand, did indeed flow into a main center of European North Sea traffic. Yet only a short stretch of its course passed through Habsburg territory and the main volume of its traffic entered the river only after it had left Bohemia. The geographic unity between Alpine hereditary lands, mountain-girded Bohemia, and Hungarian plains was no greater than of any other major European power.2 All this does not suggest that the four factors cited above as generally advanced to explain the evolution of the Habsburg power lack entirely cohesive features. Undoubtedly traits of this kind have furthered integra¬ tion to various degrees at various times. Yet not even combined, let alone separately, do they suffice to explain the rise of an empire, more diversi¬ fied than any other in existence in modern times, in regard to ethnic, linguistic, and historic traditions. No comprehensive theory, why an empire emerged and dissolved is entirely convincing on the strength of post facto reasoning. But some personal issues help to make us see the missing links in the disparate factors discussed. To one of them, the personality of the first true ruler of the newly acquired Habsburg lands, we are now turning. The introductory chapter mentioned Emperor Charles V’s brother, Ferdinand (1503-1564) in regard to his status in the line of succession and acquisition of new lands. Emperor Maximilian I, as will be remem¬ bered, had envisaged that the Bohemian, Hungarian, and Croation crowns would accrue to the Habsburgs, by way of the Jagiellonian suc¬ cession. The Jagiellon-Habsburg marriages were concluded, but the un¬ timely death of King Louis II of Hungary in the battle of Mohacs in 1526 turned dynastic speculation to a reality close at hand. It meant, at the same time, wide enlargement of Habsburg power but also its division. At the time of the family pact of Worms of 1521 between Charles and Ferdinand, when the Habsburg succession in the East was not yet de¬ termined, the universality of the rule of Charles, since 1516 king of Castile and Aragon, and since 1519 emperor, was strictly maintained. According to that agreement, Ferdinand could have succeeded only to the then five 2 Kann, Werden und Zerjall des Habsburgerreiches, pp. 27-29.

28

History of the Habsburg Empire

Lower Austrian duchies, Upper and Lower Austria, Styria, Carinthia, and Carniola. He would have remained a major vassal prince of the empire. The threefold crisis, which evolved in 1521, the beginnings of the Turk¬ ish advance beyond Belgrad into Hungary, the opening of the struggle between the houses of Habsburg and Bourbon, and the spread of the political impact of the Reformation, forced the young emperor to lighten his burden in the east and to make sure that his-position in the west would be fortified at the same time. The consequence of these considera¬ tions was the treaty of Brussels of the following year, 1522, according to which Ferdinand succeeded now in all the lands, which later would be referred to as the Austrian lands, namely, in addition to the five Lower Austrian duchies, Tirol, the Vorlande, the temporary regency in Wurttemberg, and that for lifetime in the Alsace. On the other hand, Fer¬ dinand, from now on his brother’s viceroy in all German lands, had to re¬ nounce his claims to the Spanish-Burgundian inheritance. These partition treaties, which precede the birth of the male offspring of the two brothers —the future Philip II of Spain and Maximilian II—constitute the parting of the way between the Spanish and German Habsburg lines.3 The acts of 1556 after the abdication of Charles, according to which Philip suc¬ ceeded his father as king of Spain and its appendages and Ferdinand, his brother, as emperor, provided only the official confirmation. An independent Habsburg state in Central Europe might conceivably have evolved under the terms of the pacts of Worms and Brussels, but such political structure could hardly have risen to great power if it had not encompassed the pending link of the whole Habsburg German in¬ heritance with the three eastern Bohemian and Hungarian-Croatian crowns to which Ferdinand succeeded in 1526-1527. It is difficult to see how that peculiar body, a great power, multinational in its ethnic char¬ acter and German-oriented by its western ties, could have developed under then existing conditions any other way, namely by the various mar¬ riage, inheritance, and partition treaties, which introduced a basically peaceful element in the difficult process of integration. Under the over-all rule of Charles, the emperor king in whose—loosely knit—realms the sun never set, the center of gravity of Habsburg rule and Habsburg power was in the west. The same held still true for the second half of the sixteenth and the first half of the seventeenth century. Actually only the Peace of the Pyrenees between France and Spain in 3 Adam Wandruszka, Das Haus Habsburg (Vienna, 1956), pp. 115b; Wilhelm Bauer, Die Anfange Ferdinands I (Vienna, 1907), pp. 64-161; Helmut G. Koenigsberger, The Habsburgs and Europe 1515-1660 (Ithaca, 1971), pp. 1-63.

Tur\s and Protestants

29

1659 marked the decline of royal Spain so clearly that the German Habsburgs with their wide eastern affiliations became now truly equal partners in the family alliance. Yet a genuine supremacy of the younger German line was not recognized as long as the older Spanish one existed, that is, to the death of the last Spanish Habsburg, Charles II, in 1700. It is important to keep these facts in mind, if one wants to understand the relationship between Ferdinand and his imperial brother and the re¬ lationship between the two empires in the west and east based on the family alliance. Ferdinand, superior in intelligence, administrative ability, and at the same time less prejudiced than his older brother, deferred to the emperor notwithstanding conflicts on many specific issues in his over-all policies. So did more than two centuries later another Habsburg, Leopold of Tuscany to Joseph II, whom he equaled in ability but sur¬ passed in political prudence and common sense. Still a generation fur¬ ther, the able Archduke Charles yielded to his brother, the mediocre Emperor Francis I. The allegiance to the unity of the dynasty, no matter who represented it, was one of the foremost premises of the rise of Habs¬ burg power, the subordination of the eastern problems to the western was another. Ferdinand’s political deference to Charles—a man of strong character but of little wisdom—meant recognition of the strength of imperial-dynastic ties. It meant also that the gradually evolving integra¬ tion with the incongruous parts of the eastern empire could take place off the main roads of European power politics between France and Spain, above all off the essentially sterile theater of struggle in Italy. This meant further that the seemingly insoluble conflict between emperor and Protestant princes in Germany had for some time only a fringe impact on the association between Alpine hereditary lands and those of the eastern crowns. Had it been otherwise Ferdinand could hardly have coped successfully with the enormous problems of his reign, the progress of the Protestant Reformation in the hereditary lands, the question of integration of the eastern Habsburg lands, the recognition of the Habs¬ burg succession in Hungary, and the Turkish advance from Belgrad to the gates of Vienna. Subordination to Emperor Charles, linked at the same time to the endeavor to separate western and eastern problems, is a key to the understanding of Ferdinand’s impressive efforts and respect¬ able success.4 It would be impossible to recognize the early results of this cautious policy if Ferdinand had not given to his realms some internal cohesion by far-reaching administrative reforms. Outstanding in this respect was 4 Bauer, Die Anfdnge Ferdinands l pp. 189-238.

History of the Habsburg Empire the establishment of the mentioned Aulic Council (Hofrat) as Court of Appeal and controlling administrative agency in the hereditary lands and in the empire where Ferdinand acted as regent for his imperial brother. In 1558 after he had succeeded as emperor in his own right, this body was transformed into the imperial Aulic Council (Reichshofrat). The General Court Chancery (Allgemeine Hofkanzlei) on the other hand became not merely a deliberative and advisory body, but an executive body. By implication it could supervise enforcement of the decisions of the Aulic Council and Secret Council. Under Maximilian I, the chambers for financial administration in Vienna and Innsbruck were set up partly according to administrative functions and partly on a territorial basis. When Ferdinand ruled as emperor in his own right they were divided and expanded in sections of the imperial and the Austrian hereditary lands. Even more significant from the standpoint of integration were those new institutions which pertained to all of Ferdinand’s realms including the new ones of the three eastern crowns. The most important one was the Secret Council (Geheimer Rat) set up in 1527. It became the supreme body for affairs of state (foreign and military), but also for financial matters deriving from the income from crown domains and sovereign prerogatives (regalia). The council exercised also jurisdiction in matters of domestic policies, either under the presidency of the emperor or, more often, of Ferdinand or his representative, the supreme chancellor or the master of the household. The Court Chamber (Hofkammer) was an ad¬ ministrative body with the most clearly established jurisdiction for the hereditary lands, for common agenda with the Holy Roman Empire, and in some degree also for the lands of the Bohemian and Hungarian crowns. This institution combined functions of a treasury and a ministry of economic administration entrusted with the supervision of the fiscal agencies in Vienna, Innsbruck, Prague, and Pozsony (Pressburg). Lastly, the Court War Council (Hofkriegsrat) was created, a collegiate body which served as a ministry of defense for the German and Austro-Bohemian-Hungarian Habsburg lands. The supervisory control of military operations, which this agency assumed later, was resented by Austria’s most eminent generals such as Count Raimond Montecuccoli and Prince Eugene of Savoy. These main offices do not represent a clearcut structure of an evolving Habsburg empire. Judicial and administrative functions, in particular in regard to the contested jurisdiction of the estates of various lands, were

Tur\s and Protestants

31

at least as much in conflict as those between the administrative agencies of the Holy Roman Empire, the Austro-German hereditary lands, and those of the eastern crowns. The administrative ties between Holy Roman Em¬ pire and Austro-German hereditary lands, which went largely back to the reforms of Ferdinand’s grandfather Maximilian I, were still stronger than those with the newly acquired eastern realms. As for the bonds with the empire, the Aulic Council, and later the Imperial Aulic Council, represented at least an unequivocal relationship of common interests al¬ though issues of subordination or coordination remained in doubt. Mat¬ ters were even more complex in relationship to the east. Hungarians were for all practical purposes not represented in the Secret Council. This fact was explained by the long Turkish occupation of the best part of Hun¬ garian territories. Yet Hungarian objections, and to a somewhat lesser ex¬ tent those of the Bohemian estates, impeded also the complete integration of the financial administration under the Court Chamber. The same was true for the relationship to the Court War Council.5 And yet the incongruity of common institutions between empire, hereditary lands, and the eastern crowns bears witness to the flexibility of Ferdinand’s skillful statesmanship rather than to lack of efficiency. Loose, and in the beginnings in some ways almost accidental, as the relationship between hereditary lands and eastern lands seemed, it might have been strained if the sovereign had insisted on a greater degree of central¬ ization. On the other hand, the nature of the gradually evolving ties be¬ tween hereditary and eastern lands loosened also the relationship of the former to the empire. No clear constitutional actions, but the fact that the hereditary lands in their still indistinctive union with the eastern lands became too unyieldy to be a manageable part of the empire, explain the very gradual evolution of the new great power of the future. It is difficult to say how far Ferdinand had planned all this and to what extent he followed merely the principle that politics represented the pur¬ suit of the practically feasible. Yet the assumption that his regency and reign stood for more than government by flair is borne out by several factors. His well-planned religious and foreign policy, executed cautiously but determinedly under difficult conditions, rank foremost among them. 5 Alphons Huber and Alphons Dopsch, Osterreichische Reich sgeschichte (Vienna, 1901), pp. 180-232; Ernst C. Hellbling, Osterreichische Verfassungs- und Verwaltungsgeschichte (Vienna, 1956), pp. 210-267. Laszlo Makkai, Die Entstehung der gesellschaftlichen Basis des Absolutismus in den Landern der osterreichischen Habsburger (Budapest, i960), passim.

History of the Habsburg Empire

32 B.

Sovereignty in the Austro-German and eastern Habsburg lands

The supreme power of a political entity is vested primarily in its sover¬ eign right to conduct an independent foreign policy. Far-reaching auton¬ omy in regard to domestic administration on the other hand is compatible with subordination to a superior governmental authority. Such relation¬ ship may be of a federal or quasi-federal character. Unless we deal with a confederation of independent states with common institutions between but not above them, such organization falls short off full sovereignty.6 What was the status of the rising new Habsburg power in eastern Cen¬ tral Europe in this respect ? To recapitulate briefly the legal situation: Ferdinand, according to the family compact of Brussels in 1522, which amended the pact of Worms of the preceding year, had become ruler of all hereditary Austro-German lands. Furthermore, on the basis of the state treaties with the Jagiello kings, he succeeded in 1526-1527 to the crowns of Hungary-Croatia, and Bohemia. His succession was confirmed by the Bohemian estates but only by a part of the Hungarian ones. Yet in spite of this contested election Ferdinand was crowned in Hungary as in Bohemia. The Hungarian challenge will be discussed later. At this point, we are concerned with the relationship of the new union to the empire and reign of Charles V. Ferdinand, though now a prince of the empire endowed with wider territories than any other, still owed allegiance to his brother, as emperor and as head of the Habsburg dynasty. In this respect, but also in consideration of the obligations of the princes to support the Roman emperor against foreign foes and domestic insurrection, he was legally no fully sovereign ruler. Moreover, on the basis of the Golden Bull of Emperor Charles IV which in 1356 confined the imperial elections to four temporal and three ecclesiastic princes, he was not even the full equal of the slate of electors, which did not include a Habsburg. But in a roundabout way equal status with the electors, demanded al¬ ready by Charles IV’s son-in-law Duke Rudolf IV (the Founder) of Austria was brought about under Ferdinand, as a result of the peculiar relationship between the empire and the Bohemian crown. Whether the king of Bohemia was to be considered a prince of the empire like other German electoral princes was a controversial question until 1356. His 6 See Robert A. Kann, “Federalism and the Federal State in History,” and the literature quoted there in Rapports, Comite International des Sciences Historiques, XII Congres International des Sciences Historiques, IV (Vienna, 1965), 33-48.

Tur\s and Protestants

33

status as imperial prince did not follow necessarily from his participation in imperial elections and from the honor of acting as libationer at the imperial coronations, but was generally assumed, because both of Charles IV’s sons, like their father, wore the crown of the empire as well as the Bohemian. Their Habsburg successor as German ruler, Albrecht II, al¬ most a century before Ferdinand laid at least claim to the Bohemian crown and to the Bohemian-imperial association.7 These constitutional developments raised the status of the king of Bohemia as genuine royalty in relations to the German princes.8 When Ferdinand succeeded to the Bohemian crown in 1526, the old question of loyalty of a Bohemian ruler to the emperor was revived. Even though the Habsburg king of Bohemia did not participate in the imperial elections in any but a mere formal sense, and even that only by the so-called readmission after 1708,9 a relationship of subordination of the Bohemian crown bearer to the Roman emperor had now come into existence. The electoral function which had been denied thus far to the powerful Habsburgs became accessible to them by the backdoor. More important, the character of the association between the emperor and the king of Bohemia was substantially changed when a ruler of Bohemia owed allegiance to an emperor who was simulta¬ neously head of his house. When Ferdinand succeeded his brother as emperor in 1556, and the union of imperial and Bohemian crowns was established in the same person, an important precedent had been set. The Bohemian crown was now definitely subordinated to the imperial crown. 7 On the relationship of the imperial crown to the Bohemian see James Bryce, The Holy Roman Empire (London, 1914), pp. 242 f., 265; Ferdinand Seibt, in Karl Bosl, ed. Handbuch der Geschichte der bohmischen Lander, I, pp. 391-407; Hellbling, Osterreichische Verfassungs- und Verwaltungsgeschichte, pp. 156 ff., 225. S. H. Thomson,, Czechoslovakia in European History (Princeton, 1956), pp. 29 £., 42 f. See also Frederick G. Heymann, George of Bohemia: King of Heretics (Princeton, 1965), pp. 554~5578 But in the long run this peculiar relationship restricted the freedom of the ruler of Bohemia since the lands of the Bohemian crown were now more closely tied to empire and emperor. Until the death of Albrecht II of Habsburg, king of Bohemia and Hungary and duly elected German king in 1438, the legal issue appeared to be dominant if not altogether settled. During the time of trouble after Albrecht’s death, and particularly under the regency and subsequent reign of the Hussite King George of Podiebrady (1452-1471), the question of the Bohemian electoral status within the empire became hardly practical. The same held true under the reigns of his Jagiello successors. Both Jagiello kings, Vladislav II and Louis I (as king of Hungary the second of his name), were not challenged as sovereign rulers by the Habsburg emperors. 9 Franz von Krones, Handbuch der Geschichte Osterreichs, 4 vols. and index vol. (Berlin, 1880-1881), see IV, 79 f. See also Huber and Dopsch, Osterreichische Reichsgeschichte, pp. 173-175.

34

History of the Habsburg Empire

This fact establishes a distinction between the relationship of the lands of the Bohemian and the Hungarian-Croatian crowns to emperor and empire. Frequently it has been held that only the separation of the lat¬ ter domains from the bulk of the Habsburg lands by the impact of two centuries of Turkish wars explains their more autonomous development. But the historical associations between empire and Bohemian lands, which have no parallel in the Hungarian-Croatian orbit, must be considered also as a reason for a closer link between empire and Bohemian crown. More important, they help to understand the bonds between the AustroGerman Alpine hereditary lands as part of the empire and those of the crown of St. Wenceslav. Under Charles V these distinctions between German-affiliated and nonaffiliated eastern lands of the Habsburgs were blurred because the regent of all of them owed allegiance to an emperor as head of the dynasty whose center of power was far to the west of Germany between Spain, Italy, and Flanders. This situation changed in mid-century. The separation between the Spanish-Italian line under Philip II and the German line under Ferdinand became manifest when Charles V abdicated in 1556.10 As a symbol of the separation, the imperial title reverted now to the head of the Austrian Line. Still the primacy of the western (Spanish) line outlasted the reign of Charles V. In matters of politics the center of gravity of Habsburg rule was its relation to the leading power of seventeenth-century Europe, France. In this relationship, Spain, even in its decline and in a passive way, was a more important factor than the lands of the German Habs¬ burgs. Only the extinction of the Spanish line in 1700 gave the German Habsburgs, heretofore the junior partner in the family alliance, their chance to enter world politics. C.

Principles of foreign policy

The foreign policy of Ferdinand I and his successors to the middle of the seventeenth century has to be seen in the light of the facts discussed. For a generation after 1526 the new king was only the chief executive organ of the policies of his brother. Impressive as his powers were and independent as he showed himself in the pursuit of policies, their basic principles represented necessarily the spirit of Madrid and not of Vienna. After the reign of Charles V the Austrian Habsburgs still were bound to 10 Krones, Handbuch der Geschichte Osterreichs, III, 395-397; Hermann I. Bidermann, Geschichte der osterreichischen Gesamtstaatsidee 1526-1804 (Innsbruck, 1867), Section I. 1526-1705, pp. 26-36.

Tur\s and Protestants

35

support Italian and French policies of Spain, and this at a time when they were faced by threats from the east. Even after the tide of fortunes turned against the Turks in 1699 with the peace of Karlowitz (Karlovic) Austrian policies were still largely dominated by western interests. When they could not be successfully defended in the War of the Spanish Suc¬ cession, eastern expansion served as mere substitute for the western ambi¬ tions of Charles VI in Spain, Italy, and the vast colonial empire beyond the sea. What is true for the wars against the Turks pertains also to the ideolog¬ ical and political power struggle against the Protestants. Ferdinand I was no less devout Catholic than Charles V. The same can be said for most of his successors until 1918 in regard to strictly religious attitudes as dis¬ tinguished from state-Church relations. The German Habsburgs may not always have been obedient to the will of the Church in Rome, but their devotion to the Catholic faith could seldom be doubted. The Spanish Habsburgs under Charles V and Philip II tried to undo the Reformation as far as possible by fire and sword; the Austrian Habsburgs, up to the reign of Matthias I, attempted to take the wind out of the sails of Protes¬ tantism by compromise. Intolerance on the part of the Austrian Habsburgs rose only gradually in direct proportion to the decline of the Spanish power as the foremost fighting champion of the Counter Reformation. In secular politics, Charles V focused on the fight for supremacy against the French Bourbons. Their mighty kingdom blocked the amalgamation of the lands of the Spanish crown with the Holy Roman Empire and the new eastern domains of the Habsburgs. Inasmuch as Italy became the forefield of the old power struggle between Habsburgs and Bourbons, the papacy became involved in it, in the sixteenth century, on the side of the weaker French. They represented less of the threat to the Church than Spain supported by the Habsburg power in the east. A ruler not as devout as Charles under such conditions might have veered from the orthodox Catholic line to a policy of expediency. He could have followed in the footsteps of Francis I of France who concluded the first formal alliance with the infidel Turks and supported the German Protestant princes in an underhand way as well. In the case of Charles, such actions by the French king and the shifty and, from the emperor’s viewpoint, opportun¬ istic foreign policy of the popes from Clement VII to Paul IV strength¬ ened only his determination to make the Church a more effective instru¬ ment of imperial power against the Protestant German princes and Protestantism. The struggle against the French and Protestantism, as a challenge to imperial power and imperial faith were the basic tenets of

j6

History of the Habshurg Empire

Charles’ policy. To them may be added his resolve to curb a spirit of moral laxity and independence from imperial influence within the Church in Rome. The struggle in the east against the Turkish advance meant to Charles undoubtedly an external threat to the faith but not perhaps to the same degree to which he saw an internal threat in Protestantism. The Turks represented mere diversionary tactics of infidelity which kept him from a final settling of accounts against heresy. True enough, the struggle against the Ottoman power meant also a chance to rally the German princes to a common purpose, but that did not mean reconciliation with Protestantism—it meant the hope that in the face of the danger abroad the heretic princes at home would return to the fold of emperor and Church. The Schmalkaldian religious war against the Protestant princes, from 1546 essentially to the Religious Peace of Augsburg in 1555, resulted from the emperor’s recognition that the undoing of Protestantism had become illusionary. His abdication was the final consequence of this insight. Ferdinand perceived the priorities of imperial policies in a different way. To him the Burgundian, and Flemish interests of his house and the possessions beyond the sea meant little in themselves, although they were important from the viewpoint of loyalty to the imperial brother and from that of the grandeur of the dynasty. The conflict with France ap¬ peared to him as diversionary an attack as the Turkish one to emperor Charles. The Ottoman Turkish advance, however, meant to him the clear and present danger of expulsion from his domains not only in Hungary, but in the hereditary lands as well; besides, if they should be lost to the infidels, there was little chance for him to establish his rule in Bohemia. As for the issue of Protestantism, where Charles obviously subordinated his political strategy largely to his religious convictions, Ferdinand fol¬ lowed on the whole an opposite course. Not less devout but less intolerant a Catholic than his older brother, he was ready to compromise with the Protestants even on such dogmatic questions as celibacy for priests or the cup for the laity. Ferdinand’s resistance to the foremost threat against his rule, the Ottoman Turks, was to a greater extent based on needs for domestic tranquility than Charles’ in his fight across western Europe. In the light of these considerations, Ferdinand stayed out of the em¬ peror’s conflict with France and the Italian states, above all the papal states. Even in Germany he supported the emperor only as much as the threefold obligations as member of the Habsburg dynasty to its head, as prince of the empire to the emperor, and as elected Roman king and

Tur\s and Protestants

37

successor to the imperial throne demanded. Accordingly Ferdinand dur¬ ing the Schmalkaldian war exercised a restraining influence on the emperor. At the time of the treacherous attack of Moritz of Saxony in 1552 against Charles he even acted as intermediary. In the same sense he worked for the unsatisfactory compromise of the treaty of Passau of 1552 and its confirmation in the Religious Peace of Augsburg in 1555. In¬ deed, Ferdinand’s moderating influence was apparent as early as the first session of the Council of Trent from 1545 to 1547.11 This does not mean that the problem of Protestantism did not play an important part in the reign of Ferdinand and his sons. The following discussion of events in the hereditary and eastern lands will show that the contrary was true. Yet Ferdinand’s moderate attitude toward his imperial brother’s counter¬ reformatory activities proves that his foreign policy was not nearly as much motivated by the Protestant than by the Ottoman Turkish danger. To its character, course, and consequences we now turn. D.

The Turkish wars

The problem of the Turkish wars in the sixteenth, and to a lesser degree the seventeenth and early eighteenth centuries, was that of two interrelated, but basically separate, issues: the struggle of the Habsburg and the fight of the Habsburg power against the Turks. The second dynasty for recognition in Hungary against the claims of native princes issue was one of international relations; the first was a Hungarian domestic issue, international only insofar as it helped Turkish conquest. At this point, however, we are concerned with the international aspects of the problem. In November 1526 a royal diet elected John Zapolya, count of Zips and voiwode of Transylvania, king of Hungary.

He was crowned

at

Szekesfejervar (StuhlweiBenburg). This anti-Habsburg action of the nobles—mostly lesser nobles—was not meant as an accommodation with the threatening Turkish power under Suleiman II, that had been vic¬ torious at Mohacs two months before. More likely, the diet in these times of troubles wanted to rally around a national king. Such charac¬ terization could not apply to Ferdinand, referred to as the German king by the Magyars. He was elected on the grounds of the hardly popular marriage- and succession treaties with the Jagiellons a month later at Pozsony, and crowned in the following year 1527. Ferdinand, though

11 Karl

Brandi, Kaiser Karl V, 2 vols. (Miinchen, 1937-1941), see I, 359-361, 428429; II, 184-186, 386-387. Franz von Bucholtz, Geschichte der Regierung Ferdinands l, 9 vols. (Graz, 1968), originally published 1831-1838, see Vol. VIII.

38

History of the Hahshurg Empire

recognized by the diet of Buda, was in the main only supported by the western Hungarian comitats (counties). Yet his claims to the Bohemian and Austrian hereditary lands, but above all the German and Spanish connections of his house gave him in the end a decisive advantage. As for the interests of the Turks, accommodation with the national forces of Hungary in isolation was easier than with those of a Habsburg with his power connection. The price offered for this kind of accommodation by the Ottoman Turks was limited autonomy, granted to that part of Hun¬ gary separated most securely from imperialist Habsburg designs. Thus the Habsburg objective to incorporate the new eastern possessions into an empire could be thwarted. This explains why the easternmost part of the Hungarian domains, Transylvania, up to then in substance a geo¬ graphic and social cultural entity, now became a political one under Turkish auspices. Still, there was only an indirect connection between the renewed Turk¬ ish advance in 1528, when Suleiman demanded the evacuation of Hungary by the Habsburgs and the as yet undecisive struggle between Zapolya’s and Ferdinand’s forces. It was in its beginning of little direct conse¬ quence for the main Turkish threat to the Habsburg lands. This became evident when Suleiman after the conquest of Buda in 1529—to be under Turkish control for more than 150 years—laid siege to Vienna in the fall of the same year. This first siege of Vienna has not caught the imagina¬ tion of Europe to the same extent as the second one of 1683, which in word and song has been pictured for generations as the salvation of Christian Europe from the threat of Mohammedan domination. Actually the delivery of Vienna by a brave garrison under the command of Count Niklas Salm in 1529 was probably a greater though less spectacular achievement than the liberation five generations later brought about primarily by the efforts of a rather large army of combined imperial and Polish forces. More important, the siege of 1683 represented a last powerful but isolated offensive at a time, when the tide of Turkish ad¬ vance to the west had come by and large to a standstill. At the time of Suleiman’s attack, on the other hand, the young and aggressive Ottoman power which had swept through Hungary operated in a cycle of spectacu¬ lar success. Suleiman terminated the siege, unlike the situation in 1683, not because he was defeated by a superior relief force, but simply because losses in battle and casualties due to various plagues did not seem to be worth the price. Considering the fact that the imperial and Austrian forces did not follow the retreating and disorganized Turkish army be¬ yond a relatively narrow fringe of northwestern and western Hungary,

Tur\s and Protestants

39

there is little reasons to assume that Suleiman could not have renewed the attack with stronger forces, within the next years. If he did not do so again after just one unsuccessful attempt in 1532 it was precisely because he did not deem the conquest of Vienna and a further advance into the Danube valley worth the effort. At a time when the center of gravity of Habsburg power was anchored between western Germany and Spain, Vienna was neither as economic base nor as status symbol a prize of the first order for a conqueror. Even the Danube valley rated only as mere glacis of German interests. In this respect the situation had changed sub¬ stantially by 1683 when the German Habsburgs and their capital, and not the possessions of the Spanish crown, represented the first line of defense against French imperialism from the west as well as aggression from the east. In a nutshell: the primary and permanent Turkish designs were focused on the conquest and control of Hungary. Forrays farther west under Suleiman were devices of temporary political and military ex¬ pediency. The issue of the Turkish wars was not a fight for the control of Europe but of Hungary, and interrelated with it the effort to prevent the rise of a great Habsburg power in the east. In 1532 the high tide of Suleiman’s offensive power beyond the borders of Hungary had passed. In 1538 the fortunes in the struggle between ^apolya and Ferdinand for the crown of Hungary began to turn as well: Zapolya, in the secret pact of Nagyvarad advised by his astute diplomatic representative Marinuzzi (George Utiesenic), promised to give up his alliance with the Turks and to recognize the Habsburg succession in return for the recognition of his rule in Hungary east of the Tisza for his lifetime. Inasmuch as Ferdinand had little control over events in these parts of Hungary anyway, this was a small concession. It was presumably a major reason why Zapolya a year later, strengthened now in his interna¬ tional connections by the marriage to the Polish Jagiello princess Isabella, went back on the treaty. Yet the fact that it had to be concluded in the first place and had to be renewed in one form or another repeatedly, in¬ dicated that the Habsburg power in Hungary was on the rise. For the time being the pact had little effect on the administration of the parts of Hungary not controlled by Habsburg. Except for the lands east of the Tisza and particularly Transylvania, endowed with administra¬ tive autonomy under national rulers, and a strong evolution of religious tolerance, the area was simply converted into a Turkish province with the center in Buda. Only the mountainous northwest with the Slovak mining towns and a small western strip partly settled by Germans remained under Habsburg control. In the region under direct Turkish rule pro-

40

History of the Hahshurg Empire

tracted warfare took its toll among the native Magyar population in the south. It was gradually and largely replaced by Southern Slav immigrants from the Balkans. The zone north and northwest of Buda, but still south of the fringe under Habsburg control, suffered less from the wars. Here the peasant towns remained primarily populated by Magyars. The Habsburg power for some time to come was more successful in negotiations than in frustrating military campaigns-for the. reconquest of central Hungary. A five-year armistice beginning 1547, although en¬ cumbered by a humiliating annual tribute to the sultan, allowed for con¬ solidation of Ferdinand’s forces, just at the critical time when the emperor was engaged in the military conflict with the Protestant princes. In 1551 after the Catholic forces in Germany were seemingly, though in the long run not actually, successful, Ferdinand negotiated a new agreement with Martinuzzi on behalf of Zapolya’s widow and his infant son at GyulaFeharvar (Karlsburg). The pact acknowledged for the first time Fer¬ dinand’s right to rule throughout all of Hungary including Transylvania without reservations. Again the promises were broken, this time by the younger Zapolya who moved back to Transylvania. Nevertheless, the precedent of unrestricted recognition of the Habsburg succession in Hungary was established. The outlook seemed to be all the more favor¬ able to Ferdinand as the conflict with the Turks shifted now into lower gear. In 1562 peace was established with the Turks on the basis of the status quo. It still included preservation of the annual humiliating “hon¬ orary” tribute.12 In 1564 Ferdinand died, and the next year Suleiman followed him to the grave. The death of both men had a bearing on the Eastern question. With the passing of the great sultan the main period of sixteenth-century Turkish imperialist aggression had come to a temporary end. Ferdinand, although not motivated by the urge of expansion but of defense of what he considered legitimate rights, was resolved to take possession of all the lands of the Hungarian crown. A conflict of long duration seemed in¬ evitable. But Ferdinand’s oldest son and successor, Maximilian II, took an indifferent attitude to the eastern question. Deeply interested in the reconciliation with Protestantism, and in the hour of his death in 1575 possibly a convert to the new faith himself, this man of peace was not 12 Bucholtz, ibid., vols. IV, V, VII; Eugen Csuday, Die Geschichte Ungarns (Vienna, 1900), 2nd revised ed., II, 5-49. Mathias Bernath, Habsburg und die Anfange der rumdnischen Nationsbildung (Leiden, 1972), pp. 3-20. Ladislas Makkai, Histoire de Transylvanie (Paris, 1946), pp. 131-138. Mihaly Bucsay, Geschichte des Protestantismus in Ungarn (Stuttgart, 1959), pp. 20 ff., 39 f., 58; on the situation in Transylvania see also Chapter IV, Section B:b of this study.

Tur\s and Protestants

41

interested in the active pursuit of any war. Neither from the viewpoint of Habsburg succession in the east nor on ideological grounds—the grounds of a fighting Catholic Church rather than his own concept of a kind of universal Christianity—did the Turkish war in particular mean much to him. The peace of Adrianopel of 1568 ended it. In 1570 Maximilian dropped also claims to Transylvania in favor of the younger Zapolya, who was followed soon by a far more aggressive succes¬ sor as prince of Transylvania, the able Stephen Bathory. In a royal elec¬ tion contested by the supporters of Emperor Maximilian II he became king of Poland in 1575. A forced, prestigious marriage with the daughter of the last surviving Jagiello ruler strengthened Bathory’s hands against the Habsburgs in Hungary. After his death in 1586 various members of the Habsburg dynasty vied unsuccessfully for election to the Polish throne. Yet rule by a member of the powerful foreign dynasty was feared by the majority of the membership of the Sejm and thus the chance that the Habsburgs might become rulers of the Polish-Lithuanian realms passed for good. Meanwhile the Habsburg position in Hungary which had been fought for with great efforts and some success by Ferdinand I weakened again.13 Several reasons account for this decline. In 1576 Maximilian was followed by his oldest son, Rudolf II, politically one of the most ineffectual, though one of the most cultured Habsburg rulers. Almost immediately he be¬ came involved in the political and religious problems of a fighting Protes¬ tant revolution rather than a mere religious Reformation in Bohemia. Soon he was also challenged by ambitious members of the dynasty on the issue of counterreformatory policies. Burdened with difficulties he was unable to cope with, Rudolf felt he could not budge on the eastern ques¬ tion. When the Turks refused to honor any further the twice-renewed peace of Adrianople of 1568,14 the emperor felt he had to accept the chal¬ lenge. The new Turkish war from 1593 to 1606 was at least as unsuccess¬ ful for the imperial side as any previous one, largely because of the lack of ideological appeal of the new war but also because of the military incompetence of Rudolf’s brother Matthias as commander in chief. Charles V, with the support of Ferdinand, had succeeded in establishing some 13 Laszlo Makkai, in Ervin Pamlenyi, ed., Die Geschichte Ungarns, (Budapest, 1971), Chapter III, pp. 131-149; Makkai, Histone de Transylvanie, pp. 176-181; Csuday, Die Geschichte Ungarns, II, 49-61; Eugen Horvath, Geschichte Siehenbiirgens (Budapest, n.d.), pp. 51-80; Nicolae Iorga, Histoire des Roumains et de leur Civilisation (Paris, 1920), pp. 164-180; and by the same author Histoire des Roumains et de la Romanite Orientale (Bucarest, 1937), IV, 435-457. 14 In 1584 and 1592.

42

History of the Habsburg Empire

measure of solidarity between Catholic and Protestant princes in the eastern campaigns. Rudolf failed completely in this respect. The Turkish war during his reign did neither delay nor modify the conflicts with the Protestant German princes, let alone with the aggressive Protestant estates in the Bohemian and Austro-German hereditary lands. It merely weak¬ ened the power of the regime further and made its inefficiency and lack of inner unity even within the ranks of the dynasty more obvious. Except for the brief and sometimes exaggerated importance of the events of 1683 the time had passed when the war against the Turks could become a rallying cry for Christian Europe. Nevertheless, although the war taken as a whole was a failure, it had some short-range redeeming aspects. The Bathory princes, and with them the estates, primarily those from the comitats east of the Tisza, recognized now in principle imperial rule in Transylvania and the necessity of common action against the Turks. Yet these agreements arrived at after several crises between 1589 and 1605 were not lasting. In 1605, Stephan Bocskay was elected prince of Transylvania and a few weeks later was proclaimed prince of Hungary by a substantial part of the Hungarian estates. This title as well as the manner of his elevation ran counter to the precedents of Hungarian con¬ stitutional tradition. Yet the political constellation was unprecedented as well. Bocskay previously had been a champion of cooperation with the imperial forces. Realizing that a national kingdom would have to take a stand against the Habsburgs, he now reversed his policy. This, however, did not mean an outright pro-Turkish position but rather the attempt to establish a Hungary as a “third force” between Habsburgs and Crescent. The agreement of Vienna of 1606 between Matthias on behalf of his im¬ perial brother and Bocskay acknowledged the latter’s rule as prince of Transylvania with the addition of three Hungarian comitats and in ex¬ change for a token of imperial suzerainty rather than sovereignty. Bocs¬ kay’s ultimate aim—not just rule of Transylvania but establishment of a Hungary independent of both, imperial and Turkish rule—naturally was not discussed. The subsequent peace of Zsitvatorok with the High Portal still in the same year was based on the Vienna agreement. Apart from the recognition of Transylvania as almost independent power, it included the cession of some further formerly imperial territory to the Turks (Eger, Esztergom, and Kanisza), but at least the annual tribute was replaced by a one-time “honorary gift.” Peace with the Turks, but not with the rebellious Christian anti-Habsburg forces east of the Tisza, was now established for a half century. Inasmuch as the Transylvanian rulers could challenge successfully imperial control of Hungary this meant that the

Tur\s and Protestants

43

imperial position in Hungary remained as precarious as ever. Yet this meant also that the one factor in the eastern power game that could have decisively obstructed Habsburg power in Central and Eastern European affairs in the coming decades, namely Ottoman power, remained neutral during the Thirty Years’ War. The importance of this attitude, confirmed in a treaty of 1627 to be valid for 21 years, can hardly be overrated.15 While thus relations with the High Portal appeared to be fairly stabilized for many years to come, conditions in Transylvania remained still in flux, highly unsatisfactory to the interests of Habsburg power. After the sudden death of the outstanding leader Bocskay in 1607, Gabriel Bathory was elected prince of Transylvania by the estates and recognized by the Ottoman power. Archduke Matthias, since 1608 recognized as acting head of the dynasty, crowned king of Hungary within a few months, king of Bohemia in 1611, and emperor after the death of his brother in 1612, took up the war against Bathory. He did so without success. Of Matthias, one of the poorest of all Habsburg rulers, it may be said that he possessed all the faults of his brother Rudolf II, but none of his redeeming qualities of kindness and cultural interests. Not mentally deranged like his brother at the end of his life, but slow-witted and just as indecisive in his actions, first an opportunistic friend of Protestantism, and then an ardent but in¬ effective champion of the Counter Reformation, Matthias, an equally inept and unreliable personality, stumbled from one misfortune to the other. Saved seemingly by the bell of Bathory’s assassination in 1613 he had as it turned out to cope with an even more formidable successor, Bethlen Gabor (Gabriel Bethlen). In the peace of Nagyszombat (Tyrnau) the emperor recognized him as prince of Transylvania, confirmed the right of the estates to free election of the prince in exchange for recogni¬ tion of the union between Transylvania and Hungary, and the pledge of support against the Turks. Both these concessions were under existing conditions chiefly of nom¬ inal value. The peace of Zsitvatorok of 1606 with the Turks was in the same year prolonged for twenty years and, all pledges to the contrary notwithstanding, Gabor had himself elected “prince of Hungary” at the diet of Pozsony in January 1620. The election as king, though without subsequent coronation, followed hardly six months later. This event takes 15 Horvath, Geschichte Siebenbiirgens; Constantin Daicoviciu and Miron Constantinescu, Breve Histoire de la Transylvanie (Bucarest, 1965), pp. 112-137; Robert W. Seton-Watson, A History of the Roumanians (Cambridge, 1963), pp. 50116; Bernath, Habsburg und die Anfdnge der rumanischen Nationsbildung, pp. 346.

44

History of the Habsburg Empire

us into the reign of Emperor Ferdinand II (1619-1637) and the first, Bohemian, phase of the Thirty Years’ War. Gabor, as national Hungarian prince and champion of Protestantism, tried to make use of the new em¬ peror’s troubles to his own advantage. In his endeavors to help the be¬ leaguered Czech Protestants he was foiled, however, by the invasion of Transylvania initiated by the devout Catholic king of Poland, Sigmund III Vasa, in the fall of 1619. Consequently, after -the victory of the im¬ perial forces in the battle of the White Mountain in November 1620, Bethlen Gabor was forced to agree to a compromise with the emperor in the peace of Nikolsburg (Mikulov). It secured him outside of Transyl¬ vania only the rule in several Hungarian comitats. In theory more im¬ portant was the fact that the emperor recognized religious freedom and the estates’ constitution in Hungary. As it turned out, imperial concessions in this respect were worth a little more, but not much more in Hungary than in Bohemia. Subsequently they were considered to have been made under duress. In a sense this was true, and because of the impact of Turkish power in Hungary it was duress of a more lasting kind. On the other hand it is equally true that Bethlen was not more reliable as contracting partner than the emperor. In alliance with the Protestant princes and undoubtedly in collusion with the Turks he resumed his campaign against the imperial forces in northern Hungary in 1623. In the face of the increasingly critical situation in Germany the emperor was forced now to confirm the Nikolsburg agreement by the treaty of Vienna in 1624 and to confirm it again two years later after a new attack on Ferdinand’s forces. Bethlen Gabor, undoubtedly a distinguished ruler of Hungary, died in 1629. Had he lived longer he might conceivably have intervened decisively in the supreme crisis of the war on the side of the Protestant powers. But his interests were exclusively focused on Hungar¬ ian affairs and his western policy was inconsistent and therefore such turn of events must be considered speculative. Certainly the decisive force in the east, the Turks, were as yet not interested in resumption of the war. Only by the alliance of George I Rakoczy, prince of Transylvania after 1629, with the French in 1643 (treatY of Gyula-Fehervar renewed 1645 at Munkacs) did the eastern question briefly again become part of the game of European great-power politics. Peace between the emperor

and

Rakoczy was established at Linz in 1645.16 16 Horvath, Geschichte Siebenburgens, pp. 81-100; Dominic C. Kosary, A History of Hungary (Cleveland, 1941), pp. 92-130. Makkai, Histoire de Transylvanie, pp. 224-237; Seton-Watson, A History of the Roumanians, pp. 116-119; Bernath, Habsburg und die Anfange der rumanischen Nationsbildung, pp. 21-23.

Tur\s and Protestants

45

Up to that point the question of Habsburg rule in Hungary was held in abeyance and could not be decided before new clashes with the Turks on a large scale. Only in conjunction with their policies does the Transyl¬ vanian question assume significance in international relations. What was more important in this respect, the Habsburgs’ claims to all the lands of the Hungarian crown were still maintained during the worst crisis of Habsburg rule, namely the Bohemian revolt, to which we now turn. One of the strongest integrating factors of Habsburg ascendancy in the domains of the eastern crowns pledged to the dynasty in 1526-1527 was, indeed, the stubborn resolve to maintain and to defend all allegedly legiti¬ mate claims even under the most adverse conditions. E.

The Thirty Years’ War;

Protestantism and the Habsburg cause

The Bohemian crisis led the Habsburgs straight into the Thirty Years’ War. This means that the major international conflict of the seventeenth century, and perhaps altogether the major conflict in European history between the Crusades and the Napoleonic wars, started as a domestic afiFair within one of the Habsburg domains. There were two main reasons why a struggle focused on the Habsburg claims to rule in Bohemia established in 1526 led to an international conflagration. First, the outcome of the Bohemian revolt was bound to upset the precarious balance of the Religious Peace of Augsburg of 1555 between Protestant and Catholic princes and the emperor; his interests were closely related to those of the Catholic princes, but not identical with them. Secondly, there was a crisis of confidence between these three forces, which meant that any of them would take full advantage of the situation if and when the occasion would present itself. Because the imperial side was vic¬ torious in the first phase of the conflict, the Protestant princes took to arms to undo the new state of affairs. Yet they would undoubtedly have done nothing to restore imperial rights if the elector palatine, the new king of Bohemia, would have managed to keep himself in power in Prague. In the context of the peculiar relationship between the Bohemian revolt and a major international conflagration the question has to be raised, whether the Thirty Years’ War is altogether part of the history of the Habsburg lands in terms of the union of 1526-1527. In one sense it is. Apart from its religious and national aspects, the Bohemian crisis, like the Hungarian one, was an integration crisis. It shook to the core the evolving new eastern Habsburg empire in the lands of the former Jagiello crowns as in the ancient hereditary lands. This means a Habsburg empire

46

History of the Hahshurg Empire

crisis. In another sense it is not. Certainly all Habsburg lands from Spain to Hungary were affected by the war, but the same became true for the whole of western and central Europe outside of the rule of the Habsburgs. Bohemia as foremost cause, main theater, and principal sufferer, was most deeply involved. As for Hungary, only the Transylvanian ques¬ tion, largely in its denominational ramification, linked the country to the events of the west, whereas the Turkish domination meant that Hungary was shielded from the danger of becoming a main theater of war. The hereditary lands were on the whole spared these horrors, too, but they suffered from the general misery and from the lowering of living stan¬ dards in the trail of the war. This was felt all the more deeply since there was a very short respite between the end of the Thirty Years’ War and the resumption of hostilities with the Turks. But because in the Thirty Years’ War Bohemia was a foremost victim, and in the coming conflicts with the High Portal the Hungarian lands as well, the economic and social status of the hereditary lands became relatively speaking more favorable. This was not a minor consequence of the great war and of its aftermath, the new Turkish advance in 1663 into western Hungary. The new Turkish offensive was in part motivated by the weakening of the Habsburg position brought about by general exhaustion, and one may therefore conclude that the great war was of long-range consequence for the emperor’s personal domains. As for the short-range effect of the war the situation looked different. With the exception of Bohemia for the short period between the defenestration of the royal governors and their secretary in 1618 and the battle of the White Mountain in 1620, the eastern Habsburg lands did not influence the military and political course of the war to the same extent as the empire, France, Spain, Den¬ mark, Sweden, the United Netherlands, or even Electoral Saxony, Brand¬ enburg, and Bavaria. Except for the so-called Bohemian period of the war, Ferdinand II and, after his death in 1637, Fis son Ferdinand III acted primarily not as rulers of the eastern Habsburg realms but as the heads of the empire to defend, fight for, and reestablish Catholic suprem¬ acy and with it that of their house. Naturally the hereditary power of the Habsburgs in Austria and subsequently in Bohemia and even Hun¬ gary, gave the emperor badly needed leverage in this conflict. Yet essen¬ tially the Thirty Years’ War as ideological as well as great-power struggle was above all a conflict about the Holy Roman Empire. It is one of the major features and consequences of the war that the Habsburgs acted here primarily as emperors of the Holy Roman Empire, and only in the second place as rulers of their own hereditary and quasi-elective realms.

Tur\s and Protestants

47

i Due to the weakening of Emperor Ferdinand II’s German position and : the relative strengthening of his status in the hereditary lands and the eastern kingdoms, his, and even more so his successors’, priorities were from now on reversed. In this sense the war represented indeed a divid¬ ing line not only in German history but also in that of the Habsburg lands up to 1648, and after 1648 until the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806. Just the same, there are numerous connections between the local pre¬ history of the war and its international implications. Concessions by the pro-Protestant Emperor Maximilian II to the Bohemian Protestants as early as 1575, particularly the appointment of so-called defen sores, to represent the Protestants before the emperor strengthened the Reforma¬ tion in Bohemia. Mainly the beginnings of the counterreformatory drive in the hereditary lands around 1580 laid the ground for the coming con¬ flict. This situation was accentuated by the fact that Archduke Ferdinand in 1596 became sovereign in Inner Austria (Styria, Carinthia, Carniola, Istria, and Trieste).17 With this accession the Counter Reformation secured a leader, nearly as incompetent as the then chief of the house, Emperor Rudolf II, as narrow-minded as his brother the future emperor Matthias, but more energetic and stubborn than either. If and when Ferdinand should succeed to the imperial crown, a decisive and disastrous showdown with the Reformation appeared inevitable. The possibility of diversionary activities against the Turks did not offer itself again. The unstable situation in Transylvania represented merely a political side¬ show. Even before Ferdinand was elevated to a wider sphere of power, the ambitious and equally intolerant duke of Bavaria, Maximilian, his cousin, began to destroy the precarious balance of the Religious Peace of Augs¬ burg in the empire, when he occupied the Protestant free city of Donauworth. The alliance between the Protestant estates representatives of Bohemia, Moravia, and the hereditary lands in conjunction with the Hungarian estates at Pozsony in February 1608 and confirmed in June was a response to Maximilian’s action. Of greater importance on an inter¬ national scale was the union of the Protestant German states and free cities in the same year. It was meant to be a defensive alliance against en¬ croachments of the status quo by the duke of Bavaria. In 1609 Protestantism continued its counter-offensive. The hard-pressed Rudolf II was forced to issue the famous Letter of Majesty, which granted freedom of conscience to all inhabitants of Bohemia, and to

17 As

ruler in Inner Austria the third of his name, as emperor the second.

48

History of the Hahsburg Empire

lords, knights, and royal chartered towns free public exercise of religion and the right to erect places of public worship and denominational schools.18 This concession meant an extension of Protestant rights of various denominations far beyond the provisions of the peace of Augs¬ burg. Yet this accomplishment was made against the turn of the political tide. This tide was represented by the Catholic League of bishops, im¬ perial cities, and estates under the leadership of the duke of Bavaria. The conflict about the Jiilich-Cleve succession in west Germany saw the Protestant Union and the Catholic League almost ready for a show¬ down. The uncertain situation created by the assassination of Henry IV of France, in 1610, who had favored the Protestants on the issue of balance of power, prompted both sides to abstain from immediate hostilities. Ac¬ cordingly they settled for a temporary compromise. The death of Rudolf II in 1612, shorn of practically all powers after 1610, and the succession of Matthias as emperor, distrusted by Catholics and Protestants almost alike, did not help to mitigate the tense atmosphere. Neither did the action of general diets which were meant to repre¬ sent all the lands involved in the union of 1526-1527. They were never fully representative of their constituencies. One held at Budweis (Budejovice) in Bohemia in 1614 refused the emperor help against Bethlen Gabor. A more comprehensive assembly convoked in Linz in the same year endorsed this position, largely out of fear to become involved in a new conflict with the Turks. A further meeting in Prague in 1615 was dominated by the demands of the Protestant Czech estates for wider autonomy. Imperial authority appeared to be feeble in all these instances. The issue that actually led to the defenestration of 1618 in Prague and therewith to open revolt, was relatively minor, namely the question of erection or elimination of Protestant churches built by Protestant subjects on the estates of Catholic lords. The defenestration symbolized only the surface of a much farther reaching conflict. Two secret treaties of March and June 1617 between Ferdinand, then already the obvious heir apparent to the imperial throne, with Philip III of Spain prepared the ground for open conflict. In the first treaty Philip, in return for concessions in western central Italy (Finale and Piombino), and for transfer of imperial 18 Issued for Bohemia in July 1609 and extended to Silesia the following month. See Ernst W. Zeeden, Die Entstehung der Konfessionen: Grundlagen und Formen der Konjessionsbildung im Zeitalter der Glaubens\dmpfe (Munich, 1965), pp. 161164; Count Franz von Liitzow, Bohemia, revised by H. A. Pichler (London, 1939), pp. 223-237; Karl Brandi, Deutsche Geschichte im Zeitalter der Reformation und Gegenreformation (Munich, i960), pp. 453-458; R. J. W. Evans, Rudolf II and his World (Oxford, 1973), pp. 43-115.

Tur\s and Protestants

49

claims to the Alsace, pledged to be not a candidate for the soon to be expected imperial election. This left the field free for Ferdinand. The second treaty, a genuine succession pact, was even more specific. It recog¬ nized the right of Ferdinand as heir to the Habsburg eastern realms, even though Philip III was more closely related to Matthias than Ferdinand. This meant in effect the final and permanent separation of the Spanish from the German branch of the Habsburg dynasty.19 These agreements became very practical, when Ferdinand elected and crowned king of Bo¬ hemia in 1617 and of Hungary in 1618, succeeded Matthias, who died in 1619, as emperor as well. The ruler, firmly resolved for the final show¬ down with the Reformation, had laid the groundwork for the European alliances with Spain and the Catholic League. Before his election as king of Bohemia in 1617 Ferdinand had expressly pledged adherence to the Letter of Majesty of Rudolf II, and thereby indicated that he was re¬ solved to obtain his aims, if necessary by force. The open Bohemian revolt which followed the defenestration, the establishment of an Estates Directory under Count Matthias Thurn as the government of the land, gave Ferdinand his chance. Undoubtedly, the Bohemian rebels, who had a good case in their protests against violation of the Letter of Majesty, lost their lawful standing when they turned to open revolt against the ruler to whom they had sworn allegiance. The condemnation of this action was in the beginnings of the conflict not restricted to Catholic Europe. The excessive imperial response, the con¬ comitant spread of a revolutionary appeal still based in part on an issue of faith, but, above all, the threatening shift in the balance of power between Reformation and Counter Reformation changed these feelings within two years substantially. The intransigence of Ferdinand’s new course was revealed when he dismissed and confined Cardinal Khlesl, up to this time Matthias’ and his own trusted political adviser and himself an ardent champion of counter¬ reformatory activities. Yet Khlesl, far superior in intelligence to Ferdinand —a modest compliment to be sure—for reasons of expediency had coun¬ seled compromise with Protestants in Bohemia and for this reason was 19 A reservation, that the male lines of either branch would still precede the female of the other, remained without practical importance up to the extinction of the older Spanish line in 1700. See Gustav Turba, Die Grundlagen der pragmatischen Sanction, Vol. II: Die Hausgesetze (Vienna, 1912), pp. 99-119; Grete Mecenseffy, “Habsburger im 17. Jahrhundert: Die Beziehungen der Hofe von Wien und Madrid wahrend des dreiBigjahrigen Krieges,” in Archiv fur osterreichische Geschichte (Vienna, 1955), Vol. 121:1, 4-10; Koenigsberger, The Habsburgs and Europe 1515-1660, pp. 219-231.

History of the Hahshurg Empire

50

removed. His dismissal is one of the personal changes which has not found the attention in historiography it deserves. The cardinal’s fall in 1618 may possibly have changed the course of history profoundly. Whether Khlesl could have prevented the Thirty Years’ War is, of course, un¬ certain; but that Ferdinand’s new, predominantly ideological policy, now deprived of any restraint, made a major conflagration inevitable is ob•

VIOUS.

20

A discussion of the whole course of the Thirty Years’ War would divert attention from the history of the new eastern Habsburg empire that came gradually into being. Its direct interests stood out chiefly in the earlier phases of the struggle; though they became less conspicuous, they did not disappear in the later ones either. Major events in this respect were the invalidation of Ferdinand’s election as king of Bohemia in August 1619 by the estates, the following choice of the elector palatine Frederick, the “winter king,” who had the additional support of revolting estates not only in Silesia but indirectly by the Protestants lords and knights in Lower- and above all Upper Austria. Ferdinand, certain of the benevolent attitude of the great Catholic powers—Spain and for the time being France as well—hoped for outside support if worst should come to worst. This in addition to his uncontested strong faith were the main reasons why he did not choose to yield in the face of the advance of Thurn’s army close to the gates of Vienna and the impetuous demands of the Upper and Lower Austrian estates for a Letter of Majesty compar¬ able to the one granted by Rudolf II. Ferdinand accordingly stood his ground in the summer and spring 1619 against the combined but not con¬ certed attacks of the Bohemian forces under Thurn and the Hungarian forces under Bethlen Gabor. Lack of planning on the part of his enemies, reliance on the ultimate support of the great powers, and the offensive spirit of the head of the Catholic League, Maximilian of Bavaria, who in¬ vaded Upper Austria, helped the emperor. Important was also the mili¬ tary prowess of his commander in chief, Count Tilly, which turned the en¬ gagement between the imperial forces and those of the new king of Bohemia at the White Mountain, a few miles from Prague, into one of the most decisive victories ever obtained by Habsburg troops against an enemy. 20 Krones, Handbuch der Geschichte Osterreichs, III, 402-424; Liitzow, Bohemia, pp. 253-265; Hans Sturmberger, Aufstand in Bohmen: Der Benginn des dreifiigjahrigen Krieges (Munich, 1959), pp. 7-34. Cecily V. Wedgwood, The Thirty Years War (London, 1944), pp. 76-82; Ernest Denis, Fin de Vlndependance Boheme (Paris, 1890), II, 31-560.

Tur\s and Protestants

5/

Yet while the ominous political consequences of the battle were lasting, the military impact was of short duration. Its implications in this respect were superseded to a point already by the Danish intervention in the war in 1623 and certainly by the Swedish one in 1630. What remained as consequence until the end of the Habsburg empire was the permanent alienation of the Czechs. It originated with the cruel vengeance of the imperial authorities, the undoing of the Bohemian Reformation and na¬ tional autonomy by force, and it culminated in the new Bohemian con¬ stitution of 1627 which reduced the country practically to a province. Long after the direct effects of these acts of repression had ceased and were, in the course of many generations, in part even righted by law, the indirect psychological ones remained. Again it is necessary to distinguish between the direct and indirect im¬ pact of events. Even the spectacular rise of Wallenstein from a simple colonel in 1617 to commander in chief of all imperial forces (1625), his great success against the Danes and his indifferent one against the Swedes, his subsequent dismissal in 1630 and reappointment in 1631, have only indirect bearings on the foreign relations of the rising eastern Habsburg power. This pertains also to Wallenstein’s deposition, outlaw¬ ing, and legalized murder in 1634 on acount of his vacillating, and, from the imperial viewpoint, treasonable policies of secret negotiations with the Swedes. The motivations and counter-motivations of these doings by and against the great general are focused on imperial and not on Austrian, Bohemian, or Hungarian politics. Wallenstein’s thinking and acting, or calculated nonacting, were in essence counter-moves against the Edict of Restitution of Ferdinand II in 1629. This act meant to undo the Protes¬ tant ascendancy in the empire after the peace of Augsburg in 1555. It ordered consequently the return of all the estates of the Church, secu¬ larized in the interim period, and the continued restriction of the pro¬ visions of Augsburg to Lutheran Protestants alone. These conditions were to be ever more strictly enforced. Yet all this made little difference for the Habsburg hereditary lands and those of the Bohemian crown where the Counter Reformation had reached its objectives against Lutherans and Calvinists alike for several years before the issuing of the Edict of Restitu¬ tion of 1629. It made little difference either for the bulk of Hungarian territory under Ottoman control and of Transylvanian control under Bethlen Gabor and George Rakoczy. The emperor had simply attempted to force German political and re¬ ligious conditions as far as possible into step with those in his own lands. This meant as seen from a long-range viewpoint to bring them out of

52

History of the Habsburg Empire

step with western European developments. Yet for a long time Ferdi¬ nand’s repressive policies were as successful in his own realms as they had failed on the German and European level. This is one of the major tragedies of the history of the Habsburg lands, particularly in the cul¬ tural field. It is doubly tragic because conformism triumphed by strength of enforcement and not persuasion. Faith, however genuine but brought about by external pressures, carried the seeds of future intolerance and intellectual stagnation in many fields.21 The Edict of Restitution represented the high tide of Ferdinand’s res¬ toration politics. He lived long enough to see the results of the Swedish intervention of 1630 and the Swedish-French anti-imperial alliance of 1635. When he died in 1637 Catholic counterreformatory policies were succeessful in his own lands apart from Hungary, yet they had failed be¬ yond his domains. Succeeded by a less stubborn and more peacefully in¬ clined son, Ferdinand III (1637-1657), the personality of the new bearer of the Holy Roman crown added at least not to the difficulties, which had to be overcome, before general peace could be established. This peace, the Westphalian peace treaty of Munster and Osnabriick in 1648 did not affect the Habsburg lands directly to a greater degree than the war, if we except the devastations of Bohemia. True, the Habsburgs lost im¬ portant southwest German domains (particularly in the Alsace and the Sundgau). Yet these domains in the Vorlande were not adjacent to the main body of the Habsburg lands. The modifications of the Edict of Resti¬ tution of 1629, in reverting to the state of ecclesiastic property in 1624 22 and the long overdue extension of the provisions of the peace of Augsburg to the Calvinist creed, were insignificant in territories where Protestants had been expelled and Protestantism had been driven underground alto¬ gether. More important from a political viewpoint was the fact that the sovereignty of the princes of the empire was extended. The right to con¬ clude alliances among the German princes themselves as well as with foreign powers had to be recognized—save for covenants directed against emperor and empire. Numerous alliances, not excluding even the for¬ bidden ones against emperor and empire, were concluded before the war. Still it meant something, particularly for the smaller princes, to have them legalized now to a point. Yet it meant nothing for the Habsburgs in their double capacity as bearers of the crown and mightiest princes of the empire. How could a Habsburg emperor who conspired against the 21 See also Hans Sturmberger, Kaiser Ferdinand II und das Problem des Absolutismus (Munich, 1957), pp. 32-46. 22 This specific provision did not apply to the hereditary lands.

Tur\s and Protestants

53

empire be controlled, if he was by far the most powerful prince of the empire himself and ruler of wide territories beyond its boundaries? How could he be curbed as prince if he refused to apply these curbs as em¬ peror? The old problem of Quis custodiet custodem? arose here in full force again. We have noted already the obvious, namely that course and outcome of the war hurt Bohemia far more than the hereditary lands and thus improved the latter’s relative status. This advantage—a partial advantage only—was, however, for some time offset by the general economic set¬ back brought about by the war and the retarding cultural influence re¬ sulting from the victory of the Counter Reformation in the Habsburg lands. Apart from this, one of the most important consequences of the war for the Habsburg domains was the fact that the power of the ruler of the eastern Habsburg lands was ever increasingly based on his status as prince of the empire and not of emperor himself. A trend originating already after the great interregnum under Rudolf, the patron of Habs¬ burg rule in the hereditary lands in the thirteenth century gained now renewed strength. This trend diverted the Habsburg power to some extent from German interests outside its hereditary domains, and there¬ fore meant a strengthening of the bonds between the realms of the eastern empire in the making since 1526.

CHAPTER III An Empire Evolves and Asserts Jtself -

A.

(1648-1748)

"

Common succession and common INSTITUTIONS

A great Austrian historian, Oswald Redlich, perceived the rise of the Habsburg empire to a genuine great-power position during the period from 1700 to 1740.1 This interpretation is justified if power is measured by results: the position of the Habsburg power as it evolved from the con¬ flagrations in western and Central Europe of the first half of the eigh¬ teenth century and from the spectacular though short-lived successes in the east throughout the first part of that period. But if we measure the rise of the Habsburg lands not by success but by determinant conditions and objectives we may antedate this period to the outcome of the Thirty Years’ War. Whether this war had weakened the Catholic cause on the whole may be controversial; that it had weakened the Holy Roman Empire is un¬ contested. Correspondingly, the power of a Habsburg emperor after 1648 had to rely more on his sovereignty in the Austrian hereditary lands and the lands of the Bohemian and Hungarian crowns, which he considered now as hereditary possessions as well. In regard to the Bohemian crown, Ferdinand II had fully succeeded in 1627: according to the Vernewerte Landesordnung the right of the estates to elect the king was forfeited and 1 Oswald Redlich, Das Warden einer Grofimacht: Osterreich 1700-1J40 (Baden, 1938). H. I. Bidermann, Geschichte der osterreichischen Gesamtstaatsidee 15261804 (Innsbruck, 1867-1889), II, 8-27. 54

An Empire Evolves

55

could be reestablished only if the royal house, male and female members alike, should become extinct. After 1648 every major move of the emperor had to be based exclu¬ sively on the strength resulting from the rule in his hereditary lands and those of the eastern crowns. The success of this dynastic policy was not spectacular at least until 1683, but it was still the basic premise for the attainment of a great-power position. The legal foundations of this de¬ velopment were the provisions of the Westphalian peace treaty which pertain to the extension of the sovereign rights of the German princes in foreign relations. The political consequences became apparent in the first years after the reestablishment of peace. The decreased dependence of the princes on emperor and empire in international relations strengthened their position, yet this did not mean that their gain was the emperor’s loss. Actually the first among the princes, the Habsburg ruler, gained most, because he became ever more independent from obligations to the other princes and from their concomitant interference in imperial matters. However, he secured this position not as emperor but as the most power¬ ful prince in the empire and established thus a precedent for his peers. Such increase in strength however, held not true in every respect. In 1653-1654 the imperial diet in Regensburg met for the last time as a genuine assembly of estates which could still be called a decision-making body. The new body, the permanent imperial diet (Immerwahrende Reichstag), which opened in 1663 and remained, in theory, in continuous session until the end of the empire in 1806, was a mere deliberative assembly of repre¬ sentatives of princes, secular and ecclesiastic lords, and imperial cities. This does not mean that the empire as image in the realms of ideas and the imperial crown as prestige-forming institution had lost their signifi¬ cance, but does mean that the new diet gave little additional leverage to Habsburg power in imperial domestic matters.2 Another factor related to the rise of Habsburg power as distinguished from the dynasty’s imperial position was political. The designs of Louis XIV of France in conjunction with the decline of Spain involved the Austrian Habsburgs increasingly in western European politics. The re¬ newed conflict with the Turks represented a struggle for survival, that with the French one for supremacy in Europe as well. In this sense we 2 Fritz Hartung, Deutsche Verfassungsgeschichte vom 15. Jahrhundert bis zur Gegenwart (Stuttgart, 1950), pp. 150-156; Heinrich Brunner and Ernst Heymann, Grundnss der deutschen Rechtsgeschichte (Munich, 1927), pp. 289-291; Adam Wolf, Durst Wenzel Lob\owitz, (Vienna, 1869), pp. 51-104.

56

History of the Habsburg Empire

may consider the history of the Habsburg lands after 1648 as incipient evolution of the great-power position, even though the amalgamation of administrative institutions from 1648 to 1748 was meager in content and slow in speed. More important during this era was the gradual establish¬ ment of a common succession in the German and eastern Habsburg lands. This succession brought about a limited centralization of gov¬ ernment, although as yet imperfectly reflected in common institutions. The Habsburgs from the time of their succession to the Bohemian and Hungarian crowns had claimed hereditary rule there as much as in the hereditary lands themselves. This could be materialized in regard to the Bohemian crown after the battle of the White Mountain in 1526. In Hungary the same result was achieved only at the diet of Pozsony (Pressburg) in 1687 after decisive victories against the Turks were won. Yet here the rights of the estates for free election of the king had lapsed only in case the male line of the royal house would become extinct, since female succession was not recognized. In the hereditary realms of the Habs¬ burg succession had remained uncontested. No election, or even assent of the estates in the Austro-German lands was necessary; but there were other weighty impediments to an uncontested succession. The succession order, as it stood at the end of the reign of Ferdinand I and for two generations afterward, pertained to the dynasty as a whole and not to a generally recognized law of primogeniture, that is, succes¬ sion by the closest male descendant. Inasmuch as the succession in the Bohemian and Hungarian lands approximated politically that in the hereditary lands we find here a major obstacle to the establishment of a unified empire, since the lands to be bequeathed did not automatically revert to individual persons. When Ferdinand I died in 1564 the lands under the rule of the Ger¬ man (eastern) line of the Habsburgs were divided between his three sons according to the Hausordnung of 1554. Maximilian II, his eldest son and successor as emperor (1564-1576), became king in Bohemia and Hungary 3 and sovereign in Upper and Lower Austria. The second son inherited the rule in Tirol and in the southwest German Vorlande, the third Styria, Carinthia, Carniola, Gorizia, Trieste, and Istria. When the Tirolian line became extinct in 1595 its possessions were divided between the two others. Yet this was no final determination of the issue. Only in 1665 were all 3 Recognized as king and future ruler in Bohemia already in 1549 and crowned as king of Hungary in 1563. Prior to the death of the ruling sovereign such acts of state, like in the Holy Roman empire, established, of course, only the right to suc¬ cession not as yet the actual succession to the throne.

An Empire Evolves

57

domains of the dynasty united in the same hand, that of the emperor. The principle of indivisibility of the Habsburg possessions under the em¬ peror’s hereditary rule and the sole and only succession by primogeniture, was established in the will of Ferdinand II in 1621.4 Whatever the short¬ comings of the narrow-minded Ferdinand were, he realized that a strictly regulated succession under the emperor as head of the house was impor¬ tant to give cohesion to his disparate lands. To achieve it by succession pacts seemed to be easier than by the development of common institutions. Ferdinand II failed in institutions and succeeded only partly in a unified succession. One loophole in the latter could be plugged temporarily, when the Hungarian Reichstag of 1687 was forced to recognize the hereditary Flabsburg succession in the male line. This meant, however, that the right of free elections of the king would still resort to the estates in case the male lines should become extinct. At the end of the seventeenth cen¬ tury this contingency had become a definite possibility for all Habsburg lands. The situation had become complicated by the death of the last Spanish Habsburg, King Charles II, in 1700 which led to thirteen years of major European conflagration and subsequent international crisis di¬ rectly related to it at least until 1748. This international aspect of the suc¬ cession problem will be discussed in the context of international relations. At this point we are concerned with the impact of the question on the eastern Habsburg lands. Frequently one cause is singled out as main reason for the establishment of a unified succession system, namely the need to secure the succession of the oldest daughter of Emperor Charles VI, Maria Theresa, born in 1717. Actually, the whole problem except for its latest stages was unrelated to the issue of Charles VFs male or female descendancy. As noted, the succession question became acute between the death of the last male Habsburg in Spain, King Charles II in 1700 and that of the last male German Habsburg, Emperor Charles VI in 1740. After it was decided in Vienna, that the younger son of Emperor Leopold, Archduke Charles, should claim the whole Spanish inheritance in defiance of the 4 There are several equally valid interpretations of the principle of primogeniture. In the narrowest sense it would mean succession by the oldest son. Somewhat farther go the concepts of succession in a sideline. This means that in case there are no living direct heirs, the surviving oldest brother and his descendants, re¬ spectively, if there are no brothers, male first cousins and their sons etc. would qualify. This latter, wider concept of primogeniture was the one acknowledged in the will of Ferdinand. The even broader concept of female succession, if the male lines should become extinct was not recognized by the emperor. On the whole ques¬ tion see Gustav Turba, Die Grundlagen der pragmatischen Sanction, II, 75-125.

#

5

History of the Habsburg Empire

will of Charles II of Spain a pactum mutuae successionis between the Ger¬ man line and the new Spanish line was established in some secrecy in 1703. Translated from the legal into the political sphere this meant that in case the German Habsburg claim to the Spanish inheritance could be successfully maintained against the French Bourbons, Emperor Leopold I (1657-1705) was willing to recognize the separation of the Spanish royal succession from the German (Austrian) -Hungarian-Bohemian im¬ perial line. If, however, either of the two lines—the German now repre¬ sented by Leopold’s older son Joseph, the Spanish by his younger son Charles—should become extinct, either one was to be succeeded by the other. In no other case should Spain and the possessions of the German line be united under one scepter as they were under Charles V after 1518. Provisions concerning a possible new division of the eastern posses¬ sions were added in favor of Leopold’s younger son, in case he should fail to succeed to the Spanish crown. Also the female succession after the male in Spain as well as in the Austrian hereditary lands was recognized. These agreements, however, were conjectural in several respects. The at¬ tempts to establish a new Habsburg line in Spain failed; equally unfore¬ seen, the contingency of compensation of the claimant to the Spanish crown, Leopold’s younger son Charles by his older brother Joseph, did not arise. Emperor Joseph died in 1711, which meant that the German eastern inheritance reverted now to Charles, as Emperor Charles VI (1711-1740).5 In 1713, when Charles VI announced publicly before the chief dig¬ nitaries of his realms his intentions to establish a common order of suc¬ cession for all Habsburg lands, the main issue of the war of the Spanish succession was practically settled. The rule over a much reduced Span¬ ish empire would revert to Philip of Anjou (Philip V), a grandson of Louis XIV, and not to the new Habsburg emperor. Charles, largely on emotional grounds, refused to recognize this fact formally before 1720. Just the same, the issue was clear. A common order of succession in the Habsburg lands could no longer pertain to common or mutual succession pact in Spain and the German eastern orbit. Charles wanted to establish the precedence of the succession of his own descendants before those of his deceased older brother Joseph. Charles at that time had every reason to hope for a male heir, and the question of the female succession was therefore as yet moot.6 But the decisive question of the order of common succession for all Habsburg domains remained. 5 Turba, II, 136-157. 6 Actually Charles had a son Leopold, who was born and died in 1716, the year before Maria Theresa’s birth.

An Empire Evolves

59

Common institutions were most imperfect and expected to remain so; the succession question, therefore, was of overriding importance for the evolu¬ tion of an adequately integrated Habsburg empire. In fact this issue re¬ tained its importance to the end of the empire. The great state acts, such as the proclamation of the Austrian empire of 1804 and the AustroHungarian Compromise of 1867 were anchored in the Pragmatic Sanc¬ tion.

Indeed,

had

the heir

apparent,

Archduke Francis

Ferdinand,

murdered in Sarajevo in June 1914, acceded to the throne, the interpreta¬ tion of the Austrian and Hungarian version of the order of succession might have led to a new empire crisis.7 The passing of the Pragmatic Sanction had to be channeled through a cumbersome process of submission to the estates in the various Habs¬ burg lands. The Austrian and Bohemian estates accepted the Sanctio pragmatica lex perpetua valitura in 1720, the Croatian in the following year. The latter declared their willingness to submit the act to the king of Hungary, but not to the kingdom of Hungary, a distinction, which in the era of revised Slavonic nationalism acquired significance.8 More dif¬ ficult were the negotiations with the Hungarian and Transylvanian estates, who in substance confirmed the legislation in 1722-1723. The hereditary succession as established by the diet of Pozsony of 1687 remained in force, but the requirement of a coronation oath to uphold Hungarian laws and liberties was further tightened.9 The estates of the Austrian Netherlands and of Lombardy followed in 1724 and 1725. According to this legislation the male line was always to precede the female line, but the latter had now a right to succession in case no male heirs existed. In as much as the last child of Charles VI, a daughter, was not born until 1725, the question of female succession was even now far less a motivating factor for the whole legislation than the wish to establish the precedence of the 7 According to the Hungarian version of the Pragmatic Sanction the offspring of the morganatic (non equal) marriage between Archduke Francis Ferdinand and Countess Sophie Chotek (later Duchess of Hohenberg) would have been entitled to succeed in Hungary, but not in Austria. Even though Francis Ferdinand re¬ nounced the rights to the succession of his descendants for Austria and Hungary— in both respects undoubtedly in good faith—the issue was not really settled. The assassination made, of course, any further speculations purely academic. See also Turba, ibid., I, 44-47, II, 251-257; and by the same author, Die pragmatische Sanction mit besonderer Beruc\sichtigung der Lander der Stephans\rone (Vienna, 1906), pp. 28-31. 8 The principle was embodied in the Croatian dietal declaration of 1712. See Stanko Guldescu, The CroatianSlavonian Kingdom

i^2&-iyg2 and Turba, Die

Grundlagen, II, 402-403. 9 See Heinrich Marczali, Ungarisches Verjassungsrecht (Tubingen, 1911), pp. 1416, 58-63.

6o

History of the Habsburg Empire

offspring of the ruling emperor. Yet this aim, too, was not nearly as im¬ portant as the establishment of a common order of succession in all Habsburg lands as foundation of the new great power’s gradual integra¬ tion. This, of course, was a long-range objective. The short-range goal, namely the incessant, but largely vain efforts by Charles VI to obtain recognition of this legislation by the European powers appeared more important. This problem dominated the European diplomatic and martial scene for decades. The dire consequences of the Pragmatic Sanction will have to be taken up at a later point. Here we note a domestic side effect, namely the required estates’ cooperation to enact the succession legisla¬ tion. Except for Hungary, Charles might well have been able to dispense with this cumbersome procedure. He probably could have put it through simply by imperial decree. If he-did not choose to do so, the motivation was certainly not one of preference for representative government. The emperor just wanted to play it safe, and in foreign relations excessively so, according to most critics. In domestic matters this particular effect of the succession policy was not necessarily injurious to Austrian interests. In Bohemia it helped to modify the harsh policies introduced by Ferdi¬ nand II after the battle of the White Mountain. In the other Habsburg lands—not only in Hungary—the concept of separate historic-political entities was undoubtedly strengthened. Whether this could be con¬ sidered a development for better or worse depends on the evaluation of estates’ policies, which will be discussed in the following chapter. At this point we will consider the process of administrative and legisla¬ tive integration of the Habsburg lands, whose slow and inadequate de¬ velopment was a primary reason for the complexity of Charles’ policy concerning the succession. It was handicapped by the ties of the hereditary lands to the empire and by the tradition of independence and the struggle for the preservation of autonomous institutions in the lands of the Bohemian and Hungarian crowns. In regard to the Bohemian realm the events following the battle of the White Mountain produced a measure of administrative amalgamation brought about by external force. As for the Croatian-BIungarian-Transylvanian orbit the opposite was true. The prolonged continuation of direct Turkish occupation or Turkish con¬ trolled autonomy estranged the institutional development of these lands further from Habsburg rule. It is difficult to comprise this rule as yet under any other common de¬ nominator than the dynasty itself. Common administrative institutions changed little from the end of the reign of Ferdinand I to the beginnings

An Empire Evolves

61

of Maria Theresa’s reforms, roughly at the end of the Austrian succession war in 1748. The Secret Council, the supreme agency dealing with im¬ portant administrative matters, was considerably enlarged under Ferdi¬ nand II, and further expanded to an assembly of more than 60 coun¬ cillors under Leopold I. This meant a transition from genuinely de¬ liberative to largely honorary functions. The place of the Council was taken over now by the Secret Conference, which under Joseph I was narrowed further to an executive committee on foreign and military af¬ fairs, whereas judicial matters were left to the Secret Council, otherwise now a body of reduced significance Likewise,

the

General

Court Chancery

lost in

importance,

when

Ferdinand II assigned agenda of the hereditary lands and of the dynasty to the new Austrian Court Chancery. Altogether the division of the Austro-German eastern Habsburg realms after the death of Ferdinand I among his three sons led also to departmentalization of the functions of the Supreme War Council, and the financial affairs handled by the Court Chamber. Separate administrative bodies were created and revamped under Ferdinand II and Leopold I. Not until Joseph I was a measure of centralization reintroduced. The Austrian Court Chancery became now the supreme administrative agency under the direction of two court chancellors. Under Charles VI these changes were formalized. One sec¬ tion of the Chancery dealt now in essence with foreign and military af¬ fairs and those of the imperial house, the other with administrative and judicial matters. In these latter respects cognizance had to be taken in varying degrees of the Flungarian demands for separate administrative and judicial institutions. The Finance Conference had supervisory and policy-making functions but not directly administrative executive ones. Progress could be acknowledged here only in the fact, that the Court Chamber after 1713 was organized according to subject matter and not only to territorial requirements. Basic issues of taxation and recruiting of military forces were still handled separately in the individual lands. The same was true for the bulk of judicial agenda.10 To sum up: Integration of the Habsburg lands was blocked by long wars in the west and even longer ones in the east. Although the regimes of Turkish satellite princes or outright occupation by foreign troops were obstacles, the lack of progress in administrative integration after more than two centuries of joint Habsburg rule in the hereditary lands and 10 Huber and

Dopsch,

193-205; Hellbling, 248-282.

Osterreichische Reichsgeschichte, pp.

Osterreichische

Verfassungs- und

181-184,

186-191,

Verwaltungsgeschichte, pp.

History of the Habsburg Empire

62

those territories of the eastern crowns, not directly exposed to enemy at¬ tacks in east and west, was extraordinary. This can be understood only, if we realize the different traditions of the lands, and the divisive issues of reformatory and counterreformatory struggles. The integration of the Habsburg realms cannot be judged by the evolution of common administrative institutions alone. Social and in¬ tellectual factors will be discussed in the following chapter. At this point we are concerned with the impact of common defense needs and evolving common political interests of the peoples under Habsburg rule. These needs and interests developed without the rulers paying appropriate heed to the consent of the governed, which had tragic consequences. B.

Resumption of the Turkish wars

The resumption of the Turkish wars in the third quarter of the seven¬ teenth century cannot be attributed to the same kind of imperialist ag¬ gression that prevailed under Suleiman the Magnificent in the first and second quarter of the sixteenth century. The differences were of a twofold nature. First, the Turks remained remarkably quiet during the Thirty Years’ War, when they would have had the advantage of French, Swed¬ ish, and German Protestant support, and when their advance would have been particularly dangerous to the imperial cause. This is not to say that the High Portal did not make use of the critical situation, which the Habsburg power faced in the west, to enhance the Turkish position in the Hungarian-Transylvanian orbit, but the Turkish moves are minor if compared with the Turkish offensives launched between 1526 and 1529. Turkish policy between 1663 (the beginnings of the first Turkish war of Leopold I) and 1683 (the turning of the tide in the east, the lifting of the second siege of Vienna) was not based on long-range Ottoman de¬ signs for further conquest in the west but on endeavours to maintain the Turkish position in Hungary that had lasted for nearly one and a half century. Second, Suleiman II took advantage of the difficult imperial position brought about by the conflict between emperor and those German princes who supported the Reformation. Nevertheless this was a war entirely in its own right, which presumably would have been fought anyway, ir¬ respective of the general European constellation. Only with the FrancoTurkish alliance of 1536, the first nonideological diplomatic alliance of its kind between a Christian and non-Christian empire, did the Turkish wars become part of the game of European power politics. Even then this was true only to a limited extent. The conflagrations in the east

An Empire Evolves

63

throughout the century, from the death of Suleiman II in 1566 to the out¬ break of the first Turkish war under Leopold I in 1663, changed intermit¬ tently the structure of Turkish domination in Hungary and the sover¬ eignty in Transylvania. Yet the extent of Turkish control throughout this period remained stable. The situation in the west during the Huguenot wars and those of the Fronde in France was too diffuse to allow for a concerted plan of cooperation between two great continental flanking powers. When Louis XIV began to rule in his own right, all this changed even without the formal conclusion of a new alliance with the Turks. The struggle for a lineup of European powers under the leadership of France had begun. From now on, major decisions were bound to occur in the west. In this context, the Turkish wars represented a mere sideshow, serious enough for the Habsburg power, but a secondary theatre of opera¬ tion just the same. Because of the impact of these wars on the evolution of the Habsburg empire in international and domestic affairs, it is necessary to survey their conduct and results. They declined in importance only from 1718, after the peace of Passarowitz (Passarovic), to the end of the last AustroTurkish war in 1791. By that time the Ottoman power had practically ceased to belong to the concert of European great powers. Yet for the two centuries when the Ottoman empire codetermined European affairs ac¬ tively, the Turkish question has to be discussed on two levels: the rela¬ tions between Ottoman and Habsburg power, and the impact of the Turkish wars on the eastern Habsburg realms. We will consider first the relationship between Ottoman and Habsburg power. The motivations for the resumption of the Turkish wars in 1663— Turkish or

imperial

aggressive

designs,

autonomy

of

Transylvania,

French threat in the west—may be contested as either individual or col¬ lective causes. Uncontested is the fact that these wars developed at least a limited feeling of cohesion between the Habsburg realms. This feeling could not have been brought about speedily in any other way than by fighting a power which was clearly different from all historical-political entities of the Habsburg lands. As a result, the Habsburg armed forces were forged into the strongest centripetal factor in the history of the evolving empire. In the battles in the Hungarian plains these forces had become a powerful, well-organized military instrument. It is here also, where the great Austrian military commanders rose to mastery of their profession. Yet only few of them were later able to use their eastern experience in the struggle against the French in the west.

64

History of the Hubs burg Empire

This was hardly accidental. The Habsburg armies were trained to compete in the wide-open spaces of the plains with a strongly motivated and disciplined but technologically somewhat backward foe. They were not in step with military forces modernized by the reforms of Louis XIV under his great minister of war Louvois and his brilliant chief military engineer Vauban. Nevertheless, the second half of the seventeenth and the first two decades of the eighteenth century were the times when an Austrian generalship evolved, whose performance was never to be sur¬ passed. Of previous military leaders, Wallenstein in the Thirty Years’ War was a man of brilliance as military organizer and in a diffuse way also as political general. Neither his predecessor, Count Johannes Tilly, nor his lieutenants Octavio, Prince (Count) Piccolomini and Count Matthias Gallas were more than competent field commanders, who showed neither the daring nor the ingenuity of Gustavus Adolphus or Conde. The Turkish war of 1663-1664, fought over the issue whether Transylvania should remain a Turkish satellite state, gave a new imperial general, Count Raimund Montecuccoli, a chance to show himself as organizer, tactician, and strategist. In the battle of St. Gotthard (1664) in western Hungary, close to the Styrian border, he performed brilliantly and pre¬ vented a Turkish invasion of the hereditary lands. Yet the unpredictable situation in the west, the unrest in Hungary and Transylvania, and the economic crisis in the empire and hereditary lands, forced Leopold I to conclude a rather unfavorable but under existing conditions warranted negotiated peace at Vasvar (Eisenburg)

in 1664. It gave Nagyvarad

(Grosswarclein) and Ersekujvar (Neuhausel) in southeast central Hun¬ gary to the Turks. Above all, Turkish suzerainty in Transylvania was preserved. The Habsburg cause had received a setback at a time when foreign re¬ lations were relatively favorable for them. The emperor had the support of a contingent of imperial troops and even of a small corps of French troops, and yet the political results were dismal. The conspiracy against the imperial government in the parts of Hungary under Habsburg con¬ trol in the following years and the change of relations with France from a pending to an active threat made the prospects of the Habsburg cause appear more critical than in 1683, when the second Turkish war began under Leopold I. It could not be foreseen twenty years earlier that it could be brought to an amazingly successful conclusion in 1699. Leopold’s position was indeed critical. The Turkish army, assembled in 1683 in Adrianople, was prepared for a major push against the west.

An Empire Evolves

65

The alliance of the emperor with King John Sobieski of Poland did not assure him unequivocally of strong support and the same was true for the pacts with the western German imperial estates. Reliance on French nonintervention on the basis of Christian solidarity in a war against the infidels was questionable. Thus major odds were staked against the Habsburg emperor, when the war began.11 As noted in the introductory chapter, the Turkish advance to the gates of Vienna in the critical summer of 1683 posed presumably not the same decisive threat to Christian Europe, which had existed at the time of Charles Martel’s victory against the Moslems at Tours in 732 or even Count Niklas Salm’s defense of Vienna against Suleiman the Magnifi¬ cent’s attack in 1529. Still, the situation was serious enough, when the Turkish armies swept through Hungary in 1683. Vienna might have been taken, the emperor’s armies and the incipient Habsburg eastern power could have been destroyed. The final showdown, not so much be¬ tween Crescent and Cross, but between Near and Middle East and West¬ ern and Central Europe would have depended almost exclusively on the defensive power of France, to be supported possibly by the rising Russian empire under Peter the Great. Not the victory of the Cross, but main¬ tenance of a politically viable Central and eastern Central Europe was the major consequence of this great war. It is a measure of the emperor’s curious mixture of tenacity, stubborn¬ ness, faith in adversity and, as it turned out, unrealistic harshness in vic¬ tory that Leopold, like his grandfather Ferdinand II, accepted such major challenge against great odds. The siege of Vienna from July 14 to Septem¬ ber 12, 1683 represents a heroic chapter in Austrian history. Credit should go to the citizenry under the mayor Andreas von Liebenberg, who did not live to see victory, the commander Count Rudiger von Starhemberg, and the charitable but bigoted bishop (later cardinal) Count Kollonitsch. There is disagreement, whether chief credit for the relief of the city should go to the colorful and daring Polish King John Sobieski as at least hon¬ orary commander in chief or to the leader of the imperial forces, the em¬ peror’s brother-in-law, Duke Charles of Lorraine. The latter was as cir¬ cumspect a commander as the grand vizier and leader of the Turkish forces Kara Mustapha was a negligent one.12 Since Sobieski felt slighted 11 Csuday, Die Geschichte Ungarns, II, 126-172; Kosary, A History of Hungary, pp. 127-132. Bela Kopeczi, La France et la Hongrie au debut du XVIII siecle (Budapest, 1971). 12 On the siege of Vienna see Thomas M. Barker, Double Eagle and Crescent: Vienna’s Tur\ish Siege and its Historical Setting (Albany N.Y., 1967) and Rein¬ hold Lorenz, Tur\enjahr 1683 (Vienna, 1933); see also Otto Forst de Battaglia, Jan

History of the Habshurg Empire

66

by the emperor’s subsequent disregard for his decisive contribution to victory, he withdrew to his home country in December 1683, and the architect of the later successful campaign in Hungary was Charles of Lorraine. Protected by an imperial armistice agreement with France (1648), the so-called Holy League with Poland and the Republic of Venice in the same year, and a reinsurance treaty against possible French attack with Brandenburg (1686), the Habsburg forces advanced successfully into central Hungary. In September 1686 heavily fortified Buda was taken by the Duke of Lorraine, and in 1687 a decisive victory was achieved in the field at Nagy-Harsany, close to the battlefield of Mohacs of unblessed memories. With these two victories the back of the Turkish power in central Hungary was permanently broken. In 1688 imperial forces under the command of the elector of Bavaria, Max Emanuel, Leopold’s son-inlaw, supported by margrave Louis of Baden, took for the first time Bel¬ grade, gate to the core area of the Ottoman empire and symbol of Turkish threats to the west. Yet the fact that the war was for a brief period carried into undisputed enemy territory, was of more than symbolic sig¬ nificance. This victory showed that the balance had turned in the east. It was to serve the emperor in good stead in the ever-threatening situation in the west. The change in the Hungarian constitution brought about by the em¬ peror’s insistence at the diet of Pozsony in 1687-1688 and the establish¬ ment of an imperial protectorate in Transylvania some months later will be discussed in the following section. Yet it is necessary to state at this point that the great opportunities for genuine integration of the recon¬ quered lands with the bulk of the Habsburg power in Central Europe were largely offset by Leopold’s ruthless attempts to undo 150 years of history and to enforce a victory of the Counter Reformation in Hungary at a time when the intolerance of this movement had otherwise gradually abated in Central Europe. During the war of the League of Augsburg (1689-1697), in which the emperor tried with a limited degree of success to stem the tide of French imperialist advance, the consequences of the failure to pacify Hungary became apparent.

In 1689, Margrave Louis of Baden, Charles of Lor¬

raine’s successor, vainly advanced far into Serbia. Unrest in Transylvania commenced again. Belgrade was retaken by the Turks in 1690, but in 1691 Louis of Baden could still achieve a major victory at Szalankamen Sobies\i: Konig von

Polen

(Zurich,

1946)

pp.

157-255

and

Janusz

Wolinski,

“Konig Johann Sobieski und die Schlacht bei Wien 1683,” in La Pologne, au XII Congres International des Sciences Histonques a Vienne (Warsaw, 1965), pp. 49—62.

An Empire Evolves

67

(Slankamen) where the Tisza flows in the Danube. Yet in regard to the over-all pacification of Hungary, concessions to the Hungarian Serbs and ; the grant of a limited autonomy to Transylvania were of little avail. Whether cooperation with the Magyars would have been helpful, is an < open question since no concessions were offered to them. In 1695 t^ie c perial forces were defeated at Lugos in eastern Hungary. As a consequence of the military crisis the young French prince, Eugene of Savoy, who had distinguished himself in imperial service since 1683, obtained now command in Hungary. In the battle of Zenta, adjacent to the southern Tisza, Eugene won finally a decisive victory against the Turks. It freed Hungary except for the Banat of Temesvar, as agreed upon in the peace of Karlowitz (Karlocza, Karlovici) in 1699. Further Turkish concessions had to be made to Venice and Poland. Although the Turkish wars had not ended, and neither the territorial integrity nor the domestic pacification of the kingdom was assured, a permanent success had been scored. Never again could the Ottoman power single-handed threaten the existence of Habsburg power.13 With the physically unprepossessing French prince of Italian origin, Eugene of Savoy, a new brilliant figure enters the Austrian and soon the international scene. The greatest general ever to serve the interests of the Habsburgs, he also became one of the leading statesmen and patrons of arts—a personality who splendidly fitted the colorful frame of the Baroque era. Eugene, who came perhaps closer to the concept of an Habsburg empire-wide hero 14 than any other great Austrian, won his Euro¬ pean reputation in the west in the war of the Spanish Succession (17011714). His popularity was based on his victories in the east. The years of revolutionary risings in Hungary from 1703 to 1711 saw his spectacular activities in the west. Yet after the termination of the war of the Spanish Succession with its brilliant victories and indifferent political outcome for the Habsburg cause, Austrian interests turned again eastward, and in 1716 a new Turkish war began. The question of who started it is controversial. The High Portal, after the defeat at Zenta, appeared reluctant to intervene in the great European war of succession which began in 1701. Despite French prompting the Turks proceeded only cautiously and indirectly in Transylvania. Even in 13 Krones, Handbuch der Geschichte Osterreichs, III, 628-688; Oswald Redlich, Weltmacht des BaroclOsterreich in der Zeit Leopolds / (Vienna, 1961), pp. 415484; Laszlo Makkai in Ervin Pamlenyi, ed. Die Geschichte Ungarns, Chapter III,

pp. I93-I9514 Robert A. Kann, The Habsburg Empire: A Study in Integration and Disinte¬ gration (2nd ed. New York, 1973), pp. 178-180.

History of the Habsburg Empire

68

1716 they turned only against Austria’s feeble ally Venice in Morea, an area in which the Habsburg power was not directly interested. Yet the frustrat¬ ing results of the war in the west and the vistas of rich and easy conquests in the east made the emperor Charles VI decide that the moment for decisive action—nominally in support of Venice—had come. This last Turkish war under Prince Eugene’s command has become the most pop¬ ular chapter in the book of his many military victories. In particular the battle of Peterwardein (Petervarad) in the summer of 1716 and the new conquest of Belgrade two years later, celebrated by the Prince Eugene song, rank highest. This war, the most clearly imperialistic one in its ob¬ jectives, though not necessarily in its causes, ever fought by the Habsburg empire was essentially a sideshow of strength. It displayed the efficiency of the armed forces and the recently acquired prestige of a new great power. Yet neither were basic issues of survival at stake nor had the re¬ sults of the war a more than transitory effect. The peace of Passarowitz of July, 1718, in conjunction with the peace of Rastatt with France in 1714, gave the Habsburg power its greatest extent. The Banat of Temesvar, Little Walachia (the southwestern part of Walachia) and the north¬ ern part of Bosnia and Serbia were added to the Habsburg realms. Yet, ironically, Morea, for whose retention by Venice the war was allegedly fought, remained in Turkish hands. Only small compensations were given to the republic: the islands of Corfu, Cerigo, and some Albanian coastal places. Might but not necessarily right had won.15 Might had won an inconclusive victory. Although Hungary’s territorial identity under the Habsburg scepter had been assured, the great pos¬ sibilities of getting a foothold in the eastern Mediterranean, obtaining control of the Danube principalities, and possibly gaining access to the Dardanelles, was lost. Charles VI had a strong sense for the exalted mis¬ sion of the house of Habsburg. He saw this mission still clearly in the west, in the vain hope to become heir to the Spanish empire, now under Bourbon rule. As substitute for its loss, Charles concentrated his energies on the recognition of the Pragmatic Sanction by the European powers. This was understandable, though not wise. Yet his second aim to hold at all costs to the crumbs of this Spanish empire in Italy rather than focusing his attention on Austria’s eastern position was, even from his limited point of view, neither understandable nor wise. The Emperor would have liked to hold on to the new territories in the east, but to do 15 Redlich, Das

Werden . . . , pp. 218-242; Krones, Handbuch, IV,

112-120.

Max Braubach, Prinx Eugen, 5 vols., Vienna, 1963-1965), see I, 235-271, III, 293-

379

-

An Empire Evolves

6g

so and to conduct at the same time an expansive policy in the west would have taxed the Habsburg empire’s strength beyond the breaking point. Faced by this dilemma Charles opted for the western position, but even here more in the sense of diplomatic than military preparation. One of the consequences of this eastern foreign policy was the alliance with Russia in 1726. For the recognition of the Pragmatic Sanction by a power not primarily interested in the Austrian succession, anyway, the Habsburg emperor was now forced to pay an exorbitant price, namely his support of Russian policy of southeast European expansion. Russia was nat¬ urally pleased to accept inordinate concessions for the minor service of recognizing a state act of no consequence to her interests. Her claims were cashed in in 1737 w^en Austria, according to her treaty obliga¬ tions with Russia, joined the new eastern ally in a war against Turkey. This war Austria did not want and was unable to fight because her armaments were neglected by then. The consequences of this most in¬ glorious Austrian oriental war corresponded to this situation.16

Actually the handwriting had been on the wall since the poor Austrian military showing in the war of the Polish Succession (1733-1735)- Here the aged Prince Eugene, who died in 1736, was no longer in full com¬ mand of his great faculties. Even if he had been, the poor state of preparedness brought about by financial disarray and economic ex¬ haustion, would have denied him victory. Thus the stage was set for the debacle: Little Walachia, northern Bosnia, and Serbia were lost in the peace of Belgrade in 1739. Besides, the Russian ally, who felt deserted by Austria, was resentful about this miserable outcome.17 Nevertheless, the result of Charles VPs second Turkish war, which after all did not infringe on the territorial integrity of Hungary, did not really touch vital territorial interests of Habsburg power. Yet feebly as the war was fought, it made it appear likely that Austria would continue to give priority to minor interests in Italy rather than major eastern potentialities. Above all, it showed that Austria’s military power, as tested in the hey¬ days of Eugene of Savoy’s military glory, had become a thing of the past. The peace encouraged the enemies of Habsburg power and made it likely that a third war of succession 18 would promise rich spoils to all 16 On the foreign policy of Charles VI, see also Max Braubach, Versailles und Wien von Ludwig XIV. bis Kaunitz

(Bonn, 1952), pp. 7-359 passim; Redlich,

Das Werden . . . , pp. 243-297. Kopeczi, La France et la Hongne. 17 Karl A. Roider, The Reluctant Ally '.Austria’s Policy in the Austro-Tur\ish War I737~I739 (Baton Rouge, 1972); Redlich, Das Werden . . . , pp. 298-319; Krones, Handbuch, IV, 137-144. 18 The wars of the Spanish, Polish, and subsequently Austrian succession.

yo

History of the Hahsburg Empire

those who had recognized the Pragmatic Sanction with politically appro¬ priate mental reservations. Under Joseph II the Hahsburg armies once more were called into the field against the Ottoman power, and again at the side of Russia (1788— 1791). Maria Theresa’s chancellor, Prince Kaunitz, by a skillful political operation, had succeeded to gain peacefully the Bukovina as aftermath of the Russo-Turkish war of 1771-1774. Joseph II on the other hand, like his grandfather forced as Russia’s ally into an imperialist war not of his own choosing, failed to make measurable territorial gains, despite major mili¬ tary efforts. The Austrians fought with indifferent success. Leopold II terminated the war after his older brother’s death by the peace of Sistowa in 1791. Except for the annexation of Old Orsova it had to be concluded on the basis of the status quo, even though Austrian forces had occupied sizeable enemy territories. The reasons for this unsatisfactory outcome were varied: Leopold was faced by a revolutionary situation in Hungary and in the Austrian Netherlands; diplomatic friction with Prussia had to be smoothed over in the face of Russian dissatisfaction with an inevitable Austrian separate peace; the second partition of Poland was in the offing; above everything else, the great unknown, the development of the revolu¬ tionary situation in France, casts its shadows on the European scene. Leopold II was indeed prudent to cut losses and to agree to a meager compromise. How right he was, was not realized until almost a century later, when Austrian occupation of Bosnia-Hercegovina in 1878 initiated a new ac¬ tive, and in the long run disastrous, stage of the Habsburg empire’s Bal¬ kan policy. Its consequences for the empire and Europe would become more serious than the Turkish threats to the west in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, since they contributed directly to the gradual dis¬ integration of the Habsburg empire. The Turkish wars, roughly in the period between the two sieges of Vienna, 1529-1683, played the converse and major part in the evolution and preservation of the great-power position of the empire. This has been indicated in the foregoing in regard of foreign and military policies. It will subsequently be discussed in re¬ gard to domestic policies. C.

Hungary, Transylvania, Croatia, and the Habsburg scepter

In a survey of events in the eastern Habsburg lands from mid-seven¬ teenth to mid-eighteenth century, the impact of the Turkish wars is important even on the second, the civilian, level. In 1645 Prince George I

An Empire Evolves

yi

Rakoczi of Transylvania had issued a manifesto, in which he called on the Hungarian nation to fight the emperor. Yet such a fight would have : involved the High Portal, too, which was not ready for a major showi down with the Habsburgs. Rakoczi could not have dared to initiate an avowed anti-imperial policy against Turkish advice, if he had not been promised the support of other powers—in this case by alliance treaties i with Sweden and France, concluded in 1631. Yet even such understand¬ ing, renewed again in spring 1645, meant little at such a late stage of the Thirty Years’ War, when Ferdinand III, Cardinal Mazarin (Riche¬ lieu’s more moderate successor), and Chancellor Oxenstjerna of Sweden, were all heading for the great compromise of Munster and Osnabriick. It had become clear that French-Swedish assurances at this time repre¬ sented not more than tactical manoeuvres to strengthen their position in the peace negotiations. Recognition of this state of affairs forced Rakoczi in the late summer of 1645 to the pacts of Rampersdorf and Linz with the emperor, according to which he had to give up the Franco-Swedish al¬ liance in return for the recognition of his rule in seven east Hungarian comitats in addition to Transylvania. Considering the fact that Swedish and French support would be worth little, as soon as the general peace was signed, Rakoczi had struck a good bargain. Favorable to his cause was also the recognition of freedom of religion for the lands under his rule. It included the peasants and all those who previously had been forced to change their faith, which meant in practice change under coun¬ terreformatory duress. Only the general tiredness on the imperial side and the lack of readiness on the Turkish side to take advantage of this situation explains how the Transylvanian prince and Hungarian national leader could accomplish as much as he did. The precarious peace of 1645 lasted for almost twenty years. It was strained considerably, when Rakoczi supported the Swedes against the Poles in the so-called first Northern War (1655-1660). In doing so he challenged the Habsburg-Polish alliance but at the same time the interests of his Turkish suzerain, who did not yet want to get involved in a war with the Habsburgs. This concern appeared justified. Rakoczi was de¬ posed by the High Portal to avoid further involvements with the Habs¬ burgs. Prudent Emperor Ferdinand III on his part had not responded in force to Rakoczi’s repeated forrays into the parts of Hungary in imperial hands. While thus both powers wanted to avoid a confrontation, the election of an imperial candidate as prince of Transylvania, John Kemeny, versus a Turkish appointee, Michael Apafy, led to a predictable clash. Both sides intervened in Transylvania, and the war began in 1663 under

j2

History of the Hahshurg Empire

the new and inexperienced emperor Leopold, a year after one of the two contestants, Kemeny, was killed in battle. The war and the resulting peace of Vasvar, traced in the previous sec¬ tion, displeased the Hungarian nobility. The great nobles felt that their national leader, Count Nikolas Zrinyi (Zrinski), had not received the necessary support of the imperial commander Montecuccoli. Feeling was widespread that the emperor had fought the war to eliminate Hungarian constitutional government and to replace it by imperial absolutism after the fashion of the regime in Bohemia following the battle of the White Mountain. Hungary, as far as it had a voice, was alienated by the action on both sides, Habsburg and Ottoman power alike. Several additional fac¬ tors, military requisitions, camping of German troops on Hungarian soil, counterreformatory activities, and the dependency on imperial foreign and defense policy added to the general dissatisfaction. In this atmosphere Hungarian postwar conspiracy throve. It was led by men, who were undoubtedly Hungarian patriots after a fashion, in¬ cluding Zrinyi, the banus of Croatia (one of the rare personalities, who was acknowledged as national leader there as well as in Hungary),19 his brother Peter, the Palatin Count Ferencz Wesseleny, and the Judex curiae Count Ferencz Nadasdy. The weakness of these men was twofold: they identified Flungarian national interests largely with those of the national aristocracy and they were not strong enough to pursue a truly inde¬ pendent national policy. Thus they attempted to get Turkish and French support and thereby laid themselves open to the charge of high treason, compounded by the extension of the conspiracy to nobles in the heredi¬ tary lands (Count Hans Tattenbach in Styria and Count Karl Thurn in Goricia). The conspiracy was discovered, some of the leaders executed (Peter Zrinyi, Nadasdy, and Tattenbach among them); the life of Zrinyi’s son-in-law, Ferencz Rakoczi I, was spared. One of the consequences of the exposure of the great cabal was a wave of persecution of Protestants in Hungary, particularly in the northern mining towns. Pastors were convicted by special tribunals, in which Bishop Kollonitsch played an ignoble part. The pastors were not executed, but the choice of those convicted was between recantation and serving as galley slaves. Brutal measures of this kind may have been based on the counterreformatory tendencies at the imperial court under Jesuit influ19 Great grandson of the former Banus Count Nikolas Zrinyi (Zrinski) who had died in the defense of Szigetvar against Suleiman II in 1566. Zrinyi is the Magyar, Zrinski die Croatian spelling of the name of the family.

An Empire Evolves

73

ence. Yet they could not cover up the fact that Catholic as well as Protes¬ tant nobles participated about equally in the conspiracy.20 Taking a long-range view—which Leopold and his unenlightened ad¬ visers were least capable to take—the consequences of this policy were as disastrous for the imperial side as for the national Hungarian cause. The special interests of the revolutionary Hungarian noble conspirators may have obscured the fact, that they fought for a national Hungarian idea. The religious persecutions directed against nobles, free and unfree com¬ moners alike, made this clear to everybody. So did the attempt to amalga¬ mate the Hungarian administration with that in Vienna. The establish¬ ment of a royal gubernatorial office in Pozsony in 1673 was an inmportant step in this direction. Hungary was treated as conquered territory, and treated so without the semblance of justification that had existed in Bo¬ hemia after 1620—namely defeat after a general revolt. Yet a general revolutionary peasant force, the Kurucok,21 emerged from these actions and remained at least as guerillas in being for a generation. Their first prominent leader was a noble from Upper Hungary, Count Imre Thbkoly. He managed to obtain French and Polish support for a time, but Louis XIV did not consider it to his best interest to continue it after conclusion of the peace of Nijmwegen with the emperor in 1679. Thokoly’s manifesto to fight for a free Hungary did not prove entirely successful, but a detachment of imperial troops was defeated and the em¬ peror, hard pressed in the east, agreed to suspend for the time being his policy of Hungarian “Gleichschaltung.” At the diet of Sopron (Odenburg) the ancient constitutional liberties were acknowledged, the office of Palatine restored, and religious freedom for the Protestants in the northern mining towns reestablished. This meant a notable though limited victory for the Hungarian cause, but Thokoly reversed it to future defeat, when he openly joined the Turkish side at a time when the disastrous cam¬ paign, which led the Ottoman power to the gates of Vienna, was already under way. The emperor’s ministers and generals, Lobkowitz, Caraffa, Montecuccoli foremost among them, who wanted to reduce Hungary to the status of a mere province, seemingly had proved their case. The Hungarian nation had to pay the bill after the reconquest. By this 20 Redlich, Weltmacht des Baroc\ . . . , pp. 158-235; Lacko in E. Pamlenyi, ed., “Die Geschichte Ungarns,” pp. 190-198; Csuday, Geschichte Ungarns, II, 119-160. Bucsay,

Die

Geschichte

des

Protest antismus

in

Ungarn,

pp.

81-106;

Wolf,

Lobhowitz . . . pp. 236-334. 21 The name derives either from the Latin crux (cross), the peasants revolting in the name of the cross, or from the Turkish khurudsch (the rebel).

J4

History of the Hahshurg Empire

conquest land was redistributed now through imperial commissions. Former owners, suspected of disloyalty or religious nonconformism, lost their estates, which were given to foreigners, mostly German nobles. Worse was in store for many burghers in northern cities, who lost their property and, after submission to torture, their lives.22 Considering the ruthless brutality of the bloody assizes of Eperjes of 1687, the results of the famous diet of Pozsony (Pressburg) in 1687-1688 have to be considered as relatively moderate. The hereditary succession of the Habsburgs had to be acknowledged and the right of resistance of the nobles according to the Bulla Aurea of 1222 was relinquished. Yet the coronation oath, repeated by the heir to the throne Joseph at his corona¬ tion, acknowledged the ancient liberties of the nation. Transylvania, how¬ ever, remained separated from Hungary, even though religious freedom was recognized there in 1688 and free election of the prince promised after the death of Apafy’s son.23 In 1690, the sultan recognized Count Thokoly as Prince of Transyl¬ vania, and the emperor considered this enthronization as open challenge. In 1691, after the country was reconquered by the imperial forces, the Diplomum Leopoldinum acknowledged the special status of Transyl¬

vania under the emperor including recognition of the religious liberties of the three nations, Magyars, Szekels, and Saxons. Those of the under¬ privileged Roumanian Vlachs were added only after a fashion, provided they conformed under counterreformatory pressure to accommodation with a Uniate Church under papal jurisdiction by the end of the seven¬ teenth century. After the son of Apafy, who had not yet come of age, was forced to abdicate and a separate Transylvanian court chancery was established in Vienna, the country was definitely considered as corpus separatum directly under the emperor and not as part of the Hungarian

crown lands. These measures as well as the autonomy granted in 1690 to the Hungarian Serbs in the Voiwodina between Tisza and Danube, increased anew the dissatisfaction of the Magyar nobility. Magyar nationalists on both sides of the Tisza waited only for the opportunity for new risings. They found it in the first critical years of the War of the Spanish Succession, when the French were ready to support revolt in Transylvania and the emperor’s Protestant allies, the British 22 Csuday, Die Geschichte Ungarns, II, 160-187; Redlich, Weltmacht des Baroc\ . . . , pp. 414-440. 23 Heinrich Marczali, Ungarische Verfassungsgeschichte (Tubingen, 1910), pp. 88-90; and by the same author and publisher Ungarisches Verfassungsrecht (1911), pp. 13-14. Bucsay, Geschichte des Protestantismus . . . , pp. 98-119.

An Empire Evolves

75

and the Dutch, could be expected to be resentful of a brutal imperial ) policy of suppression. Thus the risks seemed to be limited, whichever ' way the dice may fall; still, they had to be taken. In 1703, Prince Francis II Rakoczi issued a call to the nation to act and : free the country from foreign oppression. This time the movement could : count on strong support. Furthermore, not the question of Turkish i versus Habsburg alignments was at issue but that of an independent, though as yet only in a rudimentary way democratic Hungary. The prince received some French aid. In this case he could certainly not be charged with an attempt to compromise the independence of Hungary, which could only be threatened directly by Turkish or Habsburg power. Still, Rakoczi in spite of short-lived military success particularly in Upper Hungary would have been well advised to seek a compromise with the enlightened new emperor Joseph (1705-1711). He yielded, however, to the pressure of the radicals. The assembly of the Hungarian and Transylvanian insurrectionists at Onod deposed the emperor as king of Hungary and with him the whole i house of Habsburg. Joseph to his credit was still ready for a compromise and invited Rakoczi and his followers to participate in a new diet at Pozsony in 1708. Rakoczi refused and continued the civil war, though not for long. Defeated by an imperial army he was forced to flee to France. When his pleas for support were hardly listened to there, he left for Turkey, where he died in 1735. Neither Louis XIV nor the sultan had been willing to invest further in an apparent loser. Ind 1711, shortly after the death of Emperor Joseph, the leaders of the moderate wing of the revolutionary movement finally made peace with Charles VI at Szatmar. Hungarian and Translyvanian liberties within the frame of the agree¬ ments of 1687 and 1691 (diet of Pozsony and Diplomum Leopoldinum) were restored and a general amnesty issued. The national movement lacked military support, arms, and supplies for continued resistance, but the emperor too, after Britain had withdrawn from the War of the Spanish Succession, could ill afford to handle harshly a festering revolu¬ tionary situation in his backyard. Hence the compromise, which served the interests of both parties, but, from a long-range viewpoint, more the Hungarian cause that the imperial. The Rakoczi revolt had wide support not only of a privilege-conscious nobility, but also of burghers and of many peasants. Rakoczi took up the cause of religious freedom and that of the oppressed unfree peasantry, for Magyars and non-Magyars. He failed in regard to his major objectives, but his movement kept its de¬ mands alive. Its leaders in the next century represented socially still aristo-

76

History of the Habshurg Empire

cracy and gentry, but they could no longer be associated primarily with the fight for the privileges of the national nobility, as was true of most of Rakoczi’s peers. The first major break in this system of identification of class and national interest goes to Rakoczi’s credit. Even from a short-range viewpoint the position of the only temporarily retreating national movement had its advantages. Charles’s desire to have the Hungarian diet consent to the Pragmatic Sanction made it advisable not to revert to a policy of renewed suppression, which might lead to revolution on a still larger scale. Throughout his reign and that of his daughter, Maria Theresa,—that means, for two generations—Hungarian national rights in the modest frame established at Szatmar had not been tampered with. This applied equally to taxation and defense organiza¬ tions, and to a point also to the conduct of foreign affairs. Hungary could not go it alone but neither could the Habsburg emperors subordinate Hungary by force in an international situation fraught with dangers.24 The Hungarian autonomist objectives had distinct repercussions in Croatia-Slavonia. One factor was the common Croatian-Magyar experi¬ ence of having been exposed to the Turkish holocaust. The eastern part of Croatia and Bosnia had been for most of the period of the Turkish wars under Ottoman domination. Attempts to seal off further Turkish in¬ vasions in the southwest by establishing a permanently policed military frontier go back to the early sixteenth century. They were fully mate¬ rialized by 1578 and kept in being for three centuries. The Croatian military frontier represented a combination of military agricultural com¬ munities, who lived in small groups, the zadrugas, held together by a combination of family ties and military discipline. Similar defense zones existed south of the Banat of Temesvar and in southern Transylvania. In return for the grant of land by the government, the frontiersmen or granicari (Grenzer), who recognized the head of the family as their

military superior, were called up for service at short order any time a Turkish attack threatened. These granicari, mostly Croatian or German in national origin, were thus directly subordinated to the centralized im¬ perial military authority. This fact, accentuated by the provisions of the 24 Csuday, Die Geschichte Ungarns, II, 187-211; Kosary, A History of Hungary, pp. 131-137; Redlich, Das Werden . . . , pp. 148-217; Marczali, Ungarische Verfassungsgeschichte, pp. 90-93; Marczali, Ungarisches Verfassungsrecht, pp. 1415; Horvath, Geschichte Siebenburgens, pp. 109-113. Laszlo Makkai, in E. Pamlenyi, ed., Die Geschichte Ungams, Chapter III, IV, pp. 175-206; SetonWatson, A History of the Roumanians, pp. 116-125; Kopeczi, La France et la Hongne; Mathias Bernath, Habsburg und die Anfange der rumanischen Nationsbildung, Leiden, 1972, pp. 21-46.

An Empire Evolves

77

peace of Karlowitz of 1699, was resented by the Croatian national nobility and frequently subject to complaint in the Croatian estates diet, the Sabor, where subordination under the national authorities was demanded. With this, Croatian and Magyar opposition to imperial centralism merged for a time. In fact the Croatian diet as protest against the im¬ perial centralizing policy had agreed as early as 1691 to send delegates to the Hungarian diet. The banus, the head of the Croatian government, joined in 1625 the Hungarian house of Magnates. The great defender of Szigetvar in 1566 against the overpowering armies of Suleiman II, Count Nikolas Zrinyi (Zrinski) the older, became now a joint Magyar and Croatian hero. The same, though to a lesser degree, was true for his great-grandsons, Nikolas and Peter, who both represented also the Croatian interests in the Hungarian conspiracy of the 1620s. Yet Magyar and Croatian common interests were based only on the limited solidarity of the nobles and the common danger from the Turk¬ ish east. As soon as this threat ceased, the nobles’ position became more precarious also. The Southern Slav problem in Croatia and in the Serb autonomous districts in Hungary assumed new and wider propor¬ tions.25 D.

The STRUGGLE ABOUT THE BALANCE OF POWER

The integration of the Habsburg lands into a moderately centralized empire was closely connected with the Turkish wars. They were primarily fought on territories which until 1918 remained part of the Habsburg monarchy. The simultaneous struggle in the west against France and her satellites represented a different situation. Few contested territories re¬ mained under the Habsburg scepter for a long time. Yet the primary reason for the wars in the west, whether this was clear to the leading statesmen or not, was not the conflict about the possessions of the Spanish crown but a quite different double objective: establishment of a recog¬ nized great-power position and the fight against the supremacy of France. This conflict assumed at times strange forms. The latter part of the seventeenth century and the eighteenth century before the French Revolu¬ tion was the period of the wars of succession. The issues at stake were seemingly the dynastic interests to increase the power of individual sover25 Rudolf Kiszling, Die Kroaten (Graz-Cologne, 1956), pp. 24-38; Gunther E. Rothenberg, The Austrian Military Border in Croatia, 1722-1747 (Urbana, i960), pp. 52-100. Nikolaus von Preradovich, Des Kaisers Grenzer (Vienna, 1970), pp. 767; Kurt Wessely, Die K. K. Militargrenze. Beitrage zu ihrer Geschichte (Vienna,

1973), PP- 29-94-

y8

History of the Hahshurg Empire

eigns on the basis of succession claims. To a point, these wars were in¬ deed fought over the narrow interests of individual dynasties, Habsburgs, French and Spanish Bourbons, Wettins in Saxony and Poland, and Wittelsbachs in Bavaria. Yet the struggle was one for power, that had to be rationalized and in part even justified by reference to uncontested legal claims. Such claims to fight a just war over contested territories could be established most effectively on grounds of succession claims. Hence the wars of devolution and succession, which in the coming nine¬ teenth century were to yield to wars over national issues, that is again largely ideological issues. Again these wars of the future camouflaged im¬ perialist interests, as indeed had been true in part for the seemingly purely ideological religious wars of the past. The fact that these European wars of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries were not primarily ideological did not scale down the ferocity of warfare. A decline in emotional motivation was offset by the advance in military technology and improvements in communications. These advances made the conduct of operations in some respect less hard on the civilan population but in the effect on the combatant forces more deadly. Another difference from previous large-scale wars, was the greater flexibil¬ ity of the alliance systems. Alliances between Catholic and Protestant powers, still rather novel during the Thirty Years’ War, had become common occurrences, which meant that almost everybody could ally with anybody else, even with the Turks. Professional diplomacy thus got an uplift and enjoyed great influence. In this continued diplomatic struggle Habsburg power was handi¬ capped by almost a century (1657 to 1740) of two long reigns of narrow¬ minded rulers, Leopold I and Charles VI. Both were stubborn, of limited vision, and unable to decide. Leopold was more of a bigot than Charles; on the other hand, Leopold’s intelligence and erudition was superior to that of his younger son. The brief reign of the able Joseph I was thus sandwiched between those of two incompetent rulers at the height of the war in the west and the Hungarian revolt in the east. There was little room for diplomatic manoeuvering as was frequently the case under Leopold and Charles. The latter’s failings, however, were partly offset by the activities of the competent diplomats and generals referred to before. To these military commanders the name of Count Guido Starhemberg has to be added for the last years of the reign of Leopold and throughout the War of the Spanish Succession. As for the diplomats, Count Max Trautmannsdorff, chief adviser and

An Empire Evolves

79

representative of Ferdinand III at the Westphalian peace negotiations, was a prudent statesman in foreign affairs and still active in Leopold’s early reign. More controversial was the policy of Prince Wenzel Lobkowitz,

1

the president of the Court War Council, who advocated the harsh

*

course in Hungary, which alienated the Magyars in a critical period. He and another top adviser in foreign affairs, Prince

' i

(Count)

Johann

Weikart Auersperg, pursued a conciliatory policy toward France, which encouraged the young Louis XIV to further aggression. In the later part of the reign of Leopold I, Count Theodor Strattman and Count Dominik Anton Kaunitz proved to be skillful negotiators. Truly outstanding were some of Leopold’s ambassadors at a time, when the deficiency of communications resulted in wide ambassadorial power. Count Franz Eusebius Potting, ambassador to Poland and Spain, was also personally close to Leopold; Count Wenzel Wratislaw, the ambas¬ sador to the Court of St. James, kept a difficult alliance system with En-

}

gland under Leopold and his two sons as long as possible on an even

I

keel; Franz Baron Lisola brilliantly represented the emperor in Poland, Spain, and above all in the Netherlands. Lisola was one of the chief architects of the coming great alliance against France. In the later reign of Charles VI, Count Karl Friedrich Schonborn, the imperial court chan¬ cellor, brought the interests of the Holy Roman Empire and those of the Habsburg power more into line. Count Ludwig Philip Sinzendorf and Baron Johann Christoph Bartenstein—the latter not nominally but ac¬ tually—were chief advisers in international relations during the reign of Charles VI. Both, particularly Bartenstein, the converted son of a Protestant minister, served also with distinction in the early reign of Maria Theresa.26 That the tide after 1718 turned against the Habsburgs was more the fault of the policies of Emperor Charles VI and his neglect of military reorganization than that of the diplomats. As for the generals, only Prince Eugene of Savoy exercised some influence in foreign affairs at the court. Although his military faculties in the last years before his death in 1736 were in decline, his advice not to yield the eastern interests to the Spanish preferences of the emperor was as sound as his distrust in the in¬ ternational guarantees for Maria Theresa’s succession. Leopold’s early reign was largely occupied with counterreformatory activities and increased involvement in Hungarian-Transylvanian affairs, which threatened a confrontation with the Ottoman empire. Efforts to 26 Redlich, Weltmacht des Baroc\ . . . , pp. 56-71, 82-140, 211-217, 388-400.

8o

History of the Hubs burg Empire

undo the devastation of the Thirty Years’ War, linked to a modest pro¬ gram of an elementary kind of mercantilism, played an important role too. There was little interest and as it seemed little need to worry about French policies in the west. Austria refrained from participation in the Franco-Spanish war on the side of Spain as might have been expected. The treaty of the Pyrenees of 1659 had no direct impact on territorial in¬ terests of the eastern Habsburg line but it weakened the position of the Habsburg dynasty as a whole since it was still considered as one house, divided in an older Spanish and a younger closely allied German branch. In Louis XIV’s first war of Devolution of 1667-1668, Leopold according to a secret treaty with the French king managed to stay neutral. In this war, fought over the issue of Louis’s claims to the Spanish Netherlands as dowry not only Habsburg dynastic, but also German imperial interests were at stake, because a French victory would have brought the French power closer to the gates of the Holy Roman Empire. Yet Leopold could rely on the English, Dutch, Swedish intervention, which forced Louis XIV in the peace of Aix la Chapelle to a meager compromise. Louis’s second war (1672-1678), primarily directed against Holland, the core country of the alliance of 1667, afiected the empire more closely, but again Leopold by a neutrality treaty with Louis in 1671 did not dis¬ courage aggression. Several facts eventually forced Leopold’s irresolute hand: Louis’s invasion of an imperial domain, the duchy of Lorraine, in 1670 had aroused some national feelings in the Germanies. The so-called great elector of Brandenburg, Frederick William I, supported Holland and urged Leopold to intervene in behalf of the Dutch States General al¬ though he concluded a separate peace with France as soon as imperial intervention was assured. This time Leopold could not hope that En¬ gland would pull his chestnuts out of the fire. Louis had secured his position in this respect by the neutrality treaty of Dover (1670) with Charles II. Leopold however, was probably more influenced by unmis¬ takable proof, that the king of France had his hand in the Hungarian conspiracy against the emperor. This and Lisola’s advice led to Leopold’s belated decision to intervene as head of the empire in 1674. Ill prepared for military action and conscious of the threat in the east, the results were significant enough to block a full-fledged success by Louis. In the treaties of Nijmwegen of 1678, Holland, subsequently a main bulwark against French advance, remained territorially intact. The rapidly de¬ clining Spanish empire, on the other hand, lost the French Comte and some places in the Spanish Netherlands. The emperor had to cede only Freiburg. Undistinguished in war and, after Lisola’s untimely death in

\ An Empire Evolves

81

1675, also in the peace negotiations, Leopold as other Habsburgs before and after him had at least preserved the chance to fight another day :

against France. It was not far in the offing. Between 1680 and 1683 Louis set up the Chambers of Reunions, the

»

courts of claims which were to validate Louis’s demands to towns in the

(

Alsace and Luxemburg as legally justified. The French occupation oc-

j

curred almost simultaneously with the judgments of the courts. A full-

E

fledged French invasion of the Spanish Netherlands and Lorraine fol-

1

lowed in 1683, that of the territory of the archbishop of Treves in 1684. Yet Leopold in the face of the second great Turkish war of his reign, which led Kara Mustapha’s armies to the gates of Vienna in view of a still critical situation in the east, in 1684 concluded the armistice of

1 Regensburg with France. France, in addition to Strassburg and Luxem¬ burg, could keep all the new places occupied on the basis of the con¬ troversial Reunion decisions of French courts for twenty years. This agreement superseded an alliance with the western German estates of 1682 and another one of the same year with Flolland, Sweden, and Spain to fight the Reunions and the invasions of the Spanish Nether¬ lands. In exchange for a free hand in Hungary, Leopold had for the time being sacrificed his western to his eastern interests. This might be con¬ sidered a matter of mere political expediency except for the fact that in doing so Leopold had violated his sworn obligations as emperor to pro¬ tect the territorial integrity of the Holy Roman Empire. True, resolute action in the west at this time would not only have inter¬ fered with the defense of the Habsburg eastern position but also with its potential expansion in the Orient. In this sense Leopold’s decision was a devious, if unimpressive attempt to preserve the chances to fight at a later more opportune moment for Habsburg and imperial interests in the west, while for the time being accounts could be settled undisturbed by French intervention, in the east.27 Political and ideological orientation may be logically but not necessarily psychologically contradictory. The implicit imperial-French understand¬ ing was, to a point, motivated also by a feeling of Christian solidarity against the Mohammedan onslaught. Thus Louis XIV, even without formal agreement had refrained from attack against the emperor at the height of the Turkish advance in 1683. Yet the successful Habsburg cam¬ paign into Hungary changed all this. In 1688 Louis XIV started his third major war (1688-1697), commonly called the War of the League of Augsburg or the War of the Succession in the Palatinate. The first 27Redlich, ibid., pp. 77-151, 324-375; Braubach,

Versailles und Wien, pp. 7-19.

82

History of the Habshurg Empire

designation refers to the preventive alliance against further French ad¬ vance, formed by the emperor, the kings of Sweden, Spain, and the electors of Bavaria and Saxony. The term War of the Succession in the Palatinate pointed to Louis’s questionable claims on behalf of his clever sister-in-law, Princess Liselotte, sister of the deceased elector Palatine. In September 1688 Habsburg troops had occupied Belgrade, and in the following month Louis started the anticipated offensive into the Palatinate. The aim to check further imperial advances into the east was only a side effect of the French king’s major design to establish pre¬ dominance not only in western Europe, but in Central Europe, above all in Germany. Obviously this was a direct challenge to the empire, the emperor, and Habsburg power as well. Leopold pronounced the Reichskrieg, and a new, even grander alliance consisting of the members of the League of Augsburg, supplemented by England and Holland, came into being. The soul of this coalition was William III of Orange. His accession to the English throne, jointly with his wife Mary II (Stuart) after the Glorious Revolution of 1688 gave British participation a meaning which it never had had before in continental affairs beyond the French-Spanish orbit. Largely due to the preoccupation of Habsburg power in the east the war was on the Allied side fought only with indifferent success. The discord usually concomitant with the actions of a large coalition out¬ weighed almost the advantage of the greater war potential on the Allied side. In the peace of Ryswick (1697) Louis was forced to give up major portions of his previous conquests. The border fortresses between Span¬ ish Netherlands and the States General, however, were to be manned by Dutch troops. Yet this concession on Louis’s part was outweighed by retention of Alsace and Palatinate. Just the same, French aggression was blocked for the time being. The decline of Spain had become ever more obvious, far more so than the rise of Britain, which still suffered from the discord of the civil war and the Restoration period. Dutch power, the most consistent in its opposition to France, had been preserved, but it was too limited to be of decisive importance in a major European confronta¬ tion. The forces of the empire represented such conflicting interests that they were not fully effective. The emperor was far too deeply involved in the eastern war to act decisively in the west. Still, Leopold preserved his chance to intervene in the west if he could bring the war against the Turks to a successful conclusion. This was, indeed, the case when the peace of Karlowitz, which freed most of Hungary from the Turks, was signed in 1699.28 28 Heinrich von Srbik,

Wein and Versailles, i6g2-i6gy (Munich, 1944).

!■

An Empire Evolves

83

A major reason for Louis XIV’s anti-Habsburg policy and for Leopold’s attempts to check it was the question of the Spanish succession. It might ic be compared to an undischarged time bomb, the explosion of which I:

threatened the peace of Europe. This threat lasted throughout the period

tj from the birth of the last Spanish Habsburg, the debilitated Charles II in

: |

1661, to his death in 1700.29 It has been stated previously that the European conflicts about dynastic succession were primarily rationalizations of the struggles for the balance of power or against the supremacy of one continental power. This state¬ ment does not mean, that the European monarchs at a time when the divine-rights theory was still widely respected, considered dynastic wars as pretexts. The legal questions involved were controversial, and both Leo¬ pold and his cousin Louis XIV took their claim to the Spanish succession after the death of the childless king of Spain seriously, in a political and in a dynastic sense. Both rulers were married to daughters of Philip IV, Louis’s consort from the first marriage, Leopold’s from the second. The French king could claim that the renunciation of his wife to the succes¬ sion was void, because the Spanish crown had never paid her duly pledged dowry. As older daughter of Philip IV her claims would precede those of the emperor’s wife. Leopold, with somewhat better reason, could refer to mutual succession pacts between the Spanish and German Habs¬ burg lines. Since Leopold’s first consort had died in 1673, the only son of her daughter, married to the elector of Bavaria, would have been the most obvious successor to the Spanish inheritance as seen from the im¬ perial dynastic viewpoint. Yet, due to the diplomatic cooperation between Bourbons and Wittelsbachs, French interests might have been accom¬ modated, too. After the sudden death of the infant prince in 1699 the legal issue could be considered wide open. Several attempts supported by the good offices of third powers in the interest of the balance of power in Europe were made to prevent the big Bourbon-Habsburg confrontation. Both Louis and Leopold proved to be equally unreasonable in their claims to gain the undivided Spanish in¬ heritance for their houses. The opinion that Louis fought for French dominance and Leopold for the balance of power is true only insofar as the former did get his chance to make a stab for political leadership in Europe and the emperor did not. He certainly did not lack the intent. 29 Charles II (1661-1700) was nominally king since the death of his father Philip IV in 1665. Until 1675 his mother Maria Anna governed as regent in his name, after¬ wards he was king in his own right and notwithstanding his incapacity he exer¬ cised a certain influence on the course of government. See also Reginald TrevorDavies, Spain in Decline 1621-iyoo (London, 1957), pp. 109-140.

84

History of the Habsburg Empire

Efforts to arrive at partition treaties first in favor of the “kur prince” (son of the elector) of Bavaria as a third party with minor adjustments in favor of Austria and France had failed. Yet there was still hope for an eventual compromise. After the prince’s death endeavors to arrive at an understanding sponsored by England and France came to naught. It would have left to Charles, Leopold’s younger son, the bulk of the Span¬ ish inheritance with Naples, Sicily, and Lorraine going to the Bourbon side. Leopold still refused to consent, because a condition of this agree¬ ment would have been a firm commitment that the Spanish and Austrian Habsburg lines should never be united. Irrational overbearing, how¬ ever, was not confined to one side. When French diplomacy in Madrid finally won out it was precisely the same attitude on the part of Louis XIV, which led to the War of the Spanish Succession. When the dying king of Spain finally signed a will in favor of Louis’s second grandson, Philip, Duke of Anjou, Louis refused to make a commitment concerning the permanent separation of the French and Spanish crowns. In this respect he followed a precedent set by his imperial cousin, Leopold I, concerning the relationship of the Austrian and Spanish Habsburg lines. Unlike Louis, however, Leopold was not confronted with the actual bequest of the undivided Spanish inheritance. The French king, aware of the fact that this comprehensive bequest would appeal to the Spanish pride better than any partition agreement in the interest of the balance of power, de¬ cided to take advantage of the situation. He deemed it no longer neces¬ sary to commit himself to the permanent separation of the French and Spanish crowns, however remote the contingency of union was. There¬ with he provoked the great war, which the emperor probably would have brought about already, if his younger son, Charles, had been the sole ben¬ eficiary of the will. There is, however, a political difference in the situation. The European powers on the strength of Louis’s record in foreign and domestic policies had reason to believe that he had the power and ability to establish a genuine union between France and Spain. It was doubtful that Leopold had the political strength and administrative capacity to do the same in regard to two Habsburg empires.30 The great war, in which hostilities were opened in summer of 1701, was in two ways unique in the history of the Habsburg monarchy. First, it was the only war, in which not Austria’s survival but her emergence as one of the leading continental powers was an issue. Even though her chances to become the predominant power on the continent of Europe 30 Braubach, Versailles und Wien, pp. 7-27; Redlich, Weltmacht des Baroc\ . . . , PP- 37^4l4-

An Empire Evolves

85

may have been more remote than those of France, she was a more active agent in this great coalition war than ever before and afterward. Second, 1

the War of the Spanish Succession showed Austria’s military proficiency at its best. The commanders of her armies, Margrave Louis of Baden, Count Guido Starhemberg, and above all Prince Eugene of Savoy, gained victories on a general European scale, unrivaled in the Habsburgs’ history. The lineup of the two armed camps saw England and Holland, the chief Protestant powers, on the imperial side. It will always remain con¬ jecture whether an earlier and more reasonable peace could have been achieved, if King William III, the ruler of both countries and chief architect of the alliance, had not died at the beginning of the war. The other principal allies of the emperor were the new elector of Hanover, the elector of Brandenburg, as well as (after 1701) the Holy Roman Empire as a whole. The participation of Brandenburg had to be bought by the emperor’s consent to the elector’s Frederick I coronation as king in Prussia, legally then no longer a Polish fief. Even though this elevation did not involve imperial territory, it accelerated the rise of PrussiaBrandenburg to a position where she could challenge Austrian leadership in Germany. Frederick’s “promotion” was only one and not the decisive factor in this development. France was supported by Max Emanuel, the ambitious elector of Bavaria, the emperor’s son-in-law, whose imperial aspirations were en¬ couraged by Louis XIV. The ecclesiastic elector of Cologne and the Dukes of Mantua and Savoy (Sardinia) likewise supported Louis, al¬ though Eugene’s victories in Italy had already persuaded the latter to change sides in 1703. At that time Portugal also joined the alliance. While the Austro-British led coalition represented the greater war potential, Spain herself, the chief battle ground of the war, leaned defi¬ nitely to the French claimant and disliked the Austrian archduke Charles.31 It was widely believed that Louis’s grandson would be better qualified to preserve the Spanish identity and great-power tradition than the Habsburg prince. Such beliefs were hardly based on the evaluation of characters. Both, the later king Philip V of Spain and Emperor Charles VI (as rival king of Spain Charles III) were mediocre personalities. It is more suggestive that Spanish public opinion—which could not be ignored entirely even in a country under autocratic rule—saw the German Habsburg linked to a variety of extraneous Central and eastern European interests, whereas the conversion of a French to a Spanish prince seemed to be simpler. Until 1712, the military operations of the war, on the side of the grand 81 Except for Catalonia. See also Krones, Handbuch, IV, 83-86.

History of the Hahshurg Empire

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alliance, were governed by the strategy of the two equally outstanding soldiers, the British John Churchill, Duke of Marlborough, and Eugene of Savoy. The two commanders scored a series of spectacular victories against an excellent slate of French generals, foremost among them Villars, Vendome, and the great military engineer, Vauban. It must suffice here to refer to Eugene’s victories in the northern Italian campaigns, Luzzara (1702) and Turin (1706). Joint victories by Eugene and Marl¬ borough were fought in southern Germany at Hochstadt and Blenheim (1704). Chief credit for this later triumph, one of the most brilliant strategic surprise movements executed in the history of warfare, should go to Marlborough, who scored also at Ramillies (1706) in the Spanish Netherlands, and again jointly with Eugene at Oudenarde (1708) and Malplaquet (1709) in Flanders. In casualties this was the costliest battle on either side.32 Nevertheless, the peace negotiations which had begun in 1708 ended in failure. Louis by this time was ready to surrender the whole Spanish in¬ heritance and let the victors divide the spoils with the lion’s share to be going to Charles. The Allied demand that the French king should, be¬ yond this, make a financial contribution to the Austro-British campaigns in Spain, and, if necessary, drive his grandson by force of arms from Spanish soil, has always been considered an example of ruthless arrogance and political blindness. Yet it must be added that the Allied demand was made not without reason though perhaps not with good reason. To dislodge Philip and invest the Austrian prince against the will of the majority of all strata of Spanish society was something the Allies had failed to achieve in seven years of warfare and were not likely to ac¬ complish with French help either, which, of course, due to Louis’s re¬ fusal they did not get. Still, they saw in the possibility of such support at least a chance to achieve their objective. Experience of the future proved that to fight the Spaniards on their own soil was a hopeless task. It proveed the futility of the great war altogether convincingly. The rejection of the French peace offer indicated the turning of the tide in the fortunes of the warring parties. Several factors accounted for this. Religious differences strained the alliance. The pope, who frowned upon the Austro-British-Dutch coalition, gave his moral support to Philip. The British and Dutch in turn resented the suppression of the revolutionary movement in Hungary and Transylvania, inasmuch as counterreformatory tendencies against Protestants were involved there. °2 Redlich, Das Werden . . . , pp. 1-93; John B. Wolf, The Emergence of the Great Powers, 1685-17/5 (New York, 1951), pp. 170-181.

!

An Empire Evolves

8j

The same issue was involved, when Charles XII of Sweden in the Great Northern War marched through Silesia to Saxony and supported the cause of the Silesian Protestants. Joseph I, the new emperor, yielded in the peace of Altranstadt of 1707 to Charles XII’s intervention and had to ■ relieve the king in his capacity as prince of the empire of all obliga¬ tions to support the imperial war against France. Joseph had acted pru¬ dently, when by these sacrifices he managed to extricate himself from involvement in the eastern war with Russia and Poland. But he had done i so largely because he depended on the good will of his Protestant Allies and this was hardly popular at the Austrian court. In the long run it did not help much to improve Austro-British relations either. The Whig party, which supported the war, was in decline in England. In 1710 it had to yield to a Tory government, which was in favor of peace. Its cause was strengthened by the fact that support of the Stuart pretender to the British throne on the part of Louis had now become academic. Marlborough, by order of the new Tory ministry, was restricted to defensive action and in 1711 relieved of his command altogether. England was well on the way to leave the alliance. The reason usually given for this decision is the unexpected death of Emperor Joseph in 1711. This left one single Habsburg ruler, Charles, for both Spain, the empire and the eastern possessions of the house of Austria. France being weakened already, the resurrection of the empire of Charles V might at this point have disturbed the European balance of power even more seriously than a compromise with France. Actually, Leopold’s pactum mutuae successionis of 1703, discussed at the beginning of this

chapter, was no surprise to the state chancelleries of Europe. Everybody took it for granted, that the Habsburgs would claim the mutual succes¬ sion, if the male line of either one of Leopold’s sons should become ex¬ tinct. The great coalition supported the Habsburg side, not because the Habsburgs could be trusted any more than the Bourbons never to attempt the union of the Spanish inheritance with their own lands. But such a dreaded union under the auspices of an administratively, economically, and culturally advanced state like France appeared more likely and dangerous than under the Habsburg scepter. The Habsburg power system looked now perhaps not much stronger than in 1702, but France was relatively weaker. Hence the change in the British-Dutch position concerning continuation of the great alliance, when Charles, the Habsburg pretender king of Spain, was elected emperor in 1711 after his brother’s death. A stubborn man of limited ability had thus taken charge of the Austrian fortunes during the last phase of the war.

88

History of the Habsburg Empire

Charles’s decision to continue the struggle single-handed after his major allies had concluded peace with France compounded the mistakes of his predecessors. In the treaty of Utrecht (April, 1713), Spain and the colonies were left to Philip, whose royal line had to give up any further claims to rule in France, unlikely as such contingency had been even be¬ fore. Except for Minorca and Gibraltar, France and not Spain had to satisfy the colonial claims of Britain, the chief winner in the struggle. Holland received the right to garrison the barrier fortifications between the Spanish Netherlands and her own territories. With this right a major encumbrance was to be put upon the Habsburg claims to these territories. Yet it was Charles’s fault alone, when his interests were not adequately represented in these negotiations.33 The same was true when Sicily was given to Savoy and Sardinia was reserved for the emperor, even though the former island was almost contiguous to Naples, whose subsequent acquisition could be expected, whereas Sardinia was separated from Habsburg territory. Brandenburg-Prussia gained Neuchatel and Guelders, in addition to international recognition of the royal title of her ruler; Portugal obtained frontier rectifications in the colonies. Major additional Austrian gains were thus foreclosed, while the Habsburgs continued the struggle. Moreover, Austria’s former allies were now obliged to the sea powers and not to the emperor for their territorial gains. The new emperor, Charles VI, carried on until 1714 with indifferent results, for which none of his generals was to blame. In March, 1714, France and Austria finally signed a peace treaty at Rastatt. In September, peace with the Holy Roman Empire was concluded at Baden in Switzer¬ land. This treaty was essentially a mere confirmation of the agreement of Rastatt. Even though the imperial forces had by this time cleared out of Spain, Charles did not recognize reality and refused to make peace with King Philip V. According to the terms of Rastatt, which could be almost fully en¬ visaged at Utrecht, Austria received the Spanish Netherlands—that is, most present-day Belgium. The value of this acquisition, however, was restricted by the barrier treaties concluded with the Dutch (and the back¬ ing of Britain) in 1713, 1715, and 1718. It was humiliating that the Dutch could garrison the frontier fortifications in southern Belgium against France at Belgian—this meant practically Austrian—expense. More im¬ portant was the provision that the Scheld river must be closed to ocean 33 Count Philip Sinzendorf served merely as a kind of imperial observer at the peace conference. See also Max Braubach, Prinz Eugen von Savoyen, 5 vols. (Vienna, 1963-1965), III, 99-144.

i An Empire Evolves

89

:

trade.34 In Italy, the emperor obtained Naples, Milan, Mantua, Sardinia,

:

but not Sicily. Some of these scattered new domains were rich acquisi-

\

tions, but also encumbrances, difficult to defend. These consequences of

:

the war for Austria must be laid largely at the door of Charles’s personal

!

failings, in particular his inordinate dynastic pride. The outcome was

E

disappointing.35 The main positive result was that the danger of a French-dominated Europe had passed. This outcome could have been achieveed at an earlier stage of the war, if not by a reasonable compromise even before its out¬ break. The reestablishment of a Habsburg monarchy in Spain, even of a Spain deprived of many of its appendages and colonies might have en¬ hanced the imperial position in the same way as the various FrenchSpanish Bourbon family compacts helped to strengthen prestige and security of France. Since Austria failed to achieve this aim, she lost the war as issue of political prestige, which counted for much at that time. It largely obscured the fact that the major objective of blocking the su¬ premacy of France in Europe had been achieved. On the other hand, the acquisition of the Spanish Netherlands—not contiguous to the bulk of the Habsburg domains and by treaties curtailed in regard to their future economic development—was practically indefensible. Belgium could at most serve as compensatory object for later territorial barter. An attempt by Joseph II to exchange it for Bavaria, however, was understandably enough blocked by Frederick II of Prussia in 1785. Disregarding the merely transitory provisions of the peace of Campo Formio of 1797, in which the Austrian Netherlands and Lombardy were traded for the territory of the Republic of Venice, a final deal was made only at the Congress of Vienna. Austria received now the so-called LombardoVenetian kingdom in exchange for the Spanish Netherlands. With this exchange Austria became further and more permanently in¬ volved in Italian affairs, a development which had not actually started but had been activated by the treaty of Rastatt. The kingdoms of Naples and Sardinia belonged to the poorest regions of Italy and were difficult to defend without sea power. Milan and Mantua had strategic value, the former also economic wealth. Yet here Habsburg power was to become involved in the centuries-old internal and external conflicts of the penin34 Actually agreed for the first time in the Westphalian peace negotiations at Munster in 1648 between the representatives of Philip IV of Spain and those of the Dutch republic. The later barrier agreement specified the issue further. 35 Redlich, Das Werden . . . pp. 93-147; John B. Wolf, Toward a European Balance of Power, 1620-IJ15 (Chicago, 1970), pp. 156-196.

go

History of the Hahshurg Empire

sula. Here, too, the lack o£ sea power prevented the development of these possessions to full economic advantage. The geographic position of Italy and political and economic interests of France, Spain, Britain, and for the time being Venice and Tuscany, made it impossible for the Habsburgs even to think of the unification of Italy under their scepter. All that could be done was to keep a hold on scattered possessions, which offered little benefits in the face of foreign competition and were exposed to attack by other powers. When the possessions in Italy were finally consolidated in 1814 no gain could be expected either. The rise of nation¬ alism after the great French revolution made new Austrian policies still¬ born from the new start. Not all this could be foreseen in 1714. Yet the geographic and economic facts should have been clear. The unfortunate policy helped to create the notion of the nonhomogeneous unorganic empire almost from the time the great power was born. And such belief was largely due to Charles Vi’s unfortunate attempts to hold on to the illusion of a Spanish empire under Habsburg rule. As he saw it, any control of the shreds of Spanish terri¬ tories in Europe, but particularly in Italy, left the door open to the reali¬ zation of his dreams. They were persistently tied to the west and south¬ west. They largely ignored the east, where the development of a better integrated empire might still have been feasible. E.

Stalemate and decline

The first decades after 1740-1741 when new rulers ascended the throne in the Habsburg empire, Russia and Prussia initiated the era usually re¬ ferred to in diplomatic history as that of the reversal of alliances. The new Austro-French and British-Prussian associations came into being step by step. In the transitional preceding period (1714-1740) no definite new lineup was recognizable. But it became clear that the old alliance systems had outlived their usefulness. For a generation they were replaced by new combinations based on expediency and devoid of any ideological foundation, not even that of loyalty to treaty obligations. Only after the War of the Austrian Succession (1740-1748) were the new alliances more stable. The seeds of the earlier instability resulted largely from the out¬ come of the War of the Spanish Succession as unsatisfactory for all conti¬ nental parties. In particular also the power vacuum in continental Europe created by the gradual decline of France became a factor of international insecurity. The ways of the new alliance systems were shifty, but some trends in Austrian policies are recognizable. In the first place, Charles VI had not

k I

An Empire Evolves

gi

given up hope to become king of Spain, and neither had King Philip V of Spain resigned himself to the loss of his Italian possessions; continued conflict was therefore inevitable. Secondly, the emperor was anxious to establish a unified order of succession. It became necessary to test its validity by assuring the succession of a female Plabsburg, Charles Vi’s oldest daughter, Maria Theresa. The emperor believed this could be as¬ sured only by international guarantee from the European powers—at a price. As part of the price Austrian eastern policy became now increas¬ ingly obliged to conform to Russian interests. This development put brakes on the Habsburg empire’s freedom of diplomatic movement. For almost a century, until 1813-1814, the peace of Passarowitz in 1718, which terminated Charles Vi’s first Turkish war, was the last unqualified success of Habsburg arms and political power. In 1717 and 1718 Spain, with whom the emperor had refused to sign a peace treaty, occupied Sardinia and Sicily. The feeble response of the signatories of the treaty system of Utrecht, Rastatt, and Baden was the quadruple alliance of En¬ gland, France, Holland, and Austria to maintain the provisions of the peace terms. In 1720 a compromise, the treaty of the Hague, terminated the conflict. Charles finally recognized the Bourbon rule in Spain, and in return an exchange of Sardina and Sicily took place between Savoy and Austria, after the islands were evacuated by Spain. With Sicily, Austria had thus gained another noncontiguous, hardly defensible territory. A Spanish secundogeniture in Parma, Piacenza, and Tuscany was promised to the second son of the King of Spain. Yet Spain had not done too well either. King Philip, intellectually hardly superior to his imperial colleague, was ready to pay a price for the Habsburg recognition of a loss which the emperor could not have recovered anyway. Furthermore, in the spring of 1725 a rather meaningless Austro-Spanish alliance in which Austria pledged to support Spain in her fight for the recovery of Gibraltar in exchange for the Spanish recognition of the Austrian Ostende Trade Company, founded between 1719 and 1722 for the trade with the East and West Indies and the coasts of Africa, did not serve the true interests of either power. Spain failed to regain Gibraltar, but Austria’s pledge of help was a major step in the deterioration of relations with Britain. The British response was an alliance of 1725, for the maintenance of the Euro¬ pean balance of power, with France, Holland, Prussia, Denmark, and Sweden. This treaty system was directed against the discontent of Spain and Austria, whose feeble colonial ambitions aroused British concern. From that time on, Charles’s foreign policy was ever more clearly directed to obtaining international guarantees for the recognition of his

History of the Hahshurg Empire

92

daughter’s succession, although Prince Eugene advised that rearmament would be better than paper guarantees. Actually, both guarantees and armaments combined were entirely justified, but one could not replace the other. Had this been properly understood, an Austria strong in arms and guarantees would hardly have been challenged after the death of Charles VI in 1740. In the fall of 1725 Charles succeeded in obtaining Spain’s recognition of the Pragmatic Sanction in return for the emperor’s promise to marry Maria Theresa and one of her sisters to the sons of Philip V. There was considerable imperial naivete involved in this deal. Despite assurances, the Bourbons could have followed Louis XIV’s earlier pattern to make later claims of devolution resulting from such marriage contracts. This contingency did not arise, however, since both England and Holland saw in these marriage projects a threat to the future European balance of power, which had been so precariously established at Utrecht. The king of Prussia, Frederick William I, was likewise opposed to this mar¬ riage plan for the Austrian heiress. He wished her to become the consort of a prince from a German house. Consequently, Charles as partial price for the British and Prussian recognition of the Pragmatic Sanction (in 1726 and 1731), withdrew his consent to the Spanish marriage of Maria Theresa. A partial price, indeed! Charles had to promise also to support the Prussian king’s claim to the succession to the duchy of Berg. The fric¬ tion caused by this pledge put an ominous strain on imperial-Prussian relations.36 Even more far-reaching were the concessions, which the emperor was forced to make to England for her consent to the female succession, al¬ though the island power had no primary interest in this question. The price for the British recognition of the Pragmatic Sanction was the dissolu¬ tion of Charles Vi’s Trade Company. This move followed temporary suspension conceded in 1727. To sum up the foregoing: The sweeping concessions laid future Austrian colonial aspirations to rest for all times. In principle Charles Vi’s Trade Company project was on of his few constructive ideas. The de¬ sign, however, probably would not have succeeded because the Belgian base could hardly be defended by Austria. The difficulty of maintaining the company’s headquarters and naval installations in a port across the British channel coast would presumably have increased the more the company would have prospered. To assume, however, that Charles was motivated by such long-term considerations would credit him with too 36 Braubach, Versailles und Wien, pp. 105-185.

An Empire Evolves

93

much foresight. His decision to abandon this interesting project was prob¬ ably based primarily on his curious sense of values which rated an un¬ contested succession and the control of the genuine Italian appendages of the Spanish crown higher than other interests.37 When in 1726 Russia joined the tenuous Austro-Spanish alliance, Charles, as will be remembered, made another sacrifice in connection with the succession issue: the reorientation of Habsburg eastern policy in favor of Russia. Direct consequences of this shift were the disastrous outcome of the Turkish war of 1737-1739 and indirectly the unsatisfactory result of the last war against the Ottoman empire 1788-1791. These mat¬ ters have been discussed briefly in the survey on the Turkish wars. In 1732 other German states recognized the Pragmatic Sanction. Of significance were in particular the declarations of the electors. One of them was Frederick Augustus I of Saxony (as king of Poland Augustus II) whose son Frederick Augustus II was married to the first-born daughter of Charles Vi’s older brother, Emperor Joseph I. The other elec¬ tor was Charles Albert of Bavaria, married to Joseph’s younger daughter. Both princesses, who thus came from an older line of the dynasty than Maria Theresa, had duly renounced their claims to the succession when they were married. Neither the elector of Saxony, Augustus, who was in several ways indebted to Austria, nor that of Bavaria respected their consorts’s disclaimers. In fact, Charles Albert of Bavaria’s father had signed a secret treaty with France in 1714, according to which the French king pledged his support to Wittelsbach claims to the imperial title and lands of the Bohemian crown.38 These Bavarian claims were to become an unpleasant surprise, to be revealed only after the emperor’s death. Frederick Augustus of Saxony demanded immediately and obtained a price for the recognition of the Pragmatic Sanction, though this did not prevent him to challenge Maria Theresa’s succession in 1740. He asked for imperial support for his candidacy to the Polish crown when the throne became vacant in i732.The majority of the Polish nobles supported Stanislas Lesczinski, the father-in-law of Louis XV, who once before (1704-1709) had been Polish king, and an undistinguished one at that. Neither did the candidate of the minority, Frederick Augustus of Saxony, 37 Redlich, Das Werden . . . , pp. 255-271; Krones, Handbuch, IV, 120-137. 38 Technically the Bavarian claims were not based on a refusal to recognize the Pragmatic Sanction but on a clause in the will of the Emperor Ferdinand I ac¬ cording to which the Wittelsbach dynasty would succeed after the male Habsburg line had become extinct. Yet this claim was evidently based on a forgery. Ferdinand’s will referred to the extinction of all legitimate heirs that is those born in wedlock and not just male heirs. See also Krones, Handbuch, IV, 173-176.

History of the Hahshurg Empire

94

surpass him in abilities as a ruler. Yet Frederick Augustus was Russia’s candidate and thereby that of her ally Austria. Stanislas was supported by France. It was against Russian interests to have a king supported by a great power as well as by the majority of the Polish Sejm. Undoubtedly, Frederick Augustus, who had little backing in the country would be more dependent on the mighty Russian neighbor. For that reason Austria should have favored the French candidate. In that case Poland would not have become a Russian satellite, and France completely separated from Poland could have done little to sway the kingdom in the long run. A Russian predominance in Poland, on the other hand, might create diffi¬ culties at Austria’s eastern borders. Charles Vi’s reasoning, however, was different. In the first place, in relation to Russia he could no longer act as a free agent. Secondly, the Bourbons were still the traditional enemies of the Habsburgs, and im¬ perial support of the elector of Saxony would add another signature to the parchment collection guaranteeing the Pragmatic Sanction. Thus, Charles entered the Polish War of Succession (1733-1735) on the SaxonRussian side, that is, from the viewpoint of genuine Austrian interests, on the wrong side. The results of this war for the Habsburgs were equally disappointing in a military and diplomatic sense. Neither the army nor its more than seventy-year-old commander Eugene of Savoy could be compared with the armed forces and their leadership in the War of the Spanish Succes¬ sion and the first Turkish war fought in Charles’s reign. The Russians let the Austrians do most of the fighting. The Rhine army under Eugene’s command barely held its own and could not prevent the con¬ quest of Lorraine by the French under Marshal Villars. Spain and Savoy, who saw their chance in Italy, gave the emperor a lesson concerning the reliability of treaty obligations. Worse could be expected after his death since the poor state of the Austrian military establishment had now been fully revealed to the world. The Austrians lost most of their Italian possessions to the FrenchSpanish-Savoyan military forces. Villars, Eugene of Savoy’s old counter¬ part, took Milan, and the Spanish occupied Naples and Sicily. The hostilities ended in 1735, but a formal peace treaty was not signed until November 1738 in Vienna. According to its terms Frederick Augustus of Saxony was recognized as King Augustus III of Poland, Stanislas Lesczinski was retired as duke of Lorraine (actually only Upper Lorraine) to be yielded by the young sovereign of the duchy, Francis Stephan. After the death of the aged Stanislas, Lorraine, legally still imperial land, was

An Empire Evolves

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to become part of France.39 After the expected extinction of the Medici dynasty in Tuscany, Francis Stephan, now a landless prince, was to suc¬ ceed there as ruler with the seat of residence in Florence. This was con¬ sidered to be a meager substitute for Lorraine, but an added compensa¬ tion of considerable prestige and political significance was the marriage to the emperor’s heiress, Archduchess Maria Theresa, in 1736. As a pleas¬ ant by product, this diplomatically arranged deal became one of the rare princely love marriages in history.40 If Francis thus did not fare too badly, Austria did. Naples and Sicily were ceded to a Spanish secundogeniture in Italy under the second son of Philip V. Parma and Piacenza were in turn given to Austria. To¬ gether with Tuscany, where Francis and Maria Theresa ruled after 1736, these principalities would become secundo- and tertio-genitures for their offspring. The French pledge to recognize the Pragmatic Sanction, sup¬ posedly a major concession, had to be considered as worthless. The estab¬ lishment of the Saxon King in Poland, though brought about largely by Austrian military efforts and territorial sacrifices, served mainly Russian interests. Naples and Sicily, although poorly developed, were strategically and perhaps also economically more promising domains than Parma and Piacenza. Even now the Austrian possessions in Italy, though closer to the hereditary lands than Naples and Sicily, did not represent a homogen¬ eous and fully contiguous territory adjacent to the hereditary lands. It might have been conceivable to establish a new trading company in southern Italian territory. The only major Tuscanese port, Livorno, faced the Tyrrhenian sea, whereas Habsburg commercial trade by sea pointed toward the Levant. This meant that Austrian dreams to become a sea power beyond the almost landlocked Adriatic Sea had come to an end within less than twenty years after they were born. They followed thus the termination of colonial aspirations, brought about by the previous dissolution of the Trading Company in Ostende. The Habsburgs had gained no shred of security for all their sacrifices. On the contrary, the poor showing in the War of the Polish Succession, compounded by the defeat and ensuing territorial losses in Charles’s sec¬ ond Turkish war (1737-1739)? put Europe on notice that a second em¬ pire might soon be put on the auction block to be parceled out to the 39 Upper Lorraine, in substance the territory around Metz and Nancy, still re¬ tained representation at the imperial Reichstag in Regensburg. This ambiguous status was a contributory cause to the war of the First Coalition against France in 1792. 40 Braubach, Versailles und Wien, pp. 186-275; Redlich, Das Werden . . . , pp. 277-287; Wladyslaw Konopzynski, The Cambridge History of Poland (Cambridge, 1951), II, chapt. 1, 25-32.

g6

History of the Hahshurg Empire

highest bidders. The rapid accumulation of territories between 1713 and 1718 and the almost equally speedy losses between 1737 and 1739 seemed to confirm the experience that a soap bubble busts all the more easily the more rapidly it is blown up. F.

The great-power position is tested

Charles VI died on October 20, 1740, and within less than two months the great struggle known in history as the War of the Austrian Suc¬ cession (1740-1748) had begun with its first installment: the invasion of Silesia by the new king of Prussia, Frederick II. Neither the specific con¬ flict between Austria and Prussia nor the character of Maria Theresa’s mo¬ mentous reign, which was initiated by the war, will be discussed in this section. The War of the Austrian Succession will be perceived as the end of the era of the evolution of Austria as a great power. The reign of Maria Theresa belongs to a new one, discussed in Chapter V. Maria Theresa’s succession was challenged at once by Bavaria, Saxony, and Spain, whose rulers made claims to the succession in all Habsburg lands, by the elector of Bavaria on the strength of his marriage to a daughter of Joseph I and Ferdinand I’s alleged will. This former issue was now raised also by the elector of Saxony and new king of Poland. The Spanish crown considered itself heir to the succession treaties between the two main branches of the Habsburg dynasty. None of these demands had a legal foundation. Prussia did not challenge the succession, but merely demanded the cession of Silesia. Frederick II himself did not take the legal grounds on which this request was made too seriously. Neither was there much substance to the initial claims of Savoy to all or part of the duchy of Milan. What counted in the territorial aspects of this war, one of the most widespread in history before World War I, was not the comprehensiveness of the individual claims but the total political impact of the claimants and the seriousness of their purpose to enforce their dubious demands. The attempts to bring about the dismemberment of the Habsburg em¬ pire were fully backed and largely initiated by France, which hoped in the beginning to get rid of her major European rival without direct mili¬ tary intervention. Of the other powers, England, Holland, and Russia could not be considered openly favoring Austria, yet they had a common interest in preventing a complete upset of the balance of power in Eu¬ rope. Of general political claims to the succession, those of Bavaria had to be taken most seriously, not on account of the military strength of the country, but because France used her demands as the most convenient

An Empire Evolves

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handle to bring about Austria’s disintegration. Spain and Saxony hoped to fish in troubled waters but they never really expected to become heirs to all Austrian lands. Savoy’s limited and brief intervention depended on the involvement of others; Prussia’s success directed at limited objec¬ tives was primarily due to the military proficiency of her army. A major diplomatic event of the war was the alliance of Nymphenburg of May, 1741, between France, Spain, and Bavaria, in which France pledged to support the claims of the two other powers. The fact that these claims in their comprehensiveness were actually mutually exclusive, shows convincingly that this phase of European history was more anti¬ thetic to ideological issues than almost any period of the past after the early Middle Ages. What counted more than anything else in Austria’s disfavor was the French promise to support the Bavarian elector Charles Albert as candidate for the crown of the Holy Roman empire. Only a week after the Nymphenburg agreement France concluded a treaty with Bavaria and Prussia, according to which Prussia’s conquest of Lower Silesia, initiated already in December of 1740 and completed by October of 1741, was recognized. In turn, Frederick of Prussia undertook the obli¬ gation to support the imperial claims of the elector of Bavaria. Charles Albert was to receive also Bohemia and a major part of the hereditary lands. In August, 1741, another treaty of support was concluded between France and Saxony, Austria’s former ally. In November, an additional pact of mutual assistance and guarantee of conquests was concluded be¬ tween Bavaria and Prussia. The more often the same issues are confirmed by treaty obligations, the less is observance of each specific agreement to be trusted. In October, 1741, Maria Theresa and Frederick II had concluded the secret pact of Klein-Schnellendorf, according to which Austria after the unfavorable outcome of the first campaign was forced to cede Lower Silesia to Prussia and Prussia in turn promised to desist from further attack. With this pact Frederick managed to doublecross friend and foe alike. The ruler of Bavaria, elected emperor in January, 1742, at the time when he was crowned in February in Frankfurt, was practically a prince without land. The Austrians had occupied a part of Bavaria including the capital Munich. By December, 1742, the Bavarians were forced also to evacuate Bohemia, which they had occupied only a few months before with French help. In accordance with the changing fortunes of the war Sardinia-Savoy in return for the promise of the Milanese territory west of the Ticino reversed her position, and her noble king joined now the Austrian side. Yet a new setback was in store for Maria Theresa. Fred-

g8

History of the Hubs burg Empire

erick, contrary to the convention of Klein-Schnellendorf, had resumed the war; Austria after further defeats had to cede not only Lower but also Upper Silesia to Prussia in June and July, 1742 (preliminary peace of Breslau and permanent peace of Berlin).41 Against all Austrian expecta¬ tions this turned out to be in the end a permanent cession. Yet, not everything was lost for Austria. In September, 1743, England, Sardina, and Austria pledged a concerted effort to drive the Spanish armies out of central and northern Italy. A firm French-Spanish alliance followed as response. Saxony, scared now by the unexepected Prussian military success, reverted to the more predictable Austrian side. To even up the score, France in May, 1744, officially declared war on Austria and England. This move formalized merely a state of hostilities which in camouflaged manner had commenced after the death of Charles VI. The old British fear of the Bourbon French-Spanish family alliance with its inherent threat to the balance of power in Europe now worked clearly in favor of Austria. Meanwhile Frederick II, worried that Austria might be almost ready for a recovery of Silesia, concluded a new alliance with France, whose trust he had violated by the peace of Berlin. In August, 1744, Frederick marched through Saxony—the Belgium of the second half of the eigh¬ teenth century—into Bohemia. After severe, costly, but largely indecisive fighting, peace was concluded at Dresden on Christmas day 1745. Fred¬ erick maintained what he had gotten in the first Silesian war, but dropped plans for further conquests in Bohemia, which were beyond his reach. He also recognized Francis of Lorraine as emperor, whose election had taken place in September 1745 after Charles (Albert) VII’s death had ended his unhappy reign in January of the same year. The election of Francis, undistinguished as he was as emperor of the decaying Holy Roman Empire, restored prestige to the house of Austria. Since Maria Theresa as a woman was legally barred from accession to the imperial throne of the Holy Roman Empire in her own right, this meant for all practical, though not legal, purposes that the Habsburg dynasty under the new heading House of Habsburg-Lorraine would continue to bear the imperial title. The weakness of the empire notwithstanding, this meant further that Austria in the future would not be deprived of the force of nearly a millennium of imperial tradition. The nominal chief challenger, Bavaria, through the son of Charles Albert, acknowl¬ edged now in the peace of Fiissen April, 1745, the Pragmatic Sanction. Maria Theresa, heretofore known as queen of Bohemia and Hungary,

41 Austria,

however, kept Teschen, Troppau and Jagerndorf.

An Empire Evolves

99

and now officially empress consort, was from now on referred to as em¬ press or empress-queen, a title which not in law but in practice cor¬ responded to the majesty of her position and personality. The war continued for a time in full fury, and spread even further. The French and British battled each other not only in the Austrian Netherlands, where the French won the spectacular victory at Fontenoy in May, 1745, but also in North America and India. The final determi¬ nation of most of the colonial issues was not made until the peace of Paris in 1763. Yet as far as the Austrian War of Succession was con¬ cerned, the main issue could be considered as settled. Maria Theresa’s succession war hardly any longer in doubt after 1745. Still, the war in western Italy continued with indifferent results; by 1746 the SpanishFrench troops withdrew, but they managed to stay in the Austrian Netherlands and made even forays into Holland. But a defensive Austrian-Russian alliance of June, 1746, directed against a potential new Prussian attack, protected the Habsburgs from their militarily most formidable foe. The peace treaty of Aix la Chapelle, in which Count (later Prince) Anton Wenzel Kaunitz-Rietberg, the future state chancellor, showed his superb skill as Austria’s chief negotiator, was concluded in October, 1748. In addition to the loss of Silesia, the Habsburgs had to cede Parma, Piacenza, and Guastalla to the third son of Philip of Spain. Parma was to return to Austria, in case the Spanish line should become extinct as it actually occurred after the French Revolution. Savoy’s gain of the Milanese territories west of the Ticino was confirmed. The Spanish Neth¬ erlands, under existing conditions more an encumbrance than a source of power, were returned to Austria. The basic issue over which the war, in a sense the first world war, was fought, Maria Theresa’s succession according to the Pragmatic Sanction, was accepted by all parties. So was the Habsburg-Lorraine imperial title in the Holy Roman Empire. Aus¬ tria’s losses in Italy may be considered as negligible, but that of Silesia, had far-reaching consequences for Austria’s position in Germany and even for the future development of the national problems in the Habsburg monarchy. These issues will be discussed in different contexts in chapters V and VII. Maria Theresa did not yet write off Silesia. The loss in political prestige was made up by the fact that the Habsburg empire had survived concerted attacks and not been reduced like Spain in 17131714 to a secondary power, or like Poland in 1735 to a Russian puppet state. The pacification of Hungary secured in 1711 was still effective. When

100

History of the Habsburg Empire

Maria Theresa appeared in summer, 1741, before the Hungarian estates at Pozsony they pledged their support and asked only for relatively minor concessions on the issue of tax exemption. The military assistance of the Hungarian estates’ forces, the so-called estates insurrection, did not amount to much help, but the fact that the estates did not exploit the actual situa¬ tion of the courageous young queen to renewed revolutionary advantage, cemented the stability of her rule. The Bohemian estates however, con¬ scious of their abject reduction in political status after the Battle of the White Mountain, gave Charles Albert of Bavaria in 1741-1742 consider¬ able support, but they accepted the reestablishment of Habsburg rule with¬ out revolutionary action. Bavarian over lordship seemed just as far, if not farther, removed from their national aspirations than the Habsburg scepter. The defensive success of Habsburg power in the War of the Austrian Succession was not the result of particular military brilliance. Austria had great generals under Leopold I, Joseph I, and the earlier part of the reign of Charles VI, and respectable ones later in the Seven Years’ War. The supreme commander in the War of the Austrian Succession, Charles of Lorraine, Maria Theresa’s brother-in-law, on the other hand, was a man of more than ordinary incompetence, whose poor showing impaired also the performance of better Austrian generals such as counts Khevenhiiller and Traun. No brilliant military feat was connected with the out¬ come of the war. Yet if looked at in isolation from other events, the survival of Habsburg’s power, a far less homogeneous empire than even Spain at the beginning of the century, could be considered almost a miracle. It was a tremendous phenomenon which refutes the simplistic notion that this new empire was an artificial contraption, incapable to withstand the blowing of a great storm. International and even Austrian historiography have still not fully acknowledged that the divisive first great test of Aus¬ tria’s cohesive strength as great power was not the victory of the Counter Reformation, nor the relief of Vienna from the second Turkish siege, nor the dismemberment of the Spanish empire. It was rather the largely disconnected and diffuse War of the Austrian Succession. The siege of Vienna in 1683 could hardly have led at that time to a lasting Turkish victory, and the other events mentioned here brought about as many dis¬ advantages as assets to the Austrian cause. The defensive victory in the War of the Austrian Succession, on the other hand, proved to the world that this new empire despite its shortcomings was bound to survive.42 42 Walter L. Dorn, Competition for Empire, 1J40-1J63 (New York, 1940), pp. 122-177; Braubach, Versailles und Wien, pp. 276-396; Alfred von Arneth,

An Empire Evolves

IOI

This amazing outcome of the war was partly due to the fact, that the envisaged results of dismemberment did not, for any of the historicopolitical entities of the empire, hold expectations worth suffering and fighting for. Prospects such as control of Bohemia by Bavaria, Hungary by the Turks, or Belgium by France, did not inspire people to national ris¬ ings. Yet with due caution we may suggest here, that the recognition of more positive values than the mere passive issues of choice between greater or lesser evils contributed to the successful test of the Habsburg empire’s staying power. Factors of this kind are to be found in the socio¬ cultural field as much as in legal-political bonds. Some of them will be discussed in the following chapter. Geschichte Maria Theresias, io vols. (Vienna, 1863-1879), see I—III; Robert A. Kann, The Habsburg Empire: A Study in Integration and Disintegration (2nd ed. New York, 1973), pp. 30-32.

CHAPTER IV Late Renaissance and Barocjue A§e in the Tdabsburc) Lands A.

(i526-i74o)

Over-all issues

It is impossible to comprise the social and cultural history of the Habsburg domains from the second quarter of the sixteenth to the middle of the eighteenth century under one comprehensive concept. In accordance with the terminology of European cultural history, late Renaissance, hu¬ manism, possibly mannerism in the fine arts, and certainly Baroque and Rococo would represent movements of nearly equal significance. So would be references to the age of the great philosophical systems in strictly intellectual history, the era of mercantilism or princely absolutism in the sociopolitical field or Reformation and Counter Reformation in the religious one. Most of these problems, currents, and conflicts are applicable to aspects of the history of the rising Habsburg empire as they would be to that of any other western or Central European power. Yet although such concepts are not equally relevant to all these powers, the impact of several of them appears to be more incongruous in the history of the Habsburg empire than in that of many other countries. Why so? The Renaissance reached the Habsburg lands only at the end of the fifteenth century. Before it could spread widely from the centers of courtly culture to urban bourgeois civilization it was diverted from its course by the austerity and the radicalism of the incipient Reformation. In the Habsburg lands it became engaged in a particularly bitter struggle with the Counter Reformation, which lasted more than a century. The Turkish wars were followed in the east by a delayed-action counter¬ reformatory period, after Hungary was freed from the Turks as late as the 102

' Late Renaissance and Baroque c ■

jfl ir4

> i: .

i [; a

si L

PP- 26-34.

126

History of the Hahsburg Empire

secular lords, thirdly knights (lower nobility), and lastly princely towns and markets. In Tyrol, communities of free peasants represented the fourth estate, whereas lords and lower nobility were joined in the same curia. In other lands, commoners were only represented in the estate of towns and markets. This curia usually enjoyed less influence than the ecclesiastic and noble estates, from whose midst the officers of the diets were selected. At the time of a new sovereign’s accession, all estates, in return for their pledge of loyalty, received confirmation and at times ex¬ tensions of their rights and privileges. These consisted in principle in the approval of taxation, the consent to the quota of soldiers to be recruited in individual lands, and beyond that a flexible control of the princely budget. Furthermore the estates had the right to petition the prince (to present grievances) and to ask for changes, usually brought about by tedious negotiations. The estates reached the summit of their power dur¬ ing the reign of Ferdinand I, maintained it, intermittent conflicts not¬ withstanding, throughout the reigns of the following rulers, but lost most of their power under the principal counterreformatory emperor Ferdi¬ nand II. Even before he reached the summit of his power, throughout this whole century from 1526 to 1620 (the battle of the White Mountain) estates power was limited in several respects. The prince could collect regalia and levy excise taxes frequently without estates consent. Of course, large-scale warfare, such as that against the Turks, could not be fought as long as the estates controlled—and generally impeded—the raising of sub¬ stantial armed forces. This power of control led to frequent bypassing of estates consent.26 Throughout the sixteenth century, the power of the estates in the Bo¬ hemian lands was greater than in the hereditary lands, inasmuch as the first semi-hereditary Habsburg ruler there, Ferdinand I, owed his election to the Bohemian estates. His successors up to the promulgation of the oppressive constitution of 1627 likewise had to go through an electoral procedure before the coronation in St. Vitus Cathedral on Hradcany hill in Prague. Technically this meant acceptance as king by the estates rather than formal election. Privileges and rights to be recognized by the kings before the battle of the White Mountain included the restriction of ap¬ pointment of royal dignitaries to natives, judgment of these officials by 26 Brunner, Land und Herrschaft, pp. 394-440; Henry E. Strakosch, State Ab¬ solutism and the Rule of Law (Sydney, 1967), pp. 19-21; Huber and Dopsch, Osterreichische Reichsgeschichte, pp. 212-217; see also Francis L. Carsten, Princes and Parliaments in Germany from the Fifteenth to the Eighteenth Century (Oxford, 1963), pp. 422-444; Eugen Heischmann, Die Anfange des stehenden Heeres in Osterreich (Vienna, 1925), pp. 135-181.

Late Renaissance and Baroque

127

their peers, and appointment of a member of the national nobility as regent in the king’s absence. These rights lapsed according to the Vernewerte Landesordnung imposed by the conqueror Ferdinand II in 1627, until such time as the royal Habsburg line—male as well as female— would become extinct, an occurrence, which, incidentally, has not taken 1 place to this day. According to the different social stratification, the town representatives in the Bohemian estates carried more weight than in the hereditary lands. Their activities, however, as much of the estates’ power altogether, be¬ came practically meaningless after 1627. It was not unlimited previously either, to be sure. The right to convoke the diet rested traditionally with the sovereign, as in the hereditary lands, and the way to reject royal financial demands meant in practice ignoring them for a time rather than formally rejecting them. Yet when skillfully handled the whole tax¬ ation system before 1627 was still under stricter dietal control in Bohemia than in the hereditary lands. Afterward these rights were taken away from the Bohemian and Moravian diets. Yet previously the diets in Moravia as well as Silesia—the latter only indirectly affected by the counterreformatory reversal of previous privileges—enjoyed about the same status as the Bohemian diet in regard to financial matters. After the victory of the Counter Reformation, general diets of all Bohemian lands met only rarely, and not often before. The chief estates power rested in the individual diets of Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia (the last-mentioned composed of several provincial assemblies). The margravates of Upper and Lower Lusatia, previously part of the Bohemian realms, were in the course of the Thirty Years War ceded to Saxony. The general diets of all Bohemian lands had in practice hardly ever more significance than the three so-called general diets of all Habsburg lands, 1530 in Linz (without participation of the Bohemian estates), 1541 in Prague (neither the southwestern German Vorlande nor the lands of the Hungarian crown were represented then), and 1614 again in Linz (with little Hungarian and no Bohemian participation).27 As for Hungary, princely absolutism did not develop fully before the end of the seventeenth century, partly because of the constitutional tradi¬ tion of the country, dating back to the Bulla Aurea of 1222 and partly because of the Turkish wars. Even afterward, except for the era 1849— i860, absolutism was never as fully in command as subsequently in the 27 Huber and Dopsch, Osterreichische Reichsgeschichte, pp. 217-222; Ernst C. Hellbling, Osterreichische Verfassungs- und Verwaltungsgeschichte (Vienna, 1956), pp. 246-249, 262-264.

128

History of the Hahshurg Empire

hereditary and Bohemian lands. Yet the position of the diet versus the king even before the Counter Reformation was stronger than in the other Habsburg realms. Moreover, the center of gravity of estates participation in the legislative process rested here in the lower curia. The Hungarian diet was composed of only two such curias, those of the magnates and the so-called estates. The former, under the chairmanship of the palatine, a kind of viceroy, consisted of the prelates under the leadership of the primate, the archbishop of Esztergom, the aristocracy, the banus of Croatia, the other highest dignitaries of the kingdom, and the top officials of the comitats (counties with considerable local autonomy). Members of the estates curia were the lower nobility, the representatives of the chartered royal towns, and some judicial and ecclesiastic officials, the latter mainly abbots and members of diocesan chapters. The diet, as in the other Habsburg lands, coultl be convoked only by the king—only in ex¬ ceptional cases by the palatine as his representative. Yet here it was a tradition that this parliamentary body should meet in general every two years. At the time of constitutional decline in the eighteenth and early nineteenth centuries this custom fell into desuetude, yet even then the diet remained a significant political factor. It could discuss royal proposi¬ tions as well as estates grievances. Both curias had to agree on motions, in particular the approval of extraordinary taxation, but the principal leg¬ islation had to originate in the Lower House, a feature unparalleled in the diets of other lands under Habsburg rule. Matters changed in 1687 after the reconquest of Buda. As noted be¬ fore, the diet of Pozsony of 1687-1688 had to consent to the relinquish¬ ment of its right of royal election and had to acquiesce in the hereditary succession of the dynasty. Furthermore, the nobles had to sacrifice their ancient right of resistance to what they considered unlawful royal legisla¬ tion. This, however, was a more symbolic than actual decline of status. The powers of the diet remained still substantial. The king was no longer elected by this body, but he had to uphold the major part of the ancient liberties in a coronation oath. Election of the palatine, (a highly im¬ portant office in the absence of the king), approval of extraordinary taxa¬ tion, and passage of the quota of recruits, remained prerogatives of the diet. In fact, all royal bills, citizenship questions, and the granting of the charters of royal towns still required the sanction of the diet. Royal attempts to circumvent it by resort to the convocation of smaller royal councils, were not lacking, particularly in the eighteenth century, but they never succeeded for any length of time. In the eighteenth century, the geographical position of Hungary in face of the Turkish danger was still

Late Renaissance and Baroque

129

too precarious to allow the Habsburgs to procede against the country, the way they had done a century earlier against Bohemia. The reign of Joseph II provided an object lesson. In the nineteenth century, fear of Russian intervention took the place of concern about Ottoman power. Above all, the bitter experience of the Hungarian war of independence of 1848-1849 still had to be learned.28 E.

Administration

Although the estates in the Habsburg lands were legislative or legisla¬ tive consultative bodies of sorts, early modern times did not recognize a strict division between administrative and judicial institutions of gov¬ ernment. Ferdinand I, however, acknowledged such a division by ap¬ proximation in the hereditary lands. Final decisions were rendered by officials of both types of agencies jointly. As pointed out in Chapter I, neither were imperial institutions, those of all Habsburg lands and those of the hereditary lands alone, strictly separated. Yet, beginnings to that effect were made during the reign of that great administrator and organ¬ izer among the Habsburg rulers, Ferdinand I. Highest officials in the individual lands were now the Landeshauptleute, who presided also in the curia of the secular lords in the diets. Thus they served as connecting links between princely and estates functions. The high officials included many nobles, but also some learned lawyers. In the princely towns and markets commoners played the decisive role. Town councils were elected by a narrow group of propertied burghers. Members of the inner council and the mayor were usually elected, subject to confirmation by the gov¬ ernment. The town judges, however, were appointed by the prince. Al¬ together town administration was partly elective and partly appointive, but generally under princely supervision. A special constitution for Vienna granted by Ferdinand I provided for the appointment of the mayor by the sovereign from a slate of elected councillors. An appointed princely representative participated in the deliberations of the city council.29 Before the Vernwerte Landesordnung of 1627, the chief official in Bo¬ hemia (the Ob erst Burggraf), held wider power than any appointee in the hereditary lands. The king had to consult the estates before appoint¬ ment. The highest officials held lifetime tenure—they could not be dis¬ missed by the sovereign. They had to take an oath of loyalty to king 28 Marczali, Ungarische Verfassungsgesckichte, pp. 67-104; Marczali, Ungarisches Verfassungsrecht, pp. 78-84. 29 Huber and Dopsch, Osterreichische Reichsgeschichte, pp. 180-184; Hellbling, Osterreichische Verfassungs- und Verwaltungsgeschichte, pp. 246-249.

jjo

History of the Hahsburg Empire

and estates. The Bohemian administration was more clearly separated from the imperial one than the government in the hereditary lands. Moravia and Silesia likewise enjoyed autonomous administrations. In Moravia conditions changed with the defeat at the White Mountain as in Bohemia. The autonomous administration in Silesia, however, in which the governor was at the same time the head of the estates of the great nobles was only indirectly affected. An effect of the victory of the counterreformatory upset in Bohemia— and similarly in Moravia—on the administrative level was the change in the position of the Oberst Burggraf, who from now on became solely re¬ sponsible to the sovereign. The estates lost their right to share in ap¬ pointive powers altogether and lifetime tenure of offices was abolished. Major governmental agencies were transferred from Prague to Vienna. Changes on the administrative level were thus even more oppressive than in the legislative sphere.30 In Hungary, Ferdinand I established general administration, financial administration, and a court chancery as separate agencies. He and his successors tried to avoid the installment of palatines, who in the king’s absence might usurp too much power. Frequently a kind of palatine deputy or a prince of the Church served in the palatine’s stead although with more restricted powers. Yet much of this governmental structure could not be put into practice during the Turkish wars. Only in 17221723 was a new type of administration by royal appointment set up in Pozsony, the seat of the diet. The gubernatorial council communicated with the king through the Court Chancery in Vienna. The lower admin¬ istrative comitat organization remained basically unchanged. The same held true for the limited autonomy of the royal towns. In CroatiaSlavonia the banus was head of the government and, in addition to supreme judicial functions, also in charge of defense matters. His posi¬ tion remained subordinated, however, to the administration in Pozsony and the Hungarian Court Chancery in Vienna 31 Outside of the banus’ jurisdiction, and in fact of that of the Hun¬ garian government, were the military frontier districts, the Croatian district to the Adriatic, the Slavonian district between the left bank of the Sava and the confluence of Tisza and Danube, and farther east, the 30 Huber and Dopsch, Osterreichische Reichsgeschichte, pp. 217-222; Hellbling, Osterreichische Verfassungs- und Verwaltungsgeschichte, pp. 233-237; Munch, Bohmische Tragodie, pp. 79-87. 31 Huber and Dopsch, Osterreichische Reichsgeschichte, pp. 222-224; Hellbling, Osterreichische Verfassungs- und Verwaltungsgeschichte, pp. 237-239.

hate Renaissance and Baroque

13/

Banat of Temesvar. Transylvania, after the Turkish wars, had separate > royal governors and a financial administration of its own; it was also > represented by a separate Court Chancery in Vienna.32

F.

Judicial system

In the hereditary lands, minor civil and criminal cases were under the c patrimonial jurisdiction of the lords of the manor. Town courts had i about the same kind of jurisdiction for the burghers unless they had the i. legal power to render judgment in major criminal cases as well (the so-called Blutbann). Landgerichte dealt with such cases in towns which did not have the Blutbann. They also adjudicated major criminal cases in the countryside leaving minor offenses to the jurisdiction of the noble estate owners. Major civil cases among unfree peasants on the estates of the lords could become hardly practical. The so-called Landrecht, com¬ posed of members of the noble estates, was the court which had jurisdic¬ tion over secular nobles and prelates; the affairs of ordinary priests were conducted by ecclesiastic courts. Appeals from courts of the first in¬ stance were acted upon by the administration after special permission for new hearings had been granted. Here the only semi-independent court system ended in a dead alley. Special commercial courts and even a (regular) commercial court and an independent court of appeal in com¬ mercial matters were established by Charles VI. These, however, were still the exceptions to the rule.33 In Bohemia there existed a so-called major Landrecht as court for the privileged noble estates, which sat in important cases under the chairmanship of the king, regularly under that of his chief representative, the Oberst Burggraf. A particularly reprehensible feature of the Bohe¬ mian judicial system was the power of several hundred lords to exercise not only patrimonial jurisdiction as in the hereditary lands in minor cases, but to command the Blutbann. The life of the peasants was in practice and by law at the mercy of the liege lord. This state of affairs lasted until 1765, in the reign of Maria Theresa.34 In Hungary, the Hungarian judicial system was organized best, al¬ though here, too, the two chief evils of justice in early modern times prevailed: the medieval relic of at least partial symbiosis of justice and 32 Gunther Erich Rothenberg, The Austrian Military Border in Croatia: 15221*747 (Urbana, i960), pp. 27-123; Guldescu, The Croatian-Slavonian Kingdom 15261792, pp. 59-183. 33 Brunner, Land und Herrschaft, pp. 363-387. 34 Hellbling, Osterreichische Verjassungs- und Verwaltungsgeschichte, pp. 234235.

History of the Habsburg Empire

7^2

administration and the class character of the court system with its privi¬ leges for prelates, nobles, and occasionally free burghers. Just the same, the organization of the Hungarian system was superior to that in the hereditary lands and in Bohemia. Patrimonial courts of the magnates, town and market courts, and comitat courts resembled institutions in other Habsburg lands. Here, too, particularly on the higher level, judges were at the same time administrative officials. Here, too, nobles had their own privileged jurisdiction. Hungary had a better developed system of appeals. The supreme court (the royal curia) consisted of two sections. The one, the septemviral section, composed of the seven highest digni¬ taries of the country under the chairmanship of the palatine and in his absence the judex curiae (the supreme judge), was the highest instance in the country. The other, the royal tablet, composed of professional judges, magnates, and prelates, decided major cases in first instance, but was otherwise in general the court of appeal for all cases acted upon in lower courts. In Croatia, the banus presided in a court of similar composition. Transylvania had a separate court system.35 G.

Defense system

A factor of highest importance in the evolution of the Habsburg power was, of course, the development of an adequate defense system. The over¬ all administrative organization under the Court War Council (Hofkriegsrat) set up in mid-sixteenth century were traced in Chapter I. The Turkish wars had made it clear that an estates army based on contingents approved by individual lands in ever varying numbers and for limited length of service—usually measured by weeks or months—could not cope with the major tasks confronting Habsburg power. Ferdinand I, at the end of his reign, laid the keystone to a permanent army, as yet only a force of 9,000 men. The expansion of the military-frontier system led to further increases of these forces throughout the seventeenth century. Yet before sweeping changes could be made, the emperor had to go through the harrowing experience of a large-scale mercenary system as it worked for a time successfully under Wallenstein’s command between 1625 an: ceased as did the suppression o£ criticism of some religious institutions. Gottfried van Swieten, the son of Maria Theresa’s enlightened adviser ( became the chief official instrumental in this respect. Now, however, [ though no longer under the label of censorship but of various other

:

administrative licensing devices, the printing and therefore dissemination of doctrines not essential to governmental objectives was made difficult, if not impossible. Neither was there any progress in this respect during the brief reign of Leopold. While government control of educational institu¬ tions was somewhat loosened, censorship was tightened again and in¬ creasingly so under the following long reign of Francis I. Yet even before that time—and this is indeed a dark spot in the Josephin philosophy— utilitarianism had proved almost as stiff an impediment to intellectual freedom as conservative traditionalism.31 H.

The PEASANT QUESTION

Maria Theresa’s and Joseph’s agricultural reforms were complex. Maria Theresa’s policies were introduced step by step at different times in dif¬ ferent territories. Depending on the greater or lesser opposition of the lords they differend also in content. Equally important, clear-cut legal concepts which would serve as precedent did not exist in this most im¬ portant field of legislation. No doubt, obfuscation on the part of the noble estates was intended, yet the same was only in part true for the government. The failure to grapple successfully with the problem by the empress’ three predecessors was more due to incompetence of their legal advisers than to ill intent. At the time of Maria Theresa’s accession it was generally recognized that an empire with a predominantly rural popula¬ tion could not prosper, if social conditions of the peasants were miserable. The path from recognition of this simple fact to reform, however, was extremely difficult, because the main pillars of the throne, such as the landed aristocracy and to a substantial part the Church, were vehemently opposed to reforms at their expense.32 Basically, the peasants fall into two groups: tenants or dominicalists, who had a contractual relationship with the lord, which did not exclude, however, personal services; and rusticalists, a larger group, consisting of the hereditary unfree peasants settled on the lords’ estates. Again broadly 31 Mitrofanov, Joseph II, Part II, 826-832; Oskar Sashegy, Zensur und Geistesjreiheit unter Joseph II (Budapest, 1958), pp. 15-52, 153-176; see further, Hermann Gnau, Die Zensur unter Joseph II (Strassburg, 1910) and Kurt Strasser, Die Wiener Presse in der josephinischen Zeit (Wien, 1962). 32 Arneth, Geschichte Maria Theresias, IX, 339-381.

ig6

History of the Hahsburg Empire

speaking, the distinction in the status of these two groups was that between mere Unterthanig\eit and Leibeigenschaft. The distinction in English terms, approximating that between lord-subject relationship and lord-serf relationship is easy to comprehend in theory but before the Josephin abolition of Leibeigenschaft in 1781 in the Bohemian-hereditary lands and Galicia, and in 1786 in Hungary it was rather blurred in practice.33 Before this legislation the situation was highly complex. The lord, even in his relationship to the “free” tenant represented the full authority of local government as he did indeed in a restricted sense even under Joseph and afterward until the revolution of 1848-1849. From this dependency followed the subordination of the tenants to the lords in administrative and judicial matters. In both respects this power was greatly restricted under the empress and even more so under her older son. Personal services of the tenant to the lord were an indirect consequence of the lord-tenant rela¬ tionship. This obligation derived mainly from the fact that the lord had the whip hand because the manorial contract with the tenant could be terminated at the lord’s pleasure. This particular oppressive device could not be used against the serf, whose relationship to the lord was permanent and hereditary. Here, however, other social and administrative pressures, such as special service obligations and exorbitant dues for facilities pro¬ vided by the manorial estate, could be used at the discretion of the lords. Although the tenant was thus more insecure than the serf, he was in other respects in a better position, because, on the basis of a mere subject rela¬ tionship (in distinction to serfdom) he had the freedom of movement and the freedom of marriage for himself and his children outside of the estate without consent of the lord. Finally, he and his son had the right to learn a craft without the lord’s consent. Yet although the so-called free tenant had these rights in principle, he did not always have them in practice. They did not include even in theory, as was noted before, general exemp¬ tion from personal services to the lord. Yet tenant rights implied at least that personal services were limited. By and large Maria Theresa was prepared to grant to all her peasant subjects by approximation the status of the free tenant, endowed with freedom of movement, freedom of marriage without the lord’s consent, freedom of occupation, but definitely not freedom from personal service for the lord as long as the peasant held manorial land. Were it otherwise, the empress held, the difference between lord and subject would disappear and anarchy would result. How much she was in earnest about this is

33

By this time serfdom had practically ceased to exist in the Austrian hereditary

lands.

An Empire Reasserts Itself

igy

shown by her response to the actions of those peasants in Bohemia who in return for a promise of abolition of serfdom in 1742 had paid homage to Charles Albert of Bavaria. Their villages were destroyed and one of the leaders of the movement was executed.34 Yet the empress wanted sincerely to restrict or modify serfdom, and, where she could (as in the crown domains), to change to mere Unterthanigkeit. She persisted in the struggle for these objectives all through her reign. Immediately after the end of the War of the Austrian Succes¬ sion and in line with the tax reforms, a clear determination of the extent of peasant and manorial land was made for the first time. This in itself helped to check further arbitrary seizures of land by the lords. Patrimonial jurisdiction was restricted and gradually was brought under the control of the new district offices. The arbitrary fees imposed by the lords, as noted above, were not abolished but at least standardized. A so-called governmental, urbarial commission (that is, one dealing with lord-peasant relations) was set up to control excesses of the robot system. Between 1766 and 1775 restrictions had been enacted in Austrian Silesia, Moravia, Styria, and Carniola. Opposition of the lords was strong, but nowhere as obstructionist and vehement as in Bohemia, where the aristocracy, fore¬ most among them the descendants of the counterreformatory soldiers of fortune endowed with the land of the old national nobility, exercised a reign of gross and often bloody abuse. Peasant revolts were suppressed and the leaders severely punished. It speaks for Maria Theresa that these riots did not spur her to further suppression but to action against the Bohemian lords. The Robot Patent of 1775 elaborated by further legisla¬ tion of 1777 and 1778 restricted robot to a period of between one and three days weekly, usually the latter. Even this maximum of half of the peasants’ working time, which allowed them hardly to till their own land, represented a considerable improvement over the previous situation. Ac¬ tually the empress and the coregent found it difficult to enforce even the three days outer limit.85 In 1766 Maria Theresa succeeded in Hungary by a decree to have feudal dues determined. A regular system of appeal from patrimonial jurisdiction to the comitats courts was introduced and freedom of move¬ ment for the unfree peasants established. The large-scale government34 See also note 23. 85 Guglia, Maria Theresia, TT, 347-337; William E. Wright, Serf, Seigneur and Sovereign: Agrarian Reform in Eighteenth Century Bohemia (Minneapolis, 1966), pp. 38-70; Edith M. Link, The Emancipation of the Austrian Peasant 1740-1748 (New York, 1949), passim.

ig8

History of the Hahsburg Empire

sponsored immigration of South Germans was helpful here; they were mostly Suebian peasants, who moved into the southeastern areas of Hun¬ gary, which appeared largely deserted after the Turkish wars. The con¬ cessions granted to these immigrants in terms of free land, cattle, building material, and tax exemption for ten years, made it necessary to alleviate the lot of the whole Hungarian peasantry at least to some extent. Com¬ pensatory concessions to the nobility were by implication the incorporation of the Banat of Temesvar (previously part of the Military Frontier) and of Fiume (Rijeka) as a free city into the constitutional frame of Hun¬ gary.36 The first phase of Joseph’s agricultural policy represented a badly needed continuation of the Maria Theresa’s reforms. The Unterthanenpatent of September, 1781, and legislation in November of the same year, had abolished serfdom formally in the Bohemian lands. Inasmuch as the decree referred to conversion of the status of the peasants in the hereditary lands and Galicia, this implied also the formal not merely the practical elimination of serfdom there. Formal abolition of serfdom in Hungary followed in 1785.37 The patent of 1781 introduced also a constructive system of arbitration, first by the district office as administrative agency and, if its efforts failed, by regular judicial litigation between lords and peasants. In such proceeding, the peasants were represented by a govern¬ mental lawyer. Patrimonial jurisdiction in criminal affairs was now per¬ manently restricted to petty crime. Other aspects of the Josephin legislation were more controversial. In the first place, the land tax imposed on the peasants to the amount of about 30 per cent of their meager earnings—if community taxes were added even more—was still far too high. Secondly, the personal services for the lord were not abolished, though the restrictions on them were strictly enforced. Conversion of robot into monetary payments was en¬ couraged by the government. The last step in this direction was the tax and urbarial regulation of 1789, according to which all personal services were to be converted to monetary payments of 17 per cent of over-all revenue to the lord, about 13 to the government, both together roughly amounting to the compensation for two working days. This last reform measure was rejected with almost equal fervor by lords and by peasants— for whose benefit it was intended. The peasants’ violent resistance in 36 Bela K. Kiraly, Hungary in the late Eighteenth Century (New York, 1969), pp. 13-65; Henry Marczali, Hungary in the Eighteenth Century (Cambridge, 1910), pp. 204-211. 37 Wright, Serf, Seigneur and Sovereign, pp. 71-150; Mitrofanov, Joseph II, Part II, 621-623; Marczali, Hungary in the Eighteenth Century, pp. 170-195.

An Empire Reasserts Itself

igg

Hungary is easily understood, if one considers that a rural economy, largely dependent on barter could not at the command of government be im¬ mediately converted into a money economy. The precipitate action drove many peasants into bankruptcy and desperadon.38 No blame is to be attached to the emperor’s intentions but his policies, based on an erroneous appraisal of the peasants’ economic potentialities, lacked rational foresight. This criticism is not to be confounded with the cliche that Joseph should have acted more slowly. He knew that after his death there was not much chance that the reforms would be com¬ pleted, and perhaps not even continued. In fact even the well-meaning and intelligent Leopold II was forced to restore the Maria Theresan tax system of the peasants and the regulations of her robot patent of 1775. Thus it is questionable whether Joheph should have acted at a more de¬ liberate speed, but he might have abolished the personal service obliga¬ tions altogether and replaced them by an installment plan of annual pay¬ ments partly carried by the peasants and partly by the government. Thus the lords would have been indemnified for the use of the land, and the economic freedom of the peasants could have been established without ruinous obligations in cash payments at short order. It took the experience of half a century and a major revolution before these principles were enacted in 1848-1849. They were fully materialized only by additional legislation in 1853 and 1862. As it was, a good part of the Josephin agri¬ cultural policy went to shambles with other efforts of his tragic and noble reign. Yet success for the agricultural reforms even half a century later, at the time of the revolution of 1848, would have been inconceivable without his earlier endeavors. I.

Hungary and the end of the first reform era

Some facts about conditions in Hungary have to be added. In conjunc¬ tion with other points they should explain more clearly why the reform period ended. The Hungarian estates system, confirmed solemnly by the empress in the War of the Austrian Succession, survived her reign in substance unchanged. All the more passionate was the national reaction— not confined to the upper classes—to the Josephin reforms after 1780. So¬ cial change and administrative reforms were substantial but appeared tolerable because they did not touch on the main interests of the estab¬ lishment and on the traditions of the whole country. An important factor, relevant to all political and social innovation, were the conse38 Mitrofanov, Joseph II, Part II, 586-621; Wright, Serf, Seigneur and Sovereign, pp. 112-164; Link, The Emancipation of the Austrian Peasant, pp. 139-151.

200

History of the Habsburg Empire

quences of the Turkish wars. Decline in the native Magyar population in southern Hungary by more or less forced emigration during the almost two-century dong period of the Turkish wars had been made up to a good part by immigration of Southern Slavs into southern Hungary; the same was true for Roumanian immigrations into Transylvania. The new settlements were welcome to the Habsburg administration, which considered the Magyar nobility as the primary source of political dissatis¬ faction in the Hungarian realms. Correspondingly Magyar immigration from western Hungary into the newly liberated lands was not encouraged. Instead, the government in Vienna, in particular after the establishment of a colonization committee in Vienna in 1766, urged immigration of peas¬ ants from southwestern Germany to whom land, livestock, and tax exemptions were offered. Besides, many estates, vacated during the Turk¬ ish wars by their former owners, were awarded to foreign, mostly Ger¬ man officers and nobles. The agricultural structure, therefore, in which the lower nobility had previously played a dominant part, changed now in favor of the big aristocratic landowners. More important for future political developments in Hungary proper, Croatia, and Transylvania, the numbers and weight of the non-Magyar population rose. The change in the social structure is one reason why tax reforms like those in the hereditary and Bohemian lands could not be carried out in Hungary. The tax exemptions of the nobility, in which the big estates owners played a more prominent part now, remained untouched. This tax structure in turn hampered Hungarian industrial development. The Hungarian budget was separated from that of the other Habsburg lands, hence the government in Vienna had a good excuse to consider Hungary chiefly as cheap source of raw materials and agricultural labor. The Hungarian textile, silk, metal, and ore-mining industries, did not receive support comparable to that in Austria and the Bohemian lands. The Hungarian education situation, however, was not very different from that in other Habsburg domains. Higher and intermediate educa¬ tion for the privileged classes (gymnasiums) was primarily under Jesuit control. After the dissolution of the Jesuit order and under the influence of the Hungarian Enlightenment, particularly strong in the east among the Protestants, reforms were initiated in the last years of the empress’ reign. Elementary education was placed under government control. This meant that schools and public health care were improved on the village level. In intermediate schools instruction in French began to gain against Latin. In state-Church relations the empress pursued the same course in Hungary as in her other lands. She upheld the autonomy of

An Empire Reasserts Itself

201

the Orthodox and Uniate churches in contrast to her anti-Protestant policies. Yet the educational autonomy of the Serb settlements under the direction of the Orthodox clergy (as distinguished from religious auton¬ omy) had to yield to state control. In 1765-1767 Maria Theresa made an effort to improve the lot of the Hungarian peasants by decrees specifying the duties of the peasants to the lords. The freedom of movement and the choice of occupation for the peasants’ children were introduced, provided the peasant had met his obligations to the lord. Considering the established interests of the Hun¬ garian noble landowners, Maria Theresa could not hope for approval of such measures by the Reichstag—if she had called it into session. She refused to do so after 1764.39 She managed nevertheless to avoid a major collision with the ecclesi¬ astic dignitaries and secular nobles represented in the Reichstag. She dis¬ solved the administrative agency in Vienna, which controlled the Serb territories in Hungary. Moreover, as noted before, in 1777-1778 the Banat of Temesvar and the free city of Fiume (Rijeka) were incorporated into Hungary. Also the court commission concerning agenda of Transylvania, the Banat, and Illyria—the archaic and vague Roman terminology for the territory between Adriatic and northwestern Greece—was abolished in 1777. Its authority had been limited, but the elimination complied with the wishes of Magyar nobles. Such measures, pleasing to the Magyar establishment, enabled Maria Theresa to put through others of a more controversial nature. The terri¬ torial autonomy of Transylvania was strengthened by full supreme gov¬ ernmental control of the grand principality under a Transylvanian court chancery in Vienna. Furthermore, the Military Frontiers—with the excep¬ tion of the Banat of Temesvar—remained exempt from Hungarian estates control. The empress’ policy to move into Hungary with her reforms, but not to move faster than in the hereditary and Bohemian lands, had thus proved successful.40 Maria Theresa’s limited success, but still success, was achieved be¬ cause she had confined her reform program. Joseph’s limited but substan¬ tial failure in Hungary, was due to the attempt to disregard such re39 Kiraly, Hungary in the late Eighteenth Century, pp. 51-73 passim; Marczali, Hungary in the Eighteenth Century, pp. 170-195; Franz Krones, Ungarn unter Maria Theresia und Joseph II, iy40-ijgo (Graz, 1871), pp. 71-90; Laszlo Makkai in Ervin Pamlenyi, ed., Die Geschichte Ungarns (Budapest, 1971), Chapter IV, pp. 218-235. 40Arneth, Geschichte Maria Theresias, X, 122-158; Makkai in Ervin Pamlenyi, ed., Die Geschichte Ungarns, Chapter IV, pp. 227-235.

202

History of the Habshurg Empire

strictions. The emperor who refused to be crowned king of Hungary, be¬ cause such historic ceremony would run counter to the desired goal of a unitary centralized empire, also did away with the ancient medieval comitat organization of the country. He replaced it by a division in ten adminstration districts under royal commissioners. This tragic Josephin reform curtailed the power of the local nobility and destroyed the poten¬ tialities of developing the comitat autonomy in a democratic sense. Less controversial were his reforms of the judicial organization. A regular se¬ quence of appeals from the district courts to the courts of appeal and the supreme court—the Septemviral table—was organized. Buda became the permanent center of the judicial as well as the administrative system. Croatia and Transylvania retained a separate court system under the jurisdiction of the supreme court in Buda. The emperor also initiated two other salutary measures: the retention of the comitat courts below the district courts and the elimination of patrimonial jurisdiction in criminal affairs. The former measure preserved an important branch of local government close to the people, the latter abolished one of the most flagrant sources of class justice. Yet neither of these reforms survived Joseph’s reign. Of momentous significance, because of lasting importance at least in a technical sense, was the abolition of serfdom in Transylvania and Hun¬ gary between 1783 and 1785 and its conversion into a mere lord-subject relationship. These regulations abolished the restrictions on marriage, movement, and choice of occupation, but retained the obligation to per¬ sonal service as in the other Habsburg lands. Conversion of these services into cash payments proved even more difficult in Hungary with its al¬ most exclusively agricultural economy than in the hereditary and Bo¬ hemian lands. Indeed, the whole reform legislation was misunderstood. Opposition of the noble landowners could be fully expected, but that of the peasantry, particularly in Transylvania, caught the emperor unpre¬ pared. Seen from a long-range point of view it should not have come as a surprise. Restrictions on long-standing abuses kindle demands for their complete abolition. The Hungarian, and particularly the “Vlachs,” the Roumanian peasants in Transylvania, could hardly be expected to under¬ stand the fine distinction between personal services resulting from serf¬ dom and those from a tenant status as yet unknown to them.41 This lack of understanding was one reason for the revolutionary peas41 Kiraly, Hungary in the late Eighteenth Century, pp. 217-218; Daicoviciu and Constantinescu, Breve Histoire de la Transylvanie, pp. 141-166; Ladislas Makkai, Histoire de la Transylvanie (Paris, 1946), pp. 270-280.

An Empire Reasserts Itself

203

ant risings which spread from Transylvania to Hungary proper. Another was the large-scale military conscription in preparation of the RussoAustrian war against the Ottoman empire. The government ignored the traditional dietal and local patrimontial rights to pass upon the mili¬ tary quota. Besides, a greater number of Hungarians were recruited than during the Silesian wars of the previous reign. The new system of mili¬ tary conscription which in part was meant to protect the peasants against the arbitrary recruiting system of the diet hurt them in its first appli¬ cation more than the traditional order. Rumors spread that military service meant also abolition of personal services. Although the rumors were without substance, peasants generally believed them, which added fuel to fire or discontent. Emperor Joseph had no time to bring his ecclesiastic policy in Hungary as thoroughly in line with his reforms in the hereditary and the Bo¬ hemian lands, as he might have wished. The dissolution of the Jesuit order had a direct influence, and the Edict of Tolerance and the monastic legislation in Austria, a strong and lasting indirect influence on condi¬ tions in Hungary. The visit of Pope Pius VI to the emperor in Vienna in 1782 thus pertained nearly as much to Hungarian as to Austrian and Bohemian conditions. Yet the papal intervention in favor of the status quo was of as little avail here as there.42 As for education, the language decree of 1784 which required Hungarian public officials to officiate in German within three years would have less affected—if it had been put through—government on the intermediate and higher levels than the administrative institutions on the comitat level. There bureaucratic con¬ trol was new, and this control exercised in German in the administrative as well as the judicial sphere appeared truly revolutionary. Directly this decree of fateful importance did not mean a restriction of Magyar but of Latin as language of governmental communication.43 Indirectly, and in its long-range effect this act opened the pandora box of multinational discontent in Hungary. The psychological blunder of ordering the trans¬ fer of the Holy Hungarian crown to Vienna at about the same time need¬ lessly incensed public opinion further. Joseph undoubtedly intended his language legislation primarily as an expediency for a centralistic system. Secondarily, however, he believed by 42 Marczali, Hungary in the Eighteenth Century, pp. 269-300; Krones, Ungarn unter Maria Theresia und Joseph II, pp. 107-110. 43 Confidential communication on the highest level of government between Vienna, Buda, and Pressburg (Pozsony) had been transacted throughout the whole reform period in either German or French and without opposition.

204

History of the Habshurg Empire

implication in the superiority of German social and cultural institutions and assumed their entrenchment by law would work to the benefit of all his subjects. Such a philosophy was in line with the rationalistic premises of enlightened absolutism. It is also true that the emperor’s language legislation, if we consider the mere linguistic, so to speak tech¬ nical, problem, might have been workable. But this was hardly the de¬ cisive factor. Joseph was aware of the potential opposition not only of Magyars, but also of Croats and Vlachs, but he underestimated its sig¬ nificance. He did not realize that the language issue on psychological grounds was a spark in a powder keg. Naturally the emperor did not realize that his language policy was bound to fail in a political sense. In fact, with the benefit of hindsight one can assume that the national conflict would have come into the open in any case, in the near future. Joseph may have accelerated its outbreak by a few years. But the Magyars who represented after all some'what more than half of the population of the kingdom as a whole would hardly have permanently accepted the Latin language of administration of the privileged nobility. It is equally improbable that gentler tactics on Joseph’s part could have led to the gradual replacement of Latin by German. National questions in the multi¬ national state can be compromised by expediency with greater or lesser skill for some time, but to assume that by some ingenious device they can be solved is an illusion. The language decree created a wave of public indignation in Hun¬ gary against German customs and institutions in general and correspond¬ ingly an upsurge in national sentiments. These began to express them¬ selves among the educated in Magyar, rather than in German, French, or Latin. Centers of resistance were the towns, yet the rural population became increasingly concerned, too. Here the opposition to the conversion of personal services into cash payments when no cash was available, the new methods of recruiting, and the seizure of grain for the armed forces in the following years fed the opposition. It abated only when the language decree was rescinded, shortly before the emperor’s death and before it had been put fully into effect.44 Thus the main impact of the language decree was not the short-range opposition to a transitory measure but the lasting influence on the rise of nationalism, in particular in regard to the Croats and Vlachs. The 44 Francois Fejto, Un Habsbourg Revolutionnaire: Joseph II, Portrait d’un Despote Eclaire (Paris, 1953), pp. 262-267; Krones, Ungarn unter Maria Theresia und Joseph II, pp. 23-45; Laszlo Makkai and Istvan Barta in Ervin Pamlenyi, ed., Die Geschichte Ungarns, Chapters IV, V, pp. 235-245.

An Empire Reasserts Itself

205

language issue came to the fore here as a twofold movement, which merged soon in the same stream of resistance against the government. The support of Latin by the Croatian estates was directed less against German than against Magyar nationalism. With keen insight, they ex¬ pected Magyarization to follow Joseph’s Germanization. Opposition against Protestantism, primarily that of the Suabians in the Banat and that of Suabians and Saxons in Transylvania and in the Military Frontier districts, was only partly based on religious grounds and largely directed against German penetration in the South Slav territories. South Slav nationalism was not yet strong enough to represent its own case. It had to fight on the forefield of related issues, Catholicism versus Protestantism, Latin versus German, which meant actually Croatian versus Magyar nationalism. The general objectives of nationalism had become fairly clear by this time, though its specific targets had not yet been crystalized with equal precision. In Transylvania, on the other hand, the century-old tradition of the three-nation state had led to more direct confrontations between the im¬ perial government and the national forces. Throughout the reform era we observe here a steady increase of the Roumanian (Vlach) population, particularly because of immigration from the Danube principalities and a corresponding relative decline of Magyars and “Saxons” (Germans). Joseph had granted citizenship to the Vlach serfs, yet recognition as a fourth nation of equal legal standing with Magyars, Saxons,45 and Szekels was still denied. The fact that limited concessions often are more irritating than none, referred to in the context of the peasant riots of 1784, is born out by events in Transylvania. The merger of the Transylvanian court chancery with the Hungarian and the de facto abolition of the three-nation state did not diminish dissatisfaction among the Magyars, and ignited resentment among the Saxons. The emperor saw’ in the Saxons an anachronistic national group, whose public funds were now sequestered.46 The last phase of the Josephin reform regime in Hungary and its brief aftermath under Leopold II has to be perceived in conjunction with the crisis in Belgium. Joseph’s anticlerical legislation in Belgium, similar to 45 As noted before, the term Saxons in Transylvania in modern history stands for Germans in general and no longer specifically for Saxons. 46 Henry Marczali, Ungarische Verjassungsgeschichte (Tubingen, 1910), pp. 113116; Eugen Horvath, Die Geschichte Siebenbiirgens (Budapest, n.d.), pp. 109-130; Daicoviciu and Constantinescu, Breve Histoire de la Transylvanie, pp. 156-161; Makkai, Histoire de la Transylvanie, pp. 280 f.

206

History of the Habshurg Empire

his legislation in Austria, had alienated a powerful clergy, though the imperial policy in this respect had apparently the tacit support of the urban middle class. Yet Joseph’s further attempts to centralize in viola¬ tion of the established rights of the provincial estates in Belgium caused general resentment among opponents and adherents of an enlightened policy. The emperor’s readiness to barter the Austrian Netherlands for Bavaria was well remembered and did not endear him to either party. That he was forced to yield to the Dutch in the question of the encum¬ brances imposed by the peace of Utrecht concerning the barrier fortresses and the shipping on the Scheldt river, did not increase respect for him either. An open revolt supported more or less openly by the Dutch and underhand by Prussia was the popular reaction. An imperial offer to withdraw the offensive legislation came too late. In November, 1789, the estates of Flanders declared that the emperor had forfeited his claim to rule in Belgium. The imperial governor, Duke Albert of SaxonyTeschen, the emperor’s brother-in-law, and the limited armed forces at his disposal were forced to leave the country. Reconquest, while the Austrian army was engaged in a sterile war against the Turks, was out of the question. Only after an armistice with the Ottoman empire was signed, and a general understanding with Prussia had been reached, could Leopold II restore the Austrian regime in Belgium on the basis of the status before Joseph’s accession. The price for this understanding and a general termination of clandestine Prussian support of insurrectionist movements in the Habsburg empire, particularly in Hungary, was the renunciation of conquests in the east. The Belgian crisis had glaringly revealed the weakness of the im¬ perial power structure. The language decrees in Hungary had a longrange demoralizing effect on the country, and conscription and requisi¬ tion of grain for the army fighting an unpopular war against Turkey had an immediately explosive effect. The authorities could not cope with the violent response to these measures. By the end of January, 1790, Joseph then a dying man had to withdraw most of the reforms, save for the abolition of serfdom, the Tolerance Edict, and the monastic legislation. Even now he refused to convoke the Hungarian royal diet. He took his retrogressive measures only because of the danger of a Prussian-supported general insurrection in Hungary. The possibility of an overthrow of the dynasty and the establish¬ ment of a German prince as king of Hungary and satellite of the Prus¬ sian ruler seemed real. Joseph was equally loyal to the traditions of his house and to his commitment to the welfare of his peoples. He wanted to

An Empire Reasserts Itself

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see the succession of his brother Leopold, grand duke of Tuscany, secured, in whom he saw a faithful and able executor of his ideas. Desperately sick, he called Leopold to his bedside to transmit to him the inheritance. But when Leopold arrived in Vienna on March 12, 1790, Joseph’s tragic and noble reign had already come to its end. The great emperor'had died, in deep desperation, on February 20. The brief reign of his successor was no less tragic though not quite so dramatic. He was fully, indeed in some ways better, equipped than Joseph to expand and entrench the reform policies. Leopold was widely ex¬ perienced as ruler in Tuscany, highly knowledgeable, with a judicial temper, although he lacked the older brother’s dynamic energy accentu¬ ated in his image. This appeal strengthened Joseph’s position in poster¬ ity, but it was no help in the specific crises which an enlightened sovereign of his rare kind had to face. Leopold’s first task was to check open revolt at the price of some retreat on the domestic front. Considering his record as regent and the advice frequently rendered to mother and brother, there is no doubt that after he had successfully accomplished his immediate aim, he would have liked to continue the reform policy pur¬ sued by him so ably during his twenty-five-year reign in Tuscany. Before he could start with this second and to him presumably more important task, he died suddenly on March 1, 1792, to leave the execution of his plans to an unequal successor. Leopold’s first objective was to restore peace and order in Hungary. To that effect he called the diet into session and after long and tedious negotiations reached a compromise in 1791. Hungary was recognized again as separate country, though—with minor differences—subject to the same order of succession as the other Habsburg lands. Legislation was to be enacted jointly by king and parliament. Government by royal decree was made unlawful. In particular, the program of taxation had to be approved by the Reichstag, which was to be called into session at least every third year. Legal equality of Protestantism was recognized, and Latin was restored as the official language of communication. In response to Joseph’s Germanization policy, Magyar was now to be taught in all schools. Serfdom was not restored but the conversion of personal services into monetary payments, withdrawn already by Joseph in extremis, lapsed until 1848. By and large, the status of the peasant in all Habsburg lands corresponded now to Maria Theresa’s legislation of 1767.47 Leopold’s success in his negotiations with parliament was partly based on a divide et impera policy between Magyars and the other Hungarian 47 Wandruszka, Leopold II, see II, 273-290.

2o8

History of the Habshurg Empire

nationalities. In this sense he restored the Transylvanian three-nation state and the Transylvanian court chancery. An Illyrian court chancery pri¬ marily for the benefit of the Hungarian Serbs was established in 1791, but dissolved by Leopold’s successor the following year.48 Leopold’s concessions did not go far enough to initiate a reorganization of Hungary on a multinational basis but they sufficed to warn the diet that the new emperor was not entirely at the mercy of Magyarism. All this was done with circumspection and frequently in a roundabout way as fitted Leopold’s temperament. The same attitude is shown also in his ambiguous attitude toward the radical republican aspects of the late Hungarian enlightenment, which frightened king and nobility alike. In fighting it Leopold saw nothing wrong in using an agent-provocateur system.49 Although he was less than frank in his methods of government and not always choosy in his means, there is no reason to doubt the idealistic objectives of his reign. In all major respects his merits were great. He established external— though highly precarious—peace and secured internal law and order. In the domestic field he came to an understanding with the establishment without abandoning Maria Theresa’s reform legislation. Under prevail¬ ing conditions, this was an outstanding achievement. In fact he had preserved a substantial part of the Josephin reforms as well, in particular in state-church relations, administrative and judicial organization, and protection of the right of the peasant in litigations. Certainly the princi¬ ples of the reforms were kept alive. Thus, the reform era ended in retreat but not in defeat. It was beyond Leopold’s control that this “temporary” retreat continued after his death for two generations. J.

Foreign policy (1792-1815)

Throughout the war period which had begun with the war of the First Coalition against France in April, 1792, and ended with Napoleon’s debacle at Waterloo in June, 1815, the Habsburg empire was the most consistent and, throughout much of the period, also the most persistent continental opponent of France. In this respect it hardly ever had out¬ standing military leadership and only after the war of 1809 competent diplomacy. Until the end of the war of the Second Coalition in 1801, 48 An Illyrian court deputation, basically with the same functions, had been es¬ tablished by Maria Theresa, but abolished by Joseph. 49 Wandruszka, Leopold II, II, 279-280; Denis Silagi, Ja\obiner in der Habsburger Monarchic (Vienna, 1962), pp. 65-117; Ernst Wangermann, From Joseph II to the Ja\obin Trials (Oxford, 1959), pp. 61-65; Kiraly, Hungary in the late Eighteenth Century, pp. 196-197; Bernard, Jesuits and Jacobins, pp. 155-167.

An Empire Reasserts Itself

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Habsburg policy reflected Austria’s determined stand against what appeared to the government still as revolutionary development in France. As result of the peace of Utrecht and the position of the Habsburg ruler as Holy Roman emperor, Austria during this whole period in its out¬ lying possessions and appendages in southwestern Germany, in northern and central Italy and Belgium was more directly involved in a confronta¬ tion with French territorial interests than either Prussia or Russia. After this period and particularly after Napoleon’s proclamation as French emperor in 1804, when the revolutionary scare had been laid to rest, the territorial aspects of the conflict became more strongly apparent. Now the issue was mainly a struggle for the balance of power in which Austria in the midst of the continent had high stakes, namely either survival as a great power or further existence as a middle-sized French satellite state. The direction of the foreign relations of the Habsburg monarchy was at all times under the supreme authority of the new emperor Francis I (1767-1835), as Holy Roman emperor during the first part of his reign Francis II.50 In moral and intellectual stature he was very different from his father and uncle. This did not immediately indicate a completely dif¬ ferent philosophy. Francis had been raised in Tuscany in the atmosphere of the enlightened government of the then grand duke Leopold. He spent the latter part of Joseph’s reign either at the seat of the emperor’s govern¬ ment or as observer in the eastern theater of war. His hard taskmaster thoroughly indoctrinated him with the principles and practice of Josephin reformism. During the first years of his long reign of forty-three years he apparently seemed resolved to follow its patterns. But he was too small in intellectual attainment to comprehend the French Revolution in any other way than as a regime of terror and anarchy, whose traces must be wiped off the earth. The regime of the Convention in France and the execution of king and queen in 1793, which he perceived exclusively in personal terms of regicide of a fellow sovereign and his consort (his aunt Queen Marie Antoinette), shocked him deeply. Another experience, the discovery of so-called Jacobine conspiracies in Budapest, with ramifications extending to Vienna and Graz, strengthened him in the belief that only a stern conservative and in many respects reactionary absolutism could prevent a regime of revolutionary terror in his empire. Actually the Jacobine conspiracy headed by the Hungarian Abbe Martinovic was a small-scale enterprise of relatively few intellectuals, suppressed with harsh measures 60 See note 7 in this chapter.

210

History of the Hahshurg Empire

in 1794-1795. A system of police spies and agents provocateurs, an un¬ fortunate inheritance of Emperor Leopold, had led to the discovery of the plot. Francis took its lessons as he understood them to heart.51 This meant that his personality from now on increasingly reflected the nega¬ tive features of his two predecessors’ absolutism but few of their out¬ standing qualities. Francis was as secretive and in some ways as insincere as his father and as authoritarian as his uncle. He lacked the genius, the basic humanitarian motivation of the uncle, the sophisticated expert knowledge and the skill of the father. Mediocre in ability but not stupid, he was, like most small men, suspicious of new ideas, that is, suspicious of advisers with original thoughts. Incapable to grasp complex ideas, venge¬ ful against opponents, and petty in dealing with counsellors in particular those of great ability, he did not lack charm and superficial cordiality in personal contacts with his subjects. Neither did he lack shrewdness nor at times bureaucratic industry. Of the Josephin philosophy he retained the full belief in absolute government, in particular in regard to statechurch relations and in his negative attitude toward the estates system. However, he dropped the last shreds of enlightened sentiments within a few years. Although this ruler had no respect for brilliance, he did not interfere with the work of competent civil servants, as long as he could be sure of their conservative leaning and bureaucratic habits. Brilliance of any kind, even of a highly conservative character was suspect to him, since it might turn into unpredictable directions. He asked for quiet conformism and not for public articulate approval. This assessment is not contradicted by the fact that Francis drew on the support of brilliant men such as counts Johann Philip Stadion and Metternich, Friedrich von Gentz and Adam Muller. Stadion fell out of grace within a few years; Gentz and Muller were tolerated as sub¬ ordinates of Francis’ chief adviser Metternich; Metternich himself at¬ tracted Francis by strength of his devious and successful methods rather than by the brilliance of his concepts, whose pursuit was frequently mis¬ understood by the sovereign. As for the conduct of foreign affairs, the young emperor parted with Kaunitz as early as the summer of 1792. The octagenarian was not yet convinced that an attempt at reconciliation with France was beyond 51Silagi, Jahobiner in der Habsburger Monarchic, pp. 128-131; Wangermann, From Joseph II to the Jacobin Trials, pp. 133-167; Bernard, Jesuits and Jacobins, PP- 155-167. On the relationship of Francis to Joseph II and Leopold II see Walter C. Langsam, Francis the Good: The Education of an Emperor, iy68-iyg2 (New York, 1949), pp. 55-107. On the education of Francis see also Walther Tritsch, Franz von Osterreich (Mahrisch Ostrau, 1937), pp. 21-112.

An Empire Reasserts Itself

2II

reach, whereas he looked at the alliance with Prussia, the traditional enemy for half a century, with misgivings. Kaunitz’ successor, Baron Johann Thugut, born as a commoner and never elevated to Kaunitz’ high position in a formal sense, had rich diplomatic experience in eastern affairs. He shared Kaunitz’ suspicions of Russia and Prussia, yet these feelings were overshadowed by his passionate anti-French senti¬ ments. A champion of all-out antirevolutionary war, he had to quit in 1800 to make a more flexible policy possible. Formally Thugut was subordinated to Count Johann Cobenzl, who resigned, however, in 1793 because Austria’s exclusion from the second partition of Poland displeased the emperor. He served later as ambassador to France. His abler cousin, Count Johann Ludwig Cobenzl, became his and Thugut’s successor and was in charge of foreign affairs between 1801 and 1805. He had to share the responsibilities of office with the emperor’s old “Ajo” (that is, chief tutor and master of his household as crownprince) Count Franz Colloredo, a man of little experience in foreign affairs. After Austria’s defeat in the war of the Third Coalition, both he and Cobenzl resigned, yet during their tenure the switch from primarily antirevolutionary war to primarily pro-balance-of-power conflict had taken place. Count Johann Ludwig Cobenzl’s successor as foreign minister from 1805 to 1809 was Count Johann Philip Stadion. Previously ambassador to the court in St. Petersburg Stadion was a man of outstanding gifts, perhaps the fore¬ most diplomat in imperial Austrian history; he wanted to conduct a foreign policy, in this case a German-oriented foreign policy, in line with public opinion. However, he proved to be not in line with it but ahead of public opinion.52 After Austria’s defeat in the war of 1809 he was forced to leave his position to then Count Clemens Wenzel Metternich (1773-1859), former minister to Dresden and from 1806 to 1808 am¬ bassador to Napoleon’s court. In 1821 Metternich, prince since 1813, became court and state chancellor and was not only in charge of foreign affairs, but at least nominally of the whole administration until his forced resignation on the eve of the March revolution of 1848. Metternich’s merits in foreign affairs and his deficiencies in domestic policies will be considered later. He put his mark on European history during a tenure of office of nearly forty years more clearly and in some ways more lastingly than any other Austrian statesman either before or after him. As for military problems, modernization and reorganization of the armed forces had been an objective high on Joseph II’s list of priorities, but short of fulfillment. Leopold, a ruler less interested in military affairs 52 Hellmuth Rossler, Graf Johann Philipp Stadion (Vienna, 1966), I, 225-255.

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History of the Habshurg Empire

than his brother had neither the chance nor the wish for sweeping changes in this respect. A few weeks after the accession of Francis the empire was plunged into war and now it was too late for orderly peace¬ time military reorganization. The troops lacked modern equipment, unity of command, and frequently proper motivation. The leadership up to the war of 1809 was with one exception poor and afterward mediocre. This exception was represented by one of the younger brothers of the emperor, Archduke Charles (1771-1847), a popular member of the imperial house and a knowledgeable and dedicated soldier. Even this true leader and strategist was no match for Napoleon’s military genius. He could have accomplished more than he did, but the emperor, jealous of a close relative superior in ability and popularity, gave him only incomplete authority. This hampered all his campaigns beginning in December 1795 and including his tenure as commander in chief from 1806 to 1809. The war of that year terminated for all practical purposes his military career.53 Although fortune denied Charles conspicuous success he im¬ proved the tactical training of the troops, and the education of the officers corps. His successor as commander in chief in the wars from 1813 to 1815, Prince Karl Schwarzenberg, a better military diplomat than soldier and his abler chief of staff, Count Joseph Radetzky, destined to a future spectacular military career in Italy, reaped the benefit of the archduke’s reforms. When the French Constituent Assembly forced the unhappy King Louis XVI on April 20, 1792, to declare war on Austria, this action sealed only a foregone conclusion on both sides by this time. It is certain that revolutionary France wanted to forestall armed intervention by a counter¬ revolutionary alliance. It is not so certain that Emperor Leopold, who concluded the military alliance with Prussia three weeks before his death, could have prevented the showdown. Yet when the French government demanded voiding of the Austro-Prussian alliance and Austrian de¬ mobilization, and the new emperor Francis asked for restoration of the sequestered estates of Alsatian aristocrats and for the return of Avignon to the pope, war became inevitable. Prussia joined the war only in June, 1792. Its conduct on the side of the Allies was hampered from the begin¬ nings by poor motivation of the armies against the revolutionary elan of the French. The better French leadership played also its part against 63 He held only nominal command as governor of the fortress of Mainz in 1815. See also Viktor Bibl, Erzherzog Karl (Vienna, 1962), pp. 226-242. On the re¬ lationship between the emperor and his brother, see Manfred Rauchensteiner, Kaiser Franz und Erzherzog Carl (Munich, 1972).

An Empire Reasserts Itself

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the indifferent Austro-Prussian command, headed by the duke of Bruns¬ wick. His manifesto of July, 1793, threatened the French people with destruction of the capital and terrible retribution against leading revolu¬ tionaries, if the life of the royal couple should be threatened. The duke with this act of political lunacy sealed not only the fate of the king, but made the counterrevolutionary character of the war obvious to every last doubter in France. Yet if the duke’s action revealed misguided zeal on the Allied side, a reverse spirit of ideological indifference was shown by the Russian-Prussian understanding concerning the Polish question. Emperor Leopold would have been willing to preserve the territorial integrity of Poland rapidly striving for enlightened reform within the restricted boundaries of 1772. Prussia, in violation of her treaty with Poland, wished to gain the area around the mouth of the Vistula with Danzig as well as Poznan. Prussia prepared herself for a possible confrontation in the east by stalling her war efforts in the west. Thereby she blocked Catherina IPs aims of taking over Poland while the Central European powers were engaged in the west. Prussia’s direct betrayal of Poland—supposedly her ally—and indirectly of the Austrian military alliance spiked such designs. Russia and Prussia proceded with the second partition, while Austria had to stand on the sideline. Under Emperor Leopold II such abstention might have been intentional because the Habsburg empire would have wanted to become the friend of a reformed Poland. Under Francis, Austria’s isolated stand was simply due to the fact that she had missed the boat in the new landgrab. Cobenzl, held responsible for this diplomatic defeat, was replaced by Thugut. Neither did France, the former traditional ally of a conservative Poland, and the hoped-for ally of a liberalized one, distinguish herself under the regime of the Convention in this sordid affair. The French government hoped by nonintervention in the Polish cause to appease Russia, a restraint understandable under political duress, but regrettable. Actually the sacrifice of Poland merely delayed Russian intervention, but as the war of the Second Coalition and, indeed, any kind of appeasement show, did not permanently prevent it.54 The Austrians with only limited Prussian support fought between 1793 and 1795 in Holland, Belgium, and on the right bank of the Rhine. In the fall of 1794 they had to withdraw to the left bank. The declaration of war on the part of the Holy Roman Empire and of Spain against France (March and April, 1793) changed matters little. Even the British 54 William F. Reddaway in Cambridge History of Poland (Cambridge, 1951), II, I37-I53i Sorel, The Eastern Question, pp. 264-266.

214

History of the Habshurg Empire

entry into the war in February, 1793, had only relatively little immediate effect. The British engaged some French troops in Holland and although the country could not be held by the Allies, this intervention gave them a breathing spell. When Archduke Charles assumed command in Decem¬ ber, 1795, he forced a French withdrawal across the Rhine. At this point two major new factors turned the fortunes of war decisively against Austria: the Prussian withdrawal .from the war, closely related to the third and final partition of Poland, and the appearance of the young general Bonaparte in northern Italy. This strategy changed a secondary theater of war to the decisive battle ground. The revolutionary rising in Poland in 1794 under Kosziuszko’s leadership was crushed by Russian and Prussian military forces. With this victory the conservative powers considered truncated but potentially revolutionary Poland to be doomed. Doubt existed, however, concerning the question of who would get the lion’s share in the final partition. Prussia, as the still smallest of the three powers felt again that she had to keep her hands free for the final barter in the east. With the fall of Robespierre in July, 1794, the revolu¬ tionary tide in France seemed to have turned anyway and thus Frederick William II, a cynical but shrewd politician, was ready for peace in the west. In April, 1795, the separate peace of Basel between Prussia and France was concluded. Saxony, Hanover, and Hesse-Cassel also dropped out. France pledged to evacuate the right bank of the Rhine and, ac¬ cording to a secret clause, Prussia would receive compensations by seizure of ecclesiastic principalities, in case the left bank should be subsequently annexed by France. Both sides considered the annexation a foregone con¬ clusion, and in view of the peculiar political morale of the German princes in their complete separation from the spirit of German nationalism they were not disappointed. A speculation banking at the same time on French military prowess and land-grabbing greed of the German princes could indeed not fail. Frederick William II had also correctly foreseen the course of the Polish partition question. By a treaty of January, 1795, Austria had come to an understanding with Russia with the objective of excluding Prussia from participation in the planned third partition as Austria had been excluded in 1793. The peace of Basel foiled this plan. Prussia’s armed strength was ready to force participation in the new parti¬ tion, if necessary. In fact she gained the center of Poland including the capital Warsaw. Russia obtained Lithuania and part of Volynia, Austria an extension of western Galicia far to the north almost to the onates of

An Empire Reasserts Itself

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Warsaw.55 She had little chance o£ developing these territories, which she lost again permanently in the peace of Schonbrunn in 1809. Her political prestige was certainly not enhanced by this transaction, but, more im¬ portant, even limited Prussian support in the war against France—blocked by the Polish deal—might have prevented the catastrophe in the south. The Austrian government perhaps wrongly believed that France was still in the throes of a domestic revoludon but it was right insofar as the revolutionary designs in international relations had not yet ceased. The war was continued in the west with varying but not catastrophic results. Yet within a year, from March, 1796, to March, 1797, Napoleon Bonaparte unrolled the whole Austrian front in the south and his army, after spectacular successes (Arcole, November, 1796, and Rivoli, January, 1797), crossed the Austrian Alps and in western Styria came within 100 miles of Vienna in April, 1797. It was impossible to continue the war in the west and there was little chance now to defend even the capital. An armistice was concluded in Leoben in April, 1797, followed by the formal peace of Campo Formio of October 17, 1797. Austria had to cede Belgium and Lombardy to France; the Austrian tertiogeniture, the duchy of Modena, had to be merged with the French satellite Cisalpine republic; the Habsburg duke of Modena was to be indemnified with the Austrian possessions in the Breisgau. Thus this part of the treaty could be considered a family affair. A more important, more cynical, though not exactly voluntary, deal on the part of Francis as Holy Roman emperor, was the secret agreement to the cession of the left bank of the Rhine in return for not yet clearly defined indemnifica¬ tions of Austria. The openly agreed compensation for the immediate Austrian losses (mainly Belgium and Lombardy) was the cession of the eastern part of the Venetian republic, up to the Adige, including Venice, Istria, and Dalmatia. The results of the peace treaty from the point of view of power politics could have been worse for Austria. Belgium, particularly after the insur¬ rection of 1789, had little value for Austria and could not be defended under existing conditions. The same was true for Lombardy, though its strategic value was greater. With the territory of Venice east of the Adige (including Dalmatia) the Habsburg empire gained a wide area contigu¬ ous to its meager maritime possessions and as such, as it seemed then, doubly valuable. On the other hand, partition of the ancient republic be55 Marian Kukiel in Cambridge History of Poland (Cambridge, 1951), II, 154— 176.

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History of the Hahshurg Empire

tween Austria and the Cisleithanian republic, a French satellite, was as cynical as the partition of Poland. This deal and the soon to be revealed arrangement about the Rhineland lowered Austria’s political prestige even more than the military setback during the Italian campaign. This evaluation does not take into account the future serious implications in regard to the national question, which were to evolve in this politically sensitive area. Emperor Francis, within five years, had contributed greatly to the weakening of the empire and had compromised the prestige of the house of Habsburg which in several ways had been strengthened by his three predecessors. The peace of Campo Formio had settled nothing except confirmed that France was still a growing and dynamic power, whose nationalistic fervor continued to exercise considerable drawing power beyond her frontiers. This was shown by the establishment of the Roman and Helvetian satellite republics in March, 1798. In particular the abolition of the secular power of the pope created considerable resentment in Austria. Practically more important than the reduction of the status of the papacy were the results of the negotiations of the Congress of Rastatt (December, 1797, to April, 1799) in which France cashed in on the secret Austrian and Prussian agreements concerning her annexation of the left bank of the Rhine, which became now a reality. The subsequent wrangling be¬ tween German states concerning the compensation resulting from the secularization of the ecclesiastic principalities weakened the empire fur¬ ther. The French drive and the fear on the part of the European powers of its by now more alleged than true revolutionary character made a further showdown in the near future inevitable. The war of the Second Coalition against France was popular among the Austro-Germans as manifested by a demonstration against the French embassy in Vienna in the spring of 1798. Of the two leading powers in the new grand coalition, Great Britain was primarily concerned with the French expansion into the Netherlands, Russia later with France’s threat in the Mediterranean focused on Malta; Naples, Portugal, and the Otto¬ man empire joined the alliance. The war began in December, 1798, but Austria did not get directly involved until March, 1799, when France, as preventive move in a clearly predictable conflict, declared war on her. Its first phase coincided roughly with Napoleon Bonaparte’s Egyptian cam¬ paign. The second began practically with his coup d’etat after the return from Egypt in November of 1799, and his subsequent invasion of Italy, after his army had crossed the Great St. Bernhard pass in May of 1800.

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The campaigns up to that point had been fought with varying success in the northern Rhineland, Switzerland, and Italy. Beside the archduke Charles another commander, the colorful and experienced Russian field marshal Alexander Suvorov distinguished himself. Yet the unpredictable tsar Paul I recalled the Russian troops in December, 1799, because of Russian worries about British objectives, Austrian inefficiency, and the hope for a profitable understanding with France in the east. Russia’s defection helped Bonaparte’s further military success. His great victories in Italy, culminating in the battle of Marengo in June of 1800 led also to the collapse of the south German front, where General Jean Victor Moreau commanded, perhaps the ablest of Napoleon’s lieutenants. Austria had to ask for an armistice. Peace was concluded at Luneville in France in February, 1801. It was agreed to by the Holy Roman empire or rather by now its remnants the following month. Actually the treaty affected the dying empire more directly than Austria. The revisions of the peace of Campo Formio, agreed at the Congress of Rastatt, concerning the territories left of the Rhine and in a general way the compensations of the German princes on the right bank of the river were determined and confirmed. Prussia, this time a tertius gaudens, benefited from these ar¬ rangements. Habsburg power was weakened in this treaty by the sur¬ render of the emperor’s position as guardian of the integrity of the Holy Roman Empire. Austria herself had to recognize the French conquests in the Nether¬ lands, Switzerland, and Italy. Tuscany, heretofore ruled by a Habsburg grand duke, was in substance converted into the French satellite kingdom of Etruria. In 1803, the former grand duke obtained Salzburg and parts of several south German bishoprics as compensations. Considering the extent of Austria’s military defeat she had been treated rather leniently again, a fact to be explained by Bonaparte’s chief concern with England and Russia. Austria’s estimate of Napoleon as her chief enemy was never recriprocated by him. A direct consequence of the defeat was Thugut’s dismissal, which preceded even the conclusion of the peace treaty. He was blamed for his intransigent policy against France and replaced by the somewhat more flexible counts Johann Ludwig Cobenzl and Franz Colloredo. Archduke Charles as president of the antiquated Court War Council was now entrusted with the introduction of military reforms, whose beneficial effects however, could hardly have been felt in the war of the Third Coali¬ tion of 1805. In fact, aware that organizational shortcomings could not be corrected within a few years, and worried about the precipitate outbreak

2 iS

History of the Habshurg Empire

of a new war crisis, the archduke resigned in 1804. His warnings re¬ mained unheeded, when the following year Austria plunged ill-prepared into a new conflagration. Preceding these events were the protracted and unedifying negotiations of the Reichshauptdeputation of 1802-1803, the conference of the representatives of the princes of the Holy Roman Em¬ pire whose agreement, the notorious Reichsdeputationshauptschluss of February, 1803, determined the new territorial organization of the empire, after the left bank of the Rhine had been surrendered to France. The compensatory settlement of the claims of deprived princes was supposed to be an internal affair of the Holy Roman Empire. Actually it was regulated by Napoleon and his foreign minister, Charles Maurice de Talley¬ rand. Since Salzburg, the Breisgau, and part of the bishopric of Passau had been awarded to the grand duke of Tuscany and the duke of Modena, who had lost their principalities in Italy, Austria’s sphere of influence was reduced by this deal, although she was in part compensated by the acquisition of the ecclesiastic principalities of Brixen and Trento south of the Brenner pass. Over-all, the empire, and therewith Austria, were not hurt so much by the enlargement of Prussia, Bavaria, Wiirttemberg, Baden, Hanover, and other German states, but by the fact that these transactions had taken place by French intervention rather than by imperial decision. The elimi¬ nation of the ecclesiatic principalities and the reduction of the number of free imperial cities, which in principle, though not necessarily in practice, might have stood for progressive reform thus represented in the eyes of public opinion a national humiliation endorsed by a powerless emperor. On December 2, 1804, when Napoleon, under papal auspices, crowned himself emperor of the French, the signs were clearly on the wall: The dissoludon of the Holy Roman Empire was fast approaching and Habsburg power would be reduced again to an association of diverse princi¬ palities—a kingdom of Bohemia, deprived of its proud historic tradition, an obstreperous Hungarian kingdom, and Italian possessions brought only recently and by barter under the rule of the dynasty. The cohesive and in part constructive efforts of three centuries might be lost in the face of the threat from the West. In this situation, more critical than the one in 1526, when the precarious new union of the Austro-German-BohemianHungarian lands was backed by the vigor and wealth of a rising Spanish empire, Francis decided to forestall the danger of pending disintegration. If he could not restore the cohesion of Habsburg power by military force he hoped to save it by political devices. On August 14, 1804, he proclaimed himself emperor of a newly established Austrian empire. The

An Empire Reasserts Itself

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charters, rights, and privileges of his lands, in the first place Hungary, should not be impaired by this declaration made to a conference of Austrian dignitaries. A unilateral act of this kind had neither the au¬ thority of genuine constitutional government nor the tradition of the thousand-year-old Holy Roman Empire behind it. Moreover it was legally doubtful whether the emperor could on his own initiative join imperial territory—the hereditary and Bohemian lands—to a new empire. Yet considering French pressure and the egoistic policies of the German princes, the imperial action had as much justification as the Pragmatic Sanction promoted by Francis’ great-grandfather Charles VI. The procla¬ mation of 1804 could no more prevent further collisions with France and German princes than the Pragmatic Sanction could prevent the War of the Austrian Succession, but at least it did not have to be paid for in political concessions to other countries. Thus, to a limited degree, it served the purpose of preserving the image of Habsburg power.56 Austria’s participation in the war of the Third Coalition against France did not. True, she had concluded an alliance with Russia in November, 1804, and had gained some further protection by joining a Russo-British alliance system in August, 1805. Furthermore, open conflict could prob¬ ably not have been avoided after Napoleon at about the same time had demanded the withdrawal of Austrian troops from Venetian and Tyrolian territories. Yet there may have been a possibility, that the war for which Austria was not yet ready could have been put ofi until Prussia would join the alliance. The course of action taken ruled out the practicability of Prussian participation, which would have been essential for military success. In early September hostilities began. This time the archduke Charles, whose criticism had dismayed the emperor, was given only a minor command in Italy, commander in chief in Germany was General Karl Mack von Feiberich. One of the poorest military leaders in Austrian history, he was court-martialed after the war for lack of fighting spirit, when he capitulated at Ulm in Wiirttemberg.57 Considering the formid¬ able coalition of French, southern, and western German states under Napoleon’s leadership and the cautious strategy of the Russian com¬ mander Prince Kutuzov, even a better man would not have succeeded 56 See Robert A. Kann, Das Nationalitatenproblem der Habsburgermonarchie (Graz-Cologne, 1964) and the literature cited there, I, 25-30, 346-349; Josef Redlich, Das osterreichische Staats- und Reichsproblem (Leipzig, 1920), I, 42-45. 57 Mack was reprieved later and in 1819 restored to his former rank. The em¬ peror, always harsh in questions of too independent a judgment by subordinates, showed much understanding for incompetence.

220

History of the Habshurg Empire

in the long run where Mack had failed. The allied armies in Germany were soon in steady retreat. Northern Italy had to be evacuated, but the troops withdrawn there to defend Vienna came too late. The French entered the capital on November 13 after a campaign of barely three months. Napoleon, received by the Viennese population more as a celebrity than as an enemy, established his headquarters at Schonbrunn palace. His spectacular triumph did not yet mean the end of the war. In the three emperors’ battle of Austerlitz in Moravia, fought December 2, on the first anniversary of Napoleon’s coronation, he routed in one morning the joint Austrian and Russian armies. The defeat seems to have been more due to the precipitate action of Tsar Alexander than to the hesitation of Emperor Francis. The Russians under Kutuzov’s leader¬ ship managed a retreat to their home base in fairly good order, but the Austrians were completely routed and had to sue for an immediate armis¬ tice. Three weeks later they had to accept the peace terms dictated by Napoleon at Pressburg (Pozsony). This time the peace was harsh. Austria had to cede the Venetian territories gained at the peace of Campo Formio, which made her practically a landlocked country. Napoleon was recognized as king of Italy. Yet more humiliating and painful were the terms which at the French emperor’s command had to be conceded to his German satellites. Bavaria and Wurttemberg were raised to kingdoms. Together with the grand duchy of Baden they were to share the spoils of the Austrian Vorlande in southwestern Germany. Bavaria, furthermore, secured Tyrol, Vorarlberg, the territories of the rich western bishoprics Burgau, Eichstadt, Lindau, Passau, and the southern part of Brixen and Trento. The acquisition of Salzburg and Berchtesgaden by Austria repre¬ sented only a pitiable compensation for her formidable losses in the German-speaking southwest. Austria had ceased to be a great power but, unlike Prussia after her downfall less than a year later, she retained at least her independence in domestic affairs. Compared with Britain and Russia, Habsburg’s European power position had become critical.68 Nevertheless, some changes in domestic policies signified possibilities of change for the better. Archduke Charles and the emperor’s youngest brother, the relatively progressive John, were entrusted now with the continuation of military reform. Count Johann Philip Stadion, previously ambassador to St. Petersburg, was appointed minister of foreign affairs. Whether Stadion’s policy served the best interest of Austria is doubtful, but he and the emperor’s two brothers now in important positions intro¬ duced a broader outlook than the outstanding Austrian civil servants 58 See Rudolfine von Oer, Der Friede von Pressburg (Munster, 1965).

An Empire Reasserts Itself

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under Maria Theresa. All three looked for the support of “public opin¬ ion,” which, considering the tradition of the Habsburg monarchy, its affiliation with the Holy Roman Empire, and the elimination of Prussia as active factor in Central European politics, meant to them German public opinion. They believed it was Austria’s mission to rally the Ger¬ man nation in the struggle against Napoleon, to them the dictatorial apostle of violence in external affairs, but no longer as previously pictured the threat and herald of revolution. A somewhat more liberal spirit, though one tinged distinctly with German nationalist overtones, governed Austria for the next four years.59 To a point this spirit was a reaction to the consequences of the peace of Pressburg, which gradually revealed themselves in their full seriousness. In July, 1806, Napoleon established the Confederation of the Rhine, com¬ prising the major states in western and southern Germany, not including of course Austria and Prussia. Other princes in central Germany joined the confederation subsequently. The proclamation of the princes de¬ nounced the Holy Roman Empire and requested Francis to abdicate as Roman emperor. On August 6, 1806, he was forced to oblige. It is a moot point to discuss, whether the abdication of the emperor meant legally also the dissolution of the empire, because no statute or tradition existed that governed the process of dissolution.60 The empire had come to an end permanently because the German Confederation of 1815, the so-called Second Empire of 1871, and Hitler’s shameful Third Reich, represented no revival but very different concepts. The end of the empire also meant that irrespective of future developments the Habsburgs were deprived of an ancient and proud association which linked them to the core of western political and religious tradition. Of ever greater psychological impact than the establishment of the French-dominated satellite Con¬ federation of the Rhine was the crushing defeat of Prussia in October, 1806, in less than a month and against only feeble resistance. The pride of German nationalism was deeply wounded, the demand for domestic reform was now openly raised, and the desire for termination of appease¬ ment of the foreign conqueror expressed more secretly but even more passionately. Inevitable submission to Napoleon’s demand of 1808 that Austria join in the Continental Blockade of England strengthened this desire. 59 Rossler, Graf fohann Philipp Stadion, II, 13-73. 60 Ernst R. Huber, Deutsche Verfassungsgeschichte seit ij8g (Stuttgart, 1957), I, 62-74; Fritz Hartung, Deutsche Verfassungsgeschichte (Stuttgart, 1950), pp. 162-

169.

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History of the Hahshurg Empire

An indirect but clear Austrian response to the situation was the establishment of a national militia in 1808-1809 which expanded Maria Theresa’s military system to a limited general conscription. The direct appeal to Austrian patriotism on which the new institution was based, met an encouraging response. Yet neither Stadion nor the archdukes had learned their lesson in full. They believed that a people’s army would do as well as the French one in and after 1792, but they did not understand that the French success was due not only to military reforms but to the influence of a broad social revolution. Illusions, however, are understandable in a severe political crisis. Austria was now undoubtedly the last hope of German patriots, though hardly that of non-Germanic national groups within the Habsburg empire. The English counteractions against the Continental Blockade and the Spanish guerrilla warfare encouraged underhand resistance against the French throughout Europe. Still, the understanding between Napoleon and Tsar Alexander, and the Russian advice in Berlin against precipitate action were unmistakable warning signs. They remained unheeded. Habsburg power took the big jump, too soon and again not adequately prepared. The Austrian war manifesto of March 25, 1809, written by Stadion’s brilliant public-relations officer Friedrich von Gentz, appealed to the German nation as to the Austrian people. The manifesto urged their rise against the French emperor. Under existing conditions of centuries-old absolutism throughout the Germanies these invocations were bound to fail. Although they had some effect on German intellectuals, particu¬ larly on the academic youth, these groups did not represent the compre¬ hensive concept of a German political nation. Yet even if such a concept had existed under the rule of the princes of the Confederation of the Rhine, it would hardly have meant political reality. In Austria the appeal to the German nation undoubtedly had a deep effect on the people in the hereditary lands, who felt they were fighting this time a war not in the rearguard but in the forefront of continental interests. No such im¬ mediate effects were visible in the other Habsburg lands, and the war did not last long enough to test their reaction. The war began with a prearranged rising of gallant Tyrolian peasants against the hateful Bavarian satellite regime on the very day of the Austrian declaration of war on April 9, 1809. A southern army under Archduke John, an enlightened prince sympathetic to popular causes, but not an experienced general, fought the French first with some success in Italy. Yet within a few weeks this army was called back to relieve the critical situation of the main forces. A second Austrian army made a

An Empire Reasserts Itself

223

successful foray against Warsaw in the north. The main purpose of this offensive, to encourage Prussia to join the Austrian cause, failed. When Russia as Napoleon’s nominal ally sent an army to Galicia, the Austrians were forced to retreat. Archduke Charles, as commander in chief and commander of the main army, lost his first engagements in southern Ger¬ many. No successful resistance could be offered in Upper Austria either, and within five weeks after the opening of hostilities Napoleon entered Vienna. In view of the bitter Austrian resistance, the new occupation was much harsher than that in 1805. The Austrians fought on. On May 21, 1809, the archduke attacked the French army at Aspern on the left bank of the Danube opposite Vienna. After a savage battle Napoleon was forced to retreat to the Lobau, an island between the Danube and one of its arms. Whether lack of daring on the part of the archduke or exhaustion of his troops and the terrible losses inflicted by the enemy prevented him from following and routing the defeated army in its precarious camping position between the waters is uncertain. A great opportunity may have been lost. Even so, the victory of Aspern electrified Germany and stands throughout the centuries as a lasting testimony of Austrian military prowess under adverse condi¬ tions. In a sense it was Austria’s “finest hour.” Its immediate military effect was lost like that of the efforts of the Tyrolian insurrectionists under Andreas Hofer’s gallant leadership. On July 5 and 6 another hard, but this time decisive, battle was fought at Wagram less than twenty miles from Aspern. Archduke John’s army did not arrive in time and Archduke Charles ordered the retreat of his forces prematurely. The Austrian government, formerly anxious to start the war, now acted with undue haste in the conclusion of an armistice at Znaim (Znoijmo) on July 12. The Austrians might possibly have re¬ ceived better terms if they had not done so, though victory was now definitely beyond their grasp. The peace imposed upon the Habsburg empire was very severe, though again in view of Napoleon’s ulterior de¬ sign not as cruel as the treatment of Prussia at Tilsit. Austria had to cede Salzburg, Berchtesgaden, part of Upper Austria, and Vorarlberg to Bavaria, but “revolutionary” Tyrol seemed not to be safe under undivided control. The eastern French-Illyrian, the southern

part came

now

under French-Italian jurisdiction.

under The

Tyrolian peasants were abandoned completely by the Austrian govern¬ ment, and their leader, Andreas Flofer, was court-martialed by the French and shot as insurrectionist in February, 1810. He has remained a Tyrolian national hero to this day. Cracow and western Galicia had to

22^

History of the Hahsburg Empire

be ceded nominally to the grand duchy of Warsaw, with the king of Saxony as grand duke. Actually this meant cession to France, because Saxony never got into possession. Part of eastern Galicia was given to the tsar, with the intention of driving a wedge between Austria and Russia. This intention, however, failed; fear of French imperialism over¬ shadowed the issue. Extremely painful was the loss of the Austrian “Illyrian” Southern Slav territories to French rule, as it happened under an able and skillful administration by Marshall Auguste Frederic Louis Marmont as vice¬ roy. This cession pertained to the southern parts of Carinthia, Carniola, the eastern Tyrolian Puster valley, Friuli, Trieste, Istria, Dalmatia, as well as Fiume (Rijeka) and western Croatia as Hungarian contributions to the surrender. The Habsburg empire was now completely landlocked. Yet these humiliating losses including a heavy indemnity, still left the bulk of the hereditary lands, and fully the Bohemian and most of the Hungarian realms intact. Austria, though no longer a great power con¬ tinued to be a viable state, and the potentialities for future rise were still open. It was clear that these potentialities could no be exercised now in pursuit of a German course in Austria. Archduke Charles resigned as commander in chief and so did Count Stadion as minister of foreign afTairs. On October 8, less than a week before the signing of the peace treaty of Schbnbrunn, Count Metternich was appointed minister of foreign affairs, and a new chapter in the history of Austrian foreign and soon also domestic relations began. This brilliant, skillful, and personally attractive diplomat came from the Rhineland, where his father had belonged to the sovereign (reichsunmittelbar)

Rhenish

aristocracy whose domains

were expropriated

during the French Revolution. Raised in hatred and fear of revolutionary government of any kind Metternich was not anti-French on national grounds, nor did he see the situation in 1809 as comparable to that in 1792. To him Napoleon represented the overwhelming power that threatened the foundations of the old order. Yet if Napoleon’s ambitious designs could be curbed Metternich did not see him necessarily as an enemy but, on the contrary, as the bulwark against new revolutions, as the man who had succeeded to restore order in France. There is another point which in view of Metternich’s controversial do¬ mestic policies after 1815 has frequently been overlooked. Metternich was in his youth indoctrinated with the spirit of the French enlightenment as distinguished from its Josephin utilitarian Austrian brand. He was not adverse to all French domestic reforms, in particular not in regard to

An Empire Reasserts Itself

225

state-church relations. Above all, the puritan spirit of Josephinism was completely alien to him. Metternich was concerned that Austria needed a breathing spell to re¬ cover from the losses of four grievous wars, to be ready to fight another day, if the situation should present itself. It was clear to him that this re¬ covery could never be brought about in open opposition to France but only by devious ways of limited cooperation. If then the opportunity for a new grand alliance should arise Austria should not jump into the fray as in previous wars bearing the brunt of the attack. She should rather wait until a favorable bid was made to her. In that way her great power position could be secured by the pen even before it was assured by the sword. Metternich was essentially a pragmatist, although he liked to con¬ sider himself the creator of a political system. Yet although his plans were clear in principle he was ready to adjust them to the situation as it would present itself.61 He did not have to wait long. Napoleon, anxious to have an heir, whom he could not expect from Josephine Beauharnais, divorced the empress. The new consort should be the daughter of one of the great European dy¬ nasties to strengthen the hold of the Bonapartes on the throne of France by the bonds of an artificial legitimacy. After having been repudiated in a roundabout way by the tsar who was unwilling to agree to Napoleon’s marriage with Alexander’s youngest sister, Napoleon turned to Em¬ peror Francis and asked for the hand of his oldest daughter Maria Louise. The decision between acceptance or rejection represented a difficult political problem quite apart from the issue of dynastic pride. The mar¬ riage might put a heavy strain on Austrian public opinion. Could the people be asked to welcome or even to tolerate such an association just a year after they had been exhorted to fight a holy national war against the foreign conqueror? Metternich, the cool rationalist and profound sceptic concerning any expression of public opinion, thought the op¬ portunity to reconcile Napoleon was well worth the risk of alienating public opinion. As it turned out, he had no reason to worry. The marriage amused the Viennese greatly and met little opposition in the crownlands. Accordingly, Maria Louise a princess who lacked charm, brains, and char¬ acter, was married to Napoleon in April, 1810. A year later the unfor¬ tunate heir, dubbed solemnly king of Rome, was born.62 61 Heinrich von Srbik, Metternich: Der Staatsmann und Mensch (Munich, 1925), I, 1-128; Enno Kraehe, Metternich’s German Policy: The Contest with Napoleon, iygg-1814 (Princeton, 1963), I, 58-118. 62 Srbik, Metternich, I, 129-141; Kraehe, Metternich’s German Policy, I, 128-130.

226

History of the Hahshurg Empire

It was high time to be prepared for a new crisis. Austria had hardly gone through the state bankruptcy of 1811 when the threatening FrenchRussian showdown cast its shadow. Austria was even forced to con¬ tribute an auxiliary corps of 30,000 men to Napoleon’s Russian campaign of 1812. These troops under Prince Karl Schwarzenberg followed secret directions from Vienna and managed to stay out of major engagements with the nominal enemy and potential ally. After the French breakdown, an armistice with Russia was secured in January, 1813. Nobody doubted that the real foe was Napoleonic France and that Austria had to prepare for “the day.” According to Metternich’s designs it had not yet come. When a hesitating Frederick William III of Prussia had to yield to public opinion and to declare war on France in March, 1813, Austria stood on the sidelines and offered only “armed mediation,” on behalf of the warring parties, which meant on behalf of the anti-French coalition. Napoleon was asked to evacuate the right bank of the Rhine, to abolish the grand duchy of Warsaw, and to return the conquests imposed by the peace of Schonnbrunn in 1809. Metternich, who played for time, certainly did not expect that the French emperor, after he had won several vic¬ tories over the combined Prusso-Russian forces and before Austria had fired a single shot, would agree to such demands. Yet Napoleon, severely shaken by the frightful losses of the Russian campaign, agreed to an armistice, which he later characterized as the greatest mistake of his career. Meanwhile Austria, on June 27, 1813, concluded the agreement of Reichenbach with Russia, Prussia, and Sweden. According to it she would join the grand alliance with these powers and Britain if Napoleon would reject the mediation offer by the end of the armistice (July 20, but due to Metternich’s efforts prolonged until August 10). On June 26 Napoleon and Metternich met in Dresden. In this con¬ ference the Austrian offer was rejected, though this rejection was not confirmed until the termination of the armistice in August. Napoleon, consistently from his point of view, declared that he as the son of fortune could not accept defeat like the legitimate rulers—and the Austrian offer meant, indeed, acceptance of defeat. Metternich knew this, of course, as well as Napoleon. Austria’s entry into the war was then a foregone con¬ clusion, though, according to Metternich’s designs Napoleon’s complete downfall was presumably not considered inevitable at that time.63 On August 12, 1813, Austria joined the allied cause. The commander 63 For Metternich’s account of this conversation see Prince Richard Metternich Winneburg, ed., Aus Metternichs nachgelassenen Papieren (Vienna, 1880), II, 461-

463.

An Empire Reasserts Itself

227

of the Austrian army, Prince Charles Schwarzenberg, operating from Bohemian headquarters, was at the same time commander in chief of all allied forces. His competent chief of staff was Count Radetzky. It was a measure of Metternich’s skill that he had maneuvered Austria into this leading position, though her contribution of manpower was considerably below that of Prussia and Russia (Prussia 162,000 men, Russia 184,000 Austria 128,000). Schwarzenberg, a tactful coordinator of the military coalition was not an outstanding general and several setbacks occurred within the next two months. Yet at the decisive battle of Leipzig (the so-called Battle of Nations) from October 16 to 19, the allied superiority in numbers combined with the reversal of allegiance of Napoleon’s allies, the princes of the Confederation of the Rhine, was overpowering. Na¬ poleon whose armies had suffered irretrievable losses was forced to re¬ treat across the Rhine into France. Now the diplomats went into action, and Metternich played a domi¬ nant role. On December 1 Napoleon was offered the natural boundaries of France (Rhine, Alps, Pyrenees). He rejected, and the war continued. We do not know whether the propositions were meant seriously or whether Metternich, the originator of the proposal, wanted to expose Napoleon as unrepentent aggressor so that the continuation of the war in France appeared fully justified in the eyes of the public. Metternich, a facile and somedmes loquacious writer, did not express himself on this important point in his voluminous memoirs. Yet there is good reason to assume that he would not have put up the plan against stiff Russian and particularly Prussian opposion, had he discounted its acceptance from the start. It is more likely that he played it both ways. Should Napoleon reject the plan, continuation of the war in French territory would appear justified in the eyes of the public. Should he accept, however, a Napo¬ leonic regime would guarantee the necessary strength and efficiency to curb the possibilities of future revolutions in France. A Bourbon restora¬ tion would of course readily offer such guarantee. The big question was whether a Bourbon king would be strong enough to honor a com¬ mitment of this kind. Much in Metternich’s rationalist philosophy seems to support the notion that at that time he put more trust in Napoleonic ruthless strength than in the staying power of the restored ancient regime. On the other hand, Napoleon’s position as son-in-law of Emperor Francis hardly played a role in Metternich’s or even Francis’ considerations. Dynastic solidarity did not extend to an upstart, who was now clearly out of luck.64 64 Srbik, Metternich, I, 163-182; Kraehe, Metternich’s German Policy, I, 313-326.

22#

History of the Hahsburg Empire

Following Napoleon’s rejection, the war was carried into France after Christmas 1813. Now the Austrian forces were superior in numbers but not in leadership. Strategists consider the spring campaign of 1814, when Napoleon was outnumbered four to one, as one of his most brilliant campaigns. Schwarzenberg, a slow and undecisive general, was no match for Napoleon’s lightening attacks; the Russians and Prussians did not do very much better. The final victory was simply due to the exhaustion of the French army and a change in strategy directed toward engagements with Napoleon’s subleaders and a march on the capital rather than battles with the main army under his command. The Allies entered Paris on May 31, 1814, which meant the end of the Napoleonic empire. Irrespective of allied military ineptitude, Napoleon’s end had been a foregone conclusion for a long time. The treaty of Chaumont signed March 9, 1814, by Austria, Great Britain, Prussia, and Russia had estab¬ lished that the Allies would conclude peace not separately but only jointly. The French meanwhile had lost control of Italy, Holland, and —by summer, 1814—of all Austrian Southern Slav territories. There is no question that in Paris Talleyrand influenced the tsar con¬ cerning the restoration of the Bourbons, which as seen from the French viewpoint would assure the frontiers of 1792. There is much reason to speculate that Metternich for a time still considered the continued asso¬ ciation with the Bonapartic system as a better guarantee of law and order than the Bourbon restoration. The conflict about the selection of an appropriate French government, however, came never into the open. The tsar accepted Talleyrand’s advice and the French Senate yielded to the counsel of prudence but certainly not to popular enthusiasm. Accord¬ ingly, on April 6, the count of Provence was proclaimed king of France, two days after Napoleon’s forced abdication at Fontainebleau. His hon¬ orable banishment to Elba, as whose sovereign he was recognized, fol¬ lowed. The Allies, on May 30, concluded a peace with France (first treaty of Paris). Metternich played a decisive part in the conclusion of this covenant, which for all times will have to be considered as model of restraint in victory. The new French frontiers in the east were in fact somewhat more favorable than those of 1792, before the beginning of the war period. On September 18, 1814, the great peace congress, whose task it was to settle international and particularly territorial relations between all participants of the wars of the revolutionary and Napoleonic period, convened in Vienna. The final agreements were signed on June 9, 1815,

An Empire Reasserts Itself

229

even before the adventure of Napoleon’s comeback attempt—the Hundred Days regime—had ended in the disaster of Waterloo (June 18, 1815). The end of the Napoleonic regime could be considered as permanent by spring, 1814; the events between the return from Elba and the banish¬ ment to St. Helena were no more than a gripping historic episode, significant only because it restored allied unity at a critical moment. As far as Austria’s position was concerned, the return of her territories ceded to Bavaria in 1805 had been agreed upon earlier by a special convention in June, 1814. In July, the Southern Slav territories were also reoccupied by Austrian troops. This preceded the opening of the Congress of Vienna. Nevertheless, the Congress whose diplomatic conferences were presided over by Metternich was significant for the Habsburgs. Even the choice of the place added to their newly regained prestige. Yet except for the Ger¬ man question Austria at the Congress was primarily concerned with the general European balance of power, rather than with specific boundary questions, which Metternich could frequently settle in bilateral negotia¬ tions. A discussion of the general settlement would go beyond the objective of this study. An evaluation of the position of such eminent statesmen as Castlereagh and Wellington for Britain, Talleyrand for France, Hardenberg and Wilhelm von Humboldt for Prussia, Nesselrode and Capo D’Istria for Russia to mention only a few outstanding names, is only indirectly relevant. This applies also to the sovereigns present at the Congress, of whom the obtuse Frederick William III of Prussia and in particular the bright but volatile tsar disturbed rather than helped nego¬ tiations. The emperor Francis on the other hand left Metternich and his right hand man Gentz, the secretary of the Congress, much discretionary power. An understanding of the Austrian position within the general European situation but without specific discussions of the over-all European terri¬ torial problems, requires a recognition of the principles that guided the peace-making. Metternich pursued them within possible limits with dip¬ lomatic flexibility but without dogmatism. As generally known, these principles were legitimacy, restoration of the prerevolutionary status if pos¬ sible, adequate compensation if necessary, and balance of power between the great European states as imperative. Austrian policies can be de¬ veloped from these tenets.65 65 Sir Charles Webster, The Congress of Vienna, (New York, 1963), pp. 164-167. See Guglielmo Ferrero, The Principles of Power (New York, 1942), pp. 21-28, and

History of the Hubs burg Empire

2 jo

Thus, it was a foregone conclusion that the Habsburgs had a claim to get the territories back that they had lost after 1791. The claim was to be modified, however, by the experience gained since the War of the Spanish Succession that noncontiguous areas, however valuable otherwise, would be difficult to defend and thus might become sources of interna¬ tional friction. Recognition of this fact meant the renunciation of the claim to Belgium. Repossession and defense of the Vorlande in south¬ western Germany did not seem to be advisable either. Approval of the partition of these lands between the three major southern German states, Bavaria, Wiirttemberg, and Baden, however, bade well for cordial rela¬ tions with all of them and the possibility of Austrian leadership in the German south. In the northeast, eastern Galicia was returned to Aus¬ tria, but the parts of Poland received in the third partition became part of so-called Congress Poland, the trunkated Polish satellite kingdom under the rule of the tsar. Cracow was recognized as a city republic under the protection of the three partitioning powers of 1772 and 1796. Austria, then, lost poorly developed territories, which had been under her rule for only a few years. They would have been difficult to defend against Russia, that appeared on the rapid rise to become the foremost continental power, whose cooperation Austria needed in many ways. Recuperation of the spoils of 1796 thus did not prove practical and was superseded by the principle of adequate compensation. Unfortunately it was exercised according to the views of seventeenth- and eighteenthcentury statecraft, that territorial acquisitions in the west accounted for more than many times larger ones in the east. Yet while renunciation of former Austrian territories appeared sen¬ sible under existing conditions, acquisition of compensatory territories raised formidable long-range problems. Austria’s fully restored greatpower position was now to rest largely in her regained as well as her new Italian possessions. A Lombardo-Venetian kingdom including the Swiss Veltlin Valley, Tuscany, and Modena as appendages under Habsburg archdukes were involved in this deal. Such appendages came into play

in

the

disposition

of the

three

north-central

Italian

duchies

Piacenza, Parma, and Guastalla, which were given to the emperor’s daughter (Napoleon’s consort) Maria Louise, who had left her husband by the same author The Reconstruction of Europe (New York, 1941), pp. 47-61, 195-216. Sir Harold Nicolson, The Congress of Vienna (New York, 1946), pp. 257264. Karl Griewank, Der Wiener Kongress und die Neuordnung Europas (Leipzig, 1942), pp. 111-146.

An Empire Reasserts Itself

231

as soon as his fall appeared inevitable.00 Napoleon’s son, the former “King of Rome,” now reduced to a modest duke of Reichsstadt (an im¬ perial domain in Bohemia), was barred from the succession and lived from now on as a semiprisoner in the gilded cage of Schonbrunn, where he died in 1832. Both, the emperor and Metternich, had hoped to quash the revival of Bonapartism. Metternich lived long enough to see this illusion shattered after the revolution of 1848. In regard to the over-all pacification of Italy the failure of Metternich’s policy became apparent with the return of Napoleon from Elba, when his brother-in-law Murat, the satellite king of Naples, revolted against the new Italian order, even before the Congress act was signed. The insurrection was quelled by Austrian armed forces, the gallant Murat shot, and the kingdom of the two Sicilies handed over to the hated Italian Bourbons, despised by everybody except the staunch adherents of feudal pre-1789 Europe. Ac¬ tually Metternich himself belonged to those who were soon to hold the regime in contempt, which reentered now the Italian scene with in¬ creased inefficiency and feebleness but compensatory cruelty. Unmistakable warnings were on the wall in the Murat revolt, which was more national¬ ist than Bonapartist. The moral foundations of Metternich’s Italian policy have to be under¬ stood if not defended by his concern for the balance of power. He saw no other ways of maintaining it than by bringing Lombardy with feeble, Venice with hardly any, and the north-central Italian duchies with brittle dynastic bonds under the Austrian roof. Here at least almost territorial contiguity and the possibility of military defense existed, if as Metternich saw it, the Habsburg empire continued to be a great power. In view of the concessions he was willing to make in the German question he felt he had to insist on the Italian acquisitions and restitutions of former status in the face of national resentment. Metternich believed he could appease it in the German theater, if he maintained the over-all Austrian power position by insisting on the con¬ trol of north-central and northeastern Italy regardless of popular opposi¬ tion. In doing so the ultimately and inevitably played in the hands of nationalism and national liberalism. Whether this policy was erroneous 66 Parma and Guastalla were to revert after Maria Louise’s death (in 1847) to a sideline of the Bourbons, whereas Piacenza was to remain within the Austro-Italian political system. Concerning the nationalist issue, see Hannah A. Strauss, The Attitude of the Congress of Vienna towards Nationalism in Germany, Italy and Poland (New York, 1949), pp. 85-122.

2J2

History of the Hahshurg Empire

also from a short-range viewpoint depends on the opinion whether de¬ laying actions in an indefensible position make sense or not. Metternich may indeed have treated Italy as a merely geographic concept, a fact for which he was justly criticized especially because he understood that Italy meant something else.07 The core of Metternich’s policy was the German question. When he agreed to the admission of France into the inner councils of the de¬ liberations of the Congress, he did so to counteract the threat of a Rus¬ sian-backed Prussian hegemony in Germany. When in January, 1815, he signed a secret alliance with Britain and France against Russia and Prussia he did not do so to block a Russian solution of the Polish ques¬ tion and a Prussian solution of the Saxon question. This would have meant in the case of Poland the affiliation of the whole country with Russia and in that of Saxony its complete incorporation into Prussia. Metternich was not even predominantly concerned with the balance of power in these instances. His attention was focused again on the over¬ all German question. This meant to him that the Germanies must be protected from the control by one power, Prussia backed by Russia. When he stood for German unity rather than union he took this issue more seriously than his stand against German liberalism and constitu¬ tional government. To achieve unity Metternich and the emperor made important con¬ cessions, including the provisions of the second peace of Paris in Novem¬ ber, 1815. Despite the agreed upon occupation of northern France by allied troops for five years—as it turned out actually only three—and despite the imposition of a war indemnity and the change from the frontiers of 1792 to those of 1790, the terms were still moderate. Austria might have done better in southwest Germany, if she had concurred in Prussia’s demands for a harsh peace. Yet the price would have been agree¬ ment to a further Prussian aggrandizement and a further step toward her threatening hegemony in Germany. The Flabsburg empire could also have sabotaged the tsar’s personal fa¬ vorite project, the conclusion of the Holy Alliance of September 1815, whose ideological and political significance is often underrated. It pledged the adherence of the signatory sovereigns to the principles of Christian patriarchic government in international as well as domestic affairs. The implied endorsement of intervention by the conservative powers in the 67 Sir Charles Webster, The Congress of Vienna, pp. 142-147; Sir Harold Nicolson, The Congress of Vienna, pp. 182-195; Griewank, Der Wiener Kongress, pp. 236-240.

An Empire Reasserts Itself

233

affairs of other countries kept England from participating. The more subtly injected anti-Catholic character and the great weight carried by Russia made the pope withhold his support. Austria might have done likewise and would have secured for herself greater freedom of action. Yet again in view of the further course of Austro-Prussian rivalry in re¬ gard to the German question, Metternich acquiesced.68 Proof of this policy was the charter of the German Confederation69 signed on June 8, 1815, the day before the Congress adjourned and supplemented by the Viennese terminal act of May 15, 1820. The new as¬ sociation of thirty-nine sovereign states (four of them free cities) repre¬ sented in its greatly reduced number of members as compared with those in the Ploly Roman Empire an adaption to more modern condi¬ tions. Basically an alliance against foreign foes, the Confederation became an instrument of mutual defense against revolutionary activities within member states. Indirectly this provided also for the possibility of interven¬ tion of major states in the affairs of smaller ones. Constitutional guaran¬ tees were reduced to the establishment of the ancient feudal estates diets, travesties of genuine representative government and greater impediments to social reforms than the government of enlightened absolutism. The confederal diet, in permanent session in Frankfurt am Main, was to consist of two houses: (1) the ordinary assembly, in which most states, including the two great powers Austria and Prussia, had only one vote each (only some of the smaller ones had to cast a joint vote); and (2) the plenary assembly, in which the number of votes were weighted slightly in favor of the larger states. Inasmuch as the change of the basic laws of the Confederation required unanimity, this kind of organization meant little more than a courteous deference to the principle of sovereignty of the small states. Essentially also a prestige matter was the politically mean¬ ingless permanent presidency of Austria in the proceedings of the Con¬ federation. This provision hurt Prussian sensibilities but added nothing to Austria’s power. Austria and Prussia combined were the controlling forces in the Confederation, a fact strengthened further by the terminal act of 1820. Apart from the right of confederal intervention in a domes¬ tic crisis of member states, the indissolubility of the association, which 68 Henry A. Kissinger, A World Restored (Boston, 1957), pp. 175-190. 69 Literature in English refers usually to the association as German or Germanic federation and to its assembly as federal diet. Actually the organization was an example of a confederation, that is, a union of sovereign states, where common in¬ stitutions—above all the confederal assembly and the confederate council—repre¬ sented interstate relations and agencies. They did not form a federal government, to which the individual states were subordinated.

234

History of the Hahshurg Empire

prohibited voluntary withdrawal, guaranteed the firm hold of the great powers. The membership of foreign states with their German possessions (Holland in regard to Luxemburg, Denmark to Holstein, England to Hanover) complicated the external relations of the Confederation. In regard to Austria, two factors were significant, which disturbed the internal order of the association. The first was, that the Habsburg em¬ pire belonged only with those of her territories to the organization that had been part of the Holy Roman Empire. This included the hereditary lands, the Bohemian lands, Goricia, Trieste, parts of Istria, and a small part of western Galicia. In other words for the Austrian domains the membership in the German Confederation was based on historic and not on ethnic affiliation. The second disturbing factor, which derived from the first one, was that the alliance function of the Confederation did not extend to Hungary, the major part of the Polish-Ruthenian terri¬ tories, and the Lombardo-Venetian kingdom. Austria might thus become involved in a war with Russia over Polish-Ruthenian territories, and with France over Italian areas without guarantee of support from the Con¬ federation. In such a war, part of a national group—Italians or Poles— might have to fight in the service of the Confederation and part against it, a factor inherent in the structure of the multinational empire. Disadvantages, in fact contradictory disadvantages, of Austria’s mem¬ bership in the Confederation were thus obvious. Yet the Habsburgs, largely for the sake not only of heading off the national and potentially democratic revolutionary movements, but also of an understanding with Prussia, dropped any claims for restoration of the ancient Holy Roman Empire. The proud heritage of the traditional Habsburg association with its crown was neither renounced for selfless reasons nor purely in the in¬ terests of power politics. The relationship to Prussia, to the Confedera¬ tion as a whole, and to the tradition of the Holy Roman Empire, repre¬ sented the ambiguous character of a power exposed to Germanic, Slavic, Magyar, and Italian crosscurrents. Considering the complexity of this relationship no solution could serve as anything better than an expedient. That of the German Confederation, which helped to assure peace in Central Europe for a generation, was far from ideal but considering the many possibilities of armed conflict not the worst either. The unromantic, reactionary and—an unusual combination—at the same time antitraditional character of the new organization tempts students of its history to overlook these facts.70 70Ferrero, The Reconstruction of Europe, pp. 217-241; Griewank, Der Wiener Kongress, pp. 207-233; Robert A. Kann, The Problem of Restoration (Berkeley, 1968), pp. 362-370; Huber, Deutsche Verfassungsgeschichte seit iy8g, I, 475-563.

An Empire Reasserts Itself

235

Concerning Austria’s over-all situation Metternich had made far-reach¬ ing concessions in 1815 to the principles of legitimacy and restoration in the German and Italian sphere. On the other hand, by a limited applica¬ tion of the device of adequate compensations and adjustments he had even aggravated the situation by creating an essentially unhistoric Lombardo-Venetian kingdom and an equally unhistoric, though some¬ what less controversial, German Confederation. He had thus created a system of neoconservatism, that could not appeal to the power of tradi¬ tion. In this sense he was the scion of the Enlightenment. But he had in an admittedly imperfect way secured in this manner the preserva¬ tion of peace for some time, that is peace at a price of suppression of popular liberties and delay of essential social reforms. Yet Metternich had to some extent modernized the new association of German states and he had made Austria a territorially contiguous power at the price of some justifiable territorial losses. To accomplish these ends he had to ignore nationalism rather than fight it. Had a man of his standards tried to cope with it, such undertaking might have brought about disaster in its be¬ ginnings as it did in the end. It cannot be held against Metternich that he failed to jump over his own shadow—either from the viewpoint of his character or of his rationalism in terms of time and place. As for the last principle of Metternich’s foreign policy, establishment and maintenance of the balance of power, his success was far-reaching and doubly impressive, considering that he began his operations in 1809 from the position of a defeated state. By competing with England, sparing France, curbing Prussia, and subtly blocking Russia, Metternich under trying conditions had, indeed, in substance worked successfully for peace. He continued to do so for a generation to come. K.

Domestic administration of Francis I (1792-1815)

The reign of Francis I can be divided into the war period from 1792 to 1815 71 and the subsequent twenty years of peace. The latter led undistinguishably, except for the change from a mediocre to a mentally dis¬ abled ruler (Ferdinand, the Benign, 1835-1848), to the revolution of 1848. Permanent economic and social changes took place during the peace period and will be covered in the following chapter. Since intellectual trends during the Franciscan era will be treated separately, the discussion in this section can be brief. As noted before, the domestic reign of Francis did not begin with a renunciation of the aims of Josephinism but rather as a continuation of its objectives of further centralization, true to form but entirely lacking 71 Only in 1812 technically against Russia and not against France.

2]6

History of the Habsburg Empire

the spirit of the reform era. We mentioned the shock effect of the radical executions in France and the discovery of the so-called Jacobin con¬ spiracies in Budapest, Vienna, and Graz, leading to numerous arrests in 1794 and several executions and barbarous jail sentences the following year. The political activities of those participating in the plot were limited, but the scare raised by the social composition of these groups was considerable. The involvement of respectable government officials of fairly high rank, professors, burghers of means, let alone the subversive priest Martinovic, filled the emperor’s narrow mind with fear. The fact that most conspirators happened to be freemasons, which had nothing to do with their Jacobin affiliations, made him feel that anything not in the limelight of public inspection was suspicious. Public discussion of con¬ troversial questions was not acceptable to the regime. Emperor Francis neither requested nor even welcomed support of his policies. Its accep¬ tance would have implied recognition of the importance of public opin¬ ion. This in turn might eventually have led to recognition of public criticism. The sovereign asked for quiet obedience, the motto of his sys¬ tem of government. Added to this attitude was his fear that because difficult problems went over his head, his advisers might disregard his orders. This fear forced him to decide frequently important matters with¬ out proper consultation with his advisers, because he felt unable to cope with their arguments. Thus we face a strangely contradictory system of sometimes precipitate but usually vacillating and often inconsistent decisions. As noted, Francis’ regime moved in the beginning in the direction of strict centralization including Hungarian, Belgian, and Italian affairs. Yet in 1793 the financial agenda and the government of the Belgian and Italian domains were again separated from the over-all administration. In 1801 political, financial, and even judicial agenda were merged anew on the highest level. Maria Theresa’s State Council was dissolved and replaced by a so-called Conference Ministry in three departments (foreign affairs, armed forces, interior). In 1808 the emperor reversed himself once more—the Conference Ministry was dissolved and the State Coun¬ cil restored. More permanent were changes introduced in 1802. The United Court Chancery was now entrusted with German, Bohemian, Galician, and Italian affairs. The judicial administration was separated again from the political administration and the financial and commercial affairs were given over to an empire-wide court chamber. The State Council operated now in four sections (general administration, judicial affairs, military,

An Empire Reasserts Itself

237

and financial agenda). At least one member of every one of these four sections was to be a Hungarian. Above the State Council was the Con¬ ference Council entrusted with agenda that could not be disposed of by the State Council. Yet none of these collegiate bodies could be blamed for imperfect operation. The emperor consulted frequently with in¬ dividual members rather than with the whole body. Often he failed to inform an adviser, that he had asked somebody else to deal with one of the adviser’s affairs.72 In 1813 a separate minister of finance was appointed. After the emperor’s death a state conference under the chairmanship of the emperor’s brother, Archduke Louis, two other archdukes, Metternich, and the minister of state, Count Anton Kolowrat, was established to handle affairs on behalf of the mentally retarded successor, Ferdinand. The estates structure as it had been restored under Emperor Leopold II remained in substance unchanged, which meant a policy of ignoring the estates rather than fighting them. Even the bow to the estates constitu¬ tions embedded in the Charter of the German Confederation did not change this. In this respect the centralist trend initiated by Maria Theresa was continued, except for Hungary. Here the diet, a body somewhat more representative than a mere estates assembly, was regularly summoned to pass on governmental requests for taxation and conscription. A conflict with the diet in 1811-1812, however, concerning the demand for recogni¬ tion of the state bankruptcy and its devaluation of money led to con¬ tinued prorogations until 1825, when efforts to have the coronation of Ferdinand secured made reconciliation with the diet necessary. From now on the Hungarian diet was convened regularly again, not so the Translylvanian, which met only twice during Francis’ reign.73 Abso¬ lutism, dominant throughout his regime, was even more firmly in the saddle during the years of peace after 1815 when the impact of public dissatisfaction seemed less dangerous. This trend pertained also to the administration on the local level in Austria, where the remaining urban elective offices were gradually changed to appointive ones. More positive should be the evaluation of the judicial administration, where the separation of justice from administration was now generally recognized, in the lower courts as well as in the two instances of the 72 Huber and Dopsch, Osterreichische Reichsgeschichte pp. 302-323; Ernst C Hellbling, Osterreichische Verfassungs- und V' erwaltungsgeschichte (Vienna, 1956), pp. 323-330; Friedrich Walter, Osterreichische Verfassungs- und Verwaltungsgeschi¬ chte (Vienna-Cologne-Graz, 1972), pp. 118-138. 73 Marczali, Ungarische V erf assungsgeschichte, pp. 125-129.

238

History of the Hahshurg Empire

courts of appeal. Patrimonial jurisdiction was further restricted, not so much for humanitarian reasons but to uphold the principles of absolute central government. The few outstanding achievements of Franciscan government are two of three major legislative works, new codes of civil procedure, criminal law, and civil law. Between 1796 and 1816 the code on civil procedure had been introduced in several crownlands and the Lombardo-Venetian kingdom, but it was never recognized in all Habsburg lands outside of Hungary.74 With its cumbersome written procedure this code did not represent a marked improvement over that of 1781. The Code of Crim¬ inal Law of 1803 initiated by Emperor Leopold II, but strongly influenced by earlier Josephin legislation, has frequently been unfairly criticized. Changed by several piecemeal revisions and one major one in 1852, it is in essence still in force, though about to be replaced while these lines are written. No code of criminal law can do justice to social changes brought about in the course of five generations. Imperative as the needs for a new code are today as indeed they have been for almost a century, the old one was a remarkable, sophisticated legislative achievement in its theoretical aspects concerning the responsibility of the individual. It was surpassed, however, by the general civil code of 1811, drafted by a commission under the chairmanship of Franz von Zeiller and tested first in Galicia. Here the Josephin legislative drafts were of primary importance. The revisions of the Code of Criminal Law never succeeded in bringing it up to date but those of the Code of Civil Law have accomplished just that. This code has thus become the crowning achievement of Austrian legislative efforts. With only one major revision some fifty years ago it has stood the test of time to this day and is still recognized as the greatest legislative work in the judicial sphere in the German language orbit. At the same time it is a monument of Austrian culture, not fully recognized outside the legal sphere. Emperor Francis deserves at least the negative credit that he did not wreck this work. More deserving of praise are Joseph II and the members of the codification commissions whose efforts succeeded in bringing about a synthesis between principles of natural law, en¬ lightened etatism, and legal tradition. The high standards of this code and that of criminal law are illustrated by the clear language of these instruments. In this respect they surpassed previous as well as future codi¬ fications. The correlation with the evolution of classicism in German liter¬ ature is noteworthy.75

74 None

of these codifications in the judicial sphere pertained to Hungary. 75 See Strakosch, State Absolutism and the Rule of Law, pp. 152-217; Ernst Swoboda, Franz von Zeiller (Graz, 1931).

An Empire Reasserts Itself

239

Military reforms under the influence of Archduke Charles and Count Stadion have been referred to. The chief problem, even more important than the badly needed reorganization of the army itself, was that of raising military forces sufficient in numbers for the major engagements ahead. Two seemingly conflicting trends in the administration which, however, were meant to serve this purpose became apparent. Beginning with the year 1795, service exemptions were gradually restricted though by 1827 they still applied for instance to nobles, government officials, physicians, students, peasants who had to cultivate larger farms, and sons who supported their parents. At the same time, to make the service less intolerable, life-term obligations were reduced in 1802 in the hereditary lands to commitments ranging from 10 to 14 years, and by 1845 in the ITabsburg lands outside of Hungary altogether to 8 years, in Hungary in 1839-1840 to 10 years. In the course of the reforms inititated in 1802, military justice was improved and the cruel military discipline somewhat modified. These reforms, though on a smaller scale than those introduced by Scharnhorst, Gneisenau, and Boyen in Prussia, actually preceded them. One complicat¬ ing factor different from Prussia was the lack of popular appeal of mili¬ tary service after 1813; but the establishment of a national militia in the wars of 1809 and 1813, joined by volunteers, offset the impact of the man¬ power crisis during a most critical period of Austrian history. On the other hand, the success of the militia system at that time obscured the seriousness of the manpower problem for many years.76 The peasant population in Austria did not only bear the hardship of long-time military service. The conversion of personal services to the lords into monetary dues initiated so unsuccessfully by Joseph, was after 1797 left entirely to “free” agreements between lord and subject. In Hungary similar legislation was introduced during the last years of Francis’ reign. In conjunction with the decrees issued by Leopold II this meant for all practical purposes a full retreat to conditions during the sec¬ ond half of Maria Theresa’s reign, rather than an effort to improve on the Josephin legislation. In one sphere, state-church relations, Emperor Francis seemed to be pleased with Joseph’s legislation: complete state control, though in con¬ trast to its administration under the great emperor one lacking all social considerations. Changes within the Church in a more conservative direc¬ tion were encouraged under governmental control. Marriage legislation remained under jurisdiction of the state, but the state incorporated the principles of ecclesiastic law into state legislation—the one inevitable, 76 Rossler, Graf fohann Philipp Stadion, I, 233-235, 263-267.

240

History of the Hahshurg Empire

glaring weakness of the Civil Code of 1811. Thus divorce of Catholic marriages was prohibited—a Catholic to be defined as somebody who, irrespective of his later persuasion, was born into the faith. Influence of the Church on elementary and intermediate education—again under state supervision—was strengthened. The monastic legislation of the Josephin era was somewhat loosened.77 Young men and women were allowed now to join orders at the age of twenty-one. The papal decision to restore the Jesuit Order led to its readmission in Austria and although its influence became substantial again, the order never regained the powers there it had held before its dissolution. The establishment of the Redemptorist congregation (Liguorian Order in Austria) under the influence of its out¬ standing member Clemens Maria Hofbauer (later sainted) did not suc¬ ceed fully in strengthening social-welfare interests within the Church in his lifetime.78 The narrow approach of the official Church in Austria to educational and social problems (see Chapter VI. E) did not mean impoverishment of the faith. Outside of the sphere of state-church relations contemporary Catholic intellectual life injected interesting and frequently constructive new ideas into society at large. The same cannot be said wherever state and Church intervened offi¬ cially. There was some improvement in the purely administrative aspects of elementary education, but this was ofifset by the fact, that parish priests and ecclesiastic deans were now entrusted by the state with the full super¬ vision of education in their districts. The number of advanced institu¬ tions in secondary education increased somewhat. But here again clerical control was on the rise and censorship was tightened. Moderate progress could be seen, however, in the establishment of technical colleges of university rank in Prague (1812) and Vienna (1815), none in the uni¬ versities themselves. This does not exclude, of course, outstanding scholarly achievements of specific individuals.79 Technological progress in industry during the protracted war period of the first half of Francis’ regime was slow, even though the best-developed Austrian industry, textile manufacture, in the Bohemian lands and in Lower Austria benefited from the Continental Blockade, when English competition was eliminated for a time. The initial development of sugar 77 Josef Wodka, Kirche in Osterreich (Vienna, 1959), pp. 312-320; Anton Weiss, Geschichte der osterreichischen V ol\sschule iyg2-i848 (Graz, 1964), Vol. II. 78 Rudolf Till, Hofbauer und sein Kreis (Vienna, 1951), pp. 59-77. 79 Richard Meister, Entwickjung und Reform des osterreichischen Studienwesens (Vienna, 1963), I, 44-53.

An Empire Reasserts Itself

241

refineries benefited also from the restriction of imports, and the Bohemian glass industry, a true quality industry, progressed. Yet the chief impedi¬ ment of large-scale industrial progress was the lack of governmental and private capital, brought about by the prolonged financial crisis of the war period and the first years afterward. Apart from the exorbitant costs of the war, mismanagement played a part. Austrian high dignitaries in¬ volved in domestic administration, such as Archduke Charles and Count Stadion had only a limited understanding of financial affairs and of the relationship of a sound economy to the war effort. The ablest administra¬ tor in this domain, Count Franz Saurau, the president of the Lower Austrian gubernium, had only a territorially restricted jurisdiction, and Emperor Francis’ top financial adviser after 1809, and technically speak¬ ing his first minister of finance, Count Joseph Wallis, proved to be a poor administrator and an even worse consultant. Inflation had existed in Austria throughout the reign of Joseph II. Great military expenditures could not be covered by the disappointing results of agricultural and in¬ dustrial reforms. The public debt at the beginning of the reign of Leopold II amounted to 375 million guilders in government bonds. Only after 1796 did they have to be accepted, however, as payment in lieu of cash. At that time paper money was introduced officially as legal tender. The situation soon worsened. By 1809 coins were hoarded. Even copper coins disappeared from circulation. The public debt had risen to nearly 700 million guilders and was to rise further. Private credit was unobtain¬ able. In March, 1811, a decree signed by the emperor a month before it was published, declared in effect state bankruptcy. The value of the paper guilder, officially the full equivalent of the silver coin, amounted in effect (that is, in private trade) only to one-twelfth. But the decree reduced the banknotes merely to one-fifth of their nominal value. Moreover, the secret of the governmental transaction was badly kept, and specula¬ tion profited widely before the official announcement. A governmental promise that henceforth no more paper money would be printed could not be kept.80 In fact, the wars of 1813-1814 were fully financed by re¬ course to inflationary measures, which increased the public debt further. Only the establishment of an Austrian National Bank in 1816, which coincided roughly with the end of the war and the termination of the concomitant expenditures gradually stabilized the situation. The influx 80 Johanna Kraft, Die Finanzreform des Grafen Wallis und der Staatsban\erott von 1811 (Graz, 1927); Anton Springer, Geschichte Osterreichs seit dem Wiener Frieden i8og (Leipzig, 1863), I, 139-278; Viktor Bibl, Der Zerjall Osterreichs (Vienna, 1922), Vol. I, Kaiser Franz und sein Erbe, 194-202.

2^2

History of the Habsburg Empire

o£ the French war indemnity imposed in 1815 helped to ease condi¬ tions.81 Chief sufferers from the devaluation and the continued price rise during the wars were, of course, employees with fixed incomes. But in¬ dependent craftsmen and small merchants were also hurt by the increase of food prices as were peasants by that of manufactured goods. In other words, the lower middle class and daily wage earners suffered most. The state bankruptcy in itself may have been necessary, but the way it was initiated by insufficient measures and defended by false promises turned it into a failure also in a psychological sense. A wide credibility gap was created between the Austrian people and their government, which did not make for ready acceptance of the sacrifices. The first part of the Franciscan reign had ended with a limited but impressive success in the arena of international relations. In the domesticeconomic field it had proved to be a failure, camouflaged by continued stress on the hardships of war. The second part of the reign, though under less external strain, revealed also gradually that the insufficiency of government could be explained but not excused by reference to events beyond its control.

81 Rossler, Graf Johann Philipp Stadion, II, 149-220.

CHAPTER VI Standstill, Decline and Stabilization (i815-1879)

The span of two generations from the Congress of Vienna to the con¬ clusion of the Austro-German alliance covers a fairly homogeneous period but its beginnings and end mark considerable change. In 1814-1815 the Habsburg empire was reestablished as a great European power, al¬ though its restored influence was more due to its central position in the balance between east and west than to a great military potential. Second in strength only to Russia and Britain at the beginning of the new era, at its end Austria had to yield also to the second German empire, and in global respects to France. Her great-power status after the conclusion of the alliance of 1879, according to which she had to operate under the umbrella of Germany’s strength, was more nominal than real. In domestic policies these sixty-odd years present the transition from absolutism to constitutional government, a transition with several ups and downs, but on the whole leading to remarkable results. Fairly clear were also the char¬ acteristics of the era in intellectual history. It comprised romanticism, the Slavic renaissance, the rise and decline of a new liberalism, and the dawn of an integral nationalism. These and other intellectual trends, however, did not occur among all Habsburg peoples at the same time and under the same social conditions. Therefore, these complex problems of ideological change are discussed separately in Chapter VII. A.

FOREIGN

POLICY (1815-1879)

It is easier to trace a continuous course of Austrian history in inter¬ national relations than in any other field. Without losing sight of the 243

244

History of the Hahsburg Empire

decisive impact of domestic developments on foreign affairs, it is still possible to survey them in their entirety and discuss concomitant internal politics later. The loss of Austria’s Italian and German position is a dominant theme. Both were influenced by the break with Russia, brought about by the Crimean War. This rift was never healed and was still a cause of the unfortunate position in which Austria found herself when World War I broke out in 1914. Yet it is true also, that all these reversals, which be¬ came fully manifest only with the outcome of the Crimean War, could not have had such an adverse impact on the Habsburg monarchy, if the congressional system of 1815, so ingeniously designed by Metternich and Castlereagh, would not have shown serious cracks within less than a decade and almost complete paralysis by 1830. It might be said that Metternich, advanced to the position of state chancellor in 1821, was as controlling agent though never as “coachman of Europe,” as the shallow phrase goes, in command of the machinery of the Concert of Europe until 1822. This means during the brief period, when one can speak of a system of government by international con¬ ferences. In 1818 at the conference of Aix la Chapelle, the occupation of northern France by the four allied powers was terminated in substance and France as fifth great power was readmitted to the Concert of Europe, irrespective of the continuation of the wartime quadruple alliance be¬ tween Austria, Britain, Prussia, and Russia. Under the Bourbons the readmission of France strengthened undoubtedly the conservative system. What seemed even more important, the weaker and less aggressive western flank of Europe was braced against Russia and Prussia. The second and third conferences at Troppau in 1819 and at Laibach (Ljubljana) in 1820 proved how necessary the strengthening of the system was from the standpoint of Metternich’s policy. At Troppau the great powers agreed in principle to check the revolutionary move¬ ments in Spain, Portugal, and the kingdom of the two Sicilies. At Laibach, in January, 1821, the Austrian armed intervention against the popular insurrection in Naples was actually decided upon against the counsel but not against the open dissent of the British and French governments. Austrian troops restored order in Naples as well as in Piedmont, where Torino was occupied. Neither of these interventions had to cope with significant armed resistance, yet by openly aligning Austrian interests with the shameful despotism of the Italian Bourbons, repugnant even to Metternich, Habsburg power began to present itself to moderately enlightened and liberal Europe as the jailer of Italian na~

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

245

tional liberties. The Austrian government could probably in the long run not have avoided the confrontation with the Italian national movement if it wanted to hold on to the territories secured in 1814-1815, but Austria might conceivably have defended her Italian position in a spirit of con¬ ciliation and concession. Such an attitude would not have solved the problem but it might have blunted the fierce hatred of progressive forces, not only in Italy but all throughout Europe. This factor made its influence felt in all aspects of Austrian international relations in the coming decades. Not lack of skill on Metternich’s part, but the impossibility to restore Austria’s great-power rank without strengthening the untenable Italian position at the Congress of Vienna were responsible for this turn of events. The Congress of Verona in 1822, which agreed upon the French intervendon in support of the Spanish Bourbon regime in France, a hardly less disgraceful one than that in Naples, did not concern Austrian interests as directly as the Italian national movement. Yet in as much as this decision led to the British breakaway from the congressional system of foreign intervention in the domestic affairs of other states, the longrange effect of the French massive military action in Spain proved to be even more unfavorable to Austrian conservative interests than the inter¬ vention in Italy. The withdrawal of Britain meant that the congressional system had proved to be unworkable by now. British isolationism became now, if not a fact, a probability. Consequently, Russia’s rising inordinate strength among the continental powers made a mockery of the balanceof-power idea. This fact was put to the test in the Greek revolution and war of independence from 1821 to 1830. Metternich, to whom legitimacy meant more than alleged Christian principles of government, had pre¬ vailed with difficulty on Tsar Alexander I not to intervene openly on be¬ half of the Greek independence movement against the Ottoman empire. He might even have succeeded in this respect also with Alexander’s harsher successor Nicholas I, if he had had to deal with the impact of Russian imperialism alone which hoped to establish an orthodox satellite regime in the Balkans. Metternich’s failure to curb Russian designs was pri¬ marily due to the Russian-British agreement of 1826 which made it clear that the two great flanking powers of Europe had resolved in part to share and in part to divide an eastern Mediterranean sphere of influence. In any case, the preservation of the status quo of 1814-1815 meant no longer anything to them and was discarded. Thus the renunciation of the congressional system by the mightiest conservative empire, unimpeded by the leading naval power, preceded the proclamation of full Greek inde-

2^6

History of the Habsburg Empire

pendence. Yet this was not the only event of the year 1830 which unhinged the Metternich system.1 The July revolution of that dramatic year in France which replaced the pseudo-constitutional Bourbon monarchy with the pseudo-parliamentary Orleans monarchy represented another patent defeat for Metternich’s policy. As it turned out, the Orleans regime of Louis Philippe proved to be less liberal than Metternich had feared originally and the tricolor under the Orleans was hardly more revolutionary than the lily banner under the Bourbons. And yet Metternich, and again from his point of view rightly, was afraid of the precedent generating impact of the situation.2 This was indeed manifested by the separation of Belgium from Holland just a month later, by the Polish revolution suppressed only the following year, and by new risings in central Italy which required Austrian military intervention. To Metternich the revolutionary impact of Carbonari underground activities and a much publicized Mazzinian Young Italy movement, par¬ alleled by a wave of liberal pro-Hellenic and pro-Polish sentiments throughout Europe, would have seemed less dangerous if he still could have dared to cooperate fully with Russia. Yet in the critical July days of 1830, confronted with the prospect of allowing Russian military interven¬ tion in France, which would have entailed the marching through and perhaps even stationing of Russian troops in the territories of the German Confederation, he submitted to the lesser evil of the recognition of the Orleans monarchy. A system, afraid more of the protection by its own guardians than by the activities of its enemies, had defeated itself. Yet it had not defeated itself completely. The German question per¬ mitted still and required a measure of cooperation by the eastern powers. “Das Hemd ist naher als der Rock.” In other words cooperation in the German orbit, as a center of the Habsburg power position, was more important for Austria and Prussia, than the struggle for the economic and political supremacy in the Germanies. The same applied to Russia. At the stage of political conditions between 1815 and 1848 the ruling system in the Habsburg empire could be damaged and weakened by revolts in Italy and the east. It could be destroyed, however, by revolu¬ tionary movements in Germany. The same was true for Prussia. Both tsars, Alexander I and Nicholas I, acted accordingly. 1 Nicholas C. Irby, European Pentarchy and the Congress of Vienna (Ithaca, 1971), passim. John A. R. Marriot, The Eastern Question (Oxford, 1951), pp. 193224; Heinrich von Srbik, Metternich: Der Staatsmann und Mensch (Munich, 1925), I, 629-655. 2 Ibid., I, 645-682. George H. F. Berkeley, Italy in the Maying, 3 vols. (Cam¬ bridge, 1932-1940), see Vol. I.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

247

The Metternich regime, in particular under the influence of the state chancellor’s most influential counsellor in German affairs, Gentz, had viewed with concern the radical national and, to a point, liberal demon¬ stration of German youth at the Wartburg festivities of 1817. The assas¬ sination of the playwright August von Kotzebue—allegedly, but not in the real meaning of the term, a police spy in the service of the Russian government—by a romantic nationalist student, Karl Sand, in March, 1819, seemed to confirm these fears. Considering the limited extent and as yet limited appeal of the Burschenschajten, the short-range impact of this movement was not great, its long-range effect, particularly on the events of 1848, is arguable, but the inordinately severe response of the Metternich system against transgression of German intellectual life was certain. Metternich took the initiative in the proceedings of the Carlsbad Con¬ gress (August 6-31, 1819) which concerned itself largely with the police supervision

of intellectual, particularly

academic

activities.

Actually

Austria with her only modestly developed university system and public cultural activities, was in this respect far less directly affected than several other member states of the German Confederation represented at the con¬ ference such as Prussia, Bavaria, Hanover, Saxony, Wurttemberg, Baden, Nassau, and Saxony-Weimar. Moreover, Metternich himself insisted on cooperation with the tsar, even though Russia had only an ideologicalpolitical and no legal stake in the situation. The Carlsbad Decrees, ap¬ proved under Austro-Prussian pressure by the Bundestag in Frankfurt the following month by unanimous vote, provided in substance for strict gov¬ ernmental university control, prohibition of all student associations, in particular the Burschenschaften, strict censorship of publications, above all of brochures and pamphlets, and the establishment of a confederal central investigation commission of subversive activities in Mayence, en¬ trusted also with the task of blacklisting politically suspicious persons. Valid originally for only five years, the Carlsbad Decrees, at the behest of Austria and Prussia, were obligingly renewed for an indefinite period in 1824 and voided only under pressure during the March revolution of 1848. These joint efforts to defend the German Confederation and indirectly also the Habsburg territories to the east against a coming revolution, were in some degree instrumental in fermenting internal unrest among intel¬ lectuals, though this unrest stirred up Prussia and central Germany north of the Main more than the relative quietism in the Catholic south and particularly in the Austro-German hereditary lands. The necessity for political cooperation of the ruling regimes explains also why the Prussian efforts for a German customs union, excluding Austria, were so successful and the failure of the Habsburg policies to

248

check them

History of the Habsburg Empire so

spectacular. Prussian economic policy

was

in

part

prompted and in part helped by the fact that the industrial revolution had made greater progress in Germany than in Austria. The advantages of a customs union, initiated by Prussia as early as 1819, appeared more con¬ spicuous to the German member states of the Confederation than to the Austrian statesmen. Metternich’s feeble efforts to delay a German eco¬ nomic union, which easily might become a political one to the detriment of Austria, were unsuccessful, in part also because he wanted to avoid a political showdown with Prussia as long as the political philosophy of the Prussian government was agreeable to him. Political considerations preceded economic ones. Accordingly his means of checking the Prussian designs were ineffective. A South German customs union, consisting of Baden and Wurttemberg and a large Central German union of Saxony, Planover, Kurhessen, and the Thuringian states, both concluded in 1828, were favored by Austria. Just the same, most members joined the Deutsche Zollverein, which became a reality on January 1, 1834. It com¬

prised most states of the Confederation except for Austria, Baden, the Hansa cities, Nassau, and Mecklenburg. Altogether, this union comprised 23,000,000 people and in part territories with high cultural and economic standards. It is not too much to say, that the materialization of the Zoll¬ verein stood for a preliminary decision, that the coming political struggle for the supremacy in Germany would result in the victory of Prussia. No matter how reactionary the Prussian regime under Frederick William III and Frederick William IV was, no matter how brutal—indeed more brutal than in Austria—the persecutions of the “demagogues” were, the German nation associated the idea of German unification with a reformed and liberalized Prussia and not with a predominantly agricultural

and

predominantly non-Germanic Habsburg empire.3 The question arises whether the death of Emperor Francis in 1835 changed matters for better or worse. The replacement of a petty tyrant by a feeble-minded successor, the new emperor Ferdinand, dubbed “the Benign,” changed little. The absurdly excessive application of the principle of legitimacy adhered to by Francis and Metternich, namely the succession of an incapacitated man because he was the next heir to the throne, damaged the system itself. On the other hand, the intellectual equipment of the second prince in the line of succession, Archduke Francis Charles, the father of the future emperor Francis Joseph, was not impressive 3 Theodore

J.

Hamerow,

Restoration,

Revolution,

Reaction:

Economics

and

Politics in Germany, 1815-18J1 (Princeton, 1966), pp. 10-16; Heinrich von Srbik, Deutsche Einheit: Idee

und

(Munich, 1963), I, 257-283.

Wir\lich\eit

vom

heiligen

Reich

bis Koniggratz

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

249

either. In this sense the State Conference established in 1836, nominally to assist but actually to replace the emperor, could hardly do worse and in some respect might have done better than a Ferdinand or Francis Charles who would have had free reign. The conference was presided over by Emperor Francis’ most undistinguished brother, Archduke Louis. Francis Charles added little lustre to it, while the only gifted and by character strongest scions of the imperial house, archdukes Charles and John, were excluded by the will of the late emperor. Decisive influence in council was held by Metternich and by Count Anton Kolowrat, since 1826 con¬ ference minister and in charge of financial and of over-all domestic policies. Thus in internal policies it is perhaps more correct to speak for the last two decades of the restoration period of a Kolowrat regime rather than a Metternich regime. Yet the philosophy of the restoration system in external and the police system in internal affairs was associated with Metternich all over Europe. In any case, two statesmen of stature were the leading members of the state conference. Metternich, though he had passed the peak of his success, was still considered a man of foremost experience in foreign affairs. Kolowrat, a more capable administrator, had at least a limited understanding for the problems of nationalism in its conservative and traditional historical-political pattern.4 5 In 1833, at the entrevue of Miinchengratz in Bohemia the old emperor Francis had received the solemn promise of the tsar, that he would sup¬ port the antirevolutionary policies conducted in the name of the de¬ bilitated heir. Considering Nicholas’ sentiments of conservative chivalry there was no reason to doubt the seriousness of this pledge. There was complete cooperation in the settlement of the Turkish-Egyptian crisis of 1840 and in the conclusion of the Dardanelles treaty the following year, which closed the Straits in peacetime to the men of war of all nations. Yet these were matters of no immediate concern to the Habsburgs. A better test of still harmonious relations with Russia was the incorporation of the Free City State of Cracow in 1846 into Austrian territory, which, following the Polish insurrection in Galicia, took place with the full endorsement of the two other partitioning powers of old. The Polish Piedmont seemed to be destroyed. Equally important for Austria, the incorporation, com¬ bined with the conspicuous factor of Russian and Prussian intolerance against their Polish subjects, helped to give a relatively moderate Habsburg Polish policy the chance of smooth sailing for a long time.6 4 Eduard Winter, Romantismus, Restauration und Fruhliberalismus im osterreichischen Vormdrz (Vienna, 1968), pp. 206-211; Srbik, Metternich, II, 8-24. 5 Hanns Schlitter, Aus Osterreichs Vormdrz (Vienna, 1920), I, Galizien und Krakau, 19-34.

250

History of the Hahshurg Empire

The revolution of 1848-1849, as far as domestic policies are concerned, was of supreme importance for the Habsburg empire. The same is not fully true for foreign affairs, which changed the anticipated course of international relations only in regard to the German question and only intermittently for some years. Yet the German question was as much and perhaps even more an issue of domestic as of foreign policy and has to be viewed from both angles. Only the latter will be reviewed at this point. •^On March 13, 1848, unrest in Vienna was fermented by students, young professional men, mostly representatives of the better-educated citizenry. These liberal forces found support from the workers in the suburbs. Their initial success might have remained illusory had it not been for the tran¬ sitory backing by moderate, even conservative reformers, whose influence reached at least briefly members of the imperial house such as the arch¬ duchess Sophie, mother of the 'heir presumptive Francis Joseph and the archduke John, youngest brother of Emperor Francis. These conservative circles, more influential than the unorganized liberals, forced the resigna¬ tion of Metternich. They and particularly the intriguing archduchess did not do so because they disagreed with the principles of his foreign policy and even less so because they sympathized with revolutionary activities. ,They simply believed that evolutionary moderate reforms of the estates system, as proposed by the able and sincere former Tyrolian estates member, Victor von Andrian-Werburg, and his ideological friend, the artillery captain (later general) Karl Moering, might help to contain a potentially dangerous revolutionary situation. Above all, they concurred that the name of Metternich served as European cliche symbol of reaction and hostility to reforms, even though the conduct of foreign policy had only an indirect and not immediately apparent connection with the revolutionary events. This is the principal reason why Metternich had to go, and it serves also as explanation of the fact that his downfall could unbalance foreign relations for a time but not basically change them. Metternich’s enemies at the court who were in principle enemies of the revolution as well, would probably have reconsidered their attack against the chancellor’s shaky position, had they foreseen the course of revolu¬ tionary events just for a week. Actually Austria’s foreign relations were not primarily determined by the conservative or liberal domestic regime of individual powers but by the change or threat of change of the European equilibrium in general. As seen from the vantage point of foreign policy, this is the explanation why the turmoil of the events of the liberal revolution returned relations to the revolutionary Germanies and Italy to the status quo, whereas those

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

257

to an ideological ally like tsarist Russia permanently changed the Euro¬ pean picture of international relations. The revolutionary period in Austrian domestic policies ended in a larger sense neither with the dissolution of the Austrian Reichstag of Kremsier in March 1849 nor even with the surrender of the Hungarian insurrectionists in August, 1849, at Vilagos, but with the official reestab¬ lishment of absolutism throughout the empire by decree (New Year’s Eve Patent of 1851). This event almost coincides with the termination of the crisis in foreign policy, the so-called Prussian Capitulation of Olmutz (Olomuc) to Austria’s ultimatum in November, 1850. During the revolutionary period we have to focus our attention in re¬ gard to foreign policy on three main theaters. First the revolution in Italy and the invasion of Lombardy by the Sardinian army; second the revolu¬ tion (later the war of independence) in Hungary, although this extreme crisis concerns us at this point only so far as it forced the Austrian govern¬ ment in May, 1849, to make the humiliating demand for Russian military support; third the struggle about and around the German issue. Events in all three theaters were, of course, to some extent interrelated. Even though R.ussian military help was requested at a time when the inter¬ vention of Piedmont-Sardinia had been repulsed already, the Habsburg armies save for the Italian crisis would probaly have been able to put down the Hungarian insurrection so speedily and decisively that Russian intervention would not have become necessary.6 The conflict about and around the German issue, which goes back as far as the Silesian wars between Frederick II and Maria Theresa, would have come about re¬ gardless of the Italian and Hungarian confrontations, yet here too Austria could have acted sooner and more energetically against Prussian claims, if it had not been for the divisionary events in other theaters of action. Finally, the Austrian dependency on Russian support in the Hungarian crisis foreclosed the possibilities of a more flexible course in German affairs, which might have been frowned upon by the last despotic ruler in the old style European sense, Tsar Nicholas I. We begin with the revolutionary events in Italy. Disorders and public demonstrations against the hated Austrian regime in Brescia, Milan, and Padua had preceded the outbreak of the revolution in Vienna by several months. Following the signal of Metternich’s downfall, the revolution started in earnest on March 17 in Venice, where Daniel Manin, an in¬ veterate liberal foe of Austrian rule and early champion of Italian unifica6 On the background history of the Russian intervention see Elisabeth Andies, Das Bundnis Habsburg-Romanow (Budapest, 1963), pp. 7-105.

252

History of the Hubs burg Empire

tion, proclaimed a republican government. The following day the revolu¬ tion spread to Milan, the center of Austrian administration and economic and cultural activities in the Italian territories. On March 25 the army of King Charles Albert of Piedmont-Sardinia invaded Lombardy. He had himself proclaimed king of Upper Italy in June. The Sardinian invasion would not have posed a major military threat, except for the fact that the Habsburg empire had to be prepared for other risings in its far-flung realms. Just as serious was the fact that the Italian national movement found active support throughout the peninsula and strong sympathies in France. On the other hand the Italians were the one enemy whom the Austrian forces fought consistently with military success. The Austrians were well experienced in this arena, and strong fortifications, particularly the so-called quadrilateral fortresses to the south of Lake Garda, served their purpose well. The aged commander in chief, Count Joseph Radetzky, chief of staff of Prince Charles Schwarzenberg in the battle of Leip¬ zig in 1813, was an experienced soldier. His quarter master general and chief of staff, Baron Heinrich Hess, was likewise a capable officer. The military efficiency of the Sardinian-Piedmontese troops was not on a par with their strong motivation and individual bravery in many instances. The same observation was true for the Italian performance in 1859, 1866, and 1915-1918. In August, 1848, the Sardinians were defeated, after the Austrians had scored a decisive victory at Custozza on July 25. The duchies Modena and Parma were freed too as seen from the Austrian viewpoint or submitted to renewed oppression as seen from the Italian. On August 9, 1848, Charles Albert was forced to evacuate the territories under direct Austrian rule or protectorate and an armistice was signed. Yet in January, 1849, a new revolt began in Tuscany. It followed the out¬ break of the revolution in Hungary on a large scale by a few weeks. When the conflagration spread there further, Charles Albert made another try and invaded Lombardy in March, 1849 again. A week later, defeated by Radetzky at Novara, he abdicated in favor of his son, Victor Emman¬ uel II, who immediately concluded an armistice with Austria.7 Peace was signed with the assistance of British mediation on August 6, 1849. Piedmont-Sardinia was obliged to pay an indemnity of 75 million francs, but she could at least maintain the territorial status quo. Two weeks later the republican regime in Venice came to an end. Manin fled to France, and the Austrians repossessed the city and province. One consequence of the Italian risings was the ineffectiveness of the 7 Oskar Regele, Feldmarschall Radetzky (Vienna, 1957), pp. 233-320; Berkeley, see III, 97-394-

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

253

Austrian campaign in Hungary which eventually made Russian assistance and the concomitant dependence on the tsar inevitable. The incompetence of the Austrian commander in Hungary, Prince Alfred Windischgratz, played its part. As for long-range effects of the Italian campaigns, northern Italy and the duchies would hardly ever have acquiesced to Austrian rule. The war escalated Italian rejection of foreign domination to passionate nationalism, although Austria had fought a defensive war against Sardinia and had only answered force with measured force. Harder to defend were internal measures of suppression in the Lombardo-Venetian kingdom. General Alexander von Haynau, “the butcher of Brescia,” who besmirched the reputation of a centuries-old military tradition, a champion of hangings and floggings of male and female Italian patriots, was longer remembered than an often heavy-handed but on the whole remarkably clean Austrian administration in Italy.8 An issue more central to the Habsburg empire was its position in the German Confederation. The Italian question touched upon the Habsburgs’ continued existence as great power, mainly as affected by access to the eastern shores of the Adriatic sea and not yet by other territorial issues. The German question, on the other hand, was interlocked with Austria’s survival up to the dark days of her dissolution in 1918. Seen at this point only from the angle of international relations, the situation presented itself as follows: The so-called Vorparlament, the preliminary assembly of the representatives of the German peoples, a self-appointed body of German estates members, met in Frankfurt after previous discussions in Heidelberg. The objective was arrangement for the establishment of a constituent German national assembly to be elected by a democratic franchise. This assembly was joined after a few days by a handful of Austrian delegates, who like most of the five-hundred mem¬ bers, were either enlightened conservatives, such as Victor v. AndrianWerburg, or moderate liberals like Franz Schuselka and the poet Count Anton Alexander Auersperg (as writer Anastasius Grun). While at the beginning of the revolution the fate of the old order in Vienna and Berlin hung in the balance, this semiofficial body could exercise sufficient pressure on the confederal diet to repeal the Carlsbad Decrees and to do away with concomitant police machinery of enforcement in Mainz (Mayence). It was a feature of tragic irony that the subsequently elected National As8 See Friedrich Walter, “Von Windischgratz iiber Welden zu Haynau” in F. Walter and H. Steinacker, Die Nationalitdtenfrage im alten Ungarn und die Siidostpolitil\ Wiens (Munich, 1959), pp. 115-161.

254

History of the Habsburg Empire

sembly never managed to acquire the same influence as its predecessor,9 which, consdtutionally, was entirely unrepresentative. As in the dramatic overture to a grand opera, some leitmotifs of Aus¬ tria’s relations to the Germanies were heard already in these preliminary proceedings. The great Czech historian Francis Palacky (1798-1876), in an open letter of April 11, 1848, declined Czech participation in the Vorparlament and by inference in that of the coming National Assembly as well. In an official sense Palacky was not a representative of the Czech people, yet in a spiritual sense he was, indeed, the spokesman for the Slavic peoples who had settled in territories within the confines of the German Confederation, above all the Czechs in the Bohemian lands, but also the Slovenes in Carniola, southern Styria, and the northern part of the Austrian Littoral. In a wider sense Palacky could be considered as a voice, not only of a revived Austrian'Slavism, but of all non-Germanic peoples of an actually existing but not recognized multinational empire, tied to the superstructure of a German political framework. Palacky denied legal bonds of the lands of the Bohemian crown to the Holy Roman Empire and subsequently the German Confederation. With this argument he stood on strong moral and national but questionable legal and his¬ torical grounds. Even less convincing was the argumentation of the con¬ servative Czech leader that an association of German-directed principali¬ ties would not work and that a republican system in its place would lead to the disintegration of the Habsburg empire. Whether such deductions held some truth or not, they were based on conjecture. Decisive, however, was Palacky’s third argument, that a viable Habsburg empire must be¬ come a true multinational association of peoples of equal rights. Freed from the pressures of German nationalism within its borders as well as from outside it would become a bulwark against Russian expansionism toward the west. Neither accommodation with the other member states of the German Confederation nor a peaceful and friendly relationship with Russia, however, was outruled in this powerful appeal.10 Coming from the representative of a people that had been politically disarmed for more than two centuries, the Palacky letter could not have had profound repercussions if it had not fitted in with some of the burn¬ ing issues raised in the freely elected Frankfurt Constituent Assembly. It met for the first time in St. Paul’s Church on May 18, 1848, with 115 Austrians in a membership of about 560 representatives. 9 Robert A. Kann, Das Nationalitatenproblem der Habsbur germ on archie (GrazCologne, 1964), I, 72-87, 369-372. 10 Ibid., I, 171-174, 412.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

255

The issues, which the Frankfurt parliament had to face, were in many ways overlapping with those of the Austrian revolution. Yet endeavors to establish a federal democratic organization, the question of a hereditary or elective imperial head or possibly even republican presidential constitu¬ tional pattern were of concern to the entire membership of the German Confederation. The same held true for the basic question of procedure namely to solve any of these crucial problems through a legislature that had no executive arm at its service. The sovereign states, even though in the throes of the revolution, held out against subordination under a fictitious central government for all German entities. This meant further that with the eventual victory of the old establishment in the individual states after the revolution, the dream that a democratic German legislature could be cemented by an over-all democratic executive force across a hoped-for German empire would come to an end. This, indeed, was the case hardly a year after the revolution had begun. These were the main issues which concerned the Habsburg empire specifically while the struggle continued: First, the basic question of democratization of government; inasmuch as German intellectual life, particularly in the German west exercised its influence on Austria in this direction, this was undoubtedly a major factor which strengthened the revolutionary forces in the Habsburg monarchy for a time. Second, there was the struggle for the supremacy in Germany between Austria and Prussia, revived in a period of political instability and only transitory establishment of a genuine constitutional pattern. This con¬ stitutional aspect of the German question had considerable influence on public opinion but little direct impact on the course of action throughout the revolution. Negotiations in this respect were conducted primarily on the Austrian and Prussian cabinet levels. They threatened for a brief time to escalate into military confrontation, but this collision (actually as it turned out not more than a political episode) was primarily not the direct consequence of the revolution but due to the ruthless and daring policy of one man. This was the Austrian prime minister from Novem¬ ber 1848 to his death in 1852, Prince Felix Schwarzenberg. He was officer and diplomat by training, by accomplishment rather a political gambler and in any case a statesman of spectacular but only transitory success. Seen from the long-range point of view he was a brilliant failure. His predecessors in charge of foreign affairs from March, 1848 (the fall of Metternich), to November, 1849, General Count Karl Ficquelmont, Baron Franz Pillersdorf, an able administrator in domestic affairs, and barons Anton Doblhofif and Johann Wessenberg, had done little to

2 y6

History of the Habshurg Empire

force the issue of the Austrian-Prussian showdown. Deeply involved in the internal crisis, in addition to the war against Italy and the revolution in Hungary, they played a temporizing game. As it turned out this was a wiser policy than Schwarzenberg’s vabanque policy.11 This, however, was not possible in regard to the third and main issue, which involved not just the cabinets but appealed to the emotions of the educated strata in Germany and Austria and, as Palacky’s letter indicated, was to arouse Slavic interests as well. The question of the relationship of the Austrian empire to the Germanies, be it in the frame of a revised confederation or of a new federation of one kind or another, was the first issue of genuine popular appeal in Austrian foreign policy between the war of 1809 and the war against Serbia more than a century later. This powerful impact was primarily due to the fact, that this question, though in its technicalities primarily one of international relations, was in its cultural and emotional sense very much an issue of home-grown national interests.12 In terms of the stillborn Frankfurt Constitution of May 28, 1849 (Articles 2 and 3), this meant that the non-German parts of the Habsburg empire were required to have separate constitutions and administrations. Otherwise Austria could not join the new German empire even with the Austro-German hereditary lands alone. In other words, and with specific regard to the Habsburg monarchy, this meant, that the government of the German lands under Habsburg rule could be associated with the nonGerman Habsburg lands by way of a mere personal union only. The fact alone that the bearer of the crown in the hereditary lands would happen to be the same person as the ruler of all other Habsburg domains would tie entirely separate governments to each other. By clear intention of the Frankfurt Assembly this would imply the end of the Habsburg empire in its traditional sense. It meant also in substance that a basic issue, dormant since 1815, had come to life now and was to remain so for a century: the grossdeutsch idea of a German empire with the inclusion of German Austria versus a \leindeutsch program, which barred its incorporation and would thus preempt German leadership for Prussia.13 The grossdeutsch idea presented the 11 Srbik, Deutsche Einheit, II, 123-142; Kann, Nationalitatenproblem, II, 70-72, 321-322; Rudolf Kissling, Fiirst Felix zu Schwarzenberg (Graz-Cologne, 1952), pp. 206-227. 12 Srbik, Deutsche Einheit, I, 315-365. 13 The terms grossdeutsch and \leindeutsch are not translated here, since the translation into English would attach to grossdeutsch an inaccurate nationalist

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

257

wishes, indeed aspirations, of the Austrian liberals and moderate conserva¬ tives, deputies such as Eugen Megerle von Muhlfeld, Anton von Schmerling, Karl Giskra, Franz von Sommaruga, and somewhat to the left Moritz Hartmann. Only a few other Austrians in Frankfurt, like Victor von Andrian-Werburg and Karl Moering would have been ready, if neces¬ sary, to sacrifice the German affiliation in favor of a strong fully inde¬ pendent Austria. Yet the liberals believed that the German association and Austria’s independence as great power were compatible. The adherents of the bjeindeutsch program found little support among the Austrian delega¬ tion. Outside of Austria proponents of this concept were about equally divided between adherents of a Prussian supremacy as objective per se and those who believed that affiliation with Austria stood for reaction, sym¬ bolized by the bygone Metternich system. Although German intellectuals across the border were much larger in number and often more radical than their Austrian compatriots, it is difficult to see in practical terms a basic ideological distinction between Metternich’s and Francis’ conserva¬ tism and that of Frederick William III and the false neoromanticism of his mentally unbalanced son and successor, Frederick William IV. Yet the existence of such distinction belongs to the mythology of the revo¬ lution and has been nurtured ever since, in particular by Heinrich von Treitschke’s influence on German historiography. Actually only the radi¬ cal democratic Left which stood for the homogeneous German national state and a liberalism equally opposed to Austrian and Prussian reaction, can be credited with full consistency in this respect. On the other hand, the liberal Left at Frankfurt cannot be exonerated from a spirit of in¬ tegral nationalism in regard to the Germans in Schleswig-Holstein under Danish rule. The other side of the coin of German national sensitivity was the oppressive treatment of the Poles in the Prussian east.14 Highlight of the struggle in Frankfurt was the election of the enlight¬ ened conservative Archduke John on June 29, 1848, as regent of the hope¬ fully but not actually emerging new Germany. After Emperor Ferdinand and his entourage had left Vienna, the hotbed of revolution, for the safer Innsbruck, this prince of noble intention had been for a few weeks regent in Austria. His election to the more conspicuous but actually less im¬ portant honor of regent of the new Germany after the assembly had slant and to \leindeutsch a touch of diminution not generally associated with the way the term is understood in German. 14 Srhik, Deutsche Einheit, I, 366-403; Sir Lewis B. Namier, The Revolution of the Intellectuals (London, 1944), pp. 43-65.

2y8

History of the Habsburg Empire

declared the confederal diet dissolved (June, 1848) was to herald the per¬ manence of Austro-German affiliations and German and Austro-German constitutional development. The seeming victory of the National Assembly over the confederal forces of old proved empty. The archduke’s position was untenable from the start; he had no executive forces at his disposal to bring about the progress of German democratization. Yet even if this situation could have been remedied, progress was not likely under his auspices. John was neither a German, Austro-German, or simply Austrian liberal, but simply an enlightened Austrian conservative prince. Moreover, he was not en¬ dowed with political skill. His unquestioned sympathies for German uni¬ fication could hardly serve as substitute. Accordingly the archduke’s re¬ gency proved to be a failure, though more due to the force of circum¬ stances than to his own inefficiency. For this reason the Reich ministry appointed by the new regent exercised hardly more power than a cabinet of puppets although its members were distinguished men. One of the abler Austrian statesmen, Anton von Schmerling, for a few weeks speaker of the Assembly, served in it first as minister of the interior and of foreign affairs, and from September to December, 1848, as prime minister. Then, disillusioned by the forced political impotence of his position, he resigned and returned to Vienna.15 Yet, though Schmerling had little power, his appointment proved that the Austrian government, despite its difficulties in Italy and Hungary, was not ready to withdraw from its German position and was not willing to yield to Prussia. Thus Schmerling and his like-minded Austrian col¬ leagues could at least claim credit that the draft of the new German con¬ stitution, whose discussion began in October moved in the direction of a grossdeutsch compromise, acceptable to Austria. But the decisive move even in this respect had little to do with the speeches and interventions of the Austrian parliamentary delegation in Frankfurt. More important was the appointment of the new Austrian prime minister, Schwarzenberg, on November 21, 1848, in Olmiitz (Olomuc), the temporary refuge and residence of Emperor Ferdinand. The domestic activities of Schwarzenberg will be discussed in the fol¬ lowing section. Here we are concerned with his foreign policy, which was only the reverse of the same coin; namely the resolve to make Austria the leading Central European power, indeed super power, and to do this by

15 Viktor

Theiss, Erzherzog Johann (Graz, 1950), pp. 80-88; Anton von Arneth, Anton Ritter von Schmerling (Vienna, 1895), pp. 160-183.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

259

transforming her semifeudal conservative tradition into a more efficient, centralized, revamped neoconservatism. The Austro-Prussian struggle for supremacy in Germany offered Schwarzenberg a convenient handle to camouflage his imperialism behind a false front of an alleged grossdeutsch ideology.16 The neoconservatives around Schwarzenberg scored a success within a few days, which greatly enhanced the influence of the prime minister. On December 2, 1848, Emperor Ferdinand was induced to abdicate in favor of his hardly eighteen-year-old nephew Francis Joseph, the head of the Habsburg monarchy for the next sixty-eight years, almost to its end. His accession was an important event. Brought about chiefly by the endeavors of his mother, Archduchess Sophie, who induced her intellectually me¬ diocre husband Francis Charles, the emperor’s brother, to renounce his own claims to the throne, the transition meant that the old forces of tra¬ ditional feudalism represented by the incompetent commander in chief in Hungary, Fieldmarshal Prince Alfred Windischgratz, lost much of their power to the more energetic and daring neoconservatives around Schwarzenberg. The youth of eighteen faced by a bewildering and com¬ plex new situation yielded in the beginnings of his reign to Schwarzenberg’s overpowering personality. After Schwarzenberg’s death, no man was in the position to exercise a similar influence on the emperor.17 Confronted by the war of independence in Hungary,18 Schwarzenberg played for time in regard to the threatening confrontation with Prussia. First he wanted to bring his own house in order—in his ruthless fashion. In March, 1849, he dissolved the Austrian Reichstag of Kremsier, proving to the world and in particular to the Germanies that the period of revolu¬ tionary advance had come to a definite halt. By implication this meant also a future tougher stand not only in relation to Prussia but also in regard 16 See also Henry C. Meyer, Mitteleuropa (The Hague, 1955), pp. 8-11; Jacques Droz, L’Europe Centrale (Paris, i960), pp. 77-92; Kissling, Fiirst Felix zu Schwar¬ zenberg, pp. 119-166. 17 Josef Redlich, Kaiser Franz Joseph von Osterreich (Berlin, 1928), pp. 37-50; Egon Cesare Conte Corti, Vom Kind zum Kaiser (Salzburg, 1950), pp. 313-344. 18 It is appropriate to comprehend the events in Hungary beginning widi the royal sanctioning of the revised Hungarian constitution of April 11, 1848, as Hungarian revolution until the surrender at Vilagos on August 13, 1849. Yet within this revolution the phase beginning with the proclamation of the Hungarian republic in Debreczin April 14, 1849, is properly understood as the Hungarian war of independence. A distinction, on the other hand, according to which the war of independence followed the revolution is in line with Hungarian political views but not with the constitutional doctrine of the Habsburg empire, which could not recognize unilateral secession.

26o

History of the Habsburg Empire

to Austria’s further participation in the Frankfurt Assembly and indeed to representative government in any German state. After the Frankfurt Assembly had elected Friedrich Wilhelm IV of Prussia German emperor, and before he had rejected the crown, Schwarzenberg accordingly recalled the Austrian delegation from Frankfurt. This move was designed to wreck the National Assembly rather than to prevent acceptance of the election by the romantic Prussian king, who was ready to yield to his imperial nephew Francis Joseph, in whom he saw the heir of the Holy Roman emperors. Schwarzenberg’s tactics were suc¬ cessful: the Assembly never recovered from this recall. In June, 1849, after the Prussian deputies were likewise withdrawn by their government, the rump assembly moved to Stuttgart where it hoped against hope to have a better chance of withstanding the pressure of the rising forces of the counterrevolution. Here a glorious enterprise found an unglorious end by simple police action of the Wiirttemberg government. By mid-June the dream of a democratic German empire was laid to rest. The noble con¬ stitution of March 28, 1849, remained its monument—on paper. Schwarzenberg had successfully scuttled the Assembly, but in another respect he was only seemingly successful. On May 1, 1849, Francis Joseph met Tsar Nicholas in Warsaw. The tsar, the representative of the feudal imperialism of old and therefore a strong champion of monarchical soli¬ darity, was much taken by the zeal and seriousness of the youthful Francis Joseph. He granted the latter’s request for armed support in Hungary, issued on Schwarzenberg’s behest. Nicholas had good political reasons to accommodate Francis Joseph, above all fear of the spread of the Hungar¬ ian uprisings to Congress Poland. Yet as he himself saw it, this armed intervention was primarily an act of political generosity, and Francis Joseph, as we know from his correspondence with the tsar, considered it as such. The emperor felt humiliated by the necessity to accept such favor. To be sure, Francis Joseph’s anti-Russian position during the Crimean war was not primarily a response to this resentment, but undoubtedly he felt it to be necessary to prove that Austria could conduct an independent foreign policy even against Russia. There is little doubt either that Nicho¬ las would have felt less enraged by Francis Joseph’s political strategy then, if the despotic tsar could not have perceived it as ingratitude. Austria’s call for intervention had made her lose face in the eyes of the world and Francis Joseph’s belated response had the same effect in the eyes of the tsar and his successors.19 Thus the request for the Russian intervention was a fateful, though 19 Andies, Das Bundnis Habsburg-Rotnanow, pp. 160-191.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

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from the emperor’s and Schwarzenberg’s conservative point of view, in¬ evitable step. The fact that the military alliance with Russia was directed against a liberal revolution in Francis Joseph’s own realms alienated Ger¬ man liberalism deeply and perhaps irrevocably from the Austrian estab¬ lishment. It meant in turn that Austria became increasingly dependent on the good graces of the tsar in the German question too. This was bound to strengthen Schwarzenberg’s resolve to veer increasingly to the absolut¬ ist Right, to which even the conservatism of the Prussian government appeared suspect of constitutional democratic proclivities. From here on the Austrian-Prussian rivalry moves into the sphere of competing imperialist interests directed and controlled exclusively on the cabinet level. As long as Austria was involved in the Hungarian war of independence and during the following months of pacification Prussia had the upper hand. In September, 1849, Schwarzenberg had to agree to an “interim” German central power in which Austria and Prussia were to be equally represented. Archduke John, who could possibly be rated as trump card on the Austrian side, relinquished his shallow powers as regent. With Saxony and Hanover leaning to the Prussian side, and the southern king¬ doms charting a more independent course, the advantage was Prussia’s. In the Prussian union scheme culminating in the Erfurt parliament, planned since fall, 1849, and convoked in March, 1850, Prussia pressed these ad¬ vantages. A so-called inner union under Prussian leadership was to be formed. Austria was to remain outside of this federation, but to be af¬ filiated with it loosely by a special alliance resembling the frame of the old Confederation. The Habsburgs, however, with the backing of the tsar pressured the four German kingdoms apart from Prussia, namely Bavaria, Hanover, Saxony, and Wiirttemberg, to abandon the union scheme and to join Austria’s efforts to reestablish the Confederation in Frankfurt. Since the Erfurt union scheme would have been based on St. Paul’s con¬ stitution of March, 1849, whereas the Confederation represented simply the revival of the institutions of 1815, this meant, indeed, return to un¬ restricted reaction. By September, 1849, Schwarzenberg, over Prussia’s protest, succeeded in reopening the Confederal Assembly in Frankfurt. In October he and the emperor assured themselves of the backing of the southern kingdoms, and in November, in a new entrevue in Warsaw, of the support of the tsar. Nicholas I put more faith in Austrian absolutism than in the limited constitutionalism of his Prussian brother-in-law.20 The Austrian prime minister was now ready for the showdown with Prussia. The issue itself, confederal armed intervention on behalf of the 20 Srbik, Deutsche Einheit, I, 404-436; II, 17-55.

262

History of the Hahshurg Empire

reactionary elector of Hessen-Kassel against his subjects who were injured in their constitutional rights, was of secondary importance. Yet Schwarzenberg had picked his ground for the contest well. The AustrianBavarian confederal forces represented the spirit and the program of the restoration era, the opposing Prussian forces certainly not those of lib¬ eralism, but at least of limited constitutionalism. Schwarzenberg in an ultimatum demanded the withdrawal of Prussian troops from northern Hesse and the Prussian government, anxious to avoid a showdown with an Austria supported behind the scenes by Russia, acceded. In the socalled punctation of Olmiitz (Olomuc) of November 29, 1850, the Prus¬ sian government yielded. Moreover, after protracted negotiations it con¬ ceded the reestablishment of the Confederation according to the terms of 1815, supplemented in 1820. By May, 1850, the old Confederate Assembly was in operation again.21 The'complex Schleswig-Holstein question was settled, though not permanently, by the London Protocol of May, 1852, signed by the five great powers of Europe. At issue was that the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein, both largely German in character and the latter also a part of the German Confederation, might continue to be ruled by the king of Denmark but must in no way be integrated into Denmark. It was one of the few questions where the nationalism of the grossdeutsch German Left in the Frankfurt National Assembly of 18481849, Prussian expansionism, and Austrian neoconservatism could see eye to eye on common policies—as long as direct interests were not immedi¬ ately involved. The agreement of the powers, led by Russia and Great Britain, was that the separation of the duchies from Denmark was put off for the time being. As it turned out, the opening of the issue hardly a decade later was used by Prussia first by appeal to national sentiments to wrest the duchies from the Danish crown, in cooperation with Austria. The second step was then to use the ensuing conflict over their adminis¬ tration not only as a means to get control over the whole area but also in a formal showdown with the Habsburg empire to establish Prussian su¬ premacy in Germany. Here indeed one could speak of small causes lead¬ ing to great effects.22 The decisions of the London Conference were taken after a change of personnel in the Austrian foreign office had taken place. On April 5, 1852, Prince Schwarzenberg had died suddenly. As foreign minister he was 21 Ibid.; Heinrich Friedjung, Osterreich von 1848-1860 (Stuttgart, 1912, 2nd ed.), II:i, 1-51, 66-91. 22 Veit Valentin, Geschichte der deutschen Revolution von 1848-184(4 (Berlin, 1931), II, 337-347*

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

263

replaced by Count Carl Ferdinand Buol-Schauenstein (1852-1859), an experienced diplomat, less inclined than Schwarzenberg to take an ag¬ gressive stance. Schwarzenberg’s death was an important event in Austrian history. Yet except for the fact that he was the last minister whose direc¬ tives Francis Joseph followed without hesitation, his impact on foreign policies represented only a dramatic historical episode. He was, indeed, within more than a century, the first statesman, who had forced Prussia to yield, but with little benefit to Austria. The capitulation of Olmutz (Olomuc), the term used by Prussian historiography, proved to be an empty prestige success, which rankled the nationalist leaders of the Prus¬ sian establishment. The desire to avenge Olmutz drove Wilhelm I, Bis¬ marck, Moltke, and Roon to the battlefields of Koniggratz. In his larger objectives, the entry of the entire Habsburg empire into the Confedera¬ tion or at least into a German-Austrian customs union, Schwarzenberg had failed. His oppressive domestic policies had earned Austria the ill will of the west and, as it turned out after his death, they had not gained her the permanent support of the east either. True enough, Schwarzen¬ berg had restored Austria’s power position as it had existed before 1848, but it began to crumble only seven years after his death. He could hardly have prevented the loss of the Austrian position in Italy and Germany, though he might conceivably have delayed it. The reason why he presumably would have failed like his successors rests in his domestic policies, to be discussed in Section D of this chapter. Suffice it here to say that by introducing a new absolutism after 1848 Austria fell more out of step with European developments west of Russia than at any time after 1815. A regime whose course ran contrary to the currents of European public opinion, could not continue to hold the posi¬ tion it had held before 1848. Unfavorable events began to cast their shadow in 1852 and 1853. In December, 1851, Louis Bonaparte had transformed his presidency into a dictatorship, and a year later he proclaimed himself French emperor. Now a new element of instability had come into play in European power poli¬ tics. One of the devices of restored Bonapartism was the encouragement of Italian nationalism and irredentist activities against Habsburg rule in Italy. Napoleon III failed to appease the French liberals with these oppor¬ tunistic policies, but he could stir up trouble for the Austrian government. A revolt in Milan in February, 1853, had t0 he Put down by force. The immediate crisis, however, began in the east. Tsar Nicholas’ true foreign policy concerning the control of the Straits, which led to the Crimean war, is not fully clear to this day. There is no question though,

264

History of the Habshurg Empire

that the demand to exercise a protectorate over the Orthodox churches in the Ottoman empire would have been a means of reducing Turkey to a Russian vassal state. This was unacceptable to Britain, and also for France. —more for prestige reasons than on account of political interests. More di¬ rectly involved were the interests of the Habshurg monarchy, when Rus¬ sian troops moved into the Danube principalities in July, 1853, allegedly to hold them as pawn for further negotiations. Actually this step represented the threat of a permanent occupation which would have doubled the length of the common frontier between Austria and Russia. Austrian ef¬ forts to check this danger by an offer to mediate between Russia and the other European powers, of whom only Prussia played a cautious waiting game, failed because of Russian intransigence. Furthermore, the tsar went back on a promise given to the Austrian and Prussian sovereigns to refrain from crossing the Danube in Exchange for their declarations of neutrality. A new Russo-Turkish war began in October, 1853; in March of the fol¬ lowing year the Russians crossed the Danube. The French and British declarations of war against Russia followed a few days later. Austria and Prussia had meanwhile come to a secret understanding that they would resist by force if Russia would attempt to annex the Danube principalities. However, Russia could easily circumvent a formal annexation by an in¬ terminable occupation similar to the Austrian occupation of Bosnia in 1878. Accordingly, in June 1854, Austria demanded the evacuation of the principalities by Russian troops. At the same time her minister of foreign affairs, Count Buol, secured from the Turkish government permission for Austrian forces to occupy the principalities after the Russian withdrawal for the duration of the crisis. The tsar now wanted to make the best of a bad bargain and tried to obtain an Austrian guarantee for the termina¬ tion of hostilities on the part of Russia’s enemies in exchange for the re¬ call of Russian forces from the principalities. The Austrian government could never have exercised sufficient pressure on the western powers to make such a guarantee workable, even if it had wanted to. That it did, however, is doubtful. Events took now their course. Confronted by the large-scale Allied preparations for Black Sea naval operations, the tsar had to evacuate the principalities, which were occupied by Austrian troops after Russia rejected the so-called Vienna four-point terms. They amounted to an abandonment of the Russian de¬ signs against Turkey (including control of the Dardanelles) and an im¬ plied guarantee for the Turkish sovereign rights in Serbia and the Danube principalities. The escalation of the conflict between major European powers followed.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

265

In September, 1854, British and French troups began the siege of Sebasto¬ pol. In soldiers killed it was to become one of the costliest military operations of the nineteenth century. The Russian casualties alone ex¬ ceeded 100,000. After the occupation of the principalities, which had irreparably damaged Austro-Russian relations, it was only logical that the Habsburg monarchy joined the western alliance in December, 1854. According to its terms Austria was to defend the principalities and agree to territorial changes requested there by the western Allies in subsequent peace negotiations. In return, the Allies pledged support against a Russian attack on Austria and guaranted further the inviola¬ bility of the Habsburg possessions in Italy for the duration of the war. Strange as the need of such assurance of legally uncontestable rights may appear, its reasons became apparent when Sardinia-Piedmont in January, 1:855, joined the anti-Russian alliance and contributed 15,000 men to the expeditionary forces fighting on the Crimean peninsula. Sardinia had no dispute with Russia; her motivation of the unprecedented action of sacrificing Italian troops on foreign battlefields was to force the western Allies at least morally to support future claims of Italian nationalism against the Austrian rule in the kingdom of Lombardy-Venetia. With the fall of Sebastopol in mid-December, 1855, the war was practically over. Nicholas I had died a month before this crowning injury to his pride. His son and heir, Alexander II, attributed the death of his father to his anguish about Austria’s attitude which had made this humiliation possible. In the peace negotiations of Paris, February-March, 1855, Sardinia was admitted to the conference over Austria’s protests. Great as the differences were between victorious and defeated powers, it seemed that both sides were united in strong feelings against the Habsburg monarchy; on the part of the western Allies, as oppressor of Italians and Magyars, on the part of Russia as traitor to the cause of European con¬ servatism. Here resentment against the Austrian ingratitude for the supposedly selfless tsarist help in 1849 accentuated national feelings beyond the establishment. The terms of the treaty of Paris, however, gave the Habsburg mon¬ archy some satisfaction by barring Russian control of the Danube princi¬ palities. They were placed under the guarantee of the great powers. The mouth of the Danube and a strip of Bessarabia were ceded to Turkey. Other provisions, such as the neutralization of the Black Sea, the main¬ tenance of the Strait Convention of 1841, and the denial of the fraudulent Russian claim for protection of adherents of the Orthodox faith in the Ottoman empire involved Austrian interests to a lesser extent. Neverthe-

2

66

History of the Habsburg Empire

less the consequences of the Crimean crisis for Habsburg interests were long lasting and, as it turned out, irrevocably unfavorable. Austria had prevented her encirclement by Russia in the southeast, yet at the price of permanent enmity. England became morally bound not to intervene on Austria’s behalf in case of a new war of liberation in Italy. France, be¬ yond such moral commitment, became soon obliged to come to the sup¬ port of Sardinia in case of an Austrian attack. Prussia skillfully had stayed out of the conflict and could be sure that in a new Austro-Prussian conflict about supremacy in Germany, Russia would to the very last no longer support the Habsburg empire. Could Austria have avoided these consequences? Diplomatic historians have frequently made the point that she fell between two chairs because she could not decide whether to go all out in armed support of the western powers or become an* ally or at least a friendly neutral on the Russian side. However, the calamitous outcome of the crisis was not due to any particular blunder of Austrian diplomacy, but to the insoluble dilemma which the multinational empire under absolutist rule had to face. Undoubtedly Slavic Russia, in which Panslav tendencies and Panslav lures across the border had begun to stir, was potentially the most dangerous enemy of a power, half of whose population were Slavs. From this point of view Austria should have thrown her lot more energetically to the western side. Yet this side was at the same time, despite Bonapartist Caesarism in domestic matters, the champion of representative government and of national unification. Above all, the west was in several ways heir to the traditions of 1789. Russia stood for the principles of the Austrian police state of Metternich, Schwarzenberg, and his suc¬ cessor Bach. An Austria permanently allied to the western powers could never have maintained her system of absolutism. Yet if she wanted to change it, the loss of the Italian provinces was a foregone conclusion, and a new national revolution of much larger scale might be in the offing. An alliance with Russia, on the other hand, would have made the Habsburg empire the junior partner of a despotism that could always control Austria by the whiphand of Panslavist agitation. This did not exclude the possiblity that this greatly feared force might at an opportune time make common cause with the policies of western national liberalism. Habsburg Austria had indeed to face an insoluble dilemma. She could not coordinate her long-range interests as a great power with those of a gigantic and imperialist eastern police state. Yet at the same time she felt that western liberalism threatened the durability of her domestic structure. This dilemma between equally contradictory internal and

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

267

foreign policy interests in an empire ill adapted to the political and social changes of the second half of the nineteenth century was at the core of the crisis, which was heightened with the Crimean war.23 The first spectacular consequence of the Crimean crisis was the heating up of the situation in Italy. Several factors strained the situation further. The Sardinian government obtained with the appointment of Count Camillo Cavour as prime minister a far-sighted, resolute, and yet cautious leader, who was able without much fanfare to prepare his country for war and to gain the confidence of the western powers. At the same time the more intemperate nationalist agitation in the south by the followers of Giuseppe Garibaldi put pressure on the more moderate nationalists in the north. Napoleon III became more anxious to regain the favor of the liberals. The attempt of the misguided nationalist Italian youth Felice Orsini to assassinate Napoleon in January, 1858, strengthened his resolve. At the secret meeting of the French emperor with Cavour in Plombieres in July, 1858, Napoleon agreed to support Sardinia-Piedmont in a war to gain Lombardy-Venetia. Other designs to create an Italian federation of four component units: in addition to the Upper Italian (Sardinian) king¬ dom, a central Italian kingdom, the Papal States, and the kingdom of Naples and Sicily, did affect Austria at least indirectly. The alliance was formalized in December, 1858, after Russia’s benevolent attitude had been assured. Its operation, however, as a safety measure demanded by Napoleon III, was made contingent on an overt act of aggression by Austria against Sardinia. While these proceedings were secret, Austria had ample reason to move cautiously. At the diplomatic New Year’s reception of 1859 in Paris, the French emperor had issued a hardly veiled warning concerning the coming crisis to the Austrian ambassador Hiibner. A few days later the king of Sardinia, Victor Emanuel II, in an address from the throne to the Piedmontese chamber declared that the cries of anguish of the oppressed provinces would not remain unheeded. Passionate nationalist propaganda was unloosened and open military preparations of troops by Sardinia were followed by Austrian countermeasures. At the same time Napoleon III, vacillating as usual, assured the Austrian government that he sup23 Heinrich Friedjung, Der Krim\rieg und die osterreichische Politi\ (Stuttgart, 1907), pp. 3-194 passim; Josef Redlich, Kaiser Franz Joseph (Berlin, 1928), pp. 119-171; Paul W. Schroeder, “Austria and the Danubian Principalities” in Central European History, IP3 (1969), 216-236; and by the same author, Austria, Great Britain and the Crimean War (Ithaca, 1972), pp. 41-284; Bernhard Unckel, Osterreich und der Krimhrieg (Liibeck, 1969), pp. 15-32, 190-217, 239-295; and Winfrid Baumgart, Der Frieden von Paris 1856 (Munich, 1972), passim.

2

68

History of the Habshurg Empire

ported only a defensive action on the part of Sardinia. Since the situation called for diplomatic circumspection on Austria’s part, it was a blunder of her foreign minister, Count Buol, to present the Sardinian government on April 23 with a formal ultimatum to disarm within three days. When Sardinia declined, the Austrian forces crossed the Ticino into Piedmont and the casus foederis with France, which Cavour had tried to bring about by underhand provocations of the Austrian government, was now thrown into his lap by an obliging enemy. On the very day of the Austrian invasion the French declaration of war followed. Buol’s pre¬ cipitate action—worse than his performance during the Crimean war— was fully backed by the emperor, who was to follow up this first ultimatum close to the beginnings of his reign with an even more disastrous one at its end. The self-deception brought about by a system of absolutism can explain the first action, the temporary elimination of parliament, in part, the second. Austria’s military preparations for this war and the conduct of opera¬ tions were not better than her diplomatic activities. Count Francis Gyulay, a procrastinator, who delayed action against the relatively weak Sardinian army until the French forces appeared on the scene, was one of the most incapable commanders in Austria’s long military history. He could not even claim that he had to fight a better led or equipped foe. The French and Sardinian forces benefited from the Austrian blunders. Gyulay did not accept battle until after the French had joined the Sardinians. He preferred to fight the combined armed forces on his own grounds. After a brief advance, he withdrew behind the Ticino and was defeated at Magenta on June 4. A week later the eighty-six-year-old Metternich died in desperation about Austria’s political future. Whatever may be said about his policies, he would not have fallen into the FrenchSardinian trap as his successor Count Buol. In May, Francis Joseph had replaced the unlucky Buol by Count Johann Bernhard Rechberg, an experienced diplomat in German affairs. Now the emperor discharged also Gyulay and assumed the functions of commander in chief himself, apparently with the idea that imperial prestige could compensate for the lack of military experience. However, at the battle of Solferino on June 24, with terrible losses on both sides, the Austrians were defeated, although they could withdraw in good order. Only one general had fulfilled all expectations, the subcommander of the right wing of the Austrian forces, Ludwig von Benedek. He stood his ground well against the Sardinian attacks. In tragic irony, this per-

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

. 269

formance was one reason why in 1866 he was entrusted with the com¬ mand against the Prussian armies, in which he failed. Francis Joseph, shocked by the catastrophe, to which he had been an eyewitness, might have been able to continue the war with German confederal (that is, mainly Prussian) support, if he had been ready to recognize Prince Regent Wilhelm of Prussia as commander in chief of the confederal forces. As the emperor saw it, such concession would have been tantamount to a surrender of the supremacy in Germany to Prussia. Rather than accepting this political “humiliation” Francis Joseph was ready to come to terms with Napoleon in the entrevue of Villafranca on July 11, 1859. The French emperor, not anxious to risk Prussian inter¬ vention, offered moderate terms. Austria was to cede the best part of Lombardy, but not Venetia to Napoleon III, who in turn was to hand over the province to the Sardinians. This transaction was to cater to the French emperor’s pride and soften Austrian humiliation, but it infuri¬ ated Italian nationalists who felt betrayed already because Napoleon had gone back on half of his promise, the liberation of Venetia. To have to accept Lombardy, for which Italian blood had been shed, as handout from Napoleon III exacerbated these feelings further. Yet at the peace of Zurich of November 10, 1859, the preliminary terms were sanctioned and Sardinia could feel comforted because the Austrian appendage states, Tuscany, Modena, and Parma, which had driven out their princes, con¬ firmed this action by plebiscites. Accordingly, their territories as well as that of Romagna were merged with Sardinia. Only now, by the treaty of Torino of March, i860, could Napoleon III collect his own reward from Piedmont-Sardinia, namely Nice and Savoy.24 The Austrian hold in Italy had become untenable, as even Francis Joseph was to realize within a few years. It might have been wise to cede Venetia jointly with Lombardy, a decision which could have helped to forestall the more critical situation of 1866. The most spectacular proof of the bankruptcy of a system of absolute government is indeed military defeat. It was possible to camouflage the diplomatic setback in the Crimean crisis, not so the military debacle of 1859. Austria’s prestige was deeply hurt by the outcome of the war. Yet her great-power position, though weakened, remained still uncontested. The features of oppression, inefficiency, and some corruption which the defeat revealed to the public, led almost immediately to the restriction and gradually to the abolition 24 Bolton King, A History of Italian Unification from 1814-1867, 2 vols. (New York, 1967), see II, 45-81.

2 jo

History of the Habshurg Empire

of absolute government in favor of constitutionalism. If these long over¬ due changes had been delayed further, the consequences might have been even worse for Austria than those of the showdown on the German question in 1866. In this sense the outcome of the war of 1859 offset to some degree the losses. It led to defeat but it helped to save the monarchy from unmitigated disaster a few years later.25 After the termination of another phase of the Italian crisis, the German question moved into the center of the political stage. The accession of Wilhelm I, in 1858 as regent and in 1861 as king in his own right in place of his brother Friedrich Wilhelm IV who had suffered a stroke, changed the political picture. Wilhelm was quite narrow-minded and intellectually inferior to his idle and garrulous older brother. Yet he was a well-disciplined soldier. Like Maria Theresa and unlike Francis Joseph, he knew how to accept advice of those of superior qualifications, of counts Helmuth Moltke and Albrecht Roon in the military field and in the political of Otto von Bismarck, who became his prime minister in 1862. Bismarck’s appointment made it clear, that the struggle for German supremacy would have to be solved in favor of Prussia, perhaps not necessarily as he put it in a speech to a committee of the Chamber of Deputies in September, 1862, by “blood and iron” but, if necessary, by force. Bismarck’s first move to block continuation and enhancement of the Austrian position in Germany by a limited revision of the Con¬ federal charter led to the refusal of the king of Prussia to attend the Furstentag at Frankfurt in August, 1863. According to Francis Joseph’s invitation this convention of princes was to introduce some very moderate reforms under Austrian sponsorship, namely a Confederal directory under Austrian chairmanship and the convocation of a new Confederal legisla¬ tive assembly elected by the individual diets. Such as assembly meant mostly estates diets, hence the concession to the liberals was minor and due to Bismarck’s sabotage of the proceedings abortive in any case. It was easy for Bismarck to top the Austrian proposals in 1866 by more sweeping but more meaningless proposals for Confederal reforms based on general franchise, whose rejection by Austria was a foregone conclu¬ sion. The Schleswig-Holstein question, from the Austrian viewpoint, was 25 Charles W. Hallberg, Franz Joseph and Napoleon 111, 1852-1864: A Study of Austro-French Relations (New York, 1955), pp. 138-229; Carl J. Burckhardt, Briefe des Staatsjanzlers Fursten Metternich-Winnehurg an den dsterreichischen Minister des allerhochsten Hauses und des Aussern, Grafen Buol-Schauenstein (Munich, 1934), pp. 225-233; William R. Thayer, The Life and Times of Cavour (Boston, 1914), II, 1-117.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

27/

the overture to the decision in the struggle for supremacy in Germany. It was to delay rather than to prevent the showdown and was meant not to upset the existing precarious balance of power. Prussia used the ques¬ tion of the separation of the duchies from Denmark as a means of getting into a favorable position for the coming conflict with the Habsburg empire; besides, she had a direct interest to get control of the duchies herself. The Austrian objective, on the other hand, was merely to prevent a Prussian predominance in Germany. War was declared when Denmark, in January, 1864, rejected the joint Austro-Prussian ultimatum demanding that the kingdom rescind a new constitution which for all practical purposes would incorporate Schleswig into Denmark. Confederal troops—in fact only Austro-Prussian troops—entered Holstein. Although the legal issue was doubtful on either side and protracted diplomatic negotiations had preceded the invasion, Europe saw the military operation as an action of two big con¬ servative powers suspected of imperialistic designs against a small, more liberal country. The fact that Austrian interests were less involved than those of Prussia made Austria look worse, because the German nationalliberal sentiments that supported the Prussian cause, did not extend to Austria. Little Denmark was bound to be defeated. The king of Denmark was forced to cede his rights to Schleswig-Holstein and to the smaller duchy of Lauenburg to the two great German powers (peace of Vienna of October 30, 1864), which administered them first by provisional joint administration. Recognition of the fact that the Austrian policy had played into Bismarck’s hands to obtain eventually exclusive Prussian control of the duchies persuaded Emperor Francis Joseph to replace Count Rechberg by Count Alexander Mensdorff-Pouilly, a general with only limited diplomatic experience. Actually from the death of Schwarzenberg to the end of the Austro-Prussian war of 1866 Francis Joseph acted more or less as his own foreign minister, and only when the disastrous results of his policies in the conflict with Prussia became fully obvious to him, did he give his future ministers of foreign affairs a somewhat freer rein. The immediate conflict was papered over by the Gastein Convention of August 14, 1865, according to which Lauenburg was sold to Prussia, whereas Schleswig-Holstein remained in principle a joint Austro-Prussian condominium. The northern duchy, Schleswig, was to be administered by Prussia, the southern, Holstein, which was contiguous to Prussia, by Austria under General Ludwig von Gablenz. Soon a renewed crisis loomed on the political horizon. Napoleon III,

272

History of the Habsburg Empire

who as a prophet of yesterday, was convinced that Austria would be the winner in a conflict with Prussia, in October, 1865, promised Bismarck at Biarritz French neutrality in case of war. Bismarck meanwhile used alleged Austrian interference with Prussian interests in the duchies to protest to the government in Vienna, which, as expected, rejected these complaints as mere pretexts for more serious Prussian aggressive designs. In early 1866 Prussia concluded an alliance with the new kingdom of Italy, proclaimed in 1861. The objective was a common war against Austria within three months, which should secure the Venetian province for Italy. The terminal date for the outbreak of the conflict was set.26 The issue of Venetia, though a mere sideshow, represented one of the strangest episodes of diplomatic history, in which the trends of modern nationalism mingled with medieval concepts of chivalry. In spring, 1866, the Austrian governmnet was' convinced that the position in Venetia was as untenable as it previously had been in Lombardy. Nevertheless, an Italian offer made before the conclusion of the alliance with Prussia, to pay an indemnity for the cession of the province, was rejected as insult¬ ing. Just the same, within a few days before the outbreak of the war, Austria and France signed a notable neutrality agreement. Both powers concurred that the temporal jurisdiction of the pope in Rome must be preserved and protected against the threat of Italian nationalism. In¬ demnities for the deposed Habsburg rulers in the appendages (Modena, Tuscany, Parma) were assented to by France. Above all, Austria gave an assurance that French agreement would be secured in case a victorious Habsburg power wanted to make territorial changes in Germany which would upset the European balance of power. In the light of coming events this last point certainly looks strange, but there was a more startling one concerning the contested Venetian territory. Austria, win or lose, would oblige herself to cede Venetia to Napoleon III, who in turn would hand the province over to Italy. This willingness was in part due to an understandable wish to avoid a two-front war, against Prussia in the north and Italy in the south; but in part it was also due to the belated recognition that the retention of the province against the united will of the population and the upcoming Italian neighbor represented in the long run a hopeless proposition. To use Napoleon as the perhaps none too honest broker in this deal was meant to strengthen his position in the Italian sphere and at the same time to influence him in favor of Aus26 King, A History of Italian Unification, II, 281-290; Heinrich Friedjung, Der

Kampf um die Vorherrschajt in Deutschland, 1859—r$66 (Stuttgart, 1897-1898), I, 67-128; Srbik, Deutsche Einheit, IV, 118-291.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

273

tria in the crisis with Prussia. Italy felt, however, that this proposal hurt her national pride as much as outright cession to Italy would have injured the feudal mentality of the Austrian establishment. Accordingly negotia¬ tions were broken off and Italy declared war on Austria less than a week after the beginning of Austro-Prussian hostilities. The Italian military showing was even poorer than the Sardinian in the wars of 1848 and 1859. Although the main Austrian forces were engaged against Prussia in the north, an army under Archduke Albrecht won easily at Custozza on June 24, the place of a previous Austrian victory in 1848. Hardly a month later the small Austrian navy under Tegethoff’s command in a brilliant en¬ gagement near Lissa off the Dalmatian coast routed an Italian naval force, whose fighting spirit was not equal to its superiority in tonnage and firing power. Further feeble Italian efforts to gain territory to the north and northeast of the Venetian province in the Trentino and the Littoral failed. Peace was concluded in Vienna on October 3. Venice, ceded to Napoleon III immediately after the defeat at Koniggratz, now had to be yielded to Italy directly and the Italian kingdom was de jure recognized by Austria. Thus the victory which the Italians had failed to win on the battlefield was secured at the conference table.27 Several conclusions can be drawn from these proceedings. First, the decision on both sides to fight a war over a matter of national prestige, although Austria and Italy in substance agreed on the outcome beforehand, represented a moral low in international relations. Thousands were killed for the sake of “chivalry” of two military establishments. Second, the Italians resented Napoleon’s attempt to intervene as cheap benefactor without risk, yet they were dissatisfied also that the Prussian ally had not helped them to gain the Trentino to the north of Venice. According to the terms of the alliance treaty Prussia was indeed not obliged to contribute to this objective. Bismarck did not feel it was to be to her interest that Austria should be weakened further. The question may be asked, whether a far-seeing Austrian policy might not have done better to relinquish the Trentino and the northwestern strip of the Littoral voluntarily. At this particular time after a spectacular military showing in the south such concession might have been in¬ terpreted as evidence of wisdom rather than weakness. In that case Italy might have become a dependable neutral rather than a second permanent and major foe, who—a later meaningless alliance notwithstanding—at the critical time was almost bound to become an outright enemy. Such 27 Richard Blaas, Tentativi di approccio per la cessione del Veneto (Venice, 1967), passim. Friedjung, Der Kampf um die Vorherrschajt, I, 212-251.

2J4

History of the Habshurg Empire

a concession to Italy in time could have changed the course o£ history in and after 1914. On the other hand, it was the tragedy of the multinational empire that one wisely executed conciliatory step in regard to one na¬ tional group would have prompted demands by others. As for the conflict between Austria and Prussia, Bismarck, in April of 1866 had already introduced a motion for reform of the Confederal diet which included election of members of the Assembly by general male franchise. The plan was designed to be rejected by Austria. Bismarck, had he not been sure of this, would not have introduced the motion which intended to win the support of genuine German liberalism on the side of the false one put forward by him. Meanwhile the conflict about the administration of the duchies continued, and when the Austrian governor of Holstein, General Gablenz, summoned the provincial diet, Bismarck declared this to be a breach of the Gastein convention and ordered Prussian troops into Holstein. Austria now convoked the Con¬ federal diet in Frankfurt, charged Prussia with violation of the charter of the Confederation and demanded Confederal execution against Prussia. The diet approved the Austrian motion, whereupon Prussia declared the Confederation to be dissolved. Against strong Prussian pressure all major states of the Confederation stood by Austria motivated undoubtedly by fear of Prussian imperialism rather than the trappings of Bismarck’s sham liberalism. The hostilities began with the Prussian invasion of Hanover, Saxony, and Kurhesse, all then Austria’s allies. Could it therefore be said then that Austria had Germany on her side in the coming showdown? Hardly. Military support of the Austrian cause by the German states was meager, except for the contributions by Saxony and the initial ones by Hanover. Moreover the southern and central German states acted not out of sympathy with Austrian policies and even less so with her philosophy of government, but out of fear of Prussian military expansionism. The Prussian strategy, brilliantly de¬ signed by the chief of staff, Moltke, and well prepared by Minister of War Roon’s reorganization of the army, called for a three-pronged attack on Bohemia. After the invading armies had converged in central Bohemia, the Austrian forces should be forced to accept a decisive battle. This was the way it was planned and so it happened. The Austrian commander in chief, Ludwig von Benedek, was one of those mediocre strategists, who could be forced to follow the ruts drawn by a superior foe. Much ink has been spilled about the appointment and tragic fate of this man, who was pressed to accept a difficult assignment, to which he was not qualified by experience or strategic ability. Evi-

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

275

dently the emperor felt that a conceivable military disaster in the north would reflect on the crown, if Archduke Albrecht, Benedek’s senior in rank, would be given the command in the north. However, Benedek’s insufficiency was only one cause for the military catastrophe. The Austrian general staff, and particularly

Benedek’s

personal staff, failed completely, and the Prussian army was better or¬ ganized, better led, and better equipped. Its use of the needle gun with its superior and faster firing power was a major item in the balance sheet. Before the battle of Koniggratz, Benedek, after his subcommanders had been defeated, repeatedly urged the emperor to conclude preace rather than risk a major confrontation. Francis Joseph appealing to military chivalry used indirect but strong pressure on Benedek to accept battle in unfavorable terrain. Another commander would hardly have done much better. Even if Benedek had been ordered to retreat rather than having been pushed into battle, it is difficult to see, how the Austrians could have blocked a Prussian victory.28 In this sense the frequently voiced assertion that the bloody battle of Koniggratz, fought on July 4, 1866, was a decisive battle in world history, is correct only to the extent that Austria’s rout smashed the backbone of her military resistance and led within weeks to what amounted to capitu¬ lation—a defeat of far-reaching consequences. Yet this defeat was not brought about so much by a military turn of events at Koniggratz, where the Austrians fought as well as the Prussians. Koniggratz merely con¬ firmed a course of history, inevitably brought about by the accumulated effects of the national revolutions of 1848-1849: Schwarzenberg’s provoc¬ ative policy against Prussia, the Crimean and Austro-Sardinian crisis, the oppressive policies in Italy, and the insensitivity of neoabsolutism and pseudo-constitutionalism to public opinion. The shaken and disorganized Austrian troops retreated to the vicinity of Vienna. The replacement of Benedek by Archduke Albrecht and transfer of major contingents of his southern army to the north changed little. Moreover, a Prussian-equipped Hungarian legion of insurgents under the revolutionary General Klapka had entered Slovakian territory in Hungary. Although unsuccessful in non-Magyar regions, this force posed a threat in terms of potential national disintegration. Undoubtedly the victorious Prussians had to face some risks. Napoleon 28 Gordon A. Craig, The Battle of Koniggratz (Philadelphia, 1964); Wilhelm Schiissler, Koniggratz, 1866 (Munich, 1958), pp. 15-24; Heinrich Friedjung, ed., Benede\s nachgelassene Papiere (Dresden, 1904), pp. 352-404; Friedjung, Der Kampf um die Vorherrschaft, II, 179-263.

276

History of the Hahsburg Empire

III had been intimidated by the Austrian disaster. The possibility of French intervention on behalf of Austria remained a potential threat to Prussia, despite Bismarck’s skillful diplomatic maneuverings. Only speedy conclusion of an armistice with Austria could check it. There were also the typical dangers for armies in the field—cholera and dysentery. Finally, a last stand of the Austrian troops reenforced by the southern army presented at least some uncertainty. Bismarck had reason to conclude an armistice and a preliminary peace treaty with Austria. The terms of this agreement, signed on July 26 at Nikolsburg in southern Moravia, were confirmed by the peace of Prague, less than a month later. Bismarck had to overcome considerable resistance of his king, whose intellectual horizon did not transcend much that of a drill sergeant. Con¬ sequently he wished for substantial annexations of Austrian territory, whereas the prime minister intended to offer rather generous terms. The king yielded and Bismarck had his way. Fram all we know, he did not as yet have a future alliance in mind but wanted to keep all possibili¬ ties open. These were the results: Austria recognized the dissolution of the Ger¬ man Confederation and approved in advance the new organization of Germany. This included the establishment of a North German federation under Prussian leadership and the annexation by Prussia of Kurhesse, Hanover, Nassau, Frankfurt and the controversial duchies Schleswig and Holstein. A minor though humiliating indemnity of 20,000,000 Talers was to be paid by Austria. On the other hand she was able to secure the territorial integrity of her most faithful ally, Saxony. The outcome of the war was of lasting and in several respects decisive significance. As for domestic policies, it was widely felt that the new de¬ bacle was still the consequence of the neoabsolutist mismanagement and its too slow transformation after 1859. Here the defeat of Austria pro¬ moted the establishment of genuine constitutional government. Even greater were the consequences in foreign affairs. The two defeats in 1859 and 1866 had reduced Austria from a genuine great power to a nomi¬ nal one. Never again was she to rise in status. More important, the com¬ ing defeat of France in the Franco-Prussian war of 1870-1871, the perma¬ nent strained relations with Russia and in a sense also with Italy, made it clear that Germany was the only genuine potential ally of Austria. Yet an alliance with Germany meant that she would be the senior partner, to whose basic policies Austria would have to agree. The most basic of these was the notion that Germans and Magyars must be the dominant

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

277

national groups in the Habsburg empire, as the only reliable bulwark against Slav advances toward the west. This ruled out the possibility of sweeping national reforms.29 These facts dawned only gradually on Emperor Francis Joseph and the leading Austrian statesmen. Their first reaction in the years following the defeat of 1866 was to look for the possibility of revenge against Prus¬ sia, and when that possibility vanished on the battlefield of Sedan, to seek compensation of the losses in the east. This meant expansion in the Bal¬ kans, involvement in conflicts with Turkey, and most important, a new source of friction with Russia, which finally led to the crisis of the first World War. Here, too, the connection with the fatal war of 1866 is ap¬ parent because an aggressive, militaristic state like Prussia might obtain the leadership of Germany, but never, in the age of nationalism, of a multinational empire. Recognition of this simple fact lies at the root of the Austrian decline. In October, 1866, Francis Joseph accepted the resignation of Count Mensdorff-Pouilly and entrusted foreign affairs to the former Saxon prime minister, Baron ( later Count) Ferdinand Beust, a shrewd but unequal opponent of Bismarck’s policy. His assignment was, if possible, to initiate a new anti-Prussian combination, if not alliance, which should undo what never could be undone. One of the major means to that effect was seen in domestic reorganization. This meant full reconciliation with Hungary, em¬ bodied in the Compromise of 1867, henceforth the constitutional frame of the empire, to be discussed in Section E. In foreign policy the first aim was to arrive at an understanding with Napoleon III. The Salzburg entrevue of August, 1867, between Francis Joseph and the French em¬ peror was officially a visit of condolence on the occasion of the execution of Francis Joseph’s brother Maximilian of Mexico in Queretaro. He had been prompted by Napoleon to engage in the trans-Atlantic adventure but had been abandoned by him later. French fears of involvement in a conflict with the United States were understandable in political terms. Just the same, Napoleon’s attitude looked cynical as seen from a dynastic angle.

Napoleon’s past Mexican policy, however, was not the reason for the failure of the two emperors to come to terms. Francis Joseph, never too fond of his brother, certainly could overcome feelings of resentment 29 Srbik, Deutsche Einheit, IV, 366-466; Friedjung, Der Kampf um die Vorherrschaft, II, 470-518; Adam Wandruszka, Schic\salsjahr, 1866 (Graz, 1966), pp. 175— 203. F. R. Bridge, From Sadowa to Sarajevo: The Foreign Policy of AustriaHungary 1866-1914 (London, 1972), pp. 11-29.

2j8

History of the Habshurg Empire

against the upstart Bonaparte, but neither he nor Napoleon dared to take the big anti-Prussian jump. Later attempts to bring Italy into negotiations for an Austro-French-Italian alliance against Prussia never reached a stage of serious discussions. The cautious preliminary Austrian decision in favor of neutrality taken by a crown council on the eve of the outbreak of the war of 1870-1871 became permanent when the Bonapartist empire fell within six weeks under the shattering blows of the German attack. Whatever happened from now on in the war, a republican France was, for reasons of domestic policy, hardly a feasible ally for the Habsburg em¬ pire. Francis Joseph changed his course accordingly and dismissed Beust in November, 1871. His place was taken by Count Julius Andrassy, Magyar rebel in 1848-1849, subsequently proscribed emigre, sentenced in absentia to be hanged, but rehabilitated and appointed Hungarian prime minister in 1867. Andrassy, one of the architects of the Austro-Hungarian Compromise, was committed to the principle of German-Magyar pre¬ dominance in the Habsburg monarchy. Consequently he was a supporter of amicable relations with Germany. He wanted to bring Austria into such combination as equal partner, and this was the main reason for the unfortunate Oriental policy of this attractive, courageous, and in many ways capable man.30 First, however, an attempt by Bismarck was made to establish a European order directed by the three eastern empires on the basis of the principle of monarchic solidarity. In 1894, with the conclusion of the Franco-Russian alliance directed against both central powers, these efforts ended in definite failure. But long before, in fact within a few years after 1871, the failure of Bismarck’s endeavors became apparent. The so-called Three Emperors’ League of 1873 consisted in a military convention be¬ tween Russia and the new German empire of 1871 to which mere consul¬ tation and vague cooperation pacts between Russia and Austria were added. Germany gained the advantage of at least benevolent AustroRussian neutrality in the event of a French attack—unlikely as it might have been for some time. For Austria and Russia only a common front against international revolutionary activities on the extreme Left were easily feasible. Yet common actions against such true or alleged danger did hardly require a formal pact. The real test of the agreement would have been Austro-Russian co¬ operation in case of a crisis in the east—as it were in the Balkans. In 1875 30 For an over-all evaluation of Andrassy with emphasis on his services as diplomat see Eduard von Wertheimer, Graf Julius Andrassy und seine Zeit, 3 vols. (Stuttgart, 1910-1913), see III, 340-368.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

279

revolts against the oppressive Turkish regime started in Bosnia-Hercegovina. The Serbs supported the insurrections and Russia gave at least in¬ direct support to risings in the eastern Balkans. A new Russian advance in this area appeared to be in the offing. Negotiations between the leading Austrian and Russian statesmen (Andrassy and Gorchakov) and subse¬ quently between the sovereigns Francis Joseph and Alexander II in the summer of 1876 led to the so-called Reichstadt agreement, formalized by the second treaty of Budapest (January, 1877): Austria pledged her neutrality in a Russo-Turkish conflict and Russia waived objection to an Austrian occupation of Bosnia-Hercegovina. The ensuing new Russo-Turkish war of 1877-1878 alarmed Europe, particularly Great Britain and Austria. The Ottoman empire’s resistance was stronger than expected but its eventual defeat inevitable. In the pre¬ liminary peace of St. Stefano of March, 1878, Serbia, Montenegro, and Roumania were to sever their tenuous bonds to Turkey. The High Portal was also to agree to the creation of a Greater Bulgaria extending from the Black Sea to the Aegean Sea, to be occupied for several years by Russian troops. Even thereafter the new Bulgaria was to be a Russian vassal state. By this arrangement Russia would gain free passage for her naval forces through the Dardanelles and military predominance in the Balkans. The first objective was intolerable for Britain, the second for Austria. Their joint protests led to the convocation of the Congress of Berlin under Bismarck’s chairmanship in June, 1878. When the Congress adjourned in mid-July Russian advances were restricted on all fronts. In particular a territorially considerably reduced Bulgaria was confined now to a northern principality tributary to Turkey, whereas the southeastern part (East Roumelia) was given merely separate administration as a Turkish prov¬ ince. Thus a potential Russian satellite state was cut down to size. As for Austria, the signatories of the Congress act (that is, the great powers and Turkey), granted Austria the right to occupy and fully administer Bosnia and Hercegovina for an undetermined period. Furthermore the powers conceded military occupation of the Sanjak of Novibazar, a small wooded strip of territory between Serbia and Montenegro. In a secret agreement between Austria and the Ottoman empire, the Turks were assured that the occupation was meant to be provisional in character but indefinite in time. The sovereignty of the sultan should continue in principle though not in practice. This meant sweeping occupational rights but not formal annexation, which would have required the approval of the signatory powers of the Congress act. This outcome of the congressional decisions was of mixed value for

28o

History of the Habsburg Empire

the Habsburg monarchy. Russia’s dissatisfaction continued, though it was extended now from Austria to Germany. The fact that Andrassy re¬ signed himself to mere occupation and did not insist on annexation, which might have been achieved with the approval of the great powers (though not with that of Turkey) was to create difficulties in the future. The garrisoning of the Sanjak, probably indefensible in case of war, was to be a further mortgage on relations with Serbia and Montenegro, while the conceivable benefits were truly minor. Yet annexation or occupation of Bosnia-Hercegovina or mere military garrisoning in the Sanjak were secondary questions. The basic issue was the justification of Austrian military and political expansion in the Bal¬ kans. Three arguments could be advanced for the Austrian Balkan policy. One, never openly admitted but clear from further actions was that of economic penetration of southeastern Europe; this was difficult to achieve, dangerous to put through, but from the point of the Habsburg mon¬ archy’s interests, not unreasonable. Two, prestige, although the involve¬ ment in a hornets nest of conflicting Balkan interests was hardly likely to improve the Austrian position. Finally (and this was officially said), the danger of having the hinterland of Dalmatia controlled by a hostile country. This meant potentially Serbia rather than Turkey. However, the Habsburg monarchy was strong enough to take care of her interests in Dalmatia without acquisition of new territories. Whatever the case in favor of occupation or annexation might have been, disadvantages and dangers outweighed the problematical advan¬ tages. Clearly the Southern Slav problem would become more serious with the acquisition of additional Southern Slav, largely Serb, territory. The precarious balance of national alignments established by the AustroHungarian Compromise would be upset and the unfortunate device of actually permanent but legally provisional occupation was to challenge the demands of rising Southern Slav and later to some degree also Turk¬ ish nationalism. It could be expected that the occupation would strain Austro-Russian relations further, meaning, in turn, greater dependency on German protection. This last point was indeed the first major direct international consequence of the occupation.31 31 William L. Langer, European Alliances and Alignments i8yi-i8go (New York, 1938), pp. 121-170; Allan J. P. Taylor, The Struggle for Mastery in Europe 1848-1gi8 (Oxford, 1957), pp. 228-254; L. von Siidland, Die sudslawische Frage und der Welt\rieg (Vienna, 1918), pp. 484-514; Bridge, From Sadowa to Sarajevo, pp. 81-102.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

2

8l

There were others. The occupation proved to be not a pushover. The costly military campaign put a strain on relations with the High Portal and Serbia at the same time. This was partly obscured by the fact that the Serbian king Milan was sustained by Austrian subsidies. Furthermore, Magyar nationalists but particularly German liberals saw in the occupation a dangerous upsetting of the balance of Slavic peoples against Germans and Magyars. It was primarily this fact which led to the downfall of the German liberal regime in Cisleithanian Austria and its replacement by a Slavic dominated conservative coalition. This meant not only the end of the problematical rule of German liberalism in the Habsburg empire but of political liberalism in general in the western half of the monarchy until the end. In foreign relations, the Bosnian affair, as well as the German mediator role at the Congress of Berlin, strained German-Russian relations, as noted above, and led thus indirectly to the Austro-German alliance of October, 1879. Bismarck at this time was isolated. Consequently the terms of the alliance, which pledged the contracting parties to come to each other’s support, if attacked by Russia single-handed, but by France only, if that power was supported by Russia, seemed to be favorable to Austria. On paper, her obligations were more limited than those of Germany. Actually a single-handed attack by France on Germany was a purely academic contingency. Bismarck was interested in preventing a dissolu¬ tion of the Habsburg monarchy, from which Russia would have benefited more than Germany. From that point of view the alliance had indeed ad¬ vantages for Austria. On the other hand, it should have become clear that the Habsburg monarchy as ally of Germany would become involved in a future Franco-Russian two-front war against Germany, whose outbreak Bismarck’s genius could delay but not prevent. In addition, the reliance on a superior German ally barred forever the possibility for a compre¬ hensive settlement of the nationality questions in the Habsburg monarchy, if such a chance still existed. Premise for the alliance was Austro-German and Magyar predominance in the empire. The alliance meant further that as long as Germany had the upper hand Austria would have to play the second role to German interests as “brilliant second” as William II put it at the time of the first Morocco crisis. On the other hand, if Austria should be given a freer rein in international relations then the danger of involvement in a major war with Russia and her potential allies resulting from a Balkan crisis might become ever more likely. It could be held, against this line of reasoning, that the continuation of

History of the Habsburg Empire

2&z

the alliance secured for the Danube peoples limited freedom for half a century, which they would not have enjoyed under the tsarist boot. Yet the freedom was limited, the dependency on Germany great and the dan¬ ger of a major war even greater. Thus the alliance resulting in part from the Bosnian occupation represented a mixed blessing. Whether it could help to preserve constitutional government under peaceful conditions or whether it would involve the Danube monarchy in major wars would largely depend on the complexities of the national question in conjunc¬ tion with the level of statesmanship of the future architects of Austrian foreign policy.32 B.

Domestic affairs from 1815 to the revolution of 1848-1849

The twenty years of peace of the Franciscan administration after the end of the Napoleonic wars a;id their continuation during the reign of Ferdinand the Benign until 1848 may still be considered as apolitical in character. No parties, no pressure groups substantially influenced the course of government. It is true that after the revolution, from 1849 to i860, we face a restoration of absolutist government. But a restored system is always different from the original system. The lesson of the revolution of 1848-1849 may never have been learned by the ruling forces of Aus¬ trian society but neither were they forgotten. If we say that absolutism between 1815 and 1848 was still in full control, we have to qualify this statement in two respects. First, the changes brought about by the reform period in Hungary from 1825 t0 I^48, al¬ though not representing popular sovereignty in an organized manner, are in some respects a transition to a more modern social order. Second, the rumbling of nationalism among all the empire’s national groups heralded new problems, new constellations of powers, and new conflicts. And yet momentous as nationalism was to become before 1848 it was expressed primarily in the ideological sphere, less so politically and socially. Thus the Restoration period and pre-March era were still becalmed in the political sphere.33 32 Langer, European Alliances, pp. 171-216; Sidney B. Fay, The Origins of the World War (New York, 1928), 2 vols., I, pp. 59-70; Taylor, The Struggle for Mastery in Europe, pp. 255-264; Robert A. Kann, in Ludovit Holotik and Anton Vantuch, eds., Der osterreichisch-ungarische Ausgleich i86y (Bratislava, 1971), pp.

24—44* 33 In this study we perceive the Restoration period as die era from 1815 to the death of Francis I in 1835, and the pre-March era from here on to the outbreak of the revolution in 1848. See also Robert A. Kann, The Problem of Restoration (Berkeley, 1968), pp. 94-103.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

283

a) ADMINISTRATIVE-JUDICIAL SPHERE

The second half of the Franciscan reign in domestic affairs was more stable than the first with its many, but unprincipled attempts to reshuffle the organization of government. After 1815 the police played an in¬ creasingly pervasive part, which rightly gave the new system the trade¬ mark “police state.” Actually it was not entirely new. The police system had been introduced under Joseph II by Count Johann Anton Pergen to control actions initiated by the Josephin bureaucracy. The police certainly also reported the political attitude of individuals to the regime. Yet by and large it was still a security force and one of its main tasks was to en¬ force the reform legislation. In other words, in a devious way the police were to support a progressive philosophy of government. Under Francis, and particularly after 1815, the chief objective and task of the police, under its new chief, Count Joseph Sedlnitzky (as president of the police and censorship agency from 1817 to 1848) was to check the spread of even faintly liberal ideas, that meant, potentially revolutionary ideas. This task required a strict system of censorship. Loyalty stood for complete submission to political and social repression. Some Franciscan bureaucrats, like Count Franz Anton Kolowrat, a friend of the estates system in its restricted Maria Theresan sense, particularly in the Bohemian lands, was mildly opposed to this, yet Sedlnitzky’s policies, backed by Metternich, prevailed until the revolution of 1848.34 The estates rights remained extremely limited; new estates constitutions for Tyrol, Carniola, and Galicia restricted estates powers to the right of petition and some very limited participation in the collection and alloca¬ tion of tax money. Financial administration was separated from over-all political administration, and the General Court Chamber was restored as main financial agency. Karl Friedrich von Kiibeck (1780-1855), one of the ablest bureaucrats under three emperors, established this new organ¬ ization. The Franciscan government never fully overcame the conse¬ quences of the great financial crisis of 1811, which in turn was mainly the natural result of the war period. The establishment of the Austrian Nationalbank in 1816 and the government’s reliance on support of private financiers (such as Rothschild, Arnstein, Eskeles) helped, however, to prevent new economic disasters. A modernization of the land tax on a broader basis introduced for the first time truly comprehensive records of all cultivated lands in the country and of all leases in town houses. An ™ Julius Marx, Die osterreichische Zensur im Vormiirz (Vienna, 1959), pp. 1124, 36-64.

284

History of the Hahshurg Empire

indirect tax imposed in 1829 on the transportation of foodstuff beyond town and provincial limits was unfair and unpopular. As for provincial organization, the separate administration of Lornbardy-Venetia was to be divided into two gubernia in Milan and Venice. The Illyrian provinces, ceded to France in 1809, were reincorporated into Austria as two gubernia, one with the center of administration in Ljubl¬ jana and one in Trieste. The latter included the small part of Croatia on the right bank of the Sava and Fiume (Rijeka). Both, however, after some years were returned to Flungarian administration. With the rising reaction after 1815, the influence of the ecclesiastic spirit of the strictest conservative observance became increasingly strong. Un¬ doubtedly it conflicted with the lively intellectual contributions and in¬ terchange among the Catholic Romantics around Adam Muller, Josef von Pilat, Friedrich Schlegel, and Emanuel Veith. The social-oriented Chris¬ tian doctrines of the previously mentioned Clemens Maria Hofbauer (1751-1820, sainted in 1909), who represented the Redemptorist (Liguorian) congregation in the early Restoration period in Austria had little immediate but considerable long-range influence on the charitable as¬ pects of Church policy. On the other hand, the readmission of the Jesuit Order in 1814, restored to good graces by the Holy See, stood for the spirit of the ecclesia militans. All things considered a strange conversion, though not yet elimination, of Josephinism in state-Church relations, had taken place. The government never again relinquished its control of ecclesiastic matters but it used the Church as an arm of government to promote and enforce its policies. This practice pertained in particular to the supervision of secondary education for the intellectual and social elite. Here the state with the authoritative advice of the higher clergy reserved for itself the right to prescribe textbooks and academic curricula not only in the secular schools but also in the diocesan seminaries, even though they had been formally restored to episcopal control. The establishment of an Austrian Academy in 1847 was onty an isolated instance of intellectual activities outside clerical control.35 A slight tendency toward liberalization in the governmental process could be seen only in two areas. In the judicial sphere patrimonial juris¬ diction was further restricted, partly because it had become impossible to reintroduce it in the German Alpine and Southern Slav territories, which between 1805 and 1813 had been under Bavarian and French administra35 Rudolf Till, Hofbauer und sein Kreis (Vienna, 1951), pp. 9-94; Winter, Romantismus, pp. 27-55, 125-143; Edward Hosp, Kirche in Osterreich im Vormarz, 1815-1850 (Vienna, 1971), pp. 15-21, 249-359.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

285

tions; but partly also, because the safeguards of individual rights intro¬ duced by the Josephin legislation for the peasants, made continuation of this jurisdiction cumbersome and expensive for the lords. In the military sphere the needs of the war period had led to a gradual extension of service obligations and corresponding reduction of exemp¬ tions from service. As discussed (Chapt. V/K), this policy was carried over into the era of peace after 1815. To make service obligations less hate¬ ful general modifications took place, however, in the 1840s. Conditions remained severe enough and yet these modifications, linked to gradual mitigations of the harsh and degrading military discipline, proved again that even an absolute government could not entirely ignore public opinion.36 b) ECONOMICS

Gradual economic development in Austria during this period was characterized more by changing technological conditions than by planned policies. It was neither rapid nor comprehensive enough to be regarded as industrial or agrarian revolution in western European terms. The tariff policy of the government remained unsuccessful and unimaginative. Barred from participation in the German Zollverein of 1833, the regime failed to establish an effective countersystem in Germany or even a comprehensive customs union of the Habsburg lands. Hungarian op¬ position represented the chief impediment. Thus a protective tariff system in regard to foreign countries continued, alongside one of lower so-called preferential internal customs. A cumbersome order of trade organization in the non-Hungarian lands hampered industrial progress. It consisted in a largely arbitrary division between so-called commercial trades controlled by the Court Chamber and police trades supervised by the Court Chan¬ cery. The former trades were meant to satisfy needs beyond the local demands and included manufacturing in industrial plants; the latter were primarily to serve local needs. To compound the complexity, an¬ other division existed between establishments controlled by guild regula¬ tions and “free crafts,” a misleading term because they were subject to cumbersome government regulations. Some industrial progress was made just the same. The textile industry in the German-Austrian and particularly in the Bohemian lands, the silk 36 Henry A. Strakosch, State Absolutism and the Rule of Law: The Struggle for Codification of Civil Law in Austria 1753-1811 (Sydney, 1967), pp. 181-194; Huber and Dopsch, Osterreichische Reichsgeschichte, pp. 310-321; Herbert Matis, Osterreichs Wirtschaft 1848-1918 (Berlin, 1972), pp. 22-30.

2 86

History of the Habshurg Empire

industry in Lombardy, and some modest industrial establishments in Hungary (textiles, sugar refineries, distilleries) expanded. The iron and steel mining and processing industry in Witkowitz in Moravia and in northern Styria made substantial progress. Dye manufacturing was in¬ troduced in Lower Austria. Renowned for its quality was the glass in¬ dustry in Bohemia and the manufacturing of leather goods in Lower Austria, particularly in Vienna. Working conditions in the crafts were dismal. Teenage apprentices were delivered to the mercies of often cruel, greedy, but also impoverished masters. In the industrial plants a fourteen-hour working day was the rule, reduced to twelve hours in 1839 for children under twelve. In these respects Austria did neither worse nor better than industrially more ad¬ vanced countries. As to communications, the government supported the establishment of the Austrian Danube Steamship Company in 1829, and in 1836 the Austrian Lloyd, the main steamship company on the high seas, with headquarters in Trieste. Austria also pioneered on the Continent the introduction of railroads. Between 1825 and 1827 a railroad, though not yet steam-oper¬ ated, was opened between Budweis (Budejovice) in Bohemia and Linz in Upper Austria; after 1836 a very short stretch of the future Northern Railway route (Floridsdorf to Deutsch-Wagram) was operated by steam locomotives. The canal waterway system of communications in the Austro-German-Bohemian orbit was improved. In all, there was some moderate progress but the fact that it was not accompanied by social legislation led to serious disturbances in Vienna, Prague, Plzen (Pilsen), and other places during the economic crisis between 1845 and 1848. They heralded worse troubles to come.37 c) THE SITUATION IN HUNGARY

During this period of artificial centralization Hungary requires a separate discussion—not so much on constitutional grounds, but because of independent intellectual and social currents, and in the pre-March pe¬ riod already distinct political actions. In 1848 Hungary including Croatia 37 See Mayer-Kaindl-Pirchegger, Geschichte und Kulturleben Osterreichs, 5th revised edition by A. Klein (Vienna, 1965), pp. 36-42, 78-97. Kristina M. Fink, Die osterreichisch-ungarische Monarchie als Wirtschaftsgemeinschaft (Munich, 1968), pp. 9-19; Julius Marx, Die wirtschajtlichen Ursachen der Revolution von 1848 in Ostrreich (Graz-Cologne, 1965), pp. 9-167 passim; Nachum T. Gross, “Die Stellung der Habsburgermonarchie in der Weltwirtschaft” in Adam Wandruszka and Peter Urbanitsch eds.. Die Habsburgermonarchie 1848-1(418 (Wien, 1973- ), vol. I, Die wirtschaftliche Entwicklung, pp. 1-28.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

28y

had a population of nearly 12 million, a figure almost doubled in 1918. The future capital, Pest, had 50,000 inhabitants in 1848, and 2 million a century later.38 In this agricultural society the migrations of Serbs from the south, Slovaks from Bohemia and Moravia in the west, Jews and Ruthenians in substantial numbers from Galicia and Bukovina, and hundreds of thousands of Roumanians from Walachia into Transylvania, created a social structure, which first endangered and then overturned the Magyar majority in the country. Taking a long-range view, Magyar nationalism could, however, haltingly drop prejudices and privileges deriving from the specific ethnic distinction between the Ugro-Finnish Magyars, the Slavic, German, and the partly Mediterranean Roumanian peoples. It could never bow to the gradual reversal of nationality statistics and its social con¬ sequences to the disadvantage of the master race. For the time being social pressures were equal to the national ones. The tax exemption of the nobility, not abolished until the revolution of 1848, meant that some 700,000 landowners, mostly in the middle-income brackets were tax exempted. This, rather than the privileged status of the aristocratic landowners which until the Maria Theresan period paral¬ leled those in Bohemia, was the most characteristic feature of the Hun¬ garian social system. The freedom of the peasants to own lands and purchase their full unrestricted personal freedom was not established until the diet of 1840. Peasant rebellions were bound to occur frequently, particularly during and after the great plague (cholera) of 1831-1832.39 National tension was piled on the social stresses and here the nonMagyar nationalities were second-class citizens even compared with the underprivileged Magyar peasants. Slovaks, Roumanians, and Ruthenians had no political or territorial organization. The Roumanians in Transyl¬ vania did not have equal status with the Magyars, Szekels, and Germans, in Hungary proper only the Serbs enjoyed a limited autonomy. Thus by a process of elimination the language conflict, never fully put to rest again after the reign of Joseph II, evolved first between Magyars and 38 Pressburg (Pozsony) was the city where until 1848 the Hungarian diet usually convened and where the kings were crowned. It was, however, not the official capital. Beginning with the thirteenth century, Buda (Ofen) could be considered the major royal residence. Pest, on the left bank of the Danube, across from Buda, became the seat of government in 1848. In 1872, Buda and Pest merged and the new Budapest became the official capital of Hungary. The last two coronations took place there. 39 Kann, Das Nationalitatenproblem, I, 117-122 and the literature quoted ibid. 389-392; Dominic C. Kosary, A History of Hungary (Cleveland, 1941), pp. 138184; Istvan Barta in Ervin Pamlenyi, ed., Die Geschichte Ungarns (Budapest, 1971), V, 241-298, see in particular VII, 287-291.

2

88

History of the Hahsburg Empire

Croatians, of whom a large part in the south and east lived within the Military Frontier organization. Only “Civil” or “Banal Croatia” (the territory under the jurisdiction of the banus) in the northwest formed a distinct social structure of political significance. Even though subor¬ dinated to the Hungarian crown and limited within its geographical confines, the political importance of Civil Croatia was strengthened by the neighboring Military Frontier of the same ethnic composition and tradition. The Hungarian diet of 1830 had passed legislation according to which government officials and lawyers must be able to officiate in Hungarian, which up to then was only taught as second language in schools. Higher education was based almost exclusively on Latin and secondly on Ger¬ man—a policy in the interest of the Vienna government. Latin or Croatian was ruled out even as secondary official language by the Magyar nationalists, who at the diet of 1844 managed to put through a law that required the teaching of Magyar in secondary Croatian schools. More important were new laws which made immigration into Hungary in¬ cluding Croatia dependent on the knowledge of Magyar and made the Magyar language instead of Latin the official language of communica¬ tion between Hungary proper and Croatia. This meant in substance that the ancient kingdom should be considered as partes adnexae, that is, mere provinces of Hungary with a very limited degree of autonomy rather than as regna socia, allied kingdoms, the terms according to which Croatia-Slavonia had entered the union of 1527 with its separate sabor (diet) and banus (governor), appointed by the Hungarian king.40 The ideological repercussions of such problems will be discussed in the following section in regard to all national groups. At this point we are only concerned with the political struggle in Hungary, which can be understood as the conflict between the enlightened conservative reformers represented by Count Stephan Szechenyi (1791-1860) and the radical, socially progressive nationalists by Louis Kossuth (1802-1894). Szechenyi, even by his opponent Kossuth referred to as the greatest Hungarian, stood for evolutionary changes, first economically and then perhaps, but only in agreement within the Austrian government, polit¬ ically according to the principles of English constitutional government. 40 Jules Szekfii, 2s tat et Nation (Paris, 1945), pp. n-103; Rudolf Kissling, Die Kroaten (Graz-Cologne, 1956), pp. 57-61; Stanko Guldescu, “Croatian Political History 1526-1918,” in Francis H. Eterovich and Christopher Spalatin, eds., Croatia: Land, People, Culture (Toronto, 1964-1970), II, 38-40; Kann, Nationalitatenproblem, I, 246-259, 439-441.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

28g

H is efforts to achieve reforms were only to a small part successful. Yet the foundation of the Hungarian Academy, the establishment of the Na¬ tional Casino as a kind of debating society primarily for the national aristocracy, the beginning of the regulation of the Danube and Tisza rivers, and Szechenyi’s fight against the law of entail of landed property were impressive achievements under existing conditions. Such endeavors were supported by enlightened nobles like Baron Nicholas de Wesselenyi, counts Aurel Dessewffy and Antony Szecsen and by leading members of the gentry such as Joseph von Eotvos and Francis Deak. Eotvos, the champion of Hungarian administrative reorganization, became later one of the most original promoters of empire reform. Francis Deak, an outstanding constitutional lawyer and moderate parliamentarian of wide popularity, was in later years to become the great old man of Hungarian politics. Kossuth, on the other hand, the young, fiery provincial lawyer from the Slovakian region wanted to force several issues at the same time: the full emancipation of the Hungarian peasants, the recognition of Magyar as the national language throughout greater Hungary including Croatia and Transylvania, the transformation of the relationship to Austria to a kind of confederal association, and the establishment of a separate Hungarian customs territory. Szechenyi either refrained from demands which could not be put through in an evolutionary manner, that is, could not be put through at all, or he compromised, as in the Hungarian tariff question, in favor of the customs union with Austria.41 Kossuth’s brilliant dialectics and powerful, to some extent demagogic mass appeal, which was dis¬ played in the dietal deliberations of 1832-1836, 1837-1840, and 1847-1848,42 further alerted Magyar nationalism. Although Szechenyi’s success was more passive and less conspicuous, it was effective because his cautious reform policy prevented the break with Austria. If he had had his way, the liberal members of the diet of 1847 would have settled peacefully for a compromise on such demands as a lower house of parliament elected by general male franchise, govern41 George Barany, Stephen Szecheny and the Awakening of Hungarian National¬ ism, iygi-1841 (Princeton, 1968), pp. 135-317; Johann Weber, Eotvos und die ungarische Ndtionalitatenfrage (Munich, 1966), pp. 104-154; Bela Kiraly, “The Young Ferenc Deak and the Problem of the Serfs,” Sudostforschungen, XIX (1970), 91-127; Kann, N ationalitdtenproblem, I, 117-122, 389-392. 42 The king called no diets into session between 1812 and 1825 and this ex lex situation would have been continued had Francis not been anxious to secure recognition of the succession of his incapacitated son Ferdinand as crowned king of Hungary.

290

History of the Hahshurg Empire

ment responsible to parliament, free press, and abolition of all tax exemp¬ tions. This was indeed a relatively enlightened approach on the part of the gentry majority of the diet, whereas the claim for unqualified in¬ corporation of Transylvania into Hungary could be considered con¬ troversial from the viewpoint of liberal principles. However, this pro¬ gram, until March, 1848, the maximum of the obtainable, was soon super¬ seded by the revolutionary events. d) RISE OF THE PROBLEM OF NATIONALISM

In this section we are concerned with a brief analysis of a transitional stage of nationalist development. The new and important cultural con¬ tributions of the champions of the Slavic renaissance and changes in the nationalist ideologies within other groups will be discussed in Chapter VII. Here we start from the assumption that what frequently is referred to as “the emergence of the national (or nationalist) problem” or “the awakening of nationalism” goes back further in history than to the sem¬ inal ideas of Rousseau, Herder, or Schlozer in the transition period from late Enlightenment to early romanticism. What occurred in those decades is the crystallization of concepts while the phenomena of nationalism them¬ selves can be traced back to the beginnings of modern times and in some cases to the Middle Ages. True enough, the so-called Slavic renaissance —roughly from the last quarter of the eighteenth century to the second quarter of the nineteenth—strengthened a sense of national consciousness among several national groups, but this era did not create these feelings. Here an important distinction is suggestive. There were first national groups with a political history based on the tradition of medieval social stratification within the confines of the Habsburg empire (Croats, Czechs, Italians, Germans, Magyars, and Poles). They possessed a strong sense of national identity and consciousness. Secondly, such consciousness cannot be denied to the so-called national groups without history either, which for centuries were deprived by foreign overlords of autonomous political development. Consequently they could not take advantage of the mixed blessings of a nationally conscious nobility, gentry, and urban burgher class. The fact that such national groups as the Roumanians, Ruthenians, Serbs, Slovaks, Slovenes, had no independent political history and tradi¬ tion of a separate social feudal structure within the borders of the Habs¬ burg realms does not mean that they lacked history. Independent political national history of a national group—in terms of this study within the Habsburg empire—and national consciousness of such a group refer to

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

29/

separate concepts. If the first is present, the second is also, but if the first is lacking there is still a probability that national consciousness exists.43 What does this mean in terms of the transitional era under discussion here? Nationalism up to the beginning of the restoration period had at some time played an important role among some national groups within their domestic order as well as in their relationship to the empire. Now largely under the influence of the Slavic cultural renaissance and, con¬ comitant with it, with the recognition of the ethnic factor, nationalism began to become a polidcal problem for all national groups whereas pre¬ viously it had been one only for some. It changed to a, if not the empire¬ wide chief problem. This became fully apparent in the political confronta¬ tions of the revolution of 1848-1849. Yet much occurred or began to occur in the preceding Restoration and pre-March period which heralded the metamorphosis of the national problem to the most pervasive of all problems of the multinational empire. To begin with, the grossdeutsch-hleindeutsch issue was discussed briefly in Section A of this chapter in the context of foreign, especially Austrian-Prussian, relations. Of more immediate impact within Austria between 1815 and 1848 were the efforts to modernize the estates system as counterweight against the centralism of an oppressive absolutism. The former member of the Tyrolean estates, Victor von Andrian-Werburg (1813-1858) and the

artillery captain Karl Moering (1810-1870), both

mentioned in the discussion of St. Paul’s Assembly in Frankfurt, played an important part. They were distinguished writers, who promoted the idea of an Austrian estates central assembly to be convened in Vienna. They also wanted to bring the peasants of the crownlands into this estates structure, and they further advocated communal autonomy. All this should have modified both absolutism and centralism in a rather limited 43 The author, in line with his previous discussions of the problem, confines the validity of the concept of nations or national groups with independent political history to the area of the Habsburg empire. No nation in a wider sense lacks history altogether and all five national groups referred to here as lacking an inde¬ pendent political history within the confines of the Danube monarchy identified them¬ selves throughout various phases of the Middle Ages with national political asso¬ ciations, though frequently of a mere tribal character. None of them, however, had a political center in the Habsburg empire prior to the 19th century as understood in the terms of this study. This modification separates the concept, as used here, from the Marxian interpretation of the concept of nations with and without history. See Kann, N ationalitdtenproblem, I, 44-56, 359-362. For a contrary Marxian opin¬ ion see Franz Zwitter, “Die nationalen Fragen in der osterreichisch-ungarischen Monarchic (1900-1914),” in Fritz Klein and Peter Hanak, eds., Die nationale Frage in der osterreichischungarischen Monarchic (Budapest, 1966), pp. 11-28.

292

History of the Habsburg Empire

political and social sense. In effect such proposals in national terms meant a continuation of a qualified system of German-directed centralism. It was hoped that relatively minor changes of political institutions would meet the demands of other national groups halfway and in time and thus keep the ruling system viable with modest adjustments. Francis Schuselka (1811-1886), another St. Paul’s deputy, more volatile in his views than either Andrian-Werburg or Moering but an equally versa¬ tile writer, had a better insight in the seriousness of the national problems, though he proposed no better solutions. A determined opponent of na¬ tional and political oppression, he believed in the ideological superiority of German liberalism. Like many German political writers from the radi¬ cal Left to the extreme Right he also feared the impact of substantial Slavic opposition. The assumption that the administrative separation of Galicia from the bulk of the empire, in conjunction with a more liberal domestic regime, would help matters in general seemed to be more reasonable than the ideas of the champions of the estates’ reforms.44 The ideological rift among the Magyars between the enlightened con¬ servatives or moderate liberals around Szechenyi and the spokesmen for a young Hungary in the Mazzinian national pattern behind Kossuth has been surveyed in the preceding section. Equally important and politically equally advanced, though subject to more stringent government controls, were propositions among the Czechs in the Bohemian lands. Here several basic concepts at cross purposes with each other were meant to check generally recognized grievances. Public opinion found the continued rule of German-directed centralism increasingly oppressive and unendur¬ able. A widely supported device to check this situation was the cautiously camouflaged demand for Czech political dominance according to the medieval concepts of the Bohemian Staatsrecht with a view to eventual outright Czech-German separation. This program, however, was per¬ ceived as a terminal goal. As understood by the enlightened conserva¬ tives, represented later by the old Czech party, the program stood for the prevalent political view from the pre-March period roughly to the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867. It was reflected in several ways, first as that of the territorial aristocracy in the crownlands in juxtaposition to the court aristocracy in Vienna, secondly as that of a large sector of the educated upper middle class. But primarily it stood for the views and interests of the houses of Colloredo, Liechtenstein, Clam Gallas, Clam Martinic, Silva-Tarouca, Liitzow, Thun, and Schwarzenberg among other aristocratic families who had settled in the Bohemia lands after 1620. In 44 Kann, Nationalitatenproblem, I, 63-72, 365-368.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

293

substance, they had never become Czech nationalists, but they were and remained in favor of strengthened estates rights in the lands of the Bo¬ hemian crown. Count Joseph M. Thun and the historian Palacky could be considered in the pre-March period spokesmen for these views, though Palacky outgrew such narrow constitutional philosophy. It is true, however, that he never accepted a more comprehensive social plan. The political philosophy of the moderate Bohemian reformers over¬ lapped at some point with Panslav ideas. Insofar as they expressed the de¬ sire for a political union of all Slavic nations as equal partners—as pro¬ posed during the revolution by Bakunin—they were hardly more practical than the somewhat mystic concept of a cultural Panslav association under Russian leadership advocated by the romantic Slovak writer Jan Kollar. More feasible though not more popular appeared the notion of a Russiandirected and dominated Panslavism, against which Palacky took a stand in his famous letter to the Frankfurt Assembly to be discussed below. Politically more farsighted than either the Panslavs or the adherents of the Bohemian Staatsrecht was a young Czech liberal writer and journalist, Karel Havlicek (1821-1856) and an enlightened conservative, capable Bohemian aristocrat, Count Leo Thun (1811-1888). Havlicek, the first great Czech journalist, who fought under pre-March absolutism for his cause in the thinly disguised role of a reporter of conditions in Ireland and China, came closest to the idea of a separate democratic Czech polit¬ ical nation, freed from Habsburg absolutism, but protected also from tsarist-dominated Panslavism. Thun, governor of Bohemia in 1848 and an outstanding Austrian minister of education for the following eleven years, saw the best solution for the Czech demands in the gradual achievement of equality with the Germans by bilingualism in mixed territories. This measure, as it turned out, would have indeed greatly benefited the Czechs against German intransigence and arrogant refusal to learn the language of a small Slavic nation. Thun’s further-reaching notions that Austria would have to develop multinational parties, based on common politicalsocial interests, which might take precedence over the national ones, were advocated shortly after the revolution. They came too late but at the same time also too early. At any rate, they were not heeded.45

45 Hermann

Munch, Bohmische Tragodie (Braunschweig, 1949), pp. 88-189; Richard Plaschka, “Das bohmische Staatrecht in tschechischer Sicht,” in Ernst Birke and Kurt Oberdorffer, eds., Das bohmische Staatsrecht in den deutsch-tschechischen Auseinandersetzungen des ig. und 20. Jahrhunderts (Marburg, i960), pp. i—14; Hans Raupach, Der tschechische Fruhnationalismus (Darmstadt, 1967), pp. 90-137; Barbara Kohak Kimmel, “Karel Havlicek and the Czech Press before 1848,” in Peter Brock and H. Gordon Skilling, eds.. The Czech Renaissance of the

294

History of the Habshurg Empire

Regarding the Poles, the concept of a restoration in terms of the ro¬ mantic Polish emigres in the west, the resurrection of a free, indepen¬ dent, and liberal Poland remained very much alive. It was promoted in particular in the free city state of Cracow, established at the borders of western Galicia in 1815. From then until the incorporation of the city into Austria in 1846, Cracow was to serve as a kind of temporary Piedmont, a center from which endeavors for the restoration of a free undivided Poland radiated. In the pre-March period, the Poles under Prussian ad¬ ministration and, until the end of the reign of Tsar Alexander I, those under Russian rule were treated somewhat better than those under the Metternich system in Austria.46 The frustrated revolution of 1830-1831 in Congress Poland, however, changed conditions in the Russian sphere for the worse. This lead to a shift of the revolutionary activities to Austrian soil, where police suppressiomwas not quite as brutal as under the tyran¬ nical Tsar Nicholas. “Young Poland” in Austria, among whose leaders a subsequently moderate Austrian speaker of parliament, Francis Smolka, and a future imperial Austrian minister, Florian Ziemialkowski, were to be found, was active, though not very successful. For once the Polish aristoc¬ racy in Galicia and its gentry clientele, the Szlachta, belonged to the most oppressive landlords in the Habsburg domains, second to none in Bohemia and Hungary. Furthermore the Austrian government, particu¬ larly under the enlightened governor of Galicia and later minister of interior Count Francis Stadion, had introduced at least some beneficial agricultural and administrative reforms and curtailment of patrimonial jurisdiction. The Galician peasants—Polish and Ruthenians alike—con¬ sidered their own lords as worse enemies than the government in Vienna and the provincial administration in Lemberg (Lwow, L’viv). The Polish peasant revolt in 1846 in central and west Galicia-—the Ruthenians in the east remained relatively quiet—represented thus primarily a social rather than a national rising against the lords, who happened to be Poles. Strictly nationalist revolutionary activities at that time were almost negligible, though they gave the Austrian government the pretext to annex Cracow. Belated Austrian military intervention indicated clearly that Vienna was willing to play the Ruthenians against the Poles. This devious and belated

Nineteenth Century (Toronto, 1970), pp. 113-130; Kann, Nationalitatenproblem, I, 149-166, 405-410. On the Palacky letter to the Frankfurt Assembly see ibid., I, 171-174, 412. 46 Alexander was the close friend of Prince Adam Georg Czartoryski, the en¬ lightened Polish patriot and reformer. See also Marian Kukiel, Czartoryski and European Unity, iyyo-1861 (Princeton, 1955), pp. 102-139.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

295

military intervention taught the Polish landlords a lesson. They realized gradually that the solution of the Polish question could be inidated only among the Poles of all three partitioning powers at the same time. Be¬ fore this hour of All-Polish liberation would strike, the interests of the Polish lords and their clientele called for accommodation with, not revolution against, the Austrian government. This would give the Polish people in Galicia a measure of national rights and at the same time keep the social privileges of the lords untouched. Such was the situation in Galicia at the beginning of the revolution of 1848.47 As for the Croats, the conflict with the Magyars, but not some of its consequences, has been noted in the previous section. The conflict stimu¬ lated two opposing trends: the assertion of Croatian estates autonomy, based on the social interests of aristocracy and gentry, and a sudden rise of a comprehensive Southern Slav nationalism and cultural if not politi¬ cal unionism. Undoubtedly the concept of ancient Illyrism of the western Southern Slav peoples, advanced under the liberal French administration, helped this development. It was furthered also underhand by the Metternich-Kolowrat administration, who saw here the possibility to establish a counterweight to Magyar nationalism. The journalist and writer Ljudevit Gaj

(1809-1871), unimpeded by the government in Vienna, was

active to advance these ideas. He promoted the notion of a common Southern Slav “Illyrian” literary language, which for the sake of South¬ ern Slav union should be assimilated to the patterns of the rather obscure south Dalmatian Stokavian idiom rather than to Gaj’s native Croatian. In many ways Gaj’s endeavors could be compared with those of Havlicek’s political journalism among the Czechs. Yet unlike Havlicek, Gaj, despite his cultural merits, always appeared in a political twilight through his cooperation with the pre-March government in Vienna. The interest of the government to balance an at that time still moderate cul¬ tural Southern Slav nationalism against the Magyar radicals was obvious. The regime in Vienna apparently saw little danger in Southern Slav union activities. But Kossuth, who was alert to potentially radical ideas, particularly those he considered hostile to Magyar national interests, saw farther. To him Illyrism,48 the cultural national movement of the western Catholic Southern Slavs under Croatian leadership, presented a more 47 Schlitter, Aus Osterreichs Vormarz: Galizien und Kra\au, pp. 54-71; Wilhelm Feldman, Geschichte der politischen Ideen in Polen seit dessen 1 eilungen (Osnabriick, 1964), pp. 123-140; Kann, Nationalitatenproblem, I, 214-224, 427-432. 48 Illyricum was the Roman province adjacent to the eastern shores of the Adriatic sea. Illyrians were the native people there, presumably of Celtic origin settled throughout the northwestern Balkans.

296

History of the Habshurg Empire

serious threat to Magyar nationalism than Croatian demands for estates autonomy. One reason why Vienna did not take this Illyrism seriously may have been the fact that the greatest Slavic contemporary linguist, the Slovene Bartholomaus Kopitar (1780-1844), advocated another south¬ ern Slav union idea, namely the concept of the Catholic Southern Slavs under the Habshurg scepter as balance against Russian-directed Pan¬ slavism. Under the dynamic bishop of Djakovo, Josip J. Strossmayer (1815-1905), these notions changed in time into a more radical, less Habsburg-oriented, direction.49 Concerning the Italians, the history of Italian nineteenth-century na¬ tionalism and the clear-cut language frontier between Italians

and

Germans at Salurn in Tyrol help to explain why accommodations, such as the administrative division of Tyrol into a German and Italian part amounted to merely temporary arrangements. No ideological scheme which promoted a permanent solution of the Italian problem within the Habsburg empire was ever taken seriously. This held true even for the Austrian Littoral where the Italians never held an absolute majority in a nationally homogeneous area as in the Trentino but only a relative one followed closely by Croatian and Slovene minorities. Here, too, plans for multinational reorganization were only temporary, although the autonomy of the port city of Trieste was recognized in practice since the times of Charles VI. The autonomous political administration was anchored also in special legislation of 1818, 1849, and finally of 1867 (semi-crownland status). Such concessions did not change public opinion or ideological concepts, holding that, like the Polish quesdon in a restored Poland, Italian na¬ tionalism could only be settled in a united Italy. The time for such grand solutions was uncertain in either case, but the European power constella¬ tion seemed to favor the Italians.50 More complex was the situation for some national groups without in¬ dependent political history in the Habsburg empire. As for the Slovaks, the Reformation in Bohemia, particularly in its later stages under the 49 On Illyrism see: Hermann Wendel, Der Kampf der Sudslawen um Freiheit und Einheit (Frankfurt, 1925), pp. 113-140, 189-227; Alfred von Fischel, Der Fanslawismus bis zum Welt\rieg (Stuttgart, 1919), pp. 130-148; Kann, Nationalitdtenproblem, I, 246-258, 439-442; K. B. K. (initials only), “Literature from the Illyrian Movement to Realism, 1835-1895,” in Francis H. Eterovich and Christopher Spalatin, eds., Croatia, I, 242-251 and Guldescu, ibid., II, 38-40. Kopitar as loyal citizen could even become director of the National Library (Hofbibliothek) in Vienna, then an unheard-of distinction for a Slovene. 50 Hans Kramer, Osterreich und das Risorgimento (Vienna, 1963), pp. 9-52; Kann, Nationalitdtenproblem, I, 265-267, 443-445.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

297

influence of Lutheranism, was identified in Slovak territory with the concept of a Czecho-Slovak political, cultural, and particularly linguistic union. The dissatisfaction, which this estrangement from the idea of straight Slovak national identity created, was used by the Counter Reformation, especially the Jesuits, to recreate the concept of a separate Slovak cultural and linguistic character. In the eighteenth century Father Bernolak on the Catholic side and in the early nineteenth century the cultural reformers Joseph Hurban, Michael Hodza, and L’udovit Stur on the Protestant side, made each in their own way, new efforts to establish such Slovak national image. They were supported by the Catholic roman¬ tic poet Jan Holly. We also find at that time endeavors by Slovaks of strong pro-Czech tendencies, Jan Kollar and Pavel J. Safarik, to reestablish the old Czecho-Slovak union idea. However, in the Restoration period their attempts were unsuccessful. The major Slovak cultural trends moved in the direction of a separate national concept and here the Protestant in¬ fluence was stronger than the Catholic. The political progress of the Slovaks toward autonomy was hampered by the fact that the nobility and part of the upper middle class had become magyarized, but cultural progress indicated that a political program was developing as well.51 The Serbs in Hungary were granted cultural and religious autonomy in the late seventeenth century, as discussed in Chapter IV:B. In the course of time Magyarism succeeded in restricting the autonomy to the religious sphere. Somewhat better was the situation in the Military Fron¬ tiers area to the south, and this discrepancy was one reason for the violent confrontations between

Serbs

and

Magyars

during

the

revolution.

Another was that the Serb cultural renaissance during the pre-March period had its center in the Habsburg empire. The great Serbian poet and linguist Vuk Karadzic (1787-1864), widely celebrated also in the Germanlanguage orbit, serves as example. Cultural activities strengthened the Serb national pride and political consciousness.52 The Austrian Slovenes, the smallest of the Slavic national groups in the Habsburg empire and the one farthest removed from a potential poJ51 Ludwig von Gogolak, Beitrdge zur Geschichte des slowa\ischen Vollpes. II: Die slowa\ische nationale Frage in der Reformepoche Ungarns (ijgo-1848) (Munich, 1969), pp. 11-240; Theodor G. Locher, Die nationale Differenzierung und Jntegrierung der Slowa\en and Tschechen in ihrem geschichtlichen Verlauf bis 1848 (Haarlem, 1931), pp. 139-187. Kann, Nationalitdtenproblem, I, 274-280, 447-449. 62Wende], Der Kampf der Siidslawen, pp. 141-188; Fischel, Der Panslawismus, pp. 148-155; Emile Picot, Les Serbes de Hongrie (Paris, 1873), PP- 172-217; Duncan Wilson, The Life and Times of Vn\ S. Karadzic (Oxford, 1970), pp. 294-313; Kann, Nationalitdtenproblem, I, 286-289, 451-454.

2 g8

History of the Hubs burg Empire

litical autonomy, encountered little difficulties in their cultural life during the Restoration period. Politically they were not taken seriously; cul¬ turally as the example of Kopitar shows, they even found some sup¬ port in Vienna, because the concept of a Catholic Austro-Slavism suited the interests of the government. But also outspoken German liberals such as Count Anton Alexander Auersperg (as poet Anastasius Grim) 53 strongly supported Slovene cultural activities, particularly in the language field. These peaceful conditions were to change when the Slovenes for¬ mulated a political program of their own in 1848.54 Peculiar was the situation among the Ruthenians. The conversion of many of them to the Uniate church under papal jurisdiction in Galicia and northern Hungary, established by the union of Brest Litowsk of 1596, separated them from their brethren in the Bukovina (until 1775 under Turkish rule) and from the Russian Ukrainians. In the cultural sense the Ruthenians could be considered as a separate branch of the Ukrainian people. The religious difference among them was of paramount importance in the development of national consciousness, as religion is important to many oppressed people where it is the only outlet for the creation of cultural programs. A Polish drive to convert the Ruthenian peasants to the Roman-Catholic Church, the Church of their oppressors, was under¬ standably not very successful. Only the Ruthenian noble landlords merged almost imperceptibly with their Polish fellow aristocrats. The program for a definite Ruthenian cultural identity based on langauge was promoted primarily within the Uniate Church and to a point supported by the Austrian government, which considered the Ruthenian peasants as loyal and the Polish nobility, gentry, and intellectuals as poten¬ tial revolutionaries. Within the Uniate Church two trends were in conflict with each other, one which stressed the common bonds with the Orthodox Ukrainians in Russia and another western-oriented, which favored the development of a modernized Ruthenian literary language. No clear victory of either trend (Old and Young Ruthenians), both directed by Church organizations, was as yet discernible in 1848. But both stressed the necessity for the recognition of the Ruthenian language in the administra¬ tion of eastern Galicia and for an educational system of their own.55 53 The Auerspergs owned large estates in Carniola, particularly in the then German-language island of Gottschee. 54Bogumil Vosnjak, A Bulwark against Germany (London, 1917), pp. 66-82; Fischel, Der Panslawismus, pp. 125-130; Kann, Nationalitatenproblem, I, 299-303, 457-458. 65 Boris Krupnyckyj, Geschichte der Ukraine von den Anfdngen bis zum Jahre igiy (Wiesbaden, 1963), pp. 246-252; Schlitter, Aus Osterreichs Vormarz, pp.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

299

In the development of Roumanian nationalism, the establishment of a Uniate Church in Transylvania by the end of the seventeenth century and the example of the three-nation state of Magyars, Szekels, and Saxons (Germans) which gave their groups on the same territory a wide degree of political and cultural autonomy were important factors. The Rou¬ manians (Vlachs) had secured a very limited recognition of their national rights under Joseph II. Francis I tried to appease the Magyars in the face of a strong Roumanian immigration from the Danube principalities. The national program called for full equality with the status of the other three nationalities in Transylvania, in other words the conversion from the three- to four-nation state. Further claims, though not yet fully crystal¬ lized, were for political union with their conationals in the Bukovina and the Banat of Temesvar. In this latter region the Roumanian national status was inferior even that in Transylvania.66 By 1848 political activism and political programs among the eleven national groups of the empire had not developed and could not develop to the same cultural, let alone political level. Yet national consciousness among these groups had evolved to a degree that sufficed to be converted into political action if and when a revolutionary situation would offer the opportunity. C.

The revolution of

1848-1849

The revolution in the Flabsburg empire took place in several theaters and on several levels. All were interrelated. This factor can never be fully shown in a historical presentation, which cannot tell all at the same time. There was a liberal constitutional revolution, a social (mainly agrarian) revolution, and—most significant for the Habsburg realms—a number of national revolutions. Besides, the impact of foreign relations on the domestic situation opened up new revolutionary situations. Thus the Austro-Prussian rivalry was closely related to the German revolution and particularly to the events at

58-71; Ivan 2eguc, Die nationalpolitischen Bestrebungen der Karpato-Ruthenen (Wiesbaden, 1965), pp. 11-19; Fischel, Der Panslawismus, pp. 155-160; Kann, Nationalitatenproblem, I, 322-327, 466-468. 56 Constantin Daicoviciu and Miron Constantinescu, Breve Histoire de la Transylvanie (Bucharest, 1965), pp. 179-193; Cornelia Bodea, The Romanians’ Struggle for Unification 1834-1849 (Bucarest, 1970); Vasile Maciu, Mouvements Nationaux et Sociaux Roumains au XIXe Steele (Bucarest, 1971), PP- 40-101; Eugen Horvath, Die Geschichte Siebenburgens (Budapest, n.d.), pp. 57-69, 77-80, i3°~i35; Carl Gollner, Die Siebenbiirger Sachsen in den Revolutionsjahren 18481849 (Bucharest, 1967), passim; Kann, Nationalitatenproblem, I, 309-314; 460-464.

joo

History of the Habshurg Empire

St. Paul’s Assembly in Frankfurt, while the war against PiedmontSardinia cannot be separated from the revolution in the LombardoVenetian kingdom. Finally, the Russian intervention in the war of inde¬ pendence in Hungary tied this passionate struggle to the realm of foreign relations. The revolution in the Habsburg empire flared up in some places, then quieted down to move to other scenes, to break out again in the old place. There is no center nor continuity in the revolutionary events, even faintly similar to those of the French Revolution of 1789. Thus the Habsburg revolutions had no unity of action and no unity of problems and at¬ tempted solutions. ^

Many events led to the tense atmosphere in the early March days of 1848 in Vienna. The impact of the French February revolution, the unrest in Lombardy-Venetia, the radical liberal agitation at the Hungarian Reichstag in Pozsony and the preparations for the elections of a German National Assembly in Frankfurt, all tied to a prolonged economic urban crisis, served as background of the situation. Petitions of a liberal charac¬ ter, promoted primarily by professional men and students, were circulated between March 6 and 12. Demands for freedom of the press, jury trials,

j civil rights, abolition of religious discrimination, academic freedom, full 1 emancipation of the peasants, and above all constitutional representative , government were revolutionary by Austrian standards of the pre-March J period. Most of these requests expressed the interests of the urban edu-

1

cated middle class. On March 13, their representatives were the first who

I clashed with military forces in front of the Lower Austrian diet. Students were the first victims of the confrontation. Yet more casualties, altogether about fifty, occurred, when the workers in the suburbs became involved and the armed forces under the command of Archduke Albrecht acted with increasing force and decreasing restraint against the underprivileged masses. The same evening Metternich was forced to resign. More or less enlightened conservatives hoped that his fall, not unwelcome to a court party centered on the archduchess Sophie, would put an end to the com¬ motion. As events turned out, it was only the signal for its spread. The crown permitted the establishment of a national guard of the citizenry. A more dynamic legion of academic youth supplemented it and spurred the guard to action. Freedom of the press was granted also and a liberal constitution promised for the near future. A new cabinet under the chairmanship of Count Franz Anton Kolowrat, with General Count Karl Ficquelmont (Foreign Affairs), Count Theodor Latour (De¬ fense), Baron Karl Kiibeck (Finances), and Baron Franz Pillersdorf (In-

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

301

terior) was to make arrangements for the transition to constitutional government. Everyone of these five men represented to some degree the old regime, though Kolowrat, as seen from a historic-traditional view¬ point, had shown more understanding for national aspirations than Metternich. Kiibeck was a moderately enlightened bureaucrat, and only Pillersdorf, though by no means a liberal, seemed to welcome his assigned task to prepare constitutional reforms. Kolowrat, who seemed too closely associated with the Metternich regime, was forced to resign within a few weeks and Ficquelmont, his successor, closely linked to Metternich’s pro-Russian policy, had to follow him soon. Pillersdorf now became prime minister in early May, and this meant that the crown began to take the revolution more seriously, though still not seriously enough. A preliminary constitution was decreed at the end of April. It estab¬ lished a bicameral system, which was to share legislative powers with the emperor. Yet the franchise was severely restricted and daily and weekly wage earners, that meant practically all laborers were excluded. Further¬ more the characterization of the constitution as “octroy”—that is, as pri¬ vilege granted by the crown rather than as the accomplishment of a constituent assembly—created widespread resentment. As it occurred so often in the history of the Habsburg monarchy, a seemingly far-reaching concession had become largely meaningless, because it offered too little and came too late. And yet, Pillersdorf would not have been permitted to issue even this imperfect constitution, if events on many fronts had not carried bewilderment and fear into the highest ranks of government and the court, that is, primarily the feeble-minded emperor’s uncles, his brother, and the most resolute personality in the imperial house, Ferdi¬ nand’s sister-in-law, the Archduchess Sophie, mother of the future em¬ peror Francis Joseph.67 Three days after Metternich’s fall the opposition of the Hungarian diet, backed by a genuine majority, had demanded the establishment of a na¬ tional government, responsible to a parliament to be elected by general male franchise. Legislation in the future was to require countersignature of the ministry. Tax exemptions for the noble landowners were to be abolished, freedom of the press to be granted, and—a blow to minority rights—Transylvania to be fully reincorporated into Hungary. Neverthe¬ less the liberal provisions, particularly those that eliminated discrimination against the peasants in regard to taxation, outweighed the oppressive na57 Joseph A. von Helfert, Geschichte der osterreichischen Revolution (Freiburg, 1907), I, 237-477 passim; Rudolf Kissling, Die Revolution im Kaisertum Osterreich (Vienna, 1948), pp. 39-62.

History of the Habsburg Empire

J02

nationalistic measures. The crown denied two demands: one for the estab¬ lishment of a national army subordinated to the national Hungarian ^government, the other for the initiation of a national budget, entirely sep¬ arated from the imperial financial administration and tax policy. On March 22 the national ministry under the chairmanship of an enlightened, by no means radical aristocrat, Count Louis Batthiany, took office. Other members of the cabinet were Kossuth (Finances), Szechenyi (Public Works), Deak (Justice), and Eotvos (Public Instruction). To reconcile Croatian feelings of resentment against the far-reaching concessions to the Magyars, the emperor appointed a nationalist Croatian officer, Josef Jelacic de Buzim, as banus of Croatia. Meanwhile the Sardinian invasion of Lombardy had begun, the provisional National Assembly in Frankfurt had met, and Palacky had denounced Czech participation in the proceed¬ ings of the German Confederation. Czech nationalism in Prague, at the beginning of the revolution interested mainly in constitutional govern¬ ment and recognition of equality with the Germans, had renewed its old demand: the reestablishment of the union of the three lands of the Bo¬ hemian crown, in which the Czech people could claim a predominant role. The previous demands had been raised mainly by a vociferous, liberal minority but the newly revived ones also had the full support of a re¬ spected middle and upper middle urban burgher class, above all that of the powerful Bohemian aristocracy. Spring riots in Cracow and Lwow organized by Polish liberals complicated the situation further. Yet as it turned out, but could not easily be predicted at the time, the memories of the frustrated •

activities. |

revolution of 1846 capped soon the revolutionary Polish

KQ

To return to events in Vienna: National guards (chiefly middle-class burghers), workers, and students demanded now stormily the withdrawal of the octroyed constitution and convocation of a constitutional national assembly. The establishment of a revolutionary security committee under the leadership of a young physician, Dr. Adolf Fischhof, a brave man and great political talent, followed. Even before this happened, the imperial

•court, mindful of the fate of Louis XVI, who in the beginning of the 58 Hclfert, Geschichte der osterreichischen Revolution see in particular I, pp. 2312.86, 431-449 for events in Hungary, 286-291 in Galicia. As for the situation in Prague and Vienna see Friedrich Prinz, Prag und Wien 1848: Probleme der nationalen und sozialen Revolution im Spiegel der Ministerratsproto\olle (Munich, 1968) , pp. 76-105; Stanley Z. Pech, The Czech Revolution of 1848 (Chapel Hill, 1969) , pp. 47-78; Ivan D. Udalzow, Aufzeichnungen uber die Geschichte des nationalen und politischen Kampfes in Bohmen im fahre 1848 (Berlin, 1953), pp. 43-86.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

303

French revolution had practically become a prisoner in his own capital, left Vienna for Innsbruck. In July the radicals within the security commit¬ tee forced the resignation of Pillersdorf. A ministry under Wessenberg, a moderate diplomat under the Metternich regime, followed after an in¬ terim regime of a few days. Dignitaries in the restoration era had often served for more years than the new men for days. The new cabinet was undistinguished, except for the minister of justice, Dr. Alexander Bach, a young lawyer, who had been a liberal at the beginning of the revolution, but with remarkable flair foresaw the turning of the tide and moved gradually into safer, moderate, and later conservative waters. He was to become the Fouche of the revolution, although one without the cruelty of his more formidable predecessor. Meanwhile the Constituent Assembly had been duly elected and was convoked by the temporary regent, the emperor’s uncle, Archduke John. As to be expected, due to the narrow franchise and therefore limited in¬ terest of the population in the elections, the political persuasion of the Austrian Reichstag of 383 deputies, of which the peasants represented more than one quarter, ranged in substance from moderate conservative to moderate liberal, with few radicals to the right and left. Experience in an entirely new political situation is often of far less value than under ordinary conditions. Just like the French Constituent Assembly of 1789, this new body confronted by entirely new problems turned out to be far more capable than one might have had reason to expect. Only days after the convocation of the Reichstag in mid-July 1848, legislation to abolish the personal service obligation of the peasants was introduced by the young Silesian deputy Hans Kudlich. An aggravated agrarian crisis, largely due to continued poor harvests, had been in existence since 1845. Its impact helped to have the Kudlich proposals passed in early September. The enactment of these laws which required determination of an indemnity for the lords, had to wait for the postrevolutionary era. Yet the impact of what has passed into history as the Austrian peasant emancipation by the revolutionary Reichstag was so great that even the coming neo-absolutist regime could not evade the duty to put it, with some changes, into effect. Meanwhile the Reichstag busied itself with the drafting of a permanent constitution which should take care of the manifold national problems of the empire.59 69 Helfert, Geschichte der osterreichischen Revolution, II, 244-269; R. John Rath, The Viennese Revolution of 1848 (Austin, 1957), pp. 179-316; Max Bach, Geschichte der Wiener Revolution im fahre 1848 (Vienna, 1898), pp. 575-677; Friedrich Prinz, Hans Kudlich (Munich, 1962), pp. 86-107; Marx, Die wirtschaftlichen Ursachen der Revolution von 1848, pp. 123-162.

304

History of the Habsburg Empire

The events of spring and summer proved that they required indeed highest priority. Non-Magyar national groups in Hungary, Croats and Serbs in the Banat, Roumanians in Transylvania, rose against the intransi¬ gence and in some instances the blind zeal of Magyar nationalism. It was largely inspired by Kossuth who only in exile began to understand that the national discrimination which the non-Magyar peasant in Hungary had to face aggravated the social discrimination, which he shared with his Magyar countrymen. Particularly violent were the clashes with the Serbs, who saw their old and to-be-hoped-for enlarged autonomy trampled un¬ der. In May, the Transylvanian Roumanians protested at Blay against the incorporation of Transylvania into Hungary and asked at the same time for the conversion of the principality into a four-nation state. In Septem¬ ber, they demanded the outright separation from Hungary and direct subordination under the administration in Vienna. The Slovaks, on the other hand, in an improvised popular assembly at Liptovsky Svaty Mikulas appeared satisfied with autonomy within Hungary, provided it would secure them the use of their language in administration and educa¬ tion. Similar demands were raised by the Ruthenians in Galicia, who re¬ quested the administrative separation of east and west Galicia. Pillersdorf promised to meet these claims, but nothing was done. The demands of the Carpatho-Ruthenians in Hungary for autonomy were ignored by Mag¬ yar nationalism. They were the most forgotten of the forgotten people. Interesting were the requests of the small Slovene national group spread over six Austrian crownlands. As the first national group they asked for autonomy within a territory whose boundaries should be drawn along ethnic and not historic-political lines. This latter alternative would not make sense in a nation whose status as historical-political entity had never existed in Austria. Recognition as ethnic group, more in practice than by law, became now the order of the day.60 Although the government could accomplish little in these matters as long as the revolutionary situation was in flux, even efforts towards re¬ form were made only by the new legislative branch of government and not by the executive. Promptings to act were not lacking. On June 2 the international Slav Congress convened in Prague under the chairman¬ ship of Palacky. Most of the outstanding leaders of the Slavic national groups in the Habsburg empire but few from abroad were present. Con¬ gress Poland could send only emigre delegates, mostly from Paris, which impaired the representative character of the Congress. Besides, the Poles 60Kann,

Nationalitatenproblem,

I,

72-87,

122-124,

279-280, 289-290, 303-305, 3x3-315, 326-329; II, 13-15.

166-174,

224-225,

245-254,

il Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

305

and others could offer no solution on Austrian territory that would have ji challenged the territorial integrity of the Habsburg monarchy. The mere fej discussion of such questions would have invited the charge of treason. Still, the results of the Prague proceedings were impressive. If they e had not been ignored by a narrow-minded and unimaginative governix ment they could have been constructive. Thus the possibility of a Polishr. Ruthenian compromise in Galicia which would have created a bilingual 1

province with adequate representation of the Ruthenian minority (actually a majority in eastern Galicia) was seriously entertained. The possibility of a merger with the Hungarian Carpatho-Ukrainians was left open. Ru-

t thenians and Slovenes, both widely scattered national groups without ) political history in the Habsburg empire, asked thus for ethnic solutions, ii whereas Slovaks and Serbs who lived in more homogeneous territories » would have been satisfied with local autonomy within Hungary. Of the jj national groups with political history the Croatians demanded the recognii tion of the Triune kingdom, including Austrian-administered Dalmatia, ; as a separate political entity within the empire as a whole rather than within Hungary. Liberal and conservative Czechs agreed on the demands for the union of the lands of the Bohemian crown under a representative constitution. The national groups represented at the Congress professed in general terms the spiritual union of all Slavic peoples and in more speci¬ fic ones in the Habsburg empire the right to full equality with Germans and Magyars. The federalization of the empire, by and large still along historic-political lines, was recommended. Relatively minor clashes between Czech nationalists and imperial troops gave the commanding general, Prince Alfred Windischgratz no more adept as a statesman than as a military commander, the pretext to dis¬ solve the Congress by military force.61 A great hope went down with this dissolution. The next Slav Congress, now dubbed Panslav Congress, was to meet in Moscow in 1867

m

an atmosphere far less favorable for the

preservation of the Habsburg monarchy.62 Meanwhile the crisis in Hungary heightened. On July 2 the Palatine Archduke Stephan opened the newly elected Reichstag. It was the first and only one in a century to be elected by a truly democratic franchise. Its first 61 The tragic death of Windischgraetz’s consort by a stray bullet during a rela¬ tively minor revolutionary riot in Prague at that time exacerbated the situation further. 62 Hans Kohn, Pan-Slavism (New York, i960), pp. 69-101; Fischel, Der Panslawismus, pp. 261-295; Pech, The Czech Revolution of 1848, pp. 123-166; Udalzow, Aufzeichnungen, pp. 86-122, 223-226; Kann, Nationalitdtenproblem, II, 15-20, 308-

310-

History of the Habsburg Empire legislative actions were taken in defiance of the imperial administration. The establishment of a separate Hungarian (Honved) army, a separate budget, and separate currency bills were voted in. The imperial govern¬ ment accepted the challenge and sent armed forces under Jelacic across the Sava river into Hungary. The violent struggle between Magyars and Serbs embittered the Croatian commander. General civil war appeared imminent. Prime minister Count Batthyany neither could nor wished to . deal with such a situation and resigned. The hero of the radicals, Louis Kossuth, took over now. Since the Palatine resigned also a few days later and was not replaced, Kossuth’s position became a semi-dictorship. The Reichstag did not dare to oppose him, the more the crisis sharpened. Un¬ fortunate incidents, typical of a tense situation, were not lacking. Thus Magyar fury against the armed invasion led to the lynching of the im¬ perial commander in Budapest, Count Lamberg, by a mob. The imperial government responded by invalidating the Reichstag legisj

lation, which had not been sanctioned by the emperor. A state of siege was declared in Hungary. General Jelacic was given wider powers including the takeover of the civil administration in Hungary. The Reichstag de-

j

dared itself in permanent session, the imperial manifesto as void; Jelacic was branded a traitor. With these actions on both sides the revolution in Hungary had moved to a stage beyond peaceful reconciliation; but the legitimacy of the crown was as yet not directly challenged.63 The revolutionary events in Hungary had an impact on the neighbor¬ ing hereditary lands; conversely, unrest there encouraged the leaders of the Magyar revolution. In Vienna, dissatisfaction increased with the seem¬ ingly, but not actually slow progress of the Austrian Reichstag legislation, the continuing economic crisis, and various underhand efforts by the gov¬ ernment to regain control for the reactionary forces of old. The minister of defense, Count Latour, was assailed for oppressive activities of the old establishment. In early October a grenadier battalion of the Viennese garrison, ordered to march into Hungary, mutinied. Clashes followed between regular and insurrectionist troops, supported by students and workers. A mob entered the Ministry of War, attacked and lynched the old Count Latour, and strung up the mutilated body on a lamppost in the street. The authorities used this atrocity as symbol of revolutionary barbarism and as justification for acts of cruelty on the imperial side. Emperor Ferdinand and the court, who had returned to Vienna in the relatively quiet days of August, now left Vienna again, this time for Olmiitz (Olomuc), a small town in east63Kissling, Die Revolution, I, 161-173.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

307

tern Moravia, as the temporary seat of government. Ferdinand was not destined to return as emperor. Within a matter of days a regular insurrection developed in Vienna against the military forces of Windischgratz who moved from the north toward the rebellious city and against Jelacic whose Croatian troops ap¬ proached the city from the east. Inside Vienna the revolutionaries gained the upper hand. They were commanded by the Polish emigre rebel Gen¬ eral Joseph Bern who had participated in the risings of 1830-1831 against the tzarist government. The October revolution was characterized by the fact that the driving forces behind it were not middle-class intellectuals, professors at St. Paul’s Assembly in Frankfurt, or enlightened political journalists but the industrial workers. Until the rising of the Paris Com¬ mune in 1871 it was the most clear-cut workers’ revolution, and had an enormous, though short-lived impact on the sagging revolution in Ger¬ many. Nobody, whether he sympathizes with the ill-planned and largely irrational rising or not, can read the poem “Wien” (Vienna) written in the hectic days by the German revolutionary poet Ferdinand Freiligrath without being moved by its tragic revolutionary fervor. Wenn wir noch knien konnten, wir lagen auf den Knien; Wenn wir noch beten konnten, wir beteten fur Wien! . . . Wozu noch betend winseln? Ihr Manner ins Gewehr, Heut ballt man nur die Hande, man faltet sie nicht mehr! . . . Ein riesig Schilderheben, ein Ringen wild und kiihn— Das ist zur Weltgeschichte das rechte Flehn fur Wien.64 Freiligrath’s plea that the Germans should rise in support of the Aus¬ trian revolution fell on deaf ears and the seemingly more justified hope that Magyar revolutionary forces could succeed in lifting the siege of Vienna by imperial troops failed likewise. On October 30 the troops en¬ tered the city to hoist the banner of a military dictatorship. Bern managed to flee but Messenhauser, an artillery officer of the Viennese garrison who had refused to turn his guns against the people, was executed like some radicals, among them Robert Blum, a deputy of the Frankfurt Assembly 64 From Ferdinand Freiligrath’s poem “Wien,” written in early November, 1848. In translation approximately: If we could still be kneeling, we would be on our knees; if we could still be praying, for Vienna were our pleas. Don’t whimper now in prayer! Men, grab your guns, resist! Don’t fold hands any longer and clench an angry fist. Raise in this giant struggle your shields defiantly: This is the Vienna prayer in world history. (Translated by Max Knight)

jo8

History of the Habsburg Empire

and therefore legally immune from court-martial proceedings. A long dark night settled over Vienna, which, as in 1805 at the time of the first French occupation, adjusted all too readily to the changed conditions.65 The capture of Vienna by imperial troops meant in effect the end of revolutionary action outside of Hungary, though not yet the full victory of the counterrevolution, which in Austria was not to come in full force until early spring in 1849. Yet important steps to that effect were already taken in the fall of 1848. At the height of the Vienna October risings, the Reichstag, following the counsels of the government, decided to move to Kremsier (Kromenz), the summer residence of the archbishop of Olmiitz. While deliberations in Vienna at the height of the Viennese revolutionary risings were difficult, this action, as it became apparent within a few months, amounted to an abdication of the legislature as an independent branch of government. The Reichstag reopened the session at Kremier on November 22, 1848, and continued there its legislative work, in particular on the draft of a permanent constitution. It was not openly threatened as yet, but it became clear that the Kremsier Assembly had become quite isolated from the turn of revolutionary events, which was determined henceforward exclusively by the Austrian and Prussian executive forces. It was a genuine Austrian tragedy, that the Kremsier parliament, at the time when it was engaged in its most constructive work, did not realize that its legislation would be condemned to futility by an authoritarian government. The responsibility for this rested in the first place with the crown and the imperial administration, yet the Reichstag cannot be absolved entirely for its naivete or studied blindness, by which it sur¬ rendered its freedom of action to a determined, only thinly camouflaged counterrevolutionary government. Certainly the lesson of the first revolu¬ tionary phase of the events of 1789 was not learned. On November 21, Prince Felix Schwarzenberg, diplomat and general, and by his antecedents an adventurer and political gambler, was appointed prime minister and the distinguished Count Franz Stadion minister of the interior. The following summer the sick Stadion was replaced by the former radical liberal and by now ultraconservative Alexander Bach, who in the meantime had held the less important office of minister of justice. With his new position he yielded the old one to Anton von Schmerling. Other members of the cabinet were Karl Friedrich von Bruck, minister of commerce, and in later years minister of finance, an imaginative person of grossdeutsch tendencies, who like most of Schwarzenberg’s ministers 65 Bach, Geschichte der Wiener Revolution, pp. 725-855; Rath, The Viennese Revolution, pp. 317-346.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

309

took constitutional-legal “niceties” not too seriously. Krauss and Thinnfeld, the new ministers of finance and agriculture, were experienced bureaucrats and Count Leo Thun, who became the following summer minister of public instruction, was an outstanding talent. Nevertheless, the oftenquoted remark by the British ambassador that this was a cabinet of prime ministers seems exaggerated praise. Schwarzenberg was an in¬ genious and resolute man but a dilettante; Stadion was an eminent ad¬ ministrator but had passed the high tide of his usefulness; Bach was a capable man whose defects of character were commensurate with his talents; Thun was the best man.06 The new prime minister did not show his hand immediately. He pre¬ varicated in his dealings with the Reichstag with the excuse that definite steps concerning the new constitution could be taken only if and when the situation in Germany had been clarified. His first major decision was taken in conjunction with the Archduchess Sophie, namely to induce Emperor Ferdinand to abdicate in favor of his eighteen-year-old nephew Archduke Francis. The transfer of the crown took place on December 2. The new emperor added to the name Francis, under which he was known in his family circle, Joseph, as a bow to enlightened Josephinism. This was meant to please the liberals. Yet the symbolic significance rested not so so much in the double name but in the fact that Francis, the name of the arch-reactionary dull grandfather came first and that of the enlightened brilliant great-great uncle second. This mixture and this rank of values was characteristic for Francis Joseph’s sixty-eight-year reign.67 Of the young emperor’s long line of prime ministers and leading states¬ men, Schwarzenberg was probably the most daring and, taking a shortrange view, the most successful. No wonder that Francis Joseph trusted him as hardly any other adviser afterward, a trust to be rewarded with mixed blessings. The first advice which Schwarzenberg gave his teen¬ age sovereign, who was in danger to be influenced from many quarters, was rather suggestive. He counseled Francis Joseph never to discuss with his ministers any matter that did not strictly belong to their jurisdiction. This practice would protect the emperor from intrigues, hearsay, and any undue kind of influence. Francis Joseph’s unimaginative personality did 66 For a brief account on Schwarzenberg see Kann, Nationalitdtenproblem, II, 72-75, on Bach, 86-89, on Bruck, 76-80, on Stadion, 63-69, on Thun, I, 159-162; II, 70-72. See further, Rudolf Kissling and Adolf Schwarzenberg Prince Felix zu Schwarzenberg (New York, 1946); Richard Charmatz, Minister Freiherr von Bruc\ (Leipzig, 1916); Christoph Thienen-Adlerflycht, Graf Leo Thun im Vormdrz (Graz-Cologne, 1957); on Stadion see also note 67. 67Friedjung, Osterreich von 1848-1860, I, 92-118.

j/o

History of the Hahshurg Empire

not take this advice with a grain of salt but literally. Throughout his long reign he protected himself not only from undue and malicious underhand influences but also from any counsels by men whose vision and knowl¬ edge transcended the powers entrusted to them by their office. Sincere, dedicated, and always conscious of his duties, but lacking ideas of his own and unwilling to accept nonprofessional advice by others, sure of his values, but vacillating in his course of action, Francis Joseph’s talents and achievements were never more than mediocre. This was perhaps more than could be said for the emperor’s grandfather. On the other hand, un¬ like Francis, luck was never on his side. The one redeeming value of Francis Joseph’s reign, a value which became ever more clear in his old age, was the impact of the combination of a colorless personality with great merits of industry, sense of duty, and integrity. This synthesis served better as a unifying symbol of imperial rule than the greater talents of a more colorful man could ever have. Schwarzenberg showed his hand ever more clearly and brutally. His in¬ transigent and imperialist stand on the German question, which repre¬ sented in essence the compromise between a grossdeutsch and a Great Austrian solution, either one under Austrian-centralistic and conservative leadership, has been discussed in the previous section as far as it pertained to Germany. Concerning the domestic situation, Schwarzenberg sprung a surprise on the Reichstag of Kremsier and, indeed, anybody concerned with Austrian constitutional government. On March 4, 1849, the inexpe¬ rienced young emperor sanctioned on his advice a new constitution drafted by Stadion and decreed (octroyed) on March 7. The same day the Reichstag was dissolved, and a number of deputies who had not taken care of their personal safety in time were arrested and imprisoned under various pre¬ texts. None of the excuses could camouflage the flagrant violation of con¬ stitutional rights. Francis Joseph who lent his name unwittingly to this ac¬ tion by Schwarzenberg, could not be expected to see through Machiavel¬ lian tactics whose long-range effects, apart from the moral implications, proved to be unfortunate for the future of the empire. In any case Francis Joseph appeared in a dubious light. His eminent, though arch-conservative teachers Metternich and Rauscher

(the later cardinal-archbishop of

Vienna), undoubtedly would never have exposed his prestige the way the cynical Schwarzenberg did. The arrests put also an undeserved black mark beside the name of Stadion, who, when he drafted the so-called March constitution, believed that it would eventually become the law of the land; it did not. On the other hand neither he nor the emperor could have any doubt about Schwarzenberg’s intentions to delay its operation for

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

3/1

some time, when the octroyed constitution—frequently referred to as the Stadion constitution—received imperial sanction. Before we survey this document, it is necessary to discuss the basic fea¬ tures of the draft of the Kremsier constitution by outstanding members of the freely elected parliament of the Austrian peoples. This draft was unanimously approved by the constitutional committee of the Reichstag. It would without doubt within days have been accepted as the constitution of the Habsburg empire had Schwarzenberg not dissolved the Reichstag. In fact it was dissolved at this time to deprive the document of the supreme authority to be conveyed by the sanction of an overwhelming majority of the representatives of the Austrian peoples. The deficiency of this charter of liberties, the noblest in Austrian history, represented also an act of wis¬ dom on the part of the Reichstag. It refused to draw up constitutional pro¬ visions for Hungary, while the war of independence raged across the Leitha river. The justified conclusion of the deputies was that settlement of this conflagration by compromise would also make a constitutional com¬ promise with Hungary possible. It could be incorporated then into the Kremsier constitution. If on the other hand radical Kossuthism should win, Hungary would be separated permanently from the empire or if—a more likely contingency—Schwarzenberg and Windischgratz should crush the Magyar revolution by force of arms, it would be precipitate to draw up constitutional provisions in advance for the national groups in Hungary. Chief credit for the Kremsier draft belongs to two committees, the gen¬ eral on the constitutional chart and the specific on civil rights. Conspicu¬ ously distinguished were the contributions of the Czech enlightened con¬ servatives Palacky and Rieger, the Czech liberal Pinkas, the Polish liberals Smolka (later the speaker of the Reichstag), the German liberals Fischhof, Lbhner, and Schuselka, the German moderates Cajetan Mayer, Brestel, Lasser, the German conservative Helfert, the Slovene Kavcic, the Italian Gobbi, and others. The final draft represented a compromise between cen¬ tralism as proposed by most of the Germans and federalism (either along ethnic or historic-traditional lines) as favored by most of the Slavic repre¬ sentatives. Some capable deputies represented originally the ethnic position (Kavcic, Palacky, Fischhof), moved then to the historic traditional one (Rieger, Pinkas), and agreed finally on a semi-centralistic compromise (Mayer, Brestel, Hein, and eventually Palacky). This was the outcome: A bicameral legislation was to be elected by a relatively liberal, though not yet general male franchise. The upper chamber should represent the crownlands, whose boundaries were to be left unchanged. An ingenious compromise between federalism and centralism provided that the na-

j/2

History of the Hahshurg Empire

tionally mixed crownlands should be subdivided into homogeneous dis¬ tricts, whose representatives were added to the crownland delegations in the upper chamber. Thus the traditional political entities were preserved and yet a national organization on the lower administrative level was pro¬ vided. It was to serve the interest of the national minorities in the multi¬ national crownlands. Courts of national arbitration were to supplement this organization. On the lowest administrative leyel, a far-reaching au¬ tonomy was to be granted to the communities; on the highest level, parlia¬ ment was to decide legislative matters. The crown was to have only a suspensive veto. The Kremsier constitution carried all the positive and negative features of a compromise between federalism and centralism. Some problems, such as those of the scattered minorities, which did not fit into the ter¬ ritorial district organization, were left unsolved. More sophisticated solu¬ tions might have been feasible. Yet the basic achievement of Kremsier was not the legal quality of the constitution, but the fact, that it represented the will of the people. The representatives’ work was not done for eternity and new attempts of solutions would probably have been necessary in the fu¬ ture. In any case, a multilateral agreement once achieved by an Austrian parliament would have represented a powerful constructive precedent for future democratic solutions. This precedent was never established, and the solutions which might have been based on it, did not occur. Reaction had destroyed a great opportunity.68 This defeat for constitutional government is only seemingly obscured by the fact that Stadion’s constitution, though more conservative than the mildly liberal Kremsier draft, was a well-drawn document, in some respects more consistent than the Kremsier charter, since it did not have to be based on a compromise. It therefore could be comprehensive in a territorial sense and could include Hungarian affairs within its scope. This was hardly an asset, however, because Stadion in regard to Hungary had to move in a political vacuum, a dilemma which the Kremsier men had pru¬ dently avoided. The property census of the franchise system in the new constitution was

68 Josef

Redlich, Das osterreichische Staats- und Reichsproblem (Leipzig, 19201926), I, 220-323; Kann, Nationalitdtenproblem, II, 19-45, 310-316; Paula GeistLanyi, Das Nationalitdtenproblem auf dem Reichstag zu Kremsier 1848-1849 (Munich, 1920), pp. 55-203; Peter Burian, Die Ndtionalitaten in Cisleithanien und das Wahlrecht der Mdrzrevolution 1848/49 (Graz-Cologne, 1962), pp. 175-214. See further Anton Springer, ed., Proto\olle des Verfassungsausschusses im osterreichischen Reichstage 1848-1849 (Leipzig, 1885) and Alfred Fischel, ed., Die Rroto\olle des Verfassungsausschusses uber die Grundrechte (Vienna, 1912).

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

3*3

stiffer, the tenure of the legislation longer, the imperial veto absolute. The national district organization was left intact, but the crownland autonomy reduced as was the federal element in the organization of the upper cham¬ ber. Regarding Hungary, the unity of the kingdom was preserved in prin¬ ciple, but balanced by autonomy for Croatia-Slavonia including Fiume and a separate status for Transylvania, which should bring equality to all national groups. Autonomous rights were also to be secured to the Serbs in the Vojvodina. A supplement to the constitution was a communal law, decreed ten days after the octroy of the constitution. It promised com¬ munal autonomy after the Kremsier fashion “the free municipality in the free state” in this case in the unfree one. This was the only part of the March legislation which was enacted, though on a permanent basis not before i860. Altogether constitutional life under the Stadion constitu¬ tion might have been as feasible as under the Kremsier draft, if it had not been “octroyed” from above and if Hungarian agreement rather than en¬ forcement after military defeat could have been secured. But the Hun¬ garian question was not solved. Yet an agreement under the Kremsier constitution would have stood a better chance than under the Stadion octroy. The Stadion constitution did not lack limited democratic features, though the concessions to the nationalities in Hungary were hardly issued for the sake of national justice but as punishment for the Magyars. In any case, Schwarzenberg, though not Stadion himself, considered this constitu¬ tion as a meaningless scrap of paper, at the time it received imperial sanc¬ tion.69 Meanwhile the Magyars by mid-December, 1848, refused to recognize the new emperor as their king, because he was not crowned with the crown of St. Stephen and obviously could not be crowned in Hungary any longer. This defiance against the regime and the crown itself is usually con¬ sidered as the beginning of the decisive phase of the revolution or of the war of independence. Kossuth had worked for this break with Austria from the beginning of the revolution. In early January, 1849, Windischgratz’s army took Budapest while Kossuth with the government moved to the east to Debreczen. Fighting continued with increased fury but with fluctuating success. Windischgratz was an indifferent commander and the Magyar revolutionary generals, above all Gorgey and Klapka skillfully took advantage of this fact. They 69 Friedjung, Osterreich von 1848-1860, pp. 255-291; Redlich, Das osterreichische Staats- und Reichsproblem, I, 323-382; Kann, Nationalitatenproblem, II, 63-69, 320-321. See also Jiri Klabouch, Die Gemeindeselbstverwaltung in Osterreich 18481968 (Vienna, 1968), pp. 36-63.

-$ia

History of the Habshurg Empire

were helped also by the renewed outbreak of hostilities between Austria and Sardinia in March, 1849. On the other hand the Magyar cause was not only in a military but also in a psychological sense hurt by the infighting against the Serbs in the Banat and the Saxons and Roumanians in Transyl¬ vania. Magyar victories in these struggles were dearly paid for by immedi¬ ate consequences of internal discord as well as by the hatred evoked and continued until 1918 by the oppressed national groups. By April, however, the fortunes of war against the Austrian main forces had turned decidely in favor of the Magyars. On April 14 the assembly at Debreczen declared the dynasty of Habsburg-Lorraine deposed. Hungary was proclaimed a republic under Kossuth as governor with semidictatorial powers. The same day the emperor relieved Windischgratz of his command. Again, the action taken by the Hungarian Reichstag at the initiative of Kossuth had become in evitable, because the situation had developed in a way that made compromise impossible. Yet if this was so then it should have been clear to the revolutionary Hungarian government, that mo¬ narchical Europe would not stand idly by and see the Habsburg monarchy fall prey to revolution at a time of booming counterrevolutionary success in France and Germany. Russian intervention, agreed upon in May, 1849, had indeed become inevitable, if the Austrian government could not handle the situation alone. This contingency had now arisen. It does not take hindsight to come to these conclusions and the fact that Kossuth failed to draw them, belies his qualities as statesman.70 A great orator and journalist, a man of brilliant ideas and qualities of charismatic leadership, this fierce patriot lacked the abilities required by a head of state in critical times. If he had had them he would have removed himself from the scene at an earlier time, possibly in the fall of 1848, to give a new leader¬ ship the chance for a compromise. That he failed to do so was the result of the strength and weakness inherent in singleness of purpose—in Kos¬ suth’s case charismatic leadership linked with inability to put himself in his opponents’ position.71 70 The anticipated Russian intervention was before the formal agreement widely demanded and discussed in Austrian conservative circles. Neither could Russian military preparations be kept secret. See Andies, Das Biindnis Habsburg-Romanow, pp. 160-191; Cecil Marcus Knatchbull-Hugessen, The Political Evolution of the Hungarian Nation (London, 1908), II, 80-81, 124-127; Barta in Ervin Pamlenyi, ed., Die Geschichte Ungarns, V, 311-334. 71 See Kosary, A History of Hungary, pp. 219-249; Eugen Csuday, Geschichte der Ungarn, 2nd revised edition (Budapest, 1900), II, 429-467; Knatchbull-Hugessen, The Political Evolution, II, 121-190; Friedjung, Osterreich von 1848 bis i860, I, 201-235; see further Andritsch, ed., Ungarische Geisteswelt, 170-190.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

3/5

The Russian intervention sealed the fate of the Hungarian revolution and in a wider sense that of Hungary. Fighting continued, however, until August, 1849. Discord between the Magyar leaders, particularly Kossuth and Gorgey, accelerated disintegration. On August 13, Gorgey surrendered his army to a Russian general at Vilagos, while Kossuth’s fled to Turkey. Magyar nationalism has always and rightly approved of Kossuth’s action to escape the Austrian gallows, while it has unjustly donounced Gorgey for his justified decision to end useless slaughter. If Gorgey can possibly be criticized, it is just for the fact, that as a nationalist he preferred to surrender to the Russians rather than to what he considered to be the Austrian op¬ pressors. This action hardened Vienna’s resolve to mete out terrible retri¬ bution for the revolution, although it is by no means certain that a more diplomatic action on the part of Gorgey could have avoided it. To the enduring shame of the Schwarzenberg government even the intervention of the tsar for the brave Hungarian commanders was re¬ jected except for Gorgey. He was confined to Klagenfurt, but nine Hun¬ garian high officers were hanged, four others were shot.72 Even the formerly moderate prime minister, Count Batthiany, was shot. The execu¬ tions of the thirteen generals took place by explicit order of Schwarzen¬ berg, but imprisonment of 2,000 officers and civilian patriots was ordered by General Haynau, Austrian commander during the final stages of the campaign in Hungary and later military governor of the prostrate coun¬ try. As noted before, he had recommended himself for this assignment by his actions during the risings in Brescia in summer of 1848, when he had revolutionaries hanged and women flogged. The name “Hyena of Brescia” introduced him to revolutionary Hungary. The action of the Schwarzenberg government and its henchmen stands in contrast to Grant’s generous attitude toward the officers of the South after the surrender at Appomattox in the American Civil War. Schwar¬ zenberg managed to unite English, French, German, and even Russian feelings in common revulsion against him and Haynau, who was publicly insulted during his subsequent “good will” visits to Brussels and Lon¬ don.73 Strangely even modern historiography sometimes extols Haynau as a brilliant statesman. The surrender at Vilagos means the end of the revolution in the Habsburg empire, which had run its course in Germany several weeks 72 The officers who surrendered to the Russians were hung, the others shot. Altogether more than a hundred further executions took place within the next weeks. 73 Andies, Das Bundnis Habsburg-Romanow, pp. 177-183.

316

History of the Hahshurg Empire

before. The events that happened later should properly be considered as part of the neoabsolutistic period. i

What were the permanent positive effects of the revolution? As for the national question they were few. Since the neoabsolutist regime represented a course of enforced German-directed centralism, the Germans were un¬ justly blamed by the other nationalities for the oppressive character of the government, from which the German liberals suffered as much as anybody else. The frustrated hatred of the defeated Magyar people was obvious. As for the Czechs, the revolution had done nothing to meet their consti¬ tutional demands; but the regime did not want to hurt the feelings of the powerful Bohemian aristocracy, hence moderate concessions were made to Czech national rights, particularly in education under the guid¬ ance of the able new minister of instruction, Count Leo Thun. The out¬ come of the revolution had given an opening to the moderate and con¬ servative Czech nationalists, later organized in the Old Czech party. The Poles were not worse off than before, since they realized that cooperation with the Austrian government was preferable to isolated revolutionary action before the day of resurrection of Poland had struck. Its coming would depend on a change of world not just Austrian politics. This line of thought suited the Polish conservatives, who were closest to power. Few promises of the Austrian government to the Croats were kept, and a Croatian allegedly said to a Magyar: We received as reward what you got as punishment. The position of Croatian conservatism had been strengthened for a time, that of Southern Slav unionism, seen at short range, had weakened. Modest beneficiaries of the revolution were the Serbs, whose autonomy in the Vojvodina beyond the religious sphere, jointly with that of Roumanian and German minorities, was recognized for a time. Yet the governmental purpose was not to help the Serbs for their own sake but to hurt the Magyars. The autonomy of the Vojvodina was rescinded after i860 when the negotiations with the Magyars got under way. Slovaks and Slovenes had to return to the status quo ante revolution, but an imperial patent of 1850 promised the Ruthenians in Galicia equality with the Poles. Some improvement on the administra¬ tive level took place and the same held true for the Carpatho-Ruthenian comitats in northern Hungary. But the concessions to the Hungarian Ruthenians fell victim to the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867 and those to the Ruthenians in Galicia to the limited administrative autonomy granted to the crownland in 1868—and that meant a Polish-dominated Galicia. The Roumanians obtained actually nothing; the desired direct subordination of Transylvania under the imperial administration in

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

317

Vienna now meant in effect subordination under the absolutist regime— not with equal rights but with an equal lack of rights with other Transyl¬ vanian groups. In 1863 the Roumanians were officially recognized as fourth Translyvanian national group of equal standing, but the Compromise with Hungary and the reincorporation of the country under Magyar rule soon ended this transitory success. Less than a decade after 1867 the last remainders of the three-nation state in Translyvania were elim¬ inated by the Magyar administration. Thus the national achievements of the revolution were extremely meager, and if balanced against the degree of illusions destroyed and re¬ sentment created far more negative than positive. Yet the impetus given to the development of national political life, even through so short a period as the revolutionary one, was not in vain. It left its indelible traces. The political developments after 1867 would have been inconceivable without the vivid memories of 1848. In the social sphere the revolution scored a success with the emancipa¬ tion of the peasants in Austria and the roughly corresponding legislation in Hungary. As noted before, the fact that the neoabsolutist regime was forced to be the executor of the revolutionary agricultural legislation proved how widely these long overdue reforms were supported by public opinion. The revolution, on the other hand, did not leave any legislative traces in industrial organization and labor relations. Still, here too, the fact that industrial labor in Austria had for the first time played an active role was not entirely forgotten. In the constitutional field absolutism after 1848 was even more stringent and for a time more effective than before the revolution. The main residue of the revolutionary era was equality before the law—though more in principle than in practice, and in regard to the Jews for some years not even in principle. Even Stadion’s communal legislation did not become the law of the land until after the termination of the neoabsolutist period. Some rudiments of the Kremsier constitution, especially Article 21 dealing with national rights, were revived in slightly changed form in the Austrian Constitutional Law 142 of December, 1867, in the famous Article 19. Yet it could be said also with the same right that legislation by emergency decree on the part of the crown was passed on by the Stadion constitu¬ tion to the December constitutional laws of 1867.74 The impact of the revolution on Austrian constitutional life after 1866 did not depend on such odds and ends. The political forces of an era, which forge its laws may use the pattern and traditions of a previous 74 Kann, Nationalitatenproblem, II, 137-139.

318

History of the Hahshurg Empire

one, but they do not necessarily need them. The meaning of the revolu¬ tion as a whole is something more important. Political, social, and na¬ tional changes which have once reached a higher stage may be temporarily stopped and even reversed for a time, but they cannot be wiped out from memory. When the opportunity strikes for new dynamic changes, a permanent return to the prerevolutionary situation becomes impossible. At least new changes have to include and advance the revolutionary experi¬ ence of the past. This, for better or worse, is the significance of the Aus¬ trian revolution of 1848-1849.

D.

Neoabsolutism

Neoabsolutism began in Austria with the dissolution of the Reichstag of Kremsier in the early March days of 1849, in Hungary with the capitulation of Vilagos in August of the same year.76 The termination of the era is usually associated with the convocation of the enlarged Reichsrat in July, i860. It did not represent as yet the return to constitu¬ tional government, but at least the realization that some, however halting steps in that direction were necessary. The complete failure of the regime in international relations,

which became increasingly

obvious

after

Schwarzenberg’s death on April 5, 1852, but could hardly have been pre¬ vented by him in the long run, has been discussed. In domestic affairs the verdict is not quite so negative. The evaluation heard at the time, that the administration was run by a standing army of soldiers, a kneeling one of those praying in church to be acceptable to the government, and a crawl¬ ing one of informers, seems unduly harsh. Yet this bitter joke illustrates the gross unpopularity of the regime, which was not modified by the fact that Schwarzenberg’s successor in fact though not in name, Alexander Bach, was as administrator superior to Schwarzenberg. At the same time, because of his brief revolutionary past, he was generally rated an oppor¬ tunist and turncoat and was hated more than Schwarzenberg. An aristo¬ crat could be forgiven his conservative views and even his cruel actions to a point, as long as he was favored by political success. It was different with a commoner of liberal antecedents, even though Schwarzenberg’s reckless daring, ruthlessness, and cavalier lack of concern regarding the consequences of his actions, were more responsible for the bankruptcy of the regime than Bach’s opportunism. Opportunism is generally rated a 75 The last Magyar resistance, however, ended only with the surrender of the garrison of the fortress of Komorn under the command of General Klapka on September 27, 1849.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

319

more contemptible quality than recklessness and some believe it is even more reprehensible than cruelty. The notion that Bach may have changed his views out of conviction was dismissed by public opinion because his conversion to conservatism was of great benefit to his career. But in any case, Schwarzenberg was dead and Bach alive and thus it is clear that irre¬ spective of his merits as administrator and promoter of economic reforms he became the chief target of criticism and hatred. As for the over-all evaluation of the period, a philosophy restored after a revolution, however brief, is different from the prerevolutionary order. Progress and setbacks will have to be considered not just in comparison with the achievements and setbacks of the old regime. In this respect neoabsolutism came out quite well, but in comparison with the revolution the situation appeared different, though not necessarily all bad. The most influential personalities of the period, apart from Bach and Schwarzenberg, were in the emperor’s entourage: his mother, the domi¬ neering archduchess Sophie, and his older cousin, the conservative archduke Albrecht, since i860 governor of Hungary. The incapable and scheming chief aide de camp of the emperor, Count Ludwig Griinne, who sat with the cabinet, carried weight in military affairs. The minister of police, the widely feared Baron Johann Kempen-Fichtenstamm, had much authority. Francis Joseph’s former teacher and ecclesiastic adviser, Joseph Othmar von Rauscher, became archbishop of Vienna in 1853, cardinal in 1855. This priest of the strictest observance understood well how to extend the in¬ fluence of the Church even beyond the powerful position it had regained under Emperor Francis.76 Of the cabinet members, Schmerling, though increasingly conservative himself, became disappointed with the reac¬ tionary course and resigned as minister of justice in 1851. Thun, who joined the cabinet in 1849, stayed throughout the whole period until i860.77 Bruck was minister of commerce until 1851 and minister of fi¬ nance from 1855 to i860, when he committed suicide because he was unjustly suspected of malfeasance in office.78 These three men were un¬ doubtedly the ablest of Schwarzenberg’s and Bach’s collaborators. After Schwarzenberg’s death Bach became leading minister but was never appointed prime minister. This may have been due in part to Francis Joseph’s loyalty to Schwarzenberg’s memory and in part to the personality of Bach, to whose past the emperor never became quite re¬ conciled. 76 See Friedjung, Osterreich von 1848-1860, II, 473-480. 77 Ibid, II, 48(^503. 78 Charmatz, Bruc\, pp. 109-153.

32o

History of the Habsburg Empire

A word about the emperor’s family might at this point be in order. His relationship to his more liberal and more gifted brother Maximilian, the future emperor of Mexico, was always strained. Maximilian’s position as commander of the Austrian navy did not satisfy him and his subsequent assignment as governor general of the Lombardo-Venetian kingdom from 1857 to 1859 did not please the emperor, who considered his brother too liberal. In 1854, the rather lonely Francis Joseph married his first cousin Elizabeth of Bavaria, from a dynasty many times related to the Habsburgs by marriage. The beautiful and romantic empress, a fascinating and unorthodox personality, was not interested in politics, but was to play a notable part in the reconciliation with Hungary. The Schwarzenberg-Bach administrations, but particularly the latter, established the pattern of the over-all political organization of the Habs¬ burg empire. The administration of the crownlands was in the hands of the provincial governors, who received their instructions from the minister of interior. The Kreis (county) organization of the by now faint mem¬ ories of Kremsier and of Stadion’s March constitution was for a time preserved in a limited sense, though later restricted to the judicial sphere. As for Hungary, Croatia-Slavonia with Fiume, Translyvania (includ¬ ing a part of the southeastern Military Frontiers), the Vojvodina, and the Banat of Temesvar, were administratively separated from the country. The remaining trunk was divided into five districts under the over-all direction of the governor general in Budapest. The judicial organization corresponded by and large to that in effiect until 1918. Several modifications, however, are necessary. The revolu¬ tionary achievement of jury trials was abolished at the end of 1851 and with this went, consistently from the standpoint of the regime, the publicity of trials altogether. Furthermore the separation of justice and administration was eliminated on the lowest level of district office and magistrate courts. Patrimonial jurisdiction was not compatible with a system of not feudal but bureaucratic centralistic absolutism, which gov¬ erned now the Habsburg lands. Yet this achievement of Josephinism did not mean protection for the rights of the individual under now existing conditions. An infamous aspect of the merger of administration and justice on the lowest level was the introduction of corporal punishment by police authority in the Austrian lands in 1854. This was not only a method to enforce obedience but also a device to coordinate Austrian bureaucracy with traditional Hungarian feudal institutions. The pseudolegal foundation of measures of this kind was the Sylvester Patent (New Year’s Eve) of 1851, which formally invalidated the never-enacted March

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

321

constitution of Stadion. Absolutism had now become official. Even though the issuance of the Patent implied a flagrant breach of an imperial assur¬ ance of constitutional government, it was perhaps preferable to the hypo¬ critical references to a paper constitution. The only part of the Stadion legislation in terms of constitutional government that had been enacted, the communal autonomy, was voided. It was revised only in the constitu¬ tional era. An improved organization of the register of real estate and a revision of the Code of Criminal Law of 1803, introduced in 1852, represented technical improvements. The enactment of a code of craft guild regula¬ tions with some protection of the workers followed the fall of Bach by four months. Yet his administration undoubtedlvj deserves the credit for its partly successful attempt to organize the conflicting Austrian policies in this respect. The problem was not entirely solved until 1973. The true spirit of the regime was embodied in the reorganization of church-state relations, which represented an expansion of the Franciscan distortion of Josephinism, the operation of the Church as powerful arm of the state. Substantially as a result of the Concordat of 1855 the Church assumed also functions of its own, which went beyond those under her control after the reigns of Leopold I and his sons. All this was largely Rauscher’s work. Bach cooperated with him primarily because a politi¬ cal system so flagrantly out of step with the spirit of the times needed at least one strong ideological ally; this ally by a process of elimination could only be the Church. The jurisdiction of the bishops was considerably extended by legislation of 1850. Their control of the clergy including canonical trials became now almost unlimited, and their administration of the seminaries was no longer under state control. Elimination of pre¬ vious restrictions in regard to liturgical questions and ecclesiastic com¬ munications with Rome was, however, legitimate. Otherwise the spirit of intolerance paralyzed intellectual life. New restrictions were placed on the civic status of the Jews in regard to the acquisition of landed property. This was the bill presented by the state to the Jews for their allegedly inordinate participation in the revolutionary activities. The legal status of the Protestants was not directly affected, but the ban on employment of non-Catholics as teachers in Catholic schools hurt them more than the Jews. The Concordat of 1855, primarily Rauscher’s work, went beyond the previous concessions to the Church. The Catholic Church as administra¬ tor of the state religion now secured autonomy to a degree no longer compatible with even the most flexible interpretation of Josephinism. The

j22

History of the Hahsburg Empire

Church did not only strengthen her position in previously contested areas o£ relations to the state, but gained control of additional areas. Marriage legislation for Catholics, which meant anybody baptized as Catholic ir¬ respective of later changes in denominational status, had always been based on the principles of Canon law. Now something new was added. Jurisdiction in matrimonial questions was transferred from secular to ecclesiastic courts. The papacy regained also a barely restricted right to establish new bishoprics and parishes, which helped to enforce the ex¬ panded clerical jurisdiction. Above all, the new ecclesiastic rights per¬ tained to education. The Church was now not only in control of religious instruction but was empowered to see to it, that teaching in any secular discipline (languages, history, science), must not be in conflict with the tenets of religious instruction. The Church also assumed the right of cen¬ sorship of literature potentially dangerous to youth and the faithful alto¬ gether. Austria was thus thrown back into the era of the Counter Refor¬ mation in its most intransigent form. The difference was, however, that the religious policies of the Counter Reformation, though divisive in char¬ acter, had powerful, possibly majority support of the population. The new policy was backed largely by police informers—to the detriment of the state and the truly faithful, that is, in the last analysis to the Church herself.79 It is remarkable that this spirit of intolerance did not hurt higher edu¬ cation as seriously as might have been expected. In fact, important re¬ forms were put through in this era. Chief credit was due to the outstanding personality of the minister of education Count Leo Thun and his able collaborators Hermann Bonitz and Franz Exner. Thun, though a rigid conservative, managed to steer an independent course. Thus he succeeded not only in preserving previous modest standards but in improving them in several respects. He must be credited with the basic reorganization of higher secondary education, the curriculum of the Austrian classical Gymnasium

and the new Realschule (higher secondary school with

emphasis on modern languages, mathematics, and sciences).80 Thun managed also—under existing prejudices a notable achievement—to pro-

79 Erika

Weinzierl-Fischer, Die osterreichischen Kon\ordate von 1855 und ig33 (Vienna, i960), pp. 26-81; Winter, Revolution, Neoabsolutismus und Liberalismus, pp. 86'-ior. 80 Gymnasiums and Realschulen, though most of them public schools, offered instruction only to those who had passed an entrance examination. They also charged tuition. Only graduates of these schools were admitted to universities. The tuition-free general secondary schools (Burgerschulen), who admitted all graduates of grade schools, did not offer this privilege.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

323

tect academic freedom in die universities to some extent and to appoint also some objective scholars of high reputation. Neither the university organization nor particularly that of the gymnasiums—fine schools, but with an overemphasis on the cultivation of classical languages—have fully stood the test of time. In some respect they have stood it too well since what appeared progressive in Thun’s times would have required con¬ siderable adjustments in the following decades. These revisions were not forthcoming. His reforms were primarily focused on higher and inter¬ mediate higher education, not on general compulsory instruction, but this emphasis could be understood as counterweight against prevailing in¬ tolerance on the higher cultural level. By administrative actions and informally Thun also secured the right of various nationalities to have at least elementary instruction taught in the language of the majority of the population of individual communities.81 Improved were also the military regulations including the service obli¬ gations. The ancient institution of the Court War Council had to yield finally to the Ministry of War which in turn was merged with the High Command of the Army. The general service obligation of the citizenry was further extended and the method of selection for actual induction— from now on by lot—was made more equitable than before. The service obligation itself, harsh as it continued to be, was limited to eight years with two additional years in the army reserve. In equipment, moderniza¬ tion of training (especially of staff officers), emphasis on the outmoded cavalry rather than infantry, the army had fallen back behind those of other powers. These deficencies played an important role in the outcome of the wars of 1859 and 1866; the Austrian main armies in both wars were led by generals not fully up to the requirements of their task. Whether the results of both campaigns were not also due to the unpopularity or political weakness of the Austrian position is difficult to determine. The regime did relatively best in the socioeconomic field; here ab¬ solutism had possibilities of imposing its will rather than balancing oppos¬ ing interests, which a less autocratic regime would have lacked. Obviously this must not be understood as defense of a system, whose outlook never transcended beyond the barriers of narrow class interests. 81 Hans Lentze, Die Universitatsreform des Ministers Graf Leo Thun-Hohenstein (Vienna, 1962), pp. 28-294 passim; Richard Meister, Entwic\lung und Reform des osterreichischen Schulwesens (Vienna, 1963), I, 77-255 passim. On Thun’s back¬ ground see Christoph Thienen-Adlerflycht, Graf Leo Thun im Vormdrz (GrazVienna-Cologne, 1967). See also Robert A. Kann, “Hochschule und Politik im osterreichischen Verfassungsstaat” in E. Botz, H. Hautmann, H. Konrad eds., Festschrift fur Karl Stadler (Wien, 1974), pp. 507 ff.

324

History of the Habsburg Empire

Frequently die regime is credited with the exemplary manner in which the emancipation of the peasants was enacted. This is true with qualifi¬ cations. The Austrian as well as the Hungarian emancipatory peasant legislation had provided that indemnities be paid to the previous owners of the land. But only the Hungarian legislation stated that the govern¬ ment should pay for it and the Bach administration did not accept this position in full. It burdened the peasant with one-third of the indemnities to be paid for the abolishment of personal services, payments in kind servi¬ tudes, tithes, etc. One-third was to be paid by the government (in Austria the crownland administrations) and one-third, indirectly, by the former owners of the land. The indemnities to the lords were to be rendered in twenty annual installments with 5 percent interest. This settlement did not correspond to the more liberal intentions of the emancipatory legisla¬ tion of the Reichstag in September of 1848. On the other hand, the Bach administration acted at least with efficiency and deliberate speed. Unlike the peasants in Prussia and Russia the peasants in Austria did not have to pay for their obligation with parts of their meager landholdings. By the mid-i850’s the complex legislation had been enacted with efficiency.82 In 1850-1851

the Austro-Hungarian interstate customs lines were

abolished and the Habsburg monarchy for the first time, became a uni¬ fied customs territory. Credit for this was due largely to the minister of commerce von Bruck, who actually had farther-reaching designs. He promoted the idea of a great Austro-German and possibly also Italian customs union, an association that Schwarzenberg had desired in political terms. Reality fell short off these plans, but tariffs between Austria and the member states of the German customs union could be reduced and a favorable customs treaty with Prussia was concluded in 1853.83 For the first time Austria could deviate from her narrow protective tariff policy because after 1848 some beneficial effects of the industrial revolution had penetrated at least the western part of the monarchy. Austrian metallurgi¬ cal and textile industries, to mention only two main industries, had be82 Friedjung, Osterreich von 1848-1860, I, 333-367; Tremel, Wirtschafts- und Sozialgeschichte Osterreichs, pp. 321-324; Christoph Stolzl, Die Ara Bach in Bohmen (Munich, 1972), passim; Friedrich Walter, “Kaiser Franz Josephs Ungarnpolitik in der Zeit seines Neoabsolutismus,” in Theodor Mayer, ed., Der osterreichisch-ungarische Ausgleich von i86j (Munich, 1968), pp. 125-135. 83 Charmatz, Bruc\, pp. 107-124; Droz, L’Europe Centrale, pp. 92-99; Fink, Die osterreichisch-ungarische Monarchic als Wirtschaftsgemeinschaft, pp. 19-25; Herbert Matis, “Leitlinien der osterreichischen Wirtschaftspolitik” in A. Wandruszka and P. Urbanitsch eds.. Die Habsburgermonarchie, I., pp. 29-67, and ibid. Eduard Marz and Karl Socher, “Wahrung und Banken in Cisleithanien”, pp. 323-

337

*

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

325

come competitive on the European markets, and the same was true for various manufactured luxury goods. The protectionist policy deemed vital to Maria Theresa, Joseph II, and Francis was no longer necessary in the same sense, if it ever was before. Communications had also been im¬ proved. Much admired was the Semmering railway route opened in 1854, the first main railway in Europe that passed through mountainous territory. Hardly practical in its design as seen from the viewpoint of an observer today, this route with its beautiful views was a symbol of newly won Austrian engineering skill. Unified and improved was also the taxation system. A general land tax, a rent tax on urban premises, and, a true first, a general income tax were initiated. Indirect taxes were reduced. The regulation of the tax system was followed by that of the currency. In 1858 a unified silver currency, the guilder (florin) containing sixty Kreutzers, was introduced.84 Most economic reforms meant greater efficiency rather than social concern focused on economic inequality. In the relationship between management and industrial labor, difficulties were in fact on the increase. The industrial sector moved more into the foreground of Austrian eco¬ nomic problems, and a still poorly industrialized country was ill-equipped to deal with the expanding problem of management-labor-relations and working conditions. Besides, Austrian economic progress was considerable only if compared with the situation of the pre-March era. In relation to western Europe and Germany it was very modest. Nevertheless, cen¬ tralized bureaucratic absolutism, despite its class character, in an economic sense had proved superior to the semifeudal system of the prerevolu¬ tionary era. At the same time this absolutism acted more recklessly in foreign affairs. We discussed the way in which it fell into the trap of accepting a studied Piedmontese provocation in the spring of 1859. The war proved to be the system’s undoing. Actually Bach could not be blamed at all for the poor military leadership, and only to a limited degree for the inadequacy of military preparations. Yet in a wider sense the unpopularity of Austrian absolutism throughout Europe was largely responsible for the defeat. In August, 1859, Bach was dimissed and Griinne and Kempen, the most hated symbols of the oppressive regime, followed him into re¬ tirement. Neither Count Johann Rechberg, the new chairman of the 84Friedjung, Osterreich von 1848-1860, I, 292-322; Heinrich Benedikt, Die wirtschajtliche Entwic\lung in der Franz Joseph Zeit (Vienna, 1958), pp. 11-55; Eduard Marz, Osterreichische Industrie und Ban\enpoliti\ in der Zeit Franz Joseph /. (Vienna, 1965), pp. 48-94.

j26

History of the Hahshurg Empire

ministerial council and successor of Buol as minister of foreign affairs, nor Bach’s direct replacement as minister of the interior, the Polish count Agenor Goluchowski, the experienced governor of Galicia, had the same influence that Bach had held for almost a decade. On March 5, i860, the emperor announced that the Reichsrat, an ad¬ visory council of six Austrian and two Hungarian dignitaries, established in 1851, should be considerably enlarged. New members should be arch¬ dukes, high secular and ecclesiastic office holders. Large landed property was strongly represented by these men. They were to hold lifetime ap¬ pointments. There was also to be a second group of thirty-eight members, the representatives of the lands, most of whom also represented large landed property, appointed for six-year terms and selected by the emperor from a list of candidates submitted by the estates diets. They included six Magyars, two Croats, and two Serbs. The whole body was to serve in an advisory capacity, primarily in regard to financial agenda, but it should also deliberate—at the emperor’s pleasure—on further and possibly more far-reaching constitutional changes. This and the as yet merely academic resolve to restore the administrative unity of Hungary and the appoint¬ ment of some Magyar and Slavic advisers were mere straws in the wind. The enlarged Reichsrat presided by the fairly liberal Archduke Rainer was in fact a mere mockery of a constitutional body. And yet its convoca¬ tion made it clear that absolutism had come to the end of the road and was forced to adjust to the ever more clearly perceptible underground rumblings pressing for change. To be sure, in terms of the regime’s interests it should be as small as possible. On the basis of the experience of 1848 it became soon clear that such change could not be held within the confines of a modified absolutism. The events of 1859-1860 did not establish a constitutional system, yet they made the bankruptcy of the existing regime obvious. A system committed to the principle of equality before the law for everybody had proved that it stood for inequality— though not equal inequality—for the overwhelming majority of the peoples of the Habsburg empire. E.

Transition to constitutional government

(1860-1867)

The enlarged Reichsrat in session from May to September, i860, proved to the government that the token moves in to the direction of constitu¬ tional government had not met liberal expectations; even moderate con¬ servatives were disappointed. Archduke Rainer, the president of the enlarged Reichsrat, supported limited liberal reforms within a centralistic system, and the emperor’s former teacher, Cardinal Rauscher, just backed centralism without any liberal trimmings. Yet centralistic absolutism and

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

327

liberalism had that much in common that they both worked for institu¬ tions pertinent to the empire as a whole. The tide was running now in favor of constitutional government and hence centralistic tendencies favored moderately liberal government, irrespective of the government’s reluctance. The more strongly entrenched conservative supporters of historic-tradidonal federalism, on the other hand, requested wider autonomy for the historic political entities or, more correctly, for the aristocratic leadership within these entities. The principal spokesman for these views in the cabinet was the Polish minister of interior, Count Goluchowski; the leading minister, Count Rechberg, exercised little influence beyond the sphere of foreign affairs. Since the feudal conservatives could still mute the voices of Czech and Magyar liberalism—though with declining effi¬ ciency—the resulting constitutional compromise, the octroyed constitution of October 20, i860 (commonly referred to as October Diploma), leaned heavily in the direction of conservative federalism. The October Diploma conceded to the Reichsrat, basically still the sham body of March of the same year, participation in legislation as enumerated in the charter. Such participation pertained to economic and financial matters and, apart from the required consent to taxation, only in an advisory capacity. Moreover, legislation had to be shared with diets in which the influence of the usually aristocratic owners of large estates, bishops, and chambers of trade and commerce in the urban sphere were meant to be predominant. The hundred members of the Reichsrat were largely dietal representatives who represented primarily the social groups referred to above. Illustrative is the Styrian diet, one example of several: It consisted of two bishops, four other clerics, twelve big estates owners, ten town representatives, two representatives of chambers of trade and com¬ merce, and twelve of rural communities.85 This was not all. The crown, which had the prerogative to appoint the members of the Reichsrat, re¬ served for itself the right to screen the dietal nominations before selection. Significant in this strange kind of constitution was also the built-in plan for a smaller assembly—the narrower Reichsrat—for the aflfairs of the western part of the empire. This arrangement pointed indeed toward a new approach to the Hungarian problem.

|

In Hungary opposition against the absolutist regime and the suppression of the historic rights of the divided country united Magyars more than the centralists and federalists in Austria. Moderate conservative aristo

85 See

on the composition of the diets Richard Charmatz, Osterreichs innerlj? Geschichte von 1848-igoy, 2 vols. (Leipzig, 1911), second edition II, 46 ff.; Kann, N ationalitatenproblem, II, iio-m.

History of the Habsburg Empire crats like counts Anton Szecsen, Emil Dessewffy, and Paul Somssich, with whom the crown hoped to cooperate, could not bring about recon¬ ciliation. The following of Francis Deak, the only statesman of the generation of 1848, increased. Without compromising himself he had not fallen entirely from the graces of the government. Major concessions seemed to be in order. The hated archduke Albrecht was recalled from Buda as governor general and replaced by the Magyar General Benedek, equally faithful to the crown as the archduke, but not tainted with the oppressive measures of military occupation. The separate HungarianTransylvanian court chancery was to be restored and a supreme court for Hungary was to be reestablished together with the old pre-1848 comitat constitution. Above all the Reichstag was to be reconvened on the basis of a membership equal before the law. This over-all principle of civil equality, as it existed now at least in theory in the Austrian statute books, was (together with the emancipation of the peasants) the main, though still largely academic, achievement of the revolution. It could no longer be fully ignored in Hungary either. Magyar conservatives were displeased and liberals dissatisfied. Still these were important promises for the future. In Austria one could not even speak of promises at that time, save for the enforcement of Stadion’s communal legislation, which led to elections on the communal level in November i860. The feudal federalist spirit of the October Diploma was as backward as the centralistic spirit of the Bach regime and less efficient. With the still existing censorship, opposi¬ tion could be expressed only by passive rejection. Goluchowski’s schemes had failed and in December, i860, he was replaced by Schmerling, whose prominent position at St. Paul’s Assembly in 1848 was gratefully remem¬ bered by the liberals; the conservative centralists respected him as an only moderately liberal member in the Schwarzenberg cabinet. He had the reputation as man of integrity, able bureaucrat, and strongly profiled representative of the concept of German-directed, though not Germannational, centralism. On February 4 the emperor appointed his cousin, Archduke Rainer, prime minister. Whereas Schmerling was to be spokes¬ man and chief executive officer of the government, the association with an imperial prince meant that the crown hoped to reap popularity from this unusual combination never to be repeated in imperial Austrian history.86 n.

86 Redlich, Das osterreichische Staats- und Reich sproblem, I, 460-671; Josef Ulbrich, Das osterreichische Staatsrecht (Tubingen, 1909), pp. 46-49; Henry Marczali, Ungarische Verfassungsgeschichte (Tubingen, 1910), pp. 155-157; Kann, N ationalitatenproblem, II, 107-114, 323-331.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

329

Schmerling is generally credited with the draft of the February Patent promulgated on February 26, 1861, which was meant to supplement the October Diploma but actually changed it fundamentally. The real in¬ tellectual father of the Patent, however, was a relatively minor govern¬ ment official, Hans von Perthaler, an even more pronounced conservative and traditionalist than his chief Schmerling. The new constitution established a bicameral system. The Reichsrat was to be divided into a House of Lords, consisting of two groups, heredi¬ tary aristocratic members and members with life-time tenure, to be appointed by the crown. Some of the latter were to be high ecclesiastic and secular dignitaries who would serve ex officio. Most life-time mem¬ bers were to be personalities of particular distinction in politics and various cultural activities—as the crown judged these distinctions. The House of Representatives was to consist of about 300 members, elected by the estates diets of the individual crownlands. That meant that they were to represent still the old curias of great landowners, urban and rural communities, and chambers of trade and commerce. Actually the interests of commerce and industry, that is, of the urban middle and upper middle classes were to be somewhat better represented than in the October Diploma. Governmental gerrymandering favored the great landowners and the Germans—in line with Schmerling’s and Perthaler’s political philosophy. To bring these desired objectives about, the franchise was narrowly restricted by property qualifications. Individual votes in some districts weighed five times as much as in others. The Patent recognized originally neither the principle of ministerial responsibility nor parliamentary

immunity.

An

emergency

paragraph

empowered

the

government to issue laws while the parliament was not in session, without any requirement for subsequent approval. Yet this parliament, unlike the chamber of the October Diploma, had at least the power of legislative initiative and the right to pass the annual budget. It was significant that a merely academic plenum should deal with the affairs of the empire as a whole, while a narrower and more workable Reichsrat would be concerned with those exclusive of Hungary, Croatia, Transylvania, and Venetia. This arrangement pointed in the direction of the future dualistic compromise, the permanent and final constitutional frame of the empire. The February Patent was a poor representative constitution in which, to quote Orwell, everybody was equal but some more equal than others, but unlike the October Diploma it was a representative constitution of sorts nevertheless. Elections took actually place and the Reichsrat con¬ vened in May, 1861, in Vienna, though it was boycotted by Magyars,

jjo

History of the Hahshurg Empire

Croatians, and Italians from the start and opposed generally as too centralistic and partly as too liberal by Czechs, Poles, Serbs, and Slovenes. With few exceptions, these Slavic members of parliament were conserva¬ tives who for national and social reasons were opposed to the traditional centralism of the German liberals. This discrepancy in German and Slavic political ideologies represented partly also differences in degrees of ur¬ banization, partly it was due to manipulations of conflicting interests by the government, which worked more smoothly in rural than in urban districts. It favored centralism but was unwilling to buy its frequent corollary, liberalism. The still unsettled problem of Hungary’s constitu¬ tional status prevented adequate operation of the new system in any case.87 The Hungarian parliament, not yet on equal footing with the Reichsrat in Vienna, convened in Pest, in April, 1861. Deak demanded recognition of the Hungarian constitution of April, 1848. As will be remembered, provisions in this document for a separate Hungarian budget, and the use of Hungarian forces only with the approval of the Hungarian govern¬ ment and legislature, had never been approved by the administration in Vienna. Yet the crown, apart from these particularly controversial issues, still adhered to the convenient reactionary philosophy that rebellious Magyar Hungary had forfeited its constitution. A new one would have to be based on imperial pleasure and not on historic rights. Consequently the Hungarian diet was dissolved in August, 1861. And while the Croats demanded complete separation from Hungary in a somewhat contro¬ versial law passed by the Sabor in November, 1861, this did not mean as in previous times that they endorsed the imperial policy in Vienna. They were opposed to a government that refused to grant the union of Dalma¬ tia with the triune kingdom.88 Frustrated by the chronic Slavic dissatisfaction, the German liberal 87 Redlich, Das osterreichische Staats- und Reichsproblem, I, 715-814; Ulbrich, Das osterreichische Staatsrecht, pp. 49-52; Kann, Nationalitdtenproblem, II, 123132; Josef A. Tzobl, “Vorgeschichte des osterreichisch-ungarischen Ausgleichs 17131867,” in Peter Berger, ed., Der osterreichisch-ungarische Ausgleich von i86y: Vor¬ geschichte und Wir\ungen (Vienna, 1967), pp. 9-32; Otto Brunner, “Der oster¬ reichisch-ungarische Ausgleich von 1867 und seine geschichtlichen Grundlagen,” in Theodor Mayer, ed., Der osterreichisch-ungarische Ausgleich von i86j (Munich, 1968), pp. 15-24. 88 Marczali, Ungarische Verfassungsgeschichte, pp. 157-162; [Francis Deak] Ded\s Adress-Entwurj und das Staatsrecht Osterreichs (Vienna, 1861), pp. 1-80 passim. Wenzel Lustkandl, Abhandlungen aus dem osterreichischen Staatsrecht ilber das Manifest . . . vom 20. September 1861 und die beiden Adressen des haiserlichen ungarischen Landtages von 1861 (Vienna, 1866); Guldescu in F. H. Eterovich and C. Spalatin, eds., Croatia, II, 40-47; Gustav Steinbach Franz Dea\ (Vienna, 1888), pp. 34-37.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

331

disappointment with the lack of legislative action, and the even more serious Magyar discontent, the cabinet Rainer-Schmerling resigned. In July, 1865, it was replaced by a cabinet under Count Richard Belcredi, who attempted to establish a modified conservative federal system. Such course was acceptable to the Czech and Polish feudals, a handful of Magyar aristocrats represented by Count Moritz Esterhazy in the cabinet, and some German conservatives. But these groups had become increas¬ ingly unrepresentative themselves. Belcredi’s task was bound to end in failure even sooner than that of Schmerling; the accentuation of the crisis in relations with Prussia after 1684 played its part. The highlight of Belcredi’s government was the suspension of the unworkable constitution in September, 1865. This did not mean a pre¬ meditated return to absolutism. In some respects the Belcredi regime was more liberal than that of the nominal German liberal Schmerling, for instance in regard to the operation of censorship. The suppression of the constitution meant primarily that the speedy reconciliation with Hungary —badly required in the face of the threatening war with Prussia—could not be brought about in terms of the February Patent. The crown might have welcomed a long-term perpetuation of the suspension of the consti¬ tution, but that was another question. It was not to be. Francis Joseph as a goodwill gesture had visited Budapest earlier, in the summer of 1865, and had consented to the reincorporation of Transylvania into Hungary. This was a major, and from the point of national justice unfair conces¬ sion, but it opened the way for new negotiations with the Magyar leaders. In December, 1865, the king-emperor reopened the Hungarian diet and now negotiations with a select committee of the diet got seriously under way after validity of the Hungarian constitution of 1848 was recognized by the crown, as far as it could be sanctioned at that time. The theory of forfeiture of constitutional rights as punishment for rebellion was thus finally laid to rest. Deak and Count Gyula Andrassy were to be the chief Hungarian negotiators. However, before the solution of the Austro-Prussian conflict a settlement appeared unlikely. The crown, which believed in victory over Prussia, hoped for a better bargaining position after the end of hostilities, and the Hungarian negotiators, though loyal to the monarchy, expected an improvement of theirs from a reverse outcome of the war. History proved them to be right. The consequences of the war proved several other things as well. The crown could at best hope for a settlement on the terms demanded by Hungary before the outbreak of the war. This meant primarily recogni-

332

History of the Habsburg Empire

tion of a Hungarian state of at least equal constitutional standing with the other Habsburg lands. It had become clear, also, that genuine con¬ stitutional government was now an equally pressing necessity in the western part of the empire. The disastrous defeat by Prussia in 1866 was still linked to the failure of the absolutist Bach regime. Belcredi was not the man to bring the difficult changes about, which required above all an accommodation between Germans and Slavs in Austria, Magyars, Slavs, and Roumanians in Hungary, and Magyars and Germans in an empire¬ wide conflict. He resigned in February, 1867. His concept of an Austrian federation of five historic political entities, a German-Alpine, MagyarHungarian, Bohemian-Moravian, Polish-Ruthenian, and Southern Slav (Belcredi’s so-called pentarchy), was not taken seriously as feasible politi¬ cal objective.89

\~Tik successor was Baron (later Count) Beust, formerly prime minister of Saxony and since October, 1866, minister of foreign affairs. In June, 1867, the title Reichskanzler was conferred on him, which was meant to preserve the appearance rather than the reality of a joint Austro-Hungarian chief executive. The title had become meaningless by agreement on the Austro-Hungarian Compromise in March, 1867. The Compromise, ac¬ cordingly, was passed by the Hungarian parliament and was sanctioned by the emperor as king of Hungary in June of the same year. Chiefly instru¬ mental in the agreement were next to Deak and Beust, Count Andrassy. Appointed Hungarian prime minister in February, 1867, he was destined also to become Beust’s successor as minister of foreign affairs in Novem¬ ber, 1871. Beust himself lacked Andrassy’s appeal. He was appointed minister of foreign affairs on account of Saxony’s loyalty to Austria in 1866 and in the unjustified belief that his somewhat devious shrewdness could match Bismarck’s abilities, in case a still-hoped-for Austro-French alliance could be brought about. As for his more immediate task in the negotiations leading to the Compromise and subsequently the Austrian constitutional settlement, it was hoped that a foreigner would encounter less opposition and a Protestant courtier might possibly be more amenable to the Catholic viewpoint than an enlightened conservative Catholic aristocrat.90 These assumptions were believed in and transmitted to the emperor by the new minister of the interior, Count Taaffe, a confidant of long standing. But they were just too intricate to be workable. What counted more than Beust’s diplomatic skill, even more than the popular appeal

89 Kann, Nationalitatenproblem, II, 132-139, 335-336. 90 Andritsch ed., TJngarische Geisteuswelt, pp. 203-211;

on Deak see Redlich, Das osterreichische Staats- und Reichsproblem, II, 503-508; on Beust ibid., pp. 521-523.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

333

which he lacked, was credibility and sincerity, both absent in the char¬ acter of this complex man. These shortcomings counted more in Hungary than in Austria, where Beust’s support of the Austro-German centralistic position could be taken for granted within the limits of the practically obtainable objectives. In Hungary, however, neither Deak’s integrity, Andrassy’s dexterity, the popularity of both men, nor the good will of the king-emperor Francis Joseph might have sufficed, if it had not been for the mediation of the queen-empress Elizabeth, who struck a chord in the chivalrous hearts of the Magyar gentry. These were the main terms of the Compromise, henceforward the basic constitutional frame of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy up to the time of its dissolution.91 The premise of the Compromise was the association of two independent states of equal rights, which shared a common ruler, as emperor in Austria, as king in Hungary. These dual states—hence the term Dualism used in the Compromise—had also other common features. The Compromise, therefore, represented not merely a personal union but a real union (a Realunion). What in practice amounted to a constitution for the Habsburg empire was strictly speaking a treaty between two in major respects sovereign states—but by no means in all. Nevertheless, in view of the restrictions of the sovereignty of each state, the Compromise was not an international treaty. It was not a federation or confederation either. There was no state above the two member states as in a federation nor were they fully sovereign as in a confederation. Neither were the Austrian and Hungarian versions of the Compromise embedded in the constitutional laws of both states completely alike. In other words, the Compromise represented a political structure sui generis. Not in a strictly legal but in a figurative way it is thus still permissible to speak of a Habsburg empire. Agenda common to both states were foreign affairs, defense, and common finances. Concerning defense, however, the determination of the quota of recruits in each state, operation of general conscription, civil legislation connected with it, and organization of national militias were left to the two states. The language of command in the armed forces was to be German, an issue which, as the Magyars saw it, impaired their status of equality. Common finances were to be considered those that pertained to joint institutions, that is, primarily foreign affairs and 91 The official term Austro-Hungarian monarchy was introduced in 1868, but in later years, when the interpretation and operation of the Compromise moved in¬ creasingly in the direction of Hungarian semiseparatist tendencies, the term AustriaHungary was used. This implied clearly that there was no federal structure above the dual states.

History of the Hahsburg Empire defense matters. These joint expenditures were to be determined by agreement between the parliaments of both states every ten years. Also the determination of the share in common expenditures was left to this settlement every ten years. The quota agreed upon by the dual governments in 1867 required Hungary to pay 30 percent of these costs. Throughout the history of the Compromise it never rose above 36.4 percent, that is, far less than would have been appropriate on the basis of Hungary’s economic resources and potential. Subject to regulation every ten years were some matters administered separately by Austria and Hungary, but according to common principles. These included customs—in practice the continuation of the customs union—currency regulations, and problems of railway communications passing through both states. Whereas the cabinets of each state had to submit legislation and in particular the budget to their respective parlia¬ ments, the three joint ministers, of foreign affairs, defense, and joint finances, had to deal with two executive committees of both parliaments, the so-called Delegations, which met once a year alternately in Vienna and Budapest, but communicated with each other only in writing. The Magyars requested this cumbersome operation to dispell any doubt that no parliament existed above the Hungarian and Austrian legislatures. Finally, the three joint ministers and the Austrian and Hungarian prime ministers under the chairmanship of the minister of foreign affairs, formed the joint ministerial council. This institution gave the two govern¬ ments indirectly a share in the conduct of foreign and other joint affairs. Among the divergencies between the Hungarian and Austrian versions of the Compromise and its interpretation, most important was the fact that the Hungarian was rooted in the Pragmatic Sanction and the assurances that the validity of the Compromise was dependent on consti¬ tutional government in Austria. The former provision pointed to a difference in the question of common succession, which might have arisen if the heir apparent Francis Ferdinand, assassinated in 1914 at Sarajevo, would have succeeded Francis Joseph. In that case his offspring from an unequal marriage would not have been eligible to rule in Austria but would have qualified in Hungary.92 More serious was the issue concern¬ ing the preservation of constitutional government in Austria. It could be easily understood that the Hungarian constitution would have been threatened if absolutism would have been reintroduced in Austria. Yet according to Magyar constitutional interpretation this did not mean just existence of representative constitutional government in Austria but 92 The oath of renunciation for his offspring in both states taken by the arch¬ duke in 1900 was to prevent such contingency.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

333

existence of the specific constitutional laws introduced shortly afterward in December, 1867, in Austria. According to them, Austria, like Hungary, should be a unitary state and not a federal structure, which was to grant all national groups as political entities and not merely as individuals equal rights. Any change in that direction in Austria would impair also the Magyar predominance in Hungary. An imperial manifesto of midOctober, 1918, which promised the conversion of the western part of the empire into a multinational federation, gave the Hungarian parliament the legally and politically equally unjustified pretext to declare the Com¬ promise beyond the further existence of the personal union as terminated. At the stage of the game of pending dissolution of the empire this made little difference, yet it was of great importance that this arbitrary Magyar interpretation of the Compromise was one of the chief reasons, that blocked a comprehensive solution of the national problem in the Habsburg monarchy after 1867, that means possibly still in good time. Another problem was that five national groups, Croatians, Germans, Roumanians, Ruthenians, and Serbs lived in both parts of the dual mon¬ archy and only a sweeping solution introduced for the whole empire could have regulated their national affairs. This, however, was barred by the Compromise.93 There were other weak points. The ten-year com¬ promise within the Compromise tested anew the coherence, indeed, the viability of the monarchy every decade. Usually these periodical agree¬ ments had to be made possible by new Austrian concessions to Hungarian demands for expansion of sovereign rights. Besides Austrian conributions to the common expenditures, roughly almost in a proportion of two to one, were inordinate. In an economic sense it has sometimes been said that the Austro-Hungarian protective customs system for industrial goods served the interests of Austrian industry and big business as did subsequently the protective customs on agricultural products serve the Hungarian aristocratic big landowners. Yet these were merely the indirect consequences of the Austro-Hungarian association rather than the direct results of the Compromise legislation. Hungarian industrialization proceded just the same. Although the necessity of the ten-year compromise created economic and political difficulties, none were critical. They were after all overcome, though not without difficulties,94 the last time in 1917, in the midst of the World War crisis. 93 There were also Italians in Hungarian Fiume, Magyars in the Austrian Bukovina, and Slovaks in Moravia. However, these groups were small. 94 Between 1897 and 1907 it was necessary to resort in specific instances to emergency legislation by decree. This was anchored in the Compromise and the Austrian constitutional law, but not in the Hungarian constitution. See also

336

History of the Habshurg Empire

The Compromise did not terminate German predominance over other nationalities in the western part of the monarchy. It merely yielded in Hungary to a pronounced Magyar overlordship over the non-Magyar national groups, which could not be shaken except by revolution. The privileged position of two national groups, Germans and Magyars, over nine others represented a greater problem than the division of the empire in two states as such. Of these two states Hungary, the lands under the Holy Crown of St. Stephen, stood for national disequilibrium and indeed national injustice, particularly in regard to Roumanians, Ruthenians, Serbs, Slovaks, but also Germans and Croats. On the other hand, in a political sense the country represented a homogeneous historical entity with a constitutional tradition reaching far back into the beginning of medieval times. The same cannot be said for the western part of the Danube mon¬ archy, which was composed of several historical units, but did not merge them to a larger one. This larger unit, associated with the concept of Austria in public opinion, was the Habsburg empire as a whole. Apart from this, the Alpine hereditary lands, the small core lands of the Habsburgs and the preceding dynasty, the Babenbergs, are still understood as “Austria” in a narrower sense. The notion of the western part of the Habsburg empire plus Galicia and Bukovina in the east, on the other hand, did not strike a chord in anybody’s mind. The common bond be¬ tween these lands as distinguished from the historical entities of which Austria in the terms of the Compromise was composed, such as hereditary lands, lands of the Bohemian crown, and so on, was the mere fact that these were the Habsburg lands outside of Hungary. Of these seventeen crownlands Galicia and Tyrol for instance were historically no closer to each other than Hungary to Bohemia or Transylvania to Carniola. The official name now given to this area—grotesque in its lack of historical appeal and tradition—was “the kingdoms and lands represented in the Reichsrat.” No wonder that a somewhat greater tolerance in the handling of the national question in the west could not make up for this lack of historical cohesion. The venerable historic concept of Austria was applied for convenience’s sake, to this unhistorical political conglomerate.95 But although the political and economic bonds worked not too smoothly August Gmeiner, Grundzuge der Verfassung Ungarns (Nagyszeben-Hermannstadt, 1909), pp. 138-152. 95 Redlich, Das osterreichische Staats- und Reichsproblem, II, 523-680; Ivan Zolger, Der staatsrechtliche Ausgleich zwischen Osterreich und Ungarn (Leipzig, 1912), passim. Ulbrich, Das osterreichische Staatsrecht, pp. 101-137; Marczali, Ungarisches Verjassungsrecht, pp. 173-229; Kann, Nationalitdtenproblem, I, 30-39,

345 354 -

*

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

337

in the Compromise, they worked after all because the western and eastern parts of the monarchy complemented each other to a limited extent.96 By no means was Austria primarily an industrial and Hungary a purely agricultural country. Both dual states were predominantly rural in char¬ acter, though Hungary more so than Austria. Industrial progress in Hungary after 1867 could well compare with that in Austria. Thus economic complementation existed only to a point. More important were the common interests in foreign relations. Had it not been for the Compromise, the empire would probably have disinte¬ grated sooner because of the attraction of Panslavism for the Slavic peoples; they represented nearly half of the Habsburg monarchy’s popu¬ lation, and after the annexation of Bosnia-Hercegovina more than half. Panslavism was primarily directed by authoritarian, if not despotic, ideolo¬ gies in tsarist Russia. A showdown between Austria and Russia would probably have led to the empire’s dismemberment, from which Russia would have benefited more than Germany, which presumably would have gained only the Alpine lands. The Slavic peoples, and possibly also the Magyars, would have come under the tsarist heel. The fact that the German and Magyars were the privileged peoples in the dual monarchy, although inequitable, made the Austro-German alliance of 1879 possible that blocked the threat of Russian tsarism and gave the empire the chance for further peaceful development and possibly evolutionary adaptation to more modern national and social conditions. Although this chance was partly missed by 1914, nevertheless between 1867 and 1914 AustriaHungary had profited from nearly a half century of peaceful evolution. Pan-Germanism, though in some ways even more aggressive than Pan¬ slavism, could not rule in Austria because its numerical base was too small. Nor did it have to. Germany became the leading partner in the alliance, largely because of the German-Magyar predominance in the Habsburg monarchy, but, equally important, because the sovereignty of the Habsburg monarchy and its representative institutions had to be respected, since German annexation of Habsburg territories was out of the question. Had Bismarck acted otherwise, had he tried to rule AustriaHungary rather than to have it ruled by the German-Magyar coalition within the monarchy, the Habsburg empire would have disintegrated sooner and to the chief benefit of tsarist Russia. On the other hand, the preservation of the monarchy and its territorial integrity for a half century

96 See

also Chapter II, Section A. Further, Robert A. Kann, The Habsburg Em¬ pire: A Study in Integration and Disintegration (2nd ed. New York, 1973), pp. 13 f., 102 f.

j38

History of the Habshurg Empire

to come implied respect for its constitutional institutions, limited national rights for the Slavs in Austria, and at least the chance of securing them in Hungary. All these factors helped to maintain the Compromise. It was not a perfect solution. German imperialism and militarism threatened. Yet Austria was shielded from them, partly by the nature of the Compromise and partly by the hope that reasonable men would remain at the steering wheel of Austro-German foreign relations. Eventu¬ ally, the hope proved to be illusionary because of the tensions and finally conflagrations in the age of imperialism. Yet the final crisis was still a long way off and, allowing for appropriate reforms, not necessarily in¬ evitable. The Compromise gave the Danube peoples the chance to live for nearly two generations peacefully and work hopefully for a longer lasting accommodation. That this hope failed eventually was not primarily because of deficiencies of the Compromise.97 The Compromise agreed upon in Hungary in March, 1867, had yet to be passed upon by an Austrian parliament. Approval was a foregone conclusion after the crown had surmounted the more difficult Hungarian barrier. Still, it was not an easy matter. The Czechs, feudals and liberals alike, felt they had been sold down the river, and the Poles likewise re¬ sented the new development. The great old man of heretofore loyal Czech nationalism, Francis Palacky, participated now in the Panslav Congress, assembled in Moscow in May, 1867, a gathering more hostile to Austrian interests than the Slav congress in Prague nineteen years before. It was clear that the crown could bring about the passage of the Compromise legislation only with full German support, but this support was to be had only for a price: constitutional laws which conformed to the wishes of the German liberals in regard to civil liberties as well as the preservation of the German privileged position in Austria. The new Austrian parliament which convened in May, 1867, had a two-third German liberal majority versus federalist-clerical opposition, largely consisting of Slav deputies. Only the manipulating of dietal elections, still based on the unjust provisions of the February Patent, brought the result desired and expected by the crown. The first of the 97 Robert A. Kann, “The Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867 in Retrospect, Causes and Effects,” in Ludovit Holotik, ed., Der osterreichisch-ungarische Ausgleich i86y (Bratislava, 1971), pp. 24-44. (Proceedings of the International Con¬ ference in Bratislava, 1967.) See also Peter Hanak, “Die biirgerliche Umgestaltung der Habsburger Monarchic und der Ausgleich von 1867,” in Ervin Pamlenyli, ed., Social Economic Research in the History of East Central Europe (Budapest, 1970), pp. 191-231.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

339

five constitutional laws of December, 186798 on the jurisdiction of the legislation (Statute 141 of 1867) provided for a bicameral legislation, House of Lords and House of Deputies, the latter until 1873 still selected from the diets. The legislative powers of parliament were wider than in the narrow enumeration in the February Patent. Parliamentary immunity was fully granted. The big catch in this law, however, was embodied in Article 14, which gave cabinet and crown the power of tempo¬ rary emergency legislation when the Reichsrat was not assembled. This legislation had to be submitted subsequently to parliament for approval, but since the crown in case of adjournment or dissolution of parliament could bring about the opportunity for the issuance of emegency decrees, this proviso meant a serious impairment of the legislative process. It was used frequently by subsequent ministries. The second law, which offered a catalogue of the basic rights of the citizens was liberal except for the article pertaining to national rights. Yet it was impaired by the provision that the most important civil rights could be temporarily and locally suspended. The most important provision in this law (Statute 142 of 1867), article 19 dealing with the national problem, was taken with some changes from the Kremsier draft (article 21). There, however, it was part of a more comprehensive approach to the problem. Art. 19 All ethnic groups (Vol\sstamme) in the state have equal rights and every ethnic group has the inviolable right to preserve and cultivate its nationality and language. The equality of all languages customary in the crownlands (landesubliche Sprachen) are recognized in schools, government agencies, and public life. In the lands inhabited by several ethnic groups, the public schools shall be organized in a way that every ethnic group receives the necessary funds for training in its own language without being compelled to learn the second language of any land. The liberalism of this famous article was more seeming than real. According to the letter of the law the ethnic groups were not recognized as corporate bodies with a right to representation. Only the interpretation of the supreme Austrian courts later made halting steps in that direction.

98 These

five constitutional laws comprised jointly what may be called the Austrian Cisleithanian constitution, though the word “constitution” was not used. This strange omission represented a kind of inofficial compromise of its own with the crown.

340

History of the Habsburg Empire

National rights accrued only to the individual citizen, who had great difficulties to assert them in public life. Furthermore, the equality of all national languages, guaranteed in the second paragraph, was indirectly in¬ validated in the third. Only if every child would have been required to learn two languages could real equality in this respect have been achieved. As it were the Germans were neither required nor in general willing to learn the languages of a smaller Slavic national group. The non-German peoples, on the other hand, had no chance to get ahead in public life, un¬ less they learned German. Thus this article helped to enhance the German position. A third bill established an imperial court (Reichsgericht) to safe¬ guard the rights of the individual. Although this was a beneficial institu¬ tion, it could not acknowledge what would have required an express statement by law: recognition of national groups as corporate bodies of public law. The fourth bill, on judicial power, recognized the separation of powers in the classical sense in a clear and satisfactory manner. But the fifth bill, on executive power, revealed another important limitation of the constitution. It provided for impeachment proceedings against the minis¬ ters of state in case of unconstitutional conduct in office. Yet the law did not introduce the more important principle, that the cabinet as well as individual ministers needed the confidence of the majority of parliament. In other words the executive could be recalled only in the event of unlaw¬ ful conduct, but otherwise only the emperor’s confidence was required. Ministers were appointed and requested to resign at his pleasure. They could enter office and continue to hold it in the face of an expression of nonconfidence by the majority of parliament. Since a legislative program could not be put through without the support of the majority of parlia¬ ment, a cabinet would frequently resign if it did not enjoy the confidence of parliament, even though it was not legally forced to do so. On the other hand, by use of the emergency article 14 (law 141) in the bill on the jurisdiction of the legislature, a cabinet could for some time govern without the support of parliament and defy its will. The combination of an article which allowed for emergency legislation if parliament was not in session, and the absence of a requirement to resign if the cabinet did not enjoy the confidence of parliament, was, apart from the insufficient recognition of national rights, the most severe weakness of the new Austrian constitution." "There was a sixth constitutional law too which pertained to the common Austrian-Hungarian institutions according to the compromise legislation. A similar, though, as stated, not identical bill, was part of the Hungarian constitutional

Standstill, Declme, Stabilization

341

Yet with all their shortcomings, compounded by the undemocratic franchise legislation referred to before, the December laws of 1867 stood for a representative constitution superior to the sham legislation of 18601861.100 In conjunction with the constitution of Hungary, not unlike the English one a complex body of diverse laws and traditions from the Bulla Aurea of 1222 to the constitutional laws of 1848 and 1867, representative government through bicameral legislation, separation of powers, and an independent judiciary were assured there too. An unsatisfactory franchise legislation, worse in Hungary and remedied in Austria only in the course of the years, existed in both countries as did other insufficiencies in regard to the limitations of parliamentary power.101 Hungarian constitutional life nevertheless rested on stronger foundations than the Austrian since it could look back on a centuries-old historic tradition. Perhaps for that same reason Austrian constitutional conditions, less strictly welded to the past, might have been more amenable to evolutionary change. Yet in neither state was the letter of constitutional law as important as its inter¬ pretation in political practice throughout half a century. Incongruity between the laws on the statute books and their application in administra¬ tive practice existed in both states, though more flagrantly in Hungary. In spite of all shortcomings, possibilities for peaceful evolution in the direction of democratic government existed in both states. Francis Joseph was crowned king of Hungary in the nineteenth year of his reign (June, 1867) as symbol of reconciliation with the Magyar nation. The first joint ministers, headed by Beust as nominal imperial chancellor in charge of foreign affairs, were appointed in December, 1867. This occurred only days after the passage of the Austrian constitutional laws by the support of a large German liberal majority. The Habsburg empire had legislation. (Hungarian const, law XII.) See Gmeiner, Grundzuge der Verfassung Ungarns, pp. 59-66; Gerald Stourzh, “Die Gleichberechtigung der Nationalitaten und die osterreichische Dezemberverfassung,” in Peter Berger, ed., Der osterreichisch-ungarische Ausgleich von i86y: Vorgeschichte und Wir\ungen (Vienna, 1967), pp. 186-218. 100 Ulbrich, Das osterreichische Staatsrecht, pp. 138-233; Kann, Ndtionalitatenproblem, II, 132-149. 334-339101 The Hungarian electoral law of 1848 was revised in 1879 and 1881 but re¬ mained, with particular regard to administrative practice, unsatisfactory from the point of view of national and social justice. For a survey of the Hungarian con¬ stitutional status as of 1867, see Marczali, Ungarisches Verfassungsrecht, pp. 50-172 and Gmeiner, Grundzuge der Verfassung Ungarns, passim. See also Steinbach, Franz Dea\, pp. 67-78; Laszlo Katus, “La Couche Dirigeante de la Politique Hongroise et la Question de Nationalites a l’Lpoque du Compromis Austro-Hongrois de 1867,” in Ludovit Holotik and Anton Valtuch, eds., Der osterreichisch-ungarische Ausgleich (Bratislava, 1971), pp. 670-682.

342

History of the Habshurg Empire

entered the last phase of an uneasy existence. The outlook for its future was sober, but there was no reason to abandon hope entirely. F.

Domestic affairs (1860-1879)

a) ECONOMIC DEVELOPMENT

The political reconciliation with Hungary more than the terms of the Compromise legislation itself accentuated the discrepancy of economic interests between the dual states. In the 1850’$ Austrian policy, largely under the influence of the grossdeutsch ideology of the minister von Bruck,102 favored accommodation of tariffs with the German customs union. This policy, based on the Austro-Prussian commercial treaty of 1853, worked well because Austrian industry could compete with Prussian manufacture in some fields, particularly textiles, and several of the major German states needed imports of Austrian textile products. In 1862, however, Prussia granted France the most-favored-nation clause which weakened the Austrian position. The improvement of the Prussian posi¬ tion in regard to the manufacturing of textiles and in the metallurgical, chemical, and arms industry in the 1860’s made further arrangements difficult. The political conflict sharpened between 1862 and 1867 and abated gradually in the following years. It was aggravated in several respects by the economic fallout of the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867. The Hungarian economic interests in the 1860’s and 1870’s, or more correctly those of the big landowners, who represented them primarily, were not much different from those of the neoabsolutist era, but now demands of the Magyar establishment carried much greater weight than previously. They strongly favored free trade, because the relatively modest Hungarian industrial interests did not get tariff protection. This policy was to change to some extent after the 1870’s. In the era under discussion demands of industry had to yield to agrarian interests. A free-trade policy facilitated the possibilities of Hungarian grain and cattle exports abroad, in particular to Germany. Austrian industry, on the other hand, in the face of strong German competition, felt to be in need of pro¬ tective traiffs, whereas Austrian agriculture which had to play second string in their export policy, was not strong enough to balance industrialcommercial requirements and to counterbalance Hungarian demands. The Austro-Hungarian customs policy in the late 1860’s and the 1870’s 102 Minister of Commerce, November, 1848 to May, 1851; Minister of Finance, March, 1855 to April, i860, when Bruck committed suicide because he was un¬ justly suspected of corruption. See also Richard Charmatz, Minister Freiherr von Bruc\ (Leipzig, 1916), pp. 107-153.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

343

therefore accommodated primarily the interests of the aristocratic owners of big estates in Hungary, even though they collided to some degree with Austrian industrial-commercial objectives. Not until the late 1870’s when Germany and Russia moved in the direction of protective tariffs did Austria-Hungary initiate a modest protective tariff policy in regard to industrial goods: the so-called autonomous Austro-Hungarian customs tariff of 1878, was enacted on January 1, 1879. Hungarian agrarian in¬ terests remained still prevalent but in consideration of Hungarian rather than Austrian industrial progress not as markedly as before. Austrian grain exports declined in the late 1860’s and 1870’s largely because of powerful Hungarian competition but also because of the heavy debts of the small- and middle-seized peasants incurred by Bach’s rural emancipation policy. Owners of large estates were on the whole better equipped to benefit from an agricultural amelioration policy. Of particu¬ lar significance was the strong advance in the sugar-beet industry, from which raising of beef cattle benefited as well. The foundation of the Austrian agricultural university in Vienna in 1872 and the elevation of the veterinary academy in Vienna to university rank were likewise in¬ strumental to this effect. Nevertheless, Austrian agriculture, which still employed about three-fifths of the working population, had not improved its standing in comparison with Hungary and Germany. The chief advancement took place in industry, commerce, communica¬ tions, and private banking. This rise in the face of a heavy public debt of two and a half billion guilders was so rapid that it led to the great stock market crash of May, 1873. This boom-and-bust cycle was also embar¬ rassing because it followed so soon the opening of the great Viennese world exhibition in April, 1873. The corruption which the crash revealed, compromised the minister of commerce Anton von Banhans, the director general of the new Galician railway Viktor Ofenheim von Ponteuxin, and the prominent German liberal parliamentary leader and former minister of the interior Dr. Karl Giskra. The crash was not so much the consequence of the action of individuals, as of overconfidence, resulting from blind faith in the blessings of a free-trade policy and corresponding widespread financial overcommitments and speculations. The crisis of industrial and financial overexpansion in 1873 resulted in higher interest rates and underemployment throughout the decade.103 Industrial progress during the period could compete with western European and German developments in regard to standards, but not to 103 Oscar Jaszi, The Dissolution of the Habsburg Monarchy (Chicago, 1929), pp. 194-239.

344

History of the Hahshurg Empire

volume. Within Austria, the lands of the Bohemian crown strengthened their leading position in textile, machine and glass industries, and in breweries. Metallurgical and chemical industries and mining expanded. Textile, shoe, metallurgical industries and beet-sugar productions in Moravia, mining and iron foundries in Silesia were significant. Two main industrial areas were situated in the Alpine lands. One expanded in Styria and Carinthia where iron foundries, lead mining, and metallurgi¬ cal industries went back to late medieval times. The others were in Lower Austria including Vienna. Here too, as in Bohemia, chemical, textile, and machine industries were important. In Vienna the well-estab¬ lished manufacturing of articles of high-class craftsmanship in leathergoods, furniture, and china prospered. All these industries and crafts had been in existence in the mercantilist era but now they were decidedly on the upswing. Of considerable importance was also the operation of oil wells in Galicia. The railway net was expanded. The railroad across the Brenner pass was opened in 1868. The Danube steamship company could increase its activities and the Austrian Lloyd became a state-supported major com¬ pany in commercial navigation overseas. Remarkable as this development was in absolute terms, it fell still somewhat behind industrial progress in western countries. One chief reason for this were the limitations of the domestic markets, especially the lower standards of living of the peasants and the sometimes even lower ones of the industrial workers; the latter did not gain a (restricted) right to establish trade unions and to strike until 1869 and 1870.104 Hungary, where more than two-thirds of the population were engaged in agricultural work, found an open market for its big grain surplus in Austria, as noted above. Grain could also be imported to Germany before the new protective tariff system came into force there. The beneficiaries however, were mainly the owners of big and middle-sized estates. The standards of the agricultural workers were even lower than those of their counterparts in Austria. Considering the poor state of industry in the era of suppression during the neoabsolutist era, there was relatively more progress in Hungary than 104 Benedikt, Die wirtschaftliche Entwic\lung, pp. 34-121; Marz, Osterreichische Industrie, pp. 95-212; Adolf Beer, Der Staatshaushalt Osterreich-Ungarns seit 1868 (Prague, 1881), pp. 64-398; Tremel, Wirtschafts- und Sozialgeschichte Osterreichs, pp. 319-372; Matis, Osterreichs Wirtschaft 1848-1918, pp. 128-341; Mayer-KaindlPirchegger, Geschichte und Kulturleben Osterreichs, III, 270-288; Robert A. Kann, Werden und Zerjall des Habshurgerreiches (Graz-Cologne, i960), pp. 80-83, I2I_ 124.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

345

in Austria. Cotton and woolen goods, beet-sugar industry, breweries, agricultural machinery, and above all flour milling by steam mills ad¬ vanced. Mining and iron foundries expanded further. The previously poor railway net developed fast, though it was hampered by strategic considerations and national rivalries with Austria. Railway routes were traced as far as possible from the Austrian borders. In view of the joint defense system this made little sense; the Hungarian veto against the construction of a badly needed railway from Austrian Dalmatia105 to Zagreb (Agram), and Budapest was even more absurd. The Croatians in both states of the dual monarchy were thus equally unjustly punished. Yet the blow aimed at the economic development of an Austrian crownland with predominantly Croatian population, in a wider sense hurt also Austro-Hungarian economic development as a whole, particularly com¬ mercial shipping. Despite such vagaries of a nationalist economy, Hun¬ garian industrial production increased and the balance of trade in the period under discussion became active. In relative terms, economic progress in Hungary, freed from the chains of neoabsolutism, was greater than in Austria. From the point of view of distribution of the national wealth, conditions remained even more un¬ satisfactory than in the western half of the empire.106 b) EVOLUTION OF POLITICAL PARTY LIFE AND AGGRAVATION OF THE PROBLEM OF NATIONALISM

The introduction of representative constitutional government in both states, deficient though it was, brought about the evolution of a political party life, which despite much ensuing conflict injected a wholesome pluralistic feature into public life. To be sure the beneficial aspects of these innovations were partly offset by the fact that Austrian political institutions never quite succeeded in establishing permanent party struc¬ tures across common social and cultural interests of the Austrian peoples rather than by national affiliation. This national affiliation remained the rallying force around which national organizations developed. Even the 105 Claimed by Hungary as historically a part of the triune kingdom of CroatiaSlavonia-Dalmatia. 106 Laszlo Katus, “Economic Growth in Hungary during the Age of Dualism,” in Ervin Pamlenyi, ed., Social Economic Research in the History of East Central Europe (Budapest, 1970), pp. 35-127; Alexander von Matlekovits, Das Konigreich Ungarn vol\swirtschaftlich und statistisch dargestellt, 2 vols. (Leipzig, 1910), see I, 186-206, II, 1-340, 455-498; Kann, Wcrden und Zerfall des Habsburgerreiches, pp. 83-88, 124-135; Peter Hanak, “Hungary in the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy: Preponderance or Dependency?” in Austrian History Yearbook, III: 1 (1969), 266284. Guillaume Vautier, La Hongrie Economique (Paris, 1893), pp. 55-483 passim.

346

History of the Hubs burg Empire

Social Democrats, by definition fully international, succumbed in the end to the pressure of national separatism. If this problem did not seem to exist in Hungary, the reason was only that as late as 1914 the Magyars who (exclusive of Croatia) represented 54 percent of the population, held 405 parliamentary seats, all other national groups combined only 8 seats.107 A discussion of the development of parliamentary life in Austria is also made difficult because names and composition of parliamentary clubs changed repeatedly and these clubs frequently represented not adherents of a common political philosophy but rather diverse groups bound to¬ gether by a mere solidarity of tactical interests. Only radical fringe groups remained outside of these combinations. Moreover, only the electoral reform of 1873 introduced direct elections of parliament; therefore, mem¬ bers up to that time were merely representatives of the anachronistic estates diets which represented chiefly the interests of the big landowners, the propertied upper middle and middle class, the Church, and a sprin¬ kling of the rural communities. Accordingly the parliamentary elections of 1870—actually still dietal elections—changed little. Even the electoral re¬ form of 1873, a progressive one under existing conditions, meant only the extension of the franchise to a mere 6 percent of the adult male popu¬ lation, the overwhelming majority being still barred by stiff property qualifications. In these first direct elections, held in 1873 shortly after the great crash, the Liberals—mostly Germans—retained their majority. This liberal socalled Left comprising the German Liberals, the somewhat less moderate Progressive Club, and some splinter groups, held about 160 seats, the big estates owners, including a considerable number of Czechs, some 50 seats, as did the Polish opposition on the Right. The German Clericals, Southern Slavs, and Moravian Czechs controlled about 40 seats. Thus from a national point of view most Slavs—with exception of the Ruthenian anti-Polish op¬ position—were on the Right. This coloration, however, indicated in no way basic Slavic conservative preferences but merely the inequitable pecu¬ liarities of the franchise system. The electoral districts were drawn in a 107 This statement does not include the Croatian deputies in the Hungarian parliament, who according to the terms of the Croatian autonomy participated as delegates of the Croatian Sabor in the deliberations of the Hungarian parliament, but only on matters of joint Hungarian-Croatian interests, as spelled out by law (the Hungarian-Croatian Compromise of 1868). See also Branko M. Peselj, “Der ungarisch-kroatische Ausgleich vom Jahre 1868,” in Peter Berger, ed., Der osterreichisch-ungarische Ausgleich von i86y (Vienna, 1967), pp. 169-185; Guldescu, in Francis H. Eterovich and Christopher Spalatin, eds., Croatia, II, 47-50. Kann, Nationalitatenproblem I, 131-132, 398.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

34.J

way that gave liberal majorities a chance only in predominantly urban districts, whereas in the rural ones the big landowners were sure to gain safe parliamentary seats. Only to the extent that the rural population was in general more conservative than the urban one and the Slavs were more strongly represented in the rural constituencies, can one perceive an ide¬ ological difference in the Slavic and German vote. The elections of 1879 were held under the still noticeable long-range ef¬ fect of the crash of 1873 and the greater political involvement of the mid¬ dle and underprivileged classes of the Slavis peoples. They reduced the German liberal majority to an association of parliamentary groups which was about evenly balanced against the Slavic groups and the German conservatives, altogether some 140 German Liberals and Progressives against about 55 German Conservatives, roughly the same number of Czech and Polish deputies, and some 40 members of parliament without definite political affiliation. Most of them however, supported, the Slavic deputies. They became now the core of a new majority. It was not to the same degree conservative as their predecessors in the parliament of 1873. In reviewing the whole period of parliamentary life from 1867 to 1879 the German Liberals (in 1881 organized as the so-called United Left) were the real state party of Austria. The term Left as applied to them appears to many interpreters as anachronistic, even absurd because the German Lib¬ erals represented largely industry, the chambers of commerce, and high finance; their record on economic issues came often close to a laissez-faire spirit, blind to many social problems of the time. However, these Liberals represented also professional people, the well-educated urban middle and upper middle class, largely the bureaucracy, and altogether the strata of society that wanted to confine the Church to the religious sphere and im¬ proved Austrian education. A number of excellent men, including Rudolf Brestel as minister of finance and Johann Nepomuk Berger, a lawyer and likewise member of liberal cabinets, had begun their parliamentary career in the Reichstag of Kremsier. Leopold v.Hasner, professor of economics and subsequently prime minister, Julius v.Glaser, professor of criminal law, and Joseph Unger, professor of civil law and a truly creative jurist, all for some time cabinet members, were scholars as well as political advisers. Eduard Suess the famous geologist became also parliamentary leader. In¬ deed, these intellectuals could give every parliamentary regime distinction, although not all were fully representative of public opinion. Some of them, particularly Eduard Herbst, the chief spokesman of the United Left,108 were also unduly doctrinaire, adherents of a rigid centralism where it

108 Professor

of law and in the beginning of the liberal era minister of justice.

348

History of the Hahshurg Empire

agreed with their German liberal political philosophy, and opposed to it where national separatism suited the interests that elected them. In this sense these Liberals advocated for instance the administrative partition of Bohemia, where the Germans represented only a substantial minority, into a Czech and German part while they were opposed to the administrative division of Styria and Tyrol with their Slovene and Italian majorities in the south of both crownlands. In these crownlands taken as a whole the Germans held a majority and therefore looked at the problem from a different angle. These German men of politics differed from the men of St. Paul’s Assembly not in their convictions, but in the fact that they were not confined to the empty role of orators but had the opportinuity to act as legislators and some as administrators. Altough their outlook in national and social questions was limited, most German Liberals in public life were men of integrity, who believed to act for the common good, even where they acted just for the middle and upper mid¬ dle classes. Nevertheless their achievements must not be compared with those of a more egalitarian future whose problems they did not under¬ stand, but with the conditions and failures of a past whose policies were rejected except by those representing unwittingly narrow class interests.109 The gravest charge that could be made against the Liberals was that they did not adequately represent the urban petty bourgeoisie, the peas¬ ants, or labor. Agriculture was to some extent represented by the conser¬ vative, clerical groups, although the interests of the big estates owners re¬ ceived first consideration. The urban petty bourgeoisie had some support of national and so-called democratic splinter groups on the left wing of the Liberals. It carried little political weight and secured appropriate po¬ litical representation only in the two following decades. Labor had no parliamentary representation whatever. Parties, which stood for these in¬ terests did not rise until the 1880’s. A number of cultural organizations and associations for the support of the sick and unemployed workers in the large cities evolved, which were allowed to represent the completely forgotten man, the blue-collar worker, but only in a strictly nonpolitical manner. Police supervision of what was feared to become a revolutionary movement was tight, and even in terms of the time after 1868 lawful trade-union activities were harrassed. Furthermore the incipient labor movement was in general still of a sectarian character and split between 109 Gustav Kolmer, Parlament und Verfassung in Osterreich, 8 vols. (Vienna, 1903-1914), see I, 253-403, II, passim; Georg Franz, Liberalismus (Munich, 1955), PP- 13 1-220; Eduard Suess, Erinnerungen (Leipzig, 1916), pp. 164-310; Ernst von Plener, Erinnerungen (Stuttgart, 1921), II, 1—143; Max Kulisch, Beitrdge zum osterreichischen Parlamentsrecht (Leipzig, 1900), pp. 84-136.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

349

demands for economic cooperatives, unionism, and somedmes rather paro¬ chial interests. All stressed primarily the needs for national organization according to Lassalle’s ideas, whereas the supporters of international pro¬ grams were clearly in the minority. They were to win out in the not dis¬ tant future.110 Some labor organizations existed also among the Czechs, who next to the Germans had the most stabilized political life among the Austrian national groups. Here the Old Czechs, led by Palacky’s son-in-law Francis Rieger, had stood for the Bohemian Staatsrecht, that is, the indivisibility of the Bohemian lands as separate historical body under the Austrian crown. These endeavors received a setback through the Compromise of 1867 and a new attempt for recognition in 1871 favored by the conserva¬ tive Hohenwart cabinet—to be discussed below—failed likewise. Thus the Czechs were increasingly driven into opposition, and a new party move¬ ment, the Young Czechs, in a loose way in existence since the 1860’s gained grounds gradually. These Young Czechs were not opposed to the Bohe¬ mian Staatsrecht. Like the Old Czechs they rejected an administrative par¬ tition of Bohemia, demanded by an arrogant German minority. Yet ac¬ cording to the Young Czechs the Old Czechs represented a party that leaned too heavily on the support of the big landowners, mainly the Bohe¬ mian aristocracy and the princes of the Church. The Young Czechs wanted a Czech national movement controlled by the interests of com¬ merce and industry, that is, mainly the urban middle class; support of the peasantry should follow. By a policy of intermittent boycott of parliament or diet and a national propaganda in towns but also rural communities they contested the Old Czech leadership. The fact that Palacky himself, the venerable leader of the Old Czechs, attended the Panslav Congress in Moscow in 1867 and endorsed its program already indicated a gradual shift to the idea of ethnic nationalism.111 The Poles gained more by cooperation with the imperial government than the Czechs by opposition because imperial control in the distant Carpathian provinces was more difficult to establish than in Bohemia and Moravia; besides the interests of an economically feeble Ruthenian minor¬ ity could be surrendered to those of the Polish upper classes, whereas the Liberals would never have agreed to a similar treatment of the German minorities in Bohemia and Moravia. Futhermore, it was felt that a dis110 Herbert Steiner, Die Arbeiterbewegung Osterreichs 1867-1889 (Vienna, 1964), pp. 19-144. 111 Kann, N'ationalitatenproblem, I, 174-187, 412-417; Joseph F. Zacek, “Palacky and the Austro-Hungarian Compromise of 1867,” in L. Holotik and A. Vantuch, eds., Der osterreichisch-ungarische Ausgleich 1867 (Bratislava, 1967), pp. 555-573.

History of the Habshurg Empire

350

satisfied Polish population at the borders of Russia would endanger the security of the empire. Hence the administration of Galicia was handed over, by administrative decrees between 1867 and 1869 and also parlia¬ mentary legislation of 1868, to the three-fifths Polish majority. The Ruthenians fared somewhat better only in the Bukovina with her relative Ruthenian majority. Yet in Galicia the Polish language ruled supreme in courts and schools, from grade level to universities; Government officials from the lowest to the highest rank were mostly Poles, and only in com¬ munications with the ministries was German used. The Poles later sup¬ ported the conservative government in Vienna and were rewarded with high positions in the central administration, even though the government would have been justified to ask for the unconditional support of the Polish big landowners and a gentry whose interests they represented con¬ cerning major issues. Yet the Poles, from the aristocratic governor Count Goluchowski112 to the more moderate and in the days of Kremsier liberal parliamentarians Francis Smolka (later speaker of parliament) and Florian Ziemialkowski (Polish minister without portfolio in various cabinets) enjoyed strategic, geographic, and ethnic advantages, from which the Czechs could not benefit.113 Even so, it was implicitly understood that the Polish reconciliation with the empire would last only as long as no real chance for the rebirth of a united Poland existed. Obviously the Polish policy of the government did not please the Ruthenians. Their political groups were represented by the formerly liberal national Young Ruthen¬ ians and the conservative Old Ruthenians. At the time of the revolution both groups endorsed the Austrian empire idea and were frequently referred to as the Tyrolians of the east, meaning the most faithful of the faithful. Now the Young Ruthenians only thinly camouflaged the associa¬ tion of their interests with those of the Russian Ukrainians, while the Old Ruthenians sympathized more openly with conservative Russians.114 The status of the Slovenes remained unsatisfactory. As long as their na¬ tionalism was primarily of a cultural nature they had enjoyed the patron¬ age of German liberalism. Now, when they demanded adequate political 112 For seventeen years governor of Galicia (1849-1859, 1866-1868, 1871-1875). See also Stanislaw Estreicher in Cambridge History of Poland (Cambridge, 1951), II, 435 447 113 Czechs, and particularly Poles, were frequently represented by the so-called Landsmannschaftsminister (cabinet ministers without portfolio), whose sole assign¬ ment was to represent the specific interests of their respective national groups. 114 Kann, N ationalitatenproblem, I, 228-231, 329-330, 433-434, 470-471. See also Krupnickyj, Geschichte der JJ\raine, pp. 254-261. -

*

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

35/

representation in Styria, and particularly in Carniola where they com¬ prised more than 90 percent of the population but held only one-third of the seats in the diet, they found deaf ears. They continued to follow some of their conservative clerical leaders but at the same time they began to become increasingly interested in the idea of a Southern Slav political union with Croats and Serbs in Austria and especially Hungary.115 The Croats, Serbs, and Roumanians in Austria were even more con¬ cerned with the fate of their conationals in Hungary than were the Slovenes with the problem of Southern Slav unionism across the whole Habsburg empire. The status of Austrian Southern Slavs and Rouman¬ ians left something to be desired, but it was superior to that of their conationals in Hungary who were grossly discriminated against. But since the majority of these nationalities within the Habsburg mon¬ archy lived in Hungary, satisfactory solutions could not be achieved within the straitjacket of the Compromise. They had to be initiated in Hungary and would subsequently have to affect conditions in Austria.116 The situation of the Italians resembled in some ways that of the Poles. In the Trentino in south Tyrol, as well as in the Littoral it was fairly fav¬ orable. Even though the administrative separation of Italian and German Tyrol was not achieved, language rights in the diet, courts, and schools were liberal. In Trieste where the Italians had an absolute majority they enjoyed far-reaching autonomy. In Istria, where they were outnumbered by Croats as in Gorizia by Slovenes, they received preferential treatment. The fear of Italian irredentism played a decisive part in the policies of the Austrian government. Whereas the emperor could rely on the loyalty of the Poles as long as the empire lasted, he could not rely on the Italians despite Italy’s joining the Austro-German alliance in 1882. The Poles had conationals in Russia and Prussia, but no Polish allied power existed. The Austrian Italians, on the other hand, could be sure of the support of Italy. This meant that Italian irredentism in its activities did not feel necessarily bound to wait for the day of the Habsburg empire’s disintegration.117 In Hungary, Magyar Hungary that is, liberal predominance was even more marked than in Austria, but even more than in Austria was it 115 Fran Zwitter, “The Slovenes and the Habsburg Monarchy,” in Austrian History Yearbook, III:2 (1967), 170-175; see also Toussaint Hocevar, The Structure of the Slovenian Economic Development 1848-1963 (New York, 1963), pp. 15-117 and Bogumil Vosnjak, A Bulwar\ against Germany (London, 1917), pp. 83-112. 116 Kann, Nationalitdtenproblem, I, 254-257, 290-295, 303-305, 441, 455, 458. 117 Ibid., I, 268-270, 445-446.

352

History of the Hahsburg Empire

focused on political objectives rather than on social issues. Actually the re¬ lationship to Austria was perceived as the foremost political problem. The Andrassy cabinet in office from 1867 to 1871, when Prime Minister Count Gyula Andrassy became joint Austro-Hungarian minister of foreign af¬ fairs, was backed by the immense authority of Francis Deak, even though he was not a member of the cabinet. Deak and Joseph von Eotvos, the minister of public instruction, could rightly be called genuine liberals in more than in name. The Hungarian Nationality Law and the Hungarian-Croatian Law of Compromise both of 1868, as intended, though not as subsequently administered, show the influence of these men. One might have wished that they had exercised it also in favor or urgently needed agricultural reforms, but most liberals ignored agricultural problems. Re¬ luctant to deal with social problems, their attention was focused on the legal interpretation of the relationship to Austria. Kossuth, then in exile in Torino, denounced the Compromise as betrayal of the nation and stood by the demands for the reestablishment of the Hungarian republic of 1849. The emotional impact of his views was still powerful. The left-wing liberals, later organized in the Independence Party (also called Party of 1848) 118 could not openly endorse the claims for reestablishment of the revolutionary republic. They had to satisfy themselves with demands for the termination of the Compromise; while they publicly accepted the mere Personal Union, that is, recognition of the same ruler as emperor in Aus¬ tria and king in Hungary, they rejected any other constitutional bonds between the two states. The Independence Party stood at least for one es¬ sential progressive measure; introduction of the secret vote in an electoral system which by strict property qualifications and police supervision in favor of the ruling Magyar classes was inferior even to the Austrian franchise laws. But when in 1878 an aristocratic fronde under the leader¬ ship of Count Albert Apponyi accepted the separation program and merged later with the Independence Party, the movement for franchise reform lost its potentially socially progressive character. Heirs to political leadership in Hungary became the so-called Resolution Party of 1861, in¬ fluenced by the ideas of enlightened conservatives of the reform era, like Baron Siegmund Kemeny and Count Paul Somssich. A Calvinist noble¬ man, Kalman Tisza, assumed the leadership of this group, and in 1868 pre¬ sented a program that did not ask for outright abolition but for revision of the Compromise, namely the establishment of a separate Hungarian army, 118 More correct would have been the name Party of 1849, but reference to 1849, when the Hungarian republic was proclaimed, would have implied a renewed en¬ dorsement of treason against the monarchy.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

353

an entirely separate budget, and separate currency and tariff systems. In the elections of 1872 this party secured 116 parliamentary seats against 245 for the government party and 38 for the Party of 1848 on the Left. At this time also the so-called Catholic People’s Party, a primarily antiliberal and only nominally populist group, organized itself to the Right of the Deak liberals. The position of the government became increasingly difficult be¬ tween a right wing that endorsed the Compromise fully and various stronger liberal trends, which disapproved of it in one way or another. The withdrawal of the aged Deak from politics made it clear that the future belonged to the followers of Kalman Tisza, who were not saddled with the Magyar concessions made in 1867, although they claimed full credit for those granted by the crown at that time. In consequence of this policy the merger of the government party with the Resolution Party took place in 1875. This was actually the birth year of the Magyar-Hungarian “liberal” machine system as it ruled supreme with short intervals until 1918. Its leader and prime minister from 1875 to 1890 was Kalman Tisza, fre¬ quently referred to as the older Tisza to distinguish him from his more eminent son Istvan. The Tisza regime stood for the prerogatives of Mag¬ yar nationalism and national intolerance, conservatism in agricultural questions, industrial expansion, and liberalism in cultural affairs—as far as it pertained to the Magyars. This socially and nationally equally inequita¬ ble but in its peculiar way successful regime was maintained by a re¬ stricted franchise system, backed by government-directed police power.119 The Hungarian-Croatian Compromise of 1868, which granted to the Hungarian Croats a limited autonomy will be discussed under “govern¬ ment in Hungary.” At this point we will have to go back to the older concept of a Southern Slav union under Catholic leadership, as it was promoted by Kopitar in the pre-March era. This idea had little appeal to the Serbs, and it could be revived only in a changed form under the auspices of the commanding personality of Josip J. Strossmayer (18151905) bishop of Djakovo, a maverick in politics as well as in ecclesiastic questions as his protests against the papal infallibility dogma accepted at the Vatican Council of 1870 proved. Strossmayer believed that at least a cultural union of the Southern Slav peoples was feasible. In pursuit of this objective he promoted, as noted, the establishment of a Southern Slav academy (1868) and a university (1874), both in Zagreb (Agram). Stross¬ mayer supported also the idea that concessions in liturgical questions (pri¬ marily the wide recognition of the Old Slavonic Church language in Catho11{* Kosary, History of Hungary, pp. 282-298; Carlile A. Macartney, A Short History of Hungary (Edinburg, 1961), pp. 171-184.

354

History of the Hahshurg Empire

lie liturgy), could bring the Serbs at least closer to the Southern Slav union. A third device was to work for linguistic assimilation, particularly be¬ tween Croats and Slovenes. Strossmayer’s endeavors corresponded to some degree to those of the Croatian Liberal National Party, whereas the Croa¬ tian Rights Party under Ante Starcevic’s leadership stood for Croatian separatism rather than Southern Slav unionism. Politically Strossmayer was not successful. The time for linguistic union had passed, neither could accommodation to the rites of the Greek Ortho¬ dox Church in the question of Church liturgy exercise great influence on the course of nationalism in the second half of the nineteenth century. Furthermore, the bishop stood for Croatian leadership in Southern Slav affairs, though less directly than Starcevic. But since the Serbs, heretofore still loosely affiliated with the Ottoman empire, did not gain their full in¬ dependence from the Turks until 1878, Croat-Serb rivalry was not yet a major issue. In an ideological-cultural sense, however, Strossmayer fur¬ thered the union idea of the Southern Slav peoples substantly, though it finally came about in a way different from that imagined by the colorful bishop. Within the Habsburg empire this union idea was promoted first in the form of trialism, a union of the Austrian and Hungarian Southern Slavs as third major political entity within the Habsburg monarchy. This union would have required an abrogation of the Compromise, but this impractical scheme at least did not collide with the Habsburg empire idea. Since it was not feasible Southern Slav nationalism deviated gradually from the patterns of a Croatian-led trialistic idea within the empire to a unionism under the leadership of those Southern Slav people whose major¬ ity lived outside the empire, the Serbs. Trends in that direction became stronger after the Congress of Berlin of 1878.120 Before the Serb war of independence against the Turks, the Serbs played only a minor role in the Habsburg empire. Their modest political weight was one reason why Leopold I in the seventeenth century granted them limited autonomous rights in Hungary. Still their political status remained inferior to that of the Croats. That held true for Austrian-administered Dalmatia as well as for Hungary. Even more important, the reincorpora¬ tion of the Vojvodina into Hungary in i860 was followed in 1872 by the incorporation of the Military Frontier in Syrmia (Serbian Banat). In 1881 the last part of the Croatian Military Frontier was merged with Croatia. Substantial Serb communities existed in all these terriories. Thus to some 12° Wendel, Der Kampf der Sudslawen, pp. 340-396; Guldescu in Eterovich and Spalatin, eds., Croatia, II, 40-60. Kissling, Die Kroaten, pp. 62-71; Kann, Nationalitatenproblem, I, 254-260, 441-443.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

355

extent the Serbs had to foot the bill of the Austro-Hungarian and of the Hungarian-Croatian compromises. The new kingdom of Serbia would probably eventually have become the leader of the Southern Slav national movement in any case, but the governmental surrender of Serb national rights to Magyars and Croats made this development practically a cer¬ tainty.121 In regard to the Hungarian Carpatho-Ruthenians, they lost the limited national autonomy that they had enjoyed under the neoabsolutist regime more as punishment of the Magyars than a rightful concession due to them. Adolf Dobrjanskyi, a Carpatho-Ukrainian himself, was then ap¬ pointed governor of the four predominently Ruthenian Hungarian comitats and advanced the cultural and to some extent political autonomy of his people. The pending reconciliation of the crown with Hungary de¬ prived Dobrjanskyi in the early 1860’s of his position, and his people of the further protection of their national rights. Almost equally unfortunate were the Slovaks. But here, despite Magyar oppression and efforts to bring about complete Magyarization, an outright program for national autonomy within Hungary, more detailed than the demands of 1848, could i

be raised openly at a national congress in Turc Sv. Martin in 1861. This helped to strengthen Slovak national consciousness in the face of continu-

i< ous pressure for Magyarization.122 Most striking was the sellout of Roumanian national rights. As corollary to the October Diploma, the Vienna government promised restoration of : the old Transylvanian constitution. In 1863, a new diet declared the union with Hungary as void, and the Roumanians were at the same time finally 1

admitted as fourth Transylvanian nation of equal rights with Magyars, Szekels, and Saxons. A separate Roumanian Orthodox Church was recog¬ nized also. In 1867, however, the diet was dissolved and a new one elected with a flagrantly manufactured Magyar majority. It voted, as required, for

£

union with Hungary and thus voted itself out of existence. By 1868 the reincorporation was in substance an accomplished fact. In 1876 the last remainders of autonomy for the four nations weer rescinded. No Rou¬ manian deputy was represented in the Hungarian parliament before the

!

121 Wayne S. Vucinic, “The Serbs in Austria-Hungary,” in Austrian History Yearboo\, 111:2 (1967), 17-20, 24-25; Picot, Les Serbes de la Hongrie, pp. 218-342; 3 Ernest Denis, La Grande Serbie (Paris, 1915), pp. 138-160. 122 Ivan 2eguc, Die nationalpolitischen Bestrebungen der Karpatho-Ruthenen \ 1848-1914 (Wiesbaden, 1965), pp. 74-81; Vaclav L. Benes, “The Slovaks in the 1 Habsburg Empire,” in Austrian History Yearboo\, III:2 (1967), 357-364; Rene h Martel, La Ruthenie Subcarpathique (Paris, 1935); Kann, Nationalitatenproblem, 1 I, 281-283, 449-450.

J56

History of the Hubs burg Empire

1880’s and even afterward one Magyar vote in Transylvania weighed as much as about twelve Roumanian votes. A society for Roumanian language and literature led a harrassed existence. While the neighboring kingdom of Roumania could do little to check the excesses of Magyar nationalism in Transylvania, its existence helped to keep the Roumanian national spirit alive.123 c) GOVERNMENT IN AUSTRIA

A survey of the legislative work during the first, on the whole liberal, phase of Austrian constitutional government is impressive. After the resig¬ nation of Beust as Austrian prime minister in June, 1867, two brothers, the princes Karl and Adolf Auersperg, the first prime minister from 1867 to 1868, the second from 1871 to 1879 guided Austrian parliament toward considerable accomplishments. -The fact, that two enlightened high aristo¬ crats stood at the helm of the Austrian government during the main part of that dramatic period, made it easier for crown and conservatives to cooperate with the Auerspergs. This cooperation was not always forth¬ coming, however, and the liberal era of the so-called citizens’ ministries was interrupted by two attempts to install federalist conservative regimes, the first under the Polish Count Alfred Potocki from April, 1870, to Feb¬ ruary, 1871, the second under his successor, the Austro-German aristocrat Count Siegmund Hohenwart until October, 1871. Mention should also be made that during this whole period the man of the emperor’s pronounced personal confidence, Count Edward Taaffe, a conservative, was twice (1867 and 1869-1870) provisional prime minister, as were two able liberal parliamentarians, Professor Leopold von Hasner in 1870 and Dr. Karl von Stremayr in 1879. Fluctuating majorities, Slav federalist opposition, some¬ times even boycott of parliamentary proceedings, and finally dissension among the German liberals themselves, were responsible for the political wearing out of administrative-parliamentary leaders. The chief merit for the liberal legislation belonged not so much to the prime ministers, as the ministers in charge of individual departments, such as Josef von Lasser for the interior, Professor Julius von Glaser (minister of justice), Ignaz von Plener (commerce),124 Brestel (finances), and Hasner and Stremayr, who were more efficient as ministers of public instruction and religious affairs than as prime ministers. 123 Miron Constantinescu, Etudes d’Histoire Transylvaine (Bucarest, 1970), pp. 9-37; Carlile H. Macartney, Hungary and her Successors (London, 1937), pp. 251275. 124 From i860 to 1865 minister of finance.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

357

Matters of education and the separation of education from Church con¬ trol stood in the foreground of interest for a liberal cabinet. The so-called three May laws in 1868, passed against strong clerical-conservative opposi¬ tion, established secular jurisdiction in marriage questions and the prin¬ ciple of secular control of education. This doctrine was specified in the general law on elementary and general public education of May, 1869 (Reichsvol\sschulgesetz). It spelled out the secular structure of the educa¬ tional system on the grade and public high-school level (Burgerschule). The law guaranteed in most crownlands state-controlled compulsory edu¬ cation; the influence of the clergy was restricted to religious instruction. Hardly any law passed by an Austrian parliament has been so heavily contested through the years, hardly another one was as beneficial for all strata of the population, not excluding the clergy, whose previously con¬ troversial position in public life appeared now somewhat eased. The third of the three May laws dealt in principle with the legal equal¬ ity of all denominations and the permissible—but still restricted—possi¬ bilities of interdenominational marriage. The Concordat of 1855 was severely undermined by this legislation and in August, 1870, it was termi¬ nated. The proclamation of papal infallibility at the Vatican Council, only weeks before the Austrian legislative action, had strengthened the forces opposed to the Concordat. Finally a set of new May laws, passed in 1874, recognized limited gov¬ ernment control of the judicial status of the Church, and some supervision of Church income and monastic administration. Absolute legal, let alone social, equality of all denominations still did not exist: the Catholic Church had access to income from governmental funds, not open to other de¬ nominations. Nevertheless the position of the Church in her external re¬ lations was weakened in comparison with her status before 1868, and there were probably more citizens, who believed that liberalism had gone too far than those who held that it had not gone far enough.125 Less controversial was the law on general conscription of December 1868, revised in 1889, which required three years of active military service and nine further years in the reserve (Landwehr). The liberals passed this unpopular bill with some hesitation. The electoral reform of 1873, which established direct parliamentary elections in lieu of what had amounted to dietal delegations, has been mentioned. It clearly did not go far enough. Deputies were still elected according to the curia system—big estates owners, chambers of trade and 126 Weinzierl-Fischer, Die osterreichischen Kon\ordate, Revolution, Neoabsolutismus und Liberalismus, pp. 158-169.

pp.

99—111;

Winter,

35#

History of the Habsburg Empire

commerce, towns and rural communities. In some respect the reform simply meant actually the transfer of the curias from the diets into central parliament. It was symptomatic for the inherent lack of social under¬ standing on the part of the liberals, that only few of them offered opposi¬ tion to these continued restrictions.126 In 1862 the parliament, elected on the basis of the February Patent, had approved the promulgation of an Austrian commercial code, the only nota¬ ble joint Austrian-German judicial legislation, sponsored by the Con¬ federal Assembly in Frankfurt. In 1873 a new code of criminal procedure, drafted by Glaser, the minister of justice, was introduced, which, like the commercial code, is in essence still in force today. Only in comparison with previous conditions could the new code be considered liberal. Inno¬ vations like jury trials, equality of status of defense and prosecuting at¬ torney in investigations, and so on were introduced but restricted by quali¬ fying clauses. The introduction in 1875

a court °f administration (Ver-

waltungsgerichtshof\ however, was without qualifications beneficial. Although the accomplishments of the liberal administration were lim¬ ited by the narrow social outlook of the regime, they were superior to the course of the conservative federalists, who were in power in 1870-1871. Whereas the liberals tried to take care at least of the interests of the urban middle class as they saw them, the federalists considered mainly agricul¬ tural demands from the point of view of the big estates owners. The cab¬ inet Potocky had vainly tried to make its peace with the Old Czechs, who resented the Compromise which had left them in the cold. They either vehemently opposed the liberal legislation or boycotted parliament alto¬ gether. On many issues they were supported by the Polish parliamentary club and the German clerical conservatives in the provinces. Count Hohenwart, appointed prime minister in February, 1871, made an effort, to come to terms with the Czechs and thereby with Slav and even German conservatism altogether. After cumbersome and protracted negotiations with the Old Czech leaders the cabinet introduced several bills, drafted in cooperation with the Bohemian diet. The so-called Funda¬ mental Articles were to establish a general diet of the three lands of the Bohemian crown (Bohemia, Moravia, and Silesia). Bohemian deputies would no longer be regular members of an Austrian parliament, but merely participate in a Congress of dietal delegates. This arrangement would have approximated the institution of the Austro-Hungarian Delega¬ tions. In economic questions far-reaching autonomy was to be granted to 126Kolmer, Parlament und

Verjassung,

osterreichischen Parlamentsrecht, pp. 70-136.,

II,

244-284;

Kulisch, Beitrage zum

Z

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

i

the Bohemian administration, to be put now under the jurisdiction of the

359

Bohemian Court Chancery of old rather than under the Ministry of the Interior, as the other crownlands. The validity of the Compromise was nominally recognized, although the special status of the Bohemian lands contradicted the spirit of the Compromise legislation as well as that of the professed equality of status of the Austrian Cisleithanian peoples as stated in the December legislation in 1867. The Fundamental Articles were accompanied by the draft of a notable nationality law for Bohemia and Moravia. Without agreeing to the Ger¬ man demand for the administrative partition of Bohemia, it provided for the establishment of nationally homogeneous administrative districts. It put the Czech language almost fully on a par with German, each language to be recognized as official in any district where it was the native language of at least a fifth of the population. The draft met also a Czech demand for the command of both languages, Czech and German, as requirement for the appointment of government officials. Separate cultural budgets for both national groups were provided and the diet was to consist of two na¬ tional curias. The nationality law was controversial in some respects, but provided a reasonable compromise between the Czech and German view¬ point, at least concerning the partition issue. The proposed language re¬ forms were constructive. The fact that this bill was heavily criticized by leaders of both national groups does not speak against its reasonableness. Neither was bilateral opposition the main cause why Hohenwart’s pro¬ gram went down to defeat, Fundamental Articles and all. Chief cause for this failure was the opposition by the Hungarian prime minister, Count Andrassy, who saw acceptance of the Fundamental Arti¬ cles as a first step toward the federalization of the empire. This might have eventually led to the scrapping of the dualistic system under Magyar and German leadership. Equally important were perhaps reasons of foreign policy—a gentle warning by the German emperor that he would not like to be put in a position where he had to listen to the complaints of a Ger¬ man irredenta in Austria, whose predominance seemed to be threatened by acceptance of the Fundamental Articles. This hint was clear enough, and after the experience of 1866 also painful. The Czechs saw no reason to accept the Nationality Law without the Fundamental Articles and thus the crown was forced to withdraw the whole legislation. The emperor, after this brief play with the concepts of historic tradi¬ tional federalism, slightly anachronistic as it was already, returned to the spirit of the Compromise, with its built-in German-Magyar condominium. Beust, the adamant opponent of the Fundamental Articles, was thrown to

g6o

History of the Hahsburg Empire

the wolves, but the Czechs had little opportunity to rejoice. His successor became Andrassy himself who unlike Beust was not encumbered with reminiscences of an anti-Prussian policy as Saxon prime minister in 1866. Yet understanding with Germany after the victories in the war of 18701871 was doubly necessary. A distinguished Magyar like Count Andrassy, who subscribed to a pro-German policy, was the man to bring full reconciliation about. The sacrificial lambs were the Czechs; they had been promised favorable consideration of their demands, which were now re¬ pudiated. This experience was one of the main reasons why the leadership of Czech policy shifted gradually from the conservative Old Czechs to the radical Young Czechs. The national conflict, not only in the Bohemian lands, had moved again to a higher level.127 The fall of the unlucky Hohenwart after a brief intermediate regime of a few weeks was followed by appointment of the cabinet of Prince Adolf Auersperg, which put much constructive legislation on the statute books. At least in one respect the demise of the Hohenwart cabinet was to be regretted. With the prime minister went also his minister of commerce, the Suabian professor of economics, Albert Schaffle, who was also the prime minister’s adviser on problems of nationalism. Schaffle had the repu¬ tation of being antiliberal, and this supposed quality undoubtedly en¬ deared him to the archconservative Count Hohenwart. Yet he was anti¬ liberal only in the sense of an outdated Manchester liberalism. He pro¬ posed the transformation of the socially unrepresentative estates diets into corporate bodies which should give adequate representation to peasants, small business, crafts, and labor at the expense of the aristocratic landowners and big business. Schaffle may be criticized for perceiving these changes only in the frame of corporate ideas. Nevertheless he had more social understanding than his liberal adversaries. He had a better grasp of the problems of nationalism too and hoped for a genuine compro¬ mise between all national groups in the Western part of the empire. If that could be accomplished he had little doubt, Hungary would even¬ tually be forced to follow suit. For that reason he had to quit with Hohenwart; he returned to Germany where he rounded out a distin¬ guished scholarly career.128 127 Munch, Bohmische Tragodie, pp. 345-363; Kann, Nationalitatenproblem, I, 177-185, 414-416. 128 Albert E. Schaffle, Aus meinem Leben, 2 vols. (Berlin, 1905), see I, 172-256, II, i-iii. On the outcome of the crisis see also Friedrich Ferdinand Count Beust, Aus drei viertel Jahrhunderten, 2 vols. (Stuttgart, 1887), I, 465-540. Friedrich Prinz, “Die bohmischen Lander von 1848 bis 1914,” in Karl Bosl, ed., Handbuch der Geschichte der bohmischen Lander (Stuttgart, 1967), III, 135-154.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

361

Schaffle thus became a victim of the multi-national conflict, and the same was true for the Auersperg cabinet. Despite the merits of Prince Adolf Auersperg and some members of his cabinet the ministry was largely responsible for its eventual downfall of long-lasting consequences. The Auersperg cabinet had natural enemies in conservative clericals and con¬ servative aristocratic landowners, largely of Slavic nationality. It lost also the decisive support of the crown in 1878, when it opposed the occupation of Bosnia-Hercegovina. Such attitude would have been farsighted if it had been based on the idea, that an expansion into the Balkans would lead in the long run to a confrontation with Russia. The main argument of the liberals, however, was different, namely that the occupation with the acquisition of territories with Slavic population would endanger the precarious leadership of the Germans in Austria. The over-all motivation was only to a small part one of caution in foreign policy but above all one of national arrogance. One would see too much wisdom in Emperor Francis Joseph as ruler, in assuming that this was the reason why he ac¬ cepted Auersperg’s resignation. The emperor perceived in the German liberal policy, which he did not favor anyway on conservative ideological grounds, a stab-in-the-back attitude, in the face of what he believed to be a chance of enhancing the empire’s shaken power position. He never forgave the liberals for this. When the elections, held under the provi¬ sional cabinet Stremayr in summer of 1879, turned against the liberals— some 140 liberals and progressives against about 160 German-CzechPolish conservatives—the emperor gladly turned over the government to the conservative friend of his youth, Count Taaffe. His regime of four¬ teen years’ duration, the longest in Austrian history from the fall of Metternich to 1918, was mainly based on German clerical conservative and Czech and Polish conservative support. None of these groups opposed the occupation. The Czechs and Poles endorsed it, because it would strengthen the position of the Slavs in the empire. Furthermore, they as well as the German conservative-clerical opposition now saw a chance to terminate the rule of the hated liberal regime. There were still occa¬ sionally liberal members in Austrian cabinets, not even excluding that of Taaffe himself; yet not only German liberalism but liberalism altogether, seen as powerful ideology, had permanently disappeared from the Aus¬ trian political scene. This was the fault of the German liberals themselves, but also it was a symptom of the times, whose new political trends moved in the direction of political intolerance and prejudice. The liberal regime, which had governed in Austria with short intermissions or almost twelve years with fair success, became thus more the victim of the intolerance

362

History of the Habsburg Empire

of others than of its own limitations in regard to nationalist and social issues. This was the tragedy of Austrian liberalism well beyond the German orbit.129 d) GOVERNMENT IN HUNGARY

The liberal regime in Hungary, though even more unrepresentative than its counterpart in Austria, introduced some valuable legislation un¬ der the leadership of the prime minister, Count Andrassy, and the pa¬ tronage of Francis Deak. In regard to the Hungarian nationality law of 1868, credit belongs chiefly to the minister of public instruction, Joseph von Eotvos, one of the foremost students of the nationality problems of the Habsburg monarchy, Eotvos believed that its solution rested in a federa¬ tion of the traditional historic entities on the top and an ethnic adminis¬ trative organization on the county and community levels. These ideas de¬ veloped in the writings of this enlightened man in the 1850’s could not be materialized in the new Nationality law of 1868 in the face of rising Magyar nationalism (Statute XLIV). The law recognized the right of individuals to their own national language in Church, elementary and intermediate schools, and intercourse with government agencies. It was tied to the status of the individual and did not acknowledge the existence of national groups as political bodies anchored in public law. Nevertheless this statute should not be dismissed in comparison with Article 19 of the Austrian constitutional law 142 of 1867. There the reference to Stdmme— absent in the Hungarian legislation—implied recognition of national groups only in a very superficial manner. The main difference between the Austrian and Hungarian nationality legislation was rooted in admin¬ istrative and judicial practice, not in the letter of the law. The Austrian practice, particularly the interpretation by the Reichsgericht and adminis¬ trative court was admittedly far more liberal than the methods used by the Hungarian administration, enforced lamely by Hungarian courts. Had Eotvos’ and Deak’s spirit prevailed, the Hungarian treatment of na¬ tional groups might not have been inferior to that administered by the Austrian authorities. As it were, the lesser successors of these two men interpreted the concept of equality of all members of the Hungarian nation as meaning that the non-Magyar national groups in Hungary 129 On the liberal legislative record see Kolmer, Parlament und Verfassung, I, 253-403, II passim; Richard Charmatz, Osterreichs innere Geschichte von 1848iqoy, 2 vols. (Leipzig, 1909-1911), see I, 84-140, II, 1-10; on the liberal policy con¬ cerning the occupation of Bosnia-Hercegovina see Plener, Erinnerungen, I, pp. 90-

r43*

it

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

363

would be treated as equal only if they assimilated, indeed merged, with Magyarism. Magyar national policy was free from racism in so far as it i

did not base the unequal treatment of minorities on ethnic ancestry but

(T< •

on the demand to give up national identification and accept uncondi¬ tional conversion to Magyarism. Within these terms the system was

V

willing to recognize equality of all Hungarian citizens, without further

C>:

consideration of ethnic-racial origin. That this principle, too, violated the

IF right of individuals to preserve their national character, particularly if enforced by discrimination and police chicanery, was neither understood by the great Kossuth nor by his small pseudo-liberal successors.130 The second major national law passed in this era was the HungarianCroatian Compromise (Statute XXX) of the same year. Like the AustroHungarian Compromise, it represented the union between two states, who had the ruler and some institutions in common. Unlike the Com¬ promise of 1867 it was not a real union between equals but officially be¬ tween unequal states. As for affairs common to Austria and Hungary, Croatia was represented in the Hungarian delegation. As for common Hungarian-Croatian agenda originally,131 after the incorporation of the Military Frontier, forty Croatian deputies represented the historic land in the deliberations and the voting of the Hungarian parliament when¬ ever joint agenda were at issue. In either case they could be outvoted by the Magyar majority. Common Hungarian-Croatian affairs—in effect, affairs, where the influence of the Magyar majority proved decisive—in¬

i

cluded taxation, general conscription, defense, commercial treaties, and

>

communications. The autonomy of Croatia was restricted to general in¬ ternal administration, education, and judicial affairs. Even here the status

»

of the Croatian chief executive, the banus in Zagreb, amounted to a major restriction of Croatia’s autonomy. Although he was responsible to the Croatian Sabor, his appointment by the king required approval of the Hungarian parliament. Usually, therefore, the banus was a Magyar, sometimes of nationalistic tendencies. Frequently he played the divideand-conquer game between Croats and Serbs in Croatia-Slavonia. Thus the Croatian autonomy was limited.132 Still, the extension of such 130 Guldescu in Eterovich and Spalatin, eds., Crotia, II, 47-60; Macartney, A Short History of Hungary, pp. 171-187; Kann, N ationalitatenproblem, I, 128-135, 396-400. On Eotvos see ibid, II, 101-107, 327-329; Johann Weber, Eotvos und die ungarische Nationalitatenfrage (Munich, 1966), pp. 135-149. On Deak see Steinbach, Franz Dea\, pp. 29-34. 131 Croatia was also represented by several members in the Upper House. 132 Bogdan Krizman, “The Croatians in the Habsburg Monarchy in the 19th Century,” in Austrian History Yearbook^, 111:2 (1967), 128-133; Kosary, History of

364

History of the Habsburg Empire

autonomy to the other non-Magyar groups would have gone a long way to calm the national conflict in Hungary. Other legislation passed during the Andrassy-Deak era was less con¬ troversial. A Hungarian educational law of 1868 was in many ways similar to the Austrian Reichsvolksschulgesetz of 1869. The same simi¬ larities are reflected in the Austrian Wehrgesetz (defense law) of 1868 (revised 1889) and the Hungarian defense legislation of the same year including the establishment of a Hungarian

national

militia

(the

Honveds). In 1869 administration and justice were finally separated in Hungary. With the replacement of Andrassy as prime minister by Count Melchior Lonyai in 1871, the liberal regime in Hungary became more shady in character. Neither Lonyai nor his successors up to the appointment of Kalman Tisza had the authority of Andrassy, the revered revolutionary of 1848. Nor did they have the backing of the great old man of Hun¬ garian politics, Francis Deak. He gradually withdrew from the political scene and died in 1876. The boom-and-bust spirit with its inevitable by¬ product of corruption, which ended in Austria with the great crash of 1873, existed also in Hungary. The liberals lost in prestige. Except for the enactment of the new code of criminal law in 1878 not much construc¬ tive legislation was passed between the resignation of Andrassy as Hungarian prime minister and the year 1879. Tisza, however, managed to steer a middle course between Independents to the left who repudiated the Compromise, revisionists in the center, who wanted to change it, and clerical conservatives to the right, who fully endorsed it. After the death of Deak and Eotvos in the 1870’$ all these groups were implicitly agreed on a policy of intransigent Magyar nationalism in a semiliberal dressing. Unlike conditions in Austria there existed, however, no political groups on the Right strong enough to replace the liberal regime. Tisza’s economic and social policy had taken the wind out of the sails of Hungarian conservatism. As for the Left, the Independence party of 1848-1849 represented only a relatively small minority. Yet Tisza by making skillful use of the loud but insignificant opposition to the right and left, could pretend that his policy represented a concession to the king-emperor and the Austrian government. In reality, however, the Compromise in military, financial, and above all foreign affairs fully pro-

Hungary, pp. 288-290; Kann, Nationalitatenproblem, I, 131-132, 398; Peselj, “Der

ungarisch-kroatische Ausgleich vom Jahre 1868,” in P. Berger, ed., pp. 169-185. On the Hungarian-Croatian Compromise see also note 107 of this chapter.

Standstill, Decline, Stabilization

365

tected the political and economic interests of the peculiar brand of Magyar national liberalism.133 G.

THE

END OF AN ERA

In Austria, the year 1879 marked the fall of the liberals from power. No similar change occurred in Hungary, although by this time the false front of Magyar liberalism was fully exposed. Notwithstanding its grave shortcomings it had to be taken seriously under Andrassy, Deak, and Eotvos. The same was no longer true under Kalman Tisza. Mass move¬ ments comparable with those of Christian Socials, the Socialists, to a point even the Pan-Germans, almong the Austro-Germans, and the Young Czechs in Bohemia and Moravia did not yet exist in Hungary. On a more limited scale, however, Croatian national parties had begun to develop. Furthermore, an active nationalism in the lands of the Bohemian crown, in Serbia, and Roumania made it clear that Slovak nationalism in upper Hungary, Roumanian nationalism in Transylvania, and Serb na¬

I

tionalism in the Banat, the Vojvodina, and Croatia could not be ignored. Concerning foreign affairs the conclusion of the Dual Alliance of 1879 between Austria and Germany made it clear that the built-in GermanMagyar privileged status established by the Compromise of 1867 was now protected in international relations as well. The Austro-German alliance was dependent on German-Magyar leadership in the Habsburg mon¬ archy. At the same time the alliance meant that Austria-Hungary was shielded from the threat of Panslavism under tsarist police auspices. If not checked by the Dual Alliance it might have led, as noted before, to the early dissolution of the empire, from which tsarist Russia presumably would have profited most. Germany in a Pan-German and Prussian militaristic spirit could have taken the rest. This danger appeared to be removed now. Germany could rely on Austro-German-Magyar leadership in the Habsburg empire. It did not have to rule in Austria, it could guide the empire by way of the more or less camouflaged predominance of these two national groups. This meant further that constitutional government in the dual monarchy would be secured after a fashion, though, from the point of national and social justice, a highly imperfect fashion. As it were, Austria-Hungary had the chance of peaceful constitutional and social development provided that fairly adequate national and above all social reforms would be introduced. These chances were largely missed. 133 Kosary, History of Hungary, pp. 182-304; Hanak in E. Pamlenyi, ed., VII, 379-390-

j66

History of the Hahshurg Empire

Finally, as will be discussed in Chapter VII, the end of the eighteen seventies also brought the decline of pseudoclassic epigone styles in literature, architecture, painting, sculpture, and music. The first traces of naturalism, realism, and functionalism had begun to evolve. An era came to its end, a new one had not yet taken its place, but it began to take shape.

CHAPTER VII Cultural trends from Late Enlightenment to Liberalism

(From mid-eighteenth

century to the i86o’s) Basic cultural trends are all-pervasive in time and place and therefore more or less simultaneous. They penetrate any country, any nation from various directions. The degree of intensity with which new ideas strike various national groups depends on the political and social status of such groups within a country. Exposure to new ideas may leave clearer traces within better-educated strata than within underprivileged ones. This does not mean that greater opportunities offered to one group will necessarily lead to greater or more lasting results. Many factors such as the spread of new ideas into a broader or narrower hinterland, the association with other cultural orbits, degrees of affinity to new mores and old traditions, problems of communications, above all the degree of linguistic develop¬ ment, determine the results. One factor cannot be overstated, namely the difference, and that means the different value judgments, in regard to various cultures. We cannot measure the quality of cultural achievements. We can only judge the intensity of their impact within an environment. The first main trend in Austrian intellectual history during the period under discussion was pragmatic enlightened reformism under Maria Theresa. After her death under Joseph II it changed into more rigid concepts. The turn of Josephinism to the right under Emperor Francis makes a distinction from genuine conservatism in theory rather difficult. In practice the gradual reversal of the reform policy is easier to see. Centralistic endeavors in the Josephin sense continued but they were in367

368

History of the Habsburg Empire

creasingly to serve reactionary designs. In other words conservatism in Austria was largely pragmatic in nature. It changed its character in Austrian intellectual history under the influence of romanticism into a movement of far greater philosophical depth. Romanticism in Austria became a highly original movement in its own right. Intellectual endea¬ vors in the Habsburg realms after the shortlived Renaissance era had, apart from the philosophy of the Church, existed mainly on the aesthetic side of general cultural developments in music and the fine arts. The purely intellectual contribution of the Austrian Enlightenment was limited. German classicism in literature and philosophy was a powerful stimulating force but its impact headed almost exclusively from outside. Romanticism, on the other hand, in particular in its historical proclivities, in a country deeply conscious of its traditions, developed there into a more original movement with wider social and political implications. One factor strengthened its influence further: the renaissance of the Slavic languages and literatures. The word “renaissance” is correct here because a rebirth or reconstruction of past values had occurred. It was, of course, not a revival of attainment in ancient history but of medieval history. Hence we face the cultivation of folklore, sagas, fairy tales, history of the Middle Ages, in other words everything that is dear to the romantic spirit. This was a genuine movement not only among the Slavs but also the Germans, Magyars, and the Latin peoples, who all returned to the dreams of the past, disillusioned by a partly true and partly seeming failure of enlightened rationalism and frustrated reforms. Still the core of the new tendencies was centered in the Slavic peoples and here these trends changed first their character. Romanticism repre¬ sented an important aspect of the movement and as such supplied the frame of the Slavic renaissance. But another tendency was the core of this renaissance: the national revolution of the Slavic peoples to come into their own rights. This was in essence a liberal revolution which strove for nationhood, inspired by the achievements of the French Revolution. Again it blended with a stream of similar endeavors among Germans, Magyars, and Latins. Neither the disappointments nor the stimuli of the Enlightenment were forgotten. The political-social demands were on the rise, the traditional historic, largely conservative ones merged with them, but their impact in the new combinations was on the decline. Liberalism was the product of the unequal mixture. It was clear-cut as far as the rights and duties of individual man were concerned. It was contradictory, as was romanticism, in its social aspects. With the advance of urbanization

From Late Enlightenment to Liberalism

369

and technology these contradictions were more markedly felt. In literature and philosophy a new realism came in its own, but one which saw the objectives of and limits to the desired expansion of the rights of political man in the maintenance of a social order by means of minor, corrective but not basic changes. We have thus far referred to changes in intellectual history, which means in our context primarily literature and philosophy. To some extent these observations hold true also for music, theatre, the fine arts, and other cultural activities. However, their development is to a much higher degree dependent on external conditions than purely literary efforts. Con¬ sequently they are more strongly bound by tradition than intellectual changes. Major exceptions in regard to the greatest achievements not¬ withstanding, these disciplines were still strongly penetrated by the spirit of the Baroque and Rococo, at a time when in general in literature and philosophy the Enlightenment had become dominant. Subsequently when Biedermeier, the Austrian bourgeois form of classicism, prevailed in the formative arts, Romanticism became prevalent in the humanities. In fact, the fine arts never developed an original romantic style, but turned to eclectic patterns of historic styles. Only by the end of the nineteenth century, after the liberal era had passed, did the fine arts create again original patterns of their own. In music, such original patterns had existed during the romantic era and continued to exist thereafter. These observations are not based on value judgments. Cultural activities are responsive to intellectual changes but they do not develop at the speed of abstract mental processes. Out of this incongruity evolves the pluralistic character of a colorful civilization with many facets. Yet with whatever branch of cultural activities we deal in this survey, we are con¬ cerned with trends illustrated by the endeavors of men and not with a roll call of the great men and their achievements in Austrian cultural history. Within the very limited range of personalities which can be referred to here a more illustrious name may have to yield to a lesser one if the latter characterizes better prevailing trends. We will consider the relationship of individuals to the Habsburg em¬ pire and within the empire to individual national groups. Personalities born within the empire will be discussed, as well as immigrants from other countries if their residence in Habsburg lands made a cultural contribu¬ tion. In both cases, self-identification of an individual with a national orbit rather than the language used by him will be the chief determining factor for inclusion.

History of the Habsburg Empire

370 A.

a)

The Austro-German orbit

HUMANITIES, SOCIAL SCIENCES, NATURAL SCIENCES

It is not so much the privileged position which the Germans enjoyed exclusively until 1867 and in a more limited sense until 1918 but the extent of the German-language territory which secured them a leading position in so many cultural fields. Furthermore the principles of im¬ perial, aristocratic, and ecclesiastic patronage favored the Germans in the fine arts and music. To the extent to which scholarship was concentrated in the universities, learned societies, and ecclesiastic institutions of higher learning, those close to the capital, Vienna, were favored by greater gov¬ ernmental support than educational establishments in other areas. This was also true for support of scholarly activities in the less formal setting of grants given to individuals by the sovereign or by wealthy aristocrats. The universities did not assume undisputed leadership in higher educa¬ tion until the second half of the nineteenth century. Before that they had been frequently, though meagerly, supported by various kinds of patron¬ age outside the academic domain. With the rise of the non-German national groups to a more widely recognized cultural life in all spheres of the public domain in the nine¬ teenth century, the German advantage diminished. The field, where German predominance was least obvious, is that of belles lettres, in which the greatness of national achievements was largely independent of a patronage system. The same could not be said for the humanities in a more restrictive sense. To take a few examples. The humanities in the late eighteenth century made little progress because of censorship in the Maria Theresan era and the utilititarian philosophy of the Josephin regime.1 In the postwar period of the Franciscan reign three unorthodox theologians, Bernhard Bolzano, Anton Gunther, and M. J. Fesl had only a limited influence on the edu¬ cation of academic youth. Bolzano, an enlightened rationalist, was dis¬ missed from his chair at the University of Prague. Of his students, M. }. Fesl, who taught at the seminary in Leitmeritz in northern Bo¬ hemia, was likewise a professed rationalist, however, with an affinity to Leibniz’s not entirely rationalistic theory of the monads. The Church placed his writings on the index and he himself was confined to a monastery. Gunther, the most original of this trio of priestly philosophers,

1 Robert

A. Kann, A Study in Austrian Intellectual History (2nd ed. New York,

1973) > PP- i46~258.

From Late Enlightenment to Liberalism

gyi

never obtained a teaching position. His philosophy, a strange combination of scholasticism with Cartesianism, was likewise ostracized by the Church, although Gunther escaped Fesl’s fate through revocation of his doctrines.2 He had been influenced by the Romantic Catholic intellectuals from Ger¬ many, such as Zacharias Werner, the former playwright, and Johann Emanuel Veith. Both had become ecclesiastic converts, the one from Protestantism, the other from Judaism. Both were much esteemed as preachers by a somewhat decadent society, attracted by their unusual background. The literary historian, aesthetic philosopher, and literary critic, Friedrich v. Schlegel, married to the daughter of Moses Mendels¬ sohn, was for a time employed in the state chancery like Metternich’s aides Friedrich von Gentz and Adam Muller. The Protestant Gentz and the circle of Catholic intellectuals, mostly converts, roughly between 1810 and 1830 added lustre to the sober atmosphere of Franciscan government. Yet several of these eminent men, who came from Germany and were attracted by the charming way of life of the Austrian capital, returned, disillusioned by its dreary intellectual climate.3 The situation looked better in the nonpolitical sphere. Ernst von Feuchtersleben, professor of medicine, but actually a student of the philos¬ ophical aspects of psychosomatic problems, taught unimpeded at the Uni¬ versity of Vienna. The Slavists, Batholomaus Kopitar, director of the Court (National) Library in Vienna and Franz von Miklosic, both of Slovene origin, made eminent contributions to comparative philology. The latter remained active well into the second half of Francis Joseph’s reign. Two great institutions of learning were established in the preMarch era and under Neoabsolutism. In 1847 the Academy of Sciences was organized, with a philosophic-historical section and a second one dedicated to research in the natural sciences—belatedly in comparison with similar institutions in other countries. In 1854 the Institute of Aus¬ trian Historical Research was founded; next to the Fcole des Chartes in Paris it became the foremost school for training in the auxiliary historical sciences. Its first director, Albert Jager, and Franz von Krones, an out¬ standing historiographer of Austrian history at the University of Graz, should be mentioned here. In the 1820’s, Graz, like Innsbruck, was re2 See particularly Winter, Romantismus, Restauration und Fruhliberalismus im dsterreichischen Vormarz, pp. 108-118, 139-144. See also Eduard and Maria Winter, Domprediger Johann Emanuel Veith und Kardinal Friedrich Schwarzenberg: Der Gunther Prozess in unveroflentlichten Briefen und A\ten (Vienna-Cologne, 1972),

passim and Eduard Winter ed., Der Bolzano Prozess (Berlin, 1944). 3 Winter, Romantismus, Restauration und Fruhliberalismus im dsterreichischen Vormarz, pp. 132-138.

372

History of the Habsburg Empire

stored to full university rank, which both institutions had lost under Joseph’s II policy of radical bugetary trimming. Jager, Krones, and the conservative historian of the Austrian revolution of 1848, Joseph A. von Helfert, properly belong in the Francisco-Josephin era. Helfert was not a scholar but a high official in the Ministry of Educa¬ tion. One of Jager’s eminent successors as director of the Austrian His¬ torical Institute at the University of Vienna, Theodor von Sickel, spent many years as director of the Austrian Historical Institute in Rome.4 In the social sciences the previously mentioned jurists and political scientists, Joseph von Sonnenfels, Karl von Martini (eminent also as philosopher of natural law), and Franz von Zeiller, the most creative of the Austrian codifiers of civil law, divided their lifework between academic duties and governmental consulting services. They were also entrusted with the specific training of an elite civil service class in the Theresianum. Zeiller’s as well as Gentz’s and Adam Muller’s main con¬ tributions were made in the Franciscan era. Gentz, apart from his role as diplomat, was a pioneer theorist in international relations; he was a sophisticated, though somewhat devious enlightened conservative. Adam Muller was an original social philosopher, whose conservatism influenced totalitarian theories of the future. The economist and social historian of revolutionary and postrevolutionary French history, Lorenz von Stein, professor at the University of Vienna in the early Francisco-Josephin era, on the other hand, held a more moderate position with much under¬ standing for radical movements.6 In the sciences and applied sciences the late Enlightenment brought only moderate progress. Worth mentioning are the contributions by the botanist Nicolaus J. Jaquin, succeeded by his son Joseph F. at the Uni¬ versity of Vienna; another pair of father and son were Joseph J. von Littrow and Karl L. von Littrow, both distinguished astronomers from the Franciscan to the early Francisco-Josephin era. Important were also the contributions of the military mathematician Georg von Vega, still in the late Enlightenment. The importance of technology was recognized by the establishment of the Polytechni\um in Graz in 1806 and the 4 Josef Nadler, Osterreichische Literaturgeschichte (Linz, 1948), pp. 262 f.; Alfred von Fischel, Der Panslawismus bis zum Welt\rieg (Stuttgart, 1919), pp. 125-130; Alphons Lhotsky, Osterreichische Historiographie (Vienna, 1962), pp. 133-173. 5 See particularly Golo Mann, Secretary of Europe: The Life of Friedrich Gentz, Enemy of Napoleon (New Haven, 1946), pp. 96-313 passim. Karl MendelssohnBartholdy, Friedrich von Gentz (Leipzig, 1867), pp. 29-126. On Adam Muller see Jakob Baxa, Adam Muller (Jena, 1930), pp. 299-379 and Hans Lang, Politische Geschichtsbilder zu Anfang des 19. fahrhunderts (Aarau, 1944), pp. 40-92. See also Ernst Griinfeld, Lorenz von Stein und die Gesellschaftslehre (Jena, 1910).

From Late Enlightenment to Liberalism

373

Technical University (Technische Hochschule) in Vienna in 1815. Tech¬ nological contributions were the invention of the screw propeller for steamships by Joseph Ressel in the late

i82o’s

and, as noted previously,

the construction of the Semmering railway, the first alpine mountain railroad by Karl v. Ghega in the 1850’s. In railway construction Austria could claim a “first” on the continent, namely, as mentioned in a different context, the opening of the horse-drawn railway between Linz in Upper Austria and Budweis (Budejovice) in Bohemia, in 1832; the first steam locomotive on an Austrian track was operated on a short stretch of the Northern railway in 1837. A combination of practical and theoretical achievements can be seen in the lifework of the geologist Eduard Suess, to whom Vienna owed its water supply system, which carried water from the Alps to the city. This spectacular achievement of applied science was completed by 1873. One of the greatest theoretical scientists of the earlier Francisco-Josephin era was Gregor Mendel (1822-1884), abbot of the Augustinian monastery in Brno (Briinn), Moravia, whose genetic research, the famous Mendelian laws, were not recognized in their full significance until two decades after his death. The greatest combined accomplishment of theoretical and applied re¬ search was the work of the Viennese School of Medicine. Its fame, from the i88o’s to the First World War generally overshadows earlier progress, although Leopold von Auenbrugger in the second half of the eighteenth century pioneered in the field of auscultation. Ignaz Semmelweiss from Buda in Hungary spotted the causes and indicated the prevention of {

puerperal fever. The anatomist Joseph Hyrtl, the pathologist Karl von

[

Rokitansky, the professor of internal medicine Joseph Skoda, the derma¬ tologist Ferdinand von Hebra, all active before 1848 and in the first half of Francis Joseph’s reign, were joined shortly after the revolution by the physiologist Ernst von Briicke. One of the most versatile scientists, he too contributed to what may be called the first flowering period of the Vien¬ nese medical school. It extended into the Francisco-Josephin era and led up in the i87o’s to the beginning of a new period of momentuous achieve¬ ments.6 b)

LITERATURE, THEATER, PRESS

There is a seemingly strange contradiction in the development of German-Austrian literature from the Enlightenment to the rise of a new 6Erna Lesky, Die Wiener medizinische Schule im Cologne, 1965), pp. 15-160.

19. fahrhundert

(Graz-

374

History of the Habsburg Empire

liberalism in the 1860’s. In the dynamic reform era under Maria Theresa and her sons literary achievements were hardly remarkable. Under the political quietism of the Franciscan and pre-March era and the coming neoabsolutist regime on the other hand, the arts made great progress. It was perhaps the result of a delayed action impact of the great creative efforts across the German borders. Only a generation after the main works of Lessing, Herder, and the early works of Goethe, Schiller, and Kleist were published, we see their distinct effect on Austrian literature. With the spread of Romanticism in Germany the interval between German cause and effect in Austria becomes much briefer and with the new rise of Austrian literature it eventually disappears entirely. Yet there remains something unexplainable about the great Austrian literary achievements. They point to various features of the national character. Could they be fully determined, intellectual history would be dreary and not the fas¬ cinating disicpline it is. Between the death of Abraham a Sancta Clara in 1709 and the rise of the most widely recognized Austrian classic, Franz Grillparzer (17911872) the major achievement of Austrian literature rested in the popular comedy, the Punch and Judy shows. Initially tolerated by Maria Theresa, their performances were gradually curtailed and eventually suppressed, largely through the influence of Sonnenfels, who lacked a sense of humor. The popular comedy had its shortcomings 7, but the dreary highbrow tragedies of Heinrich von Collin and Cornelius von Ayrenhoff in the later part of the eighteenth century and the early nineteenth century grew on more sterile ground.8 Grillparzer’s greatness as one of the fore¬ most writers of the German drama rests, indeed, not only on the peculiar combination of romantic, classic, and realistic features in his lifework, but on the fact that it could rise on Austrian grounds where he had no predeces¬ sor and very few successors of equal stature. His deep dissatisfaction with what he considered a political climate averse to any intellectual pursuits was linked to an equally profound attachment to his home grounds. In this respect the shy and introvert man represented the am7 Except for reasons of clarification in some specific cases these notes are not meant to refer to individual artists, however great, but rather to general trends. In this respect Deutsch-dsterreichische Literaturgeschichte, 2 vols., ed. Johann W. Nagl, Jakob Zeidler and Eduard Castle (Vienna, various editions), offers the most reliable and comprehensive, though not the most sophisticated presentation. 8 See Otto Rommel, Die Alt-Wiener V ol\s\omodie (Vienna, 1957); Joseph Gregor, Geschichte des osterreichischen Theaters (Vienna, 1948), pp. 112-148; Reinhard Urbach, Die Wiener Komodie und ihr Publi\um: Stranitz\y und die Folgen (Vienna, 1973); Kann, A Study in Intellectual History, pp. 202-224.

From Late Enlightenment to Liberalism

375

bivalent Austrian national character. He may be considered as the out¬ standing genuinely Austrian writer also in an imperial sense. Several of his best plays deal with themes not only of Austro-German but Czech and Magyar history. In regard to this topical range of his historical plays he has no equal in the history of Austro-German literature. Typically Austrian, in different ways, were also two contemporary playwrights of high rank, both actors by profession. Ferdinand Raimund (1790-1836), a comedian with romantic-sentimental tendencies, a keen sense of humor, and poetic gifts, wanted to become a classical tragedian. He did not fully succeed because of his limited education. His outstanding achievements as popular, poetical playwright meant little to him. Johann Nestroy (1801-1862), the other comedy writer and actor, was less senti¬ mental and poetic in his inclinations but he was a superlative student of the human character, a social critic, and an outstanding satirist. The antiintellectualism of the pre-March era lent itself particularly well to satire. The deficiencies of government and the rigid class society offered a challenge to such attacks, yet oppressive measures were not sufficiently brutal to quell subtle opposition. Most writers during the pre-March era and the early reign of Francis Joseph might be called moderate or cau¬ tious liberals, such as the playwright Eduard von Bauernfeld and the aristocrat Count Anton Alexander Auersperg who wrote under the pseudonym Anastasius Grim. A warm friend of Slovene cultural en¬ deavors, he turned against the Slovenes as soon as their nationalism began to oppose the rule of the German minority in Carniola. Friedrich Halm (Baron Mimch-Bellinghausen), a somewhat shallow playwright but one time a competitor of Grillparzer, is forgotten today, but Friedrich Hebbel (1813-1863) who came to Vienna from the German north has main¬ tained his stature as powerful though somewhat coldly intellectual dra¬ matist. His most interesting diaries show him from a more humane angle. Ludwig Anzengruber (1839-1889), a liberal of anticlerical ten¬ dencies, possessed only modest poetic gifts but he introduced the social drama into Austrian literature. Outstanding was the melancholic lyric and writer of grand epics, Niko¬ laus Lenau (1802-1850), who came from Hungary but developed into a master of the German language. Of all great Austrian poets he was the only true, radical revolutionary. The most outstanding prose writer of the time was Adalbert Stifter (1805-1868). None before him and none after him brought nature to life the way he did. Like Grillparzer’s plays, Stifter’s prose transcends the Austro-German orbit. One of his two novels, Witikp, deals with Czech history in the high Middle Ages. Uniquely

376

History of the Hahshurg Empire

harmonious in his work, Stifter, like Grillparzer, Lenau, and Raimund, was a deeply unhappy man. He ended his life in suicide. As seen in these brief observations, dramatic literary production and with it the theater rank high in Austrian culture. Joseph II had founded the Burgtheater as court theater and, more important, as Deutsches Nationaltheater, in 1776. It maintained its reputation as the leading German repertoire theater for more than a century and continues to hold a dis¬ tinguished rank to this day. It served as a unique bond between aristoc¬ racy, cultivated bourgeoisie, and intellectuals.9 Considering the censorship, at least the first-mentioned two groups were served relatively well by the Austrian press. A Staatszeitung of 1724 evolved into the Wiener Zeitung of 1780, a local gazette but with literary tendencies still cultivated today. The Presse founded in 1848 became the mouthpiece of the liberal bourgeoisie. Gradually it was superseded by the Nene Freie Presse founded in 1864, a journal internationally known and respected on account of its excellent correspondents and literary contribu¬ tors, but edited by journalists of rather limited social understanding and political outlook. The Vaterland, founded in i860, represented Catholic conservative tendencies but after 1874 revealed more insight into social problems than the liberal press.10 under the influence of a new editor, Karl von Vogelsang. c)

MUSIC

Classical music in Austria reached high levels sooner but more gradually than literature. It would be presumptuous to review it here in a few pages, except for some brief remarks about the external conditions under which it evolved. The fact that the Italian opera beginning with Leopold I and orchestral music even under Maximilian I were largely sponsored by court and aristocracy, played a restrictive role for a long time. The Italian Pietro Metastasio in the eighteenth century held a middle position be¬ tween court poet and court composer of Emperor Charles VI. His can¬ zonets had much musical charm and his melodrama showed originality. But his contemporary, Ch. W. von Gluck, the composer of operas and orchestral music, was a greater artist. His “Orpheus and Eurydice” is one of the early but greatest operatic works of all times. Gluck could not have achieved what he did, had he not had some security as court conductor 9 See Rudolf Lothar, Das Wiener Burgtheater (Leipzig, 1899); Gregor, Geschichte des osterreichischen Theaters, pp. 149-195. 10 Kurt Paupie, Handbuch der osterreichischen Pressegeschichte 1848-1859 (Vienna, 1966), I, 1-12.

{

From Late Enlightenment to Liberalism

y>yy

for a time. Mozart, on the other hand, received practically no support from the puritan Joseph II who considered his own love for music a luxury if not a vice. Austria’s greatest composer died at the age of thirtyfive in 1791 after a hectic life which not for a single day of his adulthood had been free of worries about the livelihood of his family. Joseph Haydn is an example of a great artist who, until his fame as composer was generally recognized, owed a modest degree of security to music-loving artistocrats, above all the Esterhazys whose orchestra he conducted. In Beethoven’s life the support by aristocrats and in particular by Emperor Francis’ brother, Cardinal Archduke Rudolf, was un¬ doubtedly important. Schubert, perhaps the most genuinely Austrian among the greatest composers, lacked support entirely and died in misery. Of these five greatest—Gluck, Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, and Schubert— all of whom spent the best part of their creative life in Austria, Gluck and Beethoven were not born Austrians, and in a strictly legal sense Mozart, born as subject of the then sovereign Prince Archbishop of Salzburg was not either. The fact that Austria and particularly Vienna became the rally¬ ing point for the greatest composers, irrespective of their native country, added to the glory of the city.11 Why Vienna became the center cannot be logically deduced. Equal and perhaps superior sponsorship of music existed also at German and Italian courts. Attractions of scenery and a receptive spirit of the people existed in other places as well, and as to interest in musical innovations Vienna was and is more conservative than other centers of music. Tradition and musical receptiveness rather than full understanding on the part of the population were important factors which merely help to explain the set¬ ting for a unique phenomenon, whose core remains unexplainable. d) FINE ARTS

In the fine arts, especially architecture, the impact of external conditions was more obvious. The Baroque, and its derivative the Rococo, were primarily styles expressing the monumental pessionate, and later elegant in the service of court, aristocracy, and the Church. The Baroque’s last great representative in Austria is the Schonbrunn Palace in Vienna, 11 The evaluation of Mozart as Austria’s greatest composer is based on the assumption that Beethoven might be considered a German. Essentially the ques¬ tion of Mozart’s and Beethoven’s national affiliation and their comparative great¬ ness is a mute one. The following references are, of course, not meant to refer to musical analyses but exclusively to the relationship of the composers to their Austrian environment. See Heinrich Kralik, Das Buck der Musi\freunde (Vienna, 1951) and Karl Kobald, Wo unsterbliche Musi\ entstand (Vienna, 1950).

3j8

History of the Habsburg Empire

planned by the elder Fischer von Erlach and completed by Nicola Pacassi. In the late Maria Theresan era a French-influenced Rococo style came to the fore, which however, frequently revealed original classic features. The Gloriette pavilion by Ferdinand von Hohenberg, on a hill overlooking the formal Schonbrunn gardens, and the building of the old university (now the Academy of Sciences) by N. Jadot de Ville Issey are examples of the decorative and graceful but no longer monumental style. Two of the last of the great fresco painters following the Baroque tradition were Anton F. Maulbertsch and the Italian G. Guglielmi. J. M. Schmidt (the so-called Kremser Schmidt) adopted also the Baroque tradition of dramatic presentation of religious subjects. Martin van Meytens, a portrait painter, deviated from the grand style; in sculpture, Franz Messerschmidt and Wilhelm Byers under Maria Theresa and in particular Franz Anton von Zauner under the young Emperor Francis moved toward a less pretentious style which, on occasion, as the monu¬ ment of Joseph II by Zauner shows, has noble austerity. From Joseph II to the revolution of 1848, when frequently shallow replicas of historical designs came into vogue, this pattern of noble and harmonious simplicity and gracefulness led to felicitous artistic creations. Nevertheless this thoroughly original style of neoclassical dignity has not received its full recognition to this day. The Military Medical Academy (I. Cannavale) and the general hospital built under Joseph II in Vienna are masterpieces of the new style. They are also monuments of the social philosophy of the emperor. The gate of the outer Burg square in Vienna by Peter von Nobile and the Schotten monastery by Josef Kornhausl, both built during the reign of Francis, are like the Fries (Pallavicini) palace, also designed by Hohenberg, further landmarks of this harmonious and dignified architecture. New vistas were opened in painting. The Nazarene school of religious subjects, represented in particular by Julius Schnorr von Carolsfeld and Joseph von Fiihrich in the pre-March era are less monumental but reveal more feeling than many Baroque paintings, and the eminent Moritz von Schwind (1804-1871), a more imaginative and subtle fresco painter than his Baroque predecessors, excelled in that particular technique. Schwind was also a genre and landscape painter of warmth and charm. In this latter respect he was matched by Ferdinand Waldmuller and later by the highly original Anton Romako, who moved almost imperceptibly toward expressionist tendencies. Friedrich Amerling, Joseph Kriehuber, and in a sense also August von Pettenkofen represented the art of portrait painting in the pre-March and earlier Francisco-Josephin eras. Here, too, a new

From Late Enlightenment to Liberalism

379

bourgeois style of more modest designs but wider appeal gradually re¬ placed the courtly tradition.12 B.

The Magyars

a) LITERATURE

Hungarian intellectual history throughout the Enlightenment lacks somewhat the strong national spirit which had sustained it in general throughout the preceding stormy centuries. The challenge to survival of a proud small nation surrounded by different ethnic groups, ceased to be effective for most of the eighteenth century. This was less a consequence of the peace of Szatmar of 1711, which the Habsburgs imposed on the Hungarian insurrectionists than of the denationalizing western influence of the times. It strengthened the impact of the western-oriented part of the aristocracy and learned professions, secular and clerical. It diminished that of the national nobility and the burghers in the towns. Altogether the small base of the political nation became apparent, from which not only the non-Magyar half of Hungary was excluded but also the major part of the Magyar population itself, the unfree peasants. Peace with the crown had its social and political advantages, but at the end of Maria Theresa’s reign many nobles, and not only the Magyar aristocrats at the court in Vienna, were hardly in full command of the national language. Ecclesiastic and Church-influenced writers on the Catholic and the Protestant sides countered foreign influence, among them the Jesuit priest Ferenc Faludi, a lyric poet of distinction, Janos Illei, a representative of the Jesuit school drama, and Peter Apor (16761752), a Transylvanian noble, author of the Metamorphosis Transylvaniae. This historiographer of Transylvanian social history deplored the decline of national mores under Habsburg rule. The writer of Calvinist church songs, Paul Raday, worked for the peace of Szatmar of 1711, and hoped for further reconciliation with the Habsburgs through the Pragmatic Sanction. Gyorgy Bessenyei (1742-1810) represented the French influence of the tragedie classique and the doctrinaire utilitarian character of en¬ lightened reformism. Laurence von Orczy (1718-1789), an imperial general, likewise exemplified the French school in the form of his poetry, but this literary style was merely the setting of his plea for the revival of the Magyar mores and values of old. The spirit of national revivalism, brought about largely as protest 12 Hans Tietze, Wien (Leipzig, 1918); Konrad Kaiser, ed., Romanti\ und Realismus in Osterreich (Schweinfurt, 1968); Rupert Feuchtmiiller and Wilhelm Masch, Biedermeier in Osterreich (Vienna, 1963),

380

History of the Habsburg Empire

against the denationalizing policies of Joseph II, made itself clearly felt now. It expressed itself at the end of the eighteenth century and in the first decades of the nineteenth according to the patterns of a new classicism which became oriented toward the Latin rather than the earlier eighteenthcentury French tradition. The Pauline priest Benedikt Virag, a lyric of rank who with some exaggeration was referred to as the Hungarian Horace should be mentioned here. Jan Bacsanyi (1763-1845), head of the literary circle at Kassa (Kosice, Kaschau) in Slovak territory, stood for the breakthrough from the French to the national revolutionary spirit, albeit still in Latinized form. Though only at the fringe involved in the Martinovics Jacobin conspiracy, he remained a political suspect all his life to the authorities, was sent to jail, reprieved, rearrested, and exiled to Austria, where he spent the rest of his life under police supervision. In his esthetic and critical writings even more than in his poetry he should be seen as a vanguard of the coming new national revolution. Alexander von Kisfaludy (1772-1844), a highly educated officer in the noble guard, represented the national spirit in a more conformist manner. A poet of love poetry, he became also a national tragedian, who selected the topics of his plays from Hungarian history. They were performed in Magyar in Buda in 1790, long before the Hungarian national theater opened in Pest in 1837. The national historical drama was in the preMarch era the great vogue. It was inspired by a patriotic and poetic spirit rather than by concern with historic accuracy. No wonder—the scholarly standards of the national historians of the earlv nineteenth century, such as Istvan Kulcsar, Isaias Buday, and Istvan Horvath were not very high. The Hungarian reform period, for ever associated with the inspiring name of Count Istvan Szechenyi, the founder of the Hungarian Academy of Science (1825) furthered socio-economic, cultural and in our particu¬ lar context literary activities widely and steered skillfully a course which prevented serious molestations by the police regime of the restoration and pre-March eras. Not all new literature was politically oriented. Foreign classicism and Romanticism had primarily an artistic influence on Magyar literary endeavors. This latter aspect is illustrated by the outstanding translations of works of Shakespeare, Moliere, and Goethe by the lin¬ guistic reformer Ferenc von Kazinczy (1759-1831). Just the same, the thrust of his predominantly literary interests could not protect him under the Franciscan regime. Because of his involvement in the Martinovics conspiracy Kazinczy was condemned to capital punishment. His sen¬ tence was commuted, and he spent years in various prisons including the notorious Spielberg in Briinn,

j.

From Late Enlightenment to Liberalism

381

Increasing familiarity with the foreign classics, the rise of national ;

consciousness during the reform period, the influence of contemporary

I

romanticism, and the desire that the cultural nation should transcend the

I

narrow frame of the political one, led to the rise of a new realism with

I

{

wider popular appeal. Karoly Kisfaludi (younger brother of Alexander), the founder of a new literary almanac, Aurora, in 1822, represented these new trends as national playwright, and writer of epics and songs. Jozsef Katona exemplified them as tragedian, whose interests were focused on Hungarian medieval history. The national epic and the national historical drama were the concerns of the poet Mihaly Vorosmarty (1800-1855), who was actively, deeply, and tragically involved in the Magyar war of independence of 1848-1849. His epic Zaldn s flight, which glorifies the conquest of Hungary by the Magyars in the ninth and tenth centuries, became a symbolic centerpiece of the new revolutionary, national spirit. Its equivalent in lyrics was Vorosmarty’s famous Szozat (manifesto) of 1837, which became the lyrics of the national anthem; it symbolizes in sublime language the destiny of “the Hungarian rock surrounded by the Teutonic-Slavic sea.” The Transylvanian aristocrat Baron Miklos Josika, referred to as the Hungarian Walter Scott, was a novelist of distinction even though his works are out of date today. He, too, was actively involved in the tragedy of 1848-1849. The same held true for Baron Jozsef Eotvos (1813-1871), mentioned earlier as one of the great Magyar political thinkers of all time. Political reformer, minister of education briefly in 1848 and then again from 1867 to 1871, and largely responsible for the well-intended but poorly administered Hungarian nationality legislation of 1868, Eotvos was also a poet and writer of social novels. A true humanitarian and advocate of emancipation of the peasants, Eotvos was sceptical about the blessings of Enlightenment and democracy, though he remained opposed to aristo¬ cratic prejudices. Baron Zsigmond Kemeny, novelist, journalist, and ed¬ itor, likewise involved in the revolution, did much to extricate Magyar Hungary from an enforced cultural isolation in the postrevolutionary period. Jointly with Vorosmarty, Alexander Petofi (1823-1849) represented the revolutionary spirit and the heroic revolutionary sacrifice. His colorful life as traveling actor, his romantic-patriotic lyrics, and his heroic death in the battle of Segesvar in the Hungarian war of independence, all com¬ bined to create the portrait of the national martyr-poet true to an ideal type. Yet Petofi like Kossuth was of non-Magyar descent. His father was of Serb and his mother of Slovak origin. As with Kossuth and other

History of the Hahshurg Empire eminent Magyars, this non-Magyar descent strengthened his desire to become a full-fledged Magyar and intensified his patriotism. He suc¬ ceeded and whatever may be said against the intolerance of Magyar na¬ tionalism, the fact that it could triumph within one generation is im¬ pressive. John Arany (1817-1882), like Petbfi of peasant stock, like him originally an actor, and like him also an ardent patriot, had the opportun¬ ity, not given to Petofi, to develop his life to the fullest as writer of poetry, epics, and ballads. The Transylvanian Pal Gyulay (1826-1909) represents the transition to the postrevolutionary generation. As poet, critic, and literary historian he offered a sober analytical self-appraisal of Magyar literature. Mor Jokai (1825-1904) was also actively engaged in the politics of the revolutionary era but as deputy decidedly a moderate. This swimming against the current during the last weeks of the republic in 1849 required as much courage as revolutionary activities. Jokai remained a moderate liberal inside and outside of parliament in the constitutional period after i860. He became the novelist of the war of independence and, his realistic novels opened a new era of social understanding in literature, although many of them are inferior. Imre Madach (1823-1864), the author of the monumental Magyar Faust drama “The Tragedy of Man” combined realistic and romantic features in his lifework. Michael Horvath became a widely known historian of the reform period and the war of indepen¬ dence. His literary qualifications were largely vitiated by the curse of Magyar historiography: a far too uncritical spirit of nationalism.13 b) MUSIC

In the eighteenth century, Hungarian folk music, particularly dance music, was more independent of western influences of the Enlightenment than literature. Orchestral music, performed in the palaces of the great feudal nobles, was primarily that of the Italian and German masters. Ferenc Erkel (1810-1893) was the first distinguished composer of Hun¬ garian national operas. His contemporary Franz Liszt (1811-1886) born close to the German-Magyar language border, as composer of orchestral, choral, and piano literature belongs more in the German than in the Magyar cultural orbit. But like Brahms he was indebted also to Hungar¬ ian folk music particularly the Czardas dance music and gipsy songs. But 13 See Johann H. Schwicker, Geschichte der ungarischen Literatur (Leipzig, 1888), pp. 202-833; Julius von Farkas, Die ungarische Romanti\ (Berlin, 1931); Andritsch, ed., JJngarische Geistesgeschichte, pp. 115-245.

From Late Enlightenment to Liberalism

383

the great era of Magyar music was still to come, closer to the end of the nineteenth century.14 c) FINE ARTS

Throughout the seventeenth century, the Hungarian Baroque produced some outstanding specimens of ecclesiastic architecture in Nagy-Szombat, Gyor, and Kassa. But its spread was impeded by the Turkish occupation and the dubious blessings of the wars of liberation (until the peace of Passarowitz in 1718), which also resulted in an extension in time of the Baroque period. In the early eighteenth century Domenico Martinelli reconstructed the royal castle in Buda in Baroque style, Lucas von Hildebrandt designed the palace of Prince Eugene of Savoy in Rackeve, and Carlo Martino Carlone built that of the Esterhazys in Eisenstadt (Kis Marton) somewhat earlier and in a less attractive design. A. Mayerhoffer built the Grassalkovich castle in Godollo; later a royal palace, it repre¬ sented the beginning transition from late Baroque to a French-inspired classicism. In the second half of the eighteenth century J. Fellner was the leading Magyar architect of the new style. He designed the seminary building in Eger (Erlau) and the episcopalian palace in Veszprem (StuhlweiBenburg). The new classicist style after the transition period is exemplified by the Protestant cathedral in Debrecen by Mihaly Pechy. More characteristic is the building of the Hungarian national museum in Pest by Mihaly Poliak, erected shortly before the revolution. This era was followed by that of the typical revived, but often inimitable neohistorical styles. The influence of foreign, particularly Italian and German masters was prevalent during the Baroque. The Magyar portrait painter Adam Manyoki in the first half of the eighteenth century was an exception. In the first half of the nineteenth century the foreign pseudo classicism of Thorwaldsen and Canova strongly influenced the Hungarian sculptor Istvan Ferenczy. On the other hand, the Magyar historical school of painting, which developed somewhat later, revealed a more original national style. Altogether, Hungarian Baroque culture, because of the feudal structure of estates, represented to a greater extent and for a longer time a courtly ecclesiastic and particularly aristocratic culture than Austrian Baroque. Furthermore, the long-lasting foreign domination served as a further impediment to the development of national patterns in the fine arts. 14 Zoltan Halasz, Ungarn (Budapest, 1966), pp. 381-392.

]84

History of the Hahsburg Empire

These depend to a greater extent on external conditions than the humani¬ ties and social sciences. By the turn from the nineteenth to the twentieth century, these formidable obstacles had been successfully overcome.15 C. a)

The Czechs

LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE

During the Enlightenment and the subsequent conservative era, well beyond the revolutionary intermission of 1848, the evolution of the Magyar language but for the brief Josephin era was not impeded by outside forces; the predominance of Latin in literary intercourse derived from the feudal structure and changed within the strictly Magyar orbit gradually without much friction. The development and use of the Czech language among educated people, on the other hand, was severely re¬ stricted after the battle of the*White Mountain. These conditions were only gradually lifted during the later enlightened era. Thus at a time when Magyar literature evolved in a wide range of poetry, plays, and epics, the Czechs had first to revise and to rebuild their national language. They did so successfully within about two generations. The differences in the pace of development referred to above disappeared within the second half of the nineteenth century. In the first half they still prevailed. In 1769 a learned society for the study of then so-called Bohemian, that is Czech, culture, was founded by the enlightened aristocrats Prince Karl Egon Fiirstenberg, Count Ernst Waldstein, Count F. J. Kinsky, and mainly Count Kaspar Sternberg. The mineralogist Ignaz von Born pro¬ vided the scientific background, the historian Franz Martin Pelzel en¬ riched cultural endeavors in the humanities and social sciences. The first really creative figure in the Czech Slavic renaissance was Josef Dobrovsky (1753-1829). Dobrovsky, a Jesuit priest before the dissolution of the order in

,

1773

later an abbe was for a time director of the seminary in Hradiste

(near Olomuc) but lived for much of his life in the house of an aristo¬ cratic sponsor, Count Francis Nostitz. He considered Czech to be his mother tongue but was aware that because of external suppression and clerical upbringing his command of the native language was limited. All the more impressive were his endeavors to correct that situation—en¬ deavors still for the most part formulated in German or Latin. Dobrovsky wrote an Old Slavic grammar in Latin, a pioneer history of the Bohemian 15 Ibid., pp. 362-372; Julius Pasteiner, “Die Baukunst in Budapest,” [Crownprince Rudolf], Die osterreichisch-ungarische Monarchic in Wort und Bild (Vienna, 1886-1903), Ungarn, III, 96-112, 417-421.

(

From Late Enlightenment to Liberalism

385

(

language and literature in German, another grammar focused on syntax in German as well as a dictionary of the German and Bohemian (Czech) language. Dobrovsky’s commanding position as Slavist is uncontested, in

£1 particular in the historic significance of his work in the field of general £ Slavic studies. The work of Josef Jungmann (1773-1847) had more specific philological value in regard to the Czech language. As prefect of the U Academic Gymnasium in Prague he wrote a textbook on style in Czech

a and translated several works by Milton, Pope, Goethe, and Chateaubriand ii into Czech. Much of his lifework was focused on the compilation of a Czech-German dictionary in five volumes. He also wrote a history of >£ Bohemian literature in Czech. Largely as a result of Jungmann’s efforts jf the authorities finally permitted the teaching of Czech in secondary j* schools, though not yet as language of instruction. In 1830 Jungmann y founded the association for the scholarly cultivation of the Bohemian lan¬

guage and literature. He was the first great Czech Slavist by scholarly, not by ideological and historical standards. Excessive nationalist zeal mis¬ led Vaclav Hanka (1791-1861), the librarian of the Bohemian Museum. He fabricated two allegedly early medieval manuscripts, the Kralovedvor
PP- 284" 310- Manfred Kridl, A Survey of Polish Literature and Culture (The Hague, 1967), pp. 317 L; Count Stanislaus Tarnowski, “Polnische Literatur” in [Crownprince Rudolf] Die osterreichisch-ungarische Monarchic, vol. Galizien, 591-648; Erasmus Piltz, ed., Poland (London, 1919), PP- 291-301; Czeslav Milosz, The History of Polish Literature (London, 1969), pp. 158-259. 23 Ladislaus Luszizkiewicz, “Architecture” in [Crownprince Rudolf] Die oster¬ reichisch-ungarische Monarchic, vol. Galizien, pp. 694-720 and Marian von Sokolski, “Malerei und Plastik”, ibid. pp. 745“77i24 Jointly with the Hungarian Carpatho-Ruthenians the most western branch of the Ukrainian people.

J92

History of the Hahsburg Empire

became prevalent and the Ruthenians lost the social and intellectual upper structure of their national group, including a large part of the clergy, to the Poles. The Uniate Church, established by the Union of Brest in 1596, opened Ruthenians a spiritual center, seemingly close enough to their own national tradition, but failed to open to her members the door to equal status in Polish society. In this respect they were not better off than the Ruthenians in the former Turkish Bukovina,25 where the old ortho¬ doxy continued to prevail. In the Hungarian Carpatho-Ukraine (the Ruthenian territory longest under Habsburg rule, and settled by Ruthe¬ nians in the late Middle Ages), opportunities for the development of na¬ tional life were even more limited than in eastern Galicia. Much of this changed during the reigns of Maria Theresa and Joseph II. Furthering of Ruthenian seminaries by both rulers in Vienna (1774) and Lwow (1783) and the establishment of the new Polish university in Lwow in 1784 with at least some offerings in the Ruthenian language enhanced the Ruthenian status. These concessions were withdrawn, how¬ ever, in the early nineteenth century, and teachings in Ruthenian on the academic level resumed only after 1848, on a limited scale. The same applied to conditions at the University of Czernowitz (Cernivtsi, Cernauti), founded in 1875. The Maria Theresan-Josephin Ruthenian policy and its continuation after the revolution of 1848, in which the Ruthenian claim for equality with the Poles played its part, helped to reverse the trends of denationalization among the Ruthenian people. In particular the struggle for the use of Ruthenian as language of instruction in public schools was of great significance. Simultaneous tensions in the Russian Ukraine, the nationalist intolerance of the Polish aristocracy and gentry, and the over-all influence of the Slavic renaissance were powerful con¬ tributing factors. These tentative successes of Ruthenian recognition could not imme¬ diately lead to major literary achievements. A new conflict, this time not between Ruthenian nationalism and the Polonization process, but between the western Uniate and the eastern Orthodox trends within the clergy, developed in the pre-March period. Supporters of the former, under the leadership of the vicar general of the archdiocese of Lwow, Gregor von Yakhimovych, defended the preservation of the Cyrillic alphabet against the pro-Polish wing, anxious to switch to Latin. At the same time, a conservative trend within the clergy stood for the old Slavic Church language, which meant indirectly communion with the eastern Orthodox Church and Russia. The course of the future however, was neither in a 25 Under Austrian administration after 1774.

From Late Enlightenment to Liberalism

393

Ruthenian liberal nationalism focused on east Galicia nor in a conservative old Ruthenian linked to tsarism, and least of all in accommodation to Polish culture. The objectives of future generations pointed to a broad Ukrainian cultural nationalism, clearly delineated from Habsburg or Romanov interests and ambitions. Whether they intended it or not, the first and second generation of Ruthenian literary men under Habsburg rule served this ultimate goal of Ruthenian-Ukrainian nationalism. Three friends, Markiian

Saskevyc

(1811-1843), Ivan Vahylevyc (1811-1866), and Iakiv Holovackyj (1814— 1888) deserve attention. Shashkevych, a Uniate priest, did for the Ruthe¬ nian people on a more ,elmentary level what the Slavists, Bobrovsky, Jungmann, and Safarik had done for the Czech people. Undoubtedly they and other Slavists had influenced Saskevyc’s lifework. In his collection of folksongs he used the Ruthenian idiom in Galicia. In 1843, Saskevyc and his friends, despite police chicaneries, published a literary almanac, Rusal ha Dnistrovaia, and also wrote poetry. Vahylevyc studied Ruthenian

history (especially literary history) and ethnography. He translated medie¬ val Ruthenian literature into Polish. Holovackyj was for a time professor of Ruthenian language and literature at the University of Lwow, where he was also concerned with the collection of folksongs. His leanings toward the Russians were the strongest among the three; accordingly he had to relinquish his chair eventually. Vahylevic represented a moderately pro-Polish position and Saskevyc the most definite Ruthenian one. All three, however—and in this sense they are not so much represen¬ tatives of Ruthenian as of Ukrainian nationalism—established close con¬ tacts with the rising Ukrainian national literature across the Russian border as represented above all by Ivan P. Kotlarewskyj (1769-1838) and the great Ukrainian classic Taras Shevchenko (1814-1861). Within a few decades they were followed by a group of writers, ethnographers, and historians. Whatever the political conflicts between imperial Austrian and Russian interests were, whatever the issues between Ukrainian, Ruthenian, and Russian nationalisms had become, however divisive denominational conflicts between Orthodoxy, Uniate, and Roman Catholic Church might have been, the literary Ukrainian union movement had become irresistible in the half century from the outgoing Enlightenment to the national revolution of 1848. It took only two more decades for this union movement to spread to the isolated Carpatho-Ukraine and to the Bukovina, where the new University of Czernowitz and the literary society Ruska Besida (1868) opened additional gates to cultural Ukrainian unionism. The Ruthenian-Ukrainian literary rise, more an awakening than a renaissance

History of the Habshurg Empire

394

movement, was one of the most successful crusades of Slavic cultural na¬ tionalism in the nineteenth century. Its success in east Galicia and the Bukovina were related to changes in the huge Ukrainian hinterland across the Russian frontiers. Such relationship to a majority of ethnic brethren across state boundaries was in itself by no means unique among the national groups in the Habsburg empire. Unique was, however, the joining in common cultural endeavors of two branches of a great nation which had been controlled for generations by alien authorities. The ex¬ perience of similar outside pressures led to similar cultural objectives.26 G.

The Southern Slavs

The cultural rise of the Southern Slav peoples in the Habsburg empire from the Enlightenment onward is as much associated with the Slavic renaissance as the rise of other Slavic peoples. What differentiated the Southern Slav renaissance movement from that of other Slavs was the direct, and not merely implied, relationship between endeavors for lin¬ guistic and literary union, and those for political union. Similar ideas, as noted before, existed also among Czechs and Slovaks, but not quite simul¬ taneously and in a less specific and politically less realistic sense than among the western Southern Slav nations, Croats, Serbs, and Slovenes. Yet even there, endeavors to achieve linguistic-literary union, did not mean cultural union and even less political union. The latter was brought about only in a most imperfect manner by the establishment of Yugoslavia in 1918.27 It took another generation and two world wars to establish a genuine though still imperfect federation on the basis of national equality. Linguistic- literary union has not been accomplished to this day although an accommodation between Croatian and Slovene literature has progressed gradually throughout the romantic stage of the Slavic renaissance and in a less spectacular way ever since. The rise of a true joint Serbo-Croatian literature coincided with the establishment of the first political union in 1918. It has not yet reached its goal. Nevertheless, this cultural union has come closer to materialization after 1918 and increasingly so after 1945. Southern Slav intellectual developments to this day may still be compre26 Emil Ohonowskij, “Ruthenische Literatur” (in Galicia) in [Crownprince Rudolf] Die osterreichisch-ungarische Monarchic, Vol. Galizien, pp. 652-664, Emil Kakuzniacki, “Die ruthenische Sprache und Literatur” (in Bukovina), Vol. Bu\owina, pp. 400-405; Michael Hrushevsky, A History of Ukraine (New Haven, I94I), PP- 47I_474> 487~493> 495~49827 In this respect, the declaration of Corfu on July 20, 1917 had only declaratory character.

From Late Enlightenment to Liberalism

395

hended largely as a separate process within each of the three nations. Up to 1918 separate analysis is necessary. a)

THE SLOVENES

The Slovenes (smallest of the Southern Slav national groups), pioneers in the translations of the gospels into a Slavic language at the time of the Reformation were pioneers also in grammatical development. The linguisdc studies by Adam Bohoric, published in the late eighteenth cen¬ tury, anchored the previously noted sixteenth-century Bible translations of Trubar and Dalmatin into a firm grammatical frame. The Counter Reformation had represented a standstill in linguistic development, al¬ though Jesuit influence in the cultivation of the drama and the spread of Italian Baroque opera music had modified the dangers of Slovene cultural isolation. An era of rapid advance began with the Enlightenment under Maria Theresa as result of the attempts to introduce general education on the elementary level. The consequences exceeded the modest original objec¬ tives. One cause was the French occupation of the so-called Austrian Illyrian territories (most of Carinthia, Carniola, Gorizia, Istria, Dalmatia, and southwestern Croatia-Slavonia) from 1809-1814. The French ad¬ ministration cemented the foundations of the relatively brief Austrian re¬ form era and advanced it in higher education. The short duration of this regime blunted tendencies to associate reforms with the impact of sup¬ pression by foreign governments. The Slavic linguistic renaissance was another most important factor in the cultural rise of the Slovenes. A literary almanac had been published in Ljubljana as early as 1779, a newspaper followed in 1797. Both existed only for a few years. Aristocratic sponsorship by Baron S. Zois and a generation later by Anastasius Griin still had to provide a protective shield for the activities of enlightened intellectuals, modest as they were under the Franciscan police regime. At least the bucolic lyrics of Valentin Vodnik (1758-1819) were permissible and a Bible translation could now be undertaken on the Catholic side. The great and lasting advancement of Slovene literary development came under the auspices of romanticism, but a romanticism with solid scholarly foundations. The previously mentioned linguist and philologist Bartholomaeus Kopitar, director of the Austrian court library in Vienna, was a pioneer in the field of comparative Slavic linguistics and a reformer if not so some extent creator of modern Slovene. He intended to “convert”

396

History of the Habshurg Empire

Slovene, the most western of the Southern Slav languages, to a bridgehead of western Slavism under Catholic, and by implication Habsburg, spon¬ sorship. He did more. His was the task, largely successfully performed, to give a nation with a solid literary tradition but no political past, a future solely anchored in cultural achievements and political potentialities. Simi¬ lar developments can be observed among other Slavic peoples but in no instance was the political survival and future so clearly and predominantly based on cultural attainments as in that of the Slovenes. Kopitar’s influence reached beyond the Slovene orbit into that of Croats and Serbs. In regard to general linguistic education and popular cultural activities in the Slovene language his work was supported by the veter¬ inarian Janez Bleiweis, the founder of a journal, Novice, in 1843. Through his professional, literary, and .political activities he exercised an almost equal influence on peasants, clergymen, and the new writers. He was re¬ ferred to as father of the nation. Bleiweis inspired also the lyric France Preseren (1800-1849). Kopitar’s scholarly student was Fran von Miklosich, who in the following generation became the leading Slavist at the Uni¬ versity of Vienna. The primarily apolitical aspect of Slovene literature is shown also by the post-1848 generation of Slovene writers, the lyrics F. Lestvik and Simon Jenko, and the novelist Joseph Jurcic. New and more radical literary developments were to evolve in the last decades of the nineteenth century. The sensitivity for harmony in verse and prose, introduced by the phonetics of Kopitar’s scholarship and the art of Pre¬ seren, remained a characteristic feature of Slovene literature.28 b) THE CROATS

The rich development of Croatian literature in the school of Dubrovnik from Ivan Gundulic in the early seventeenth century to Nicola Dordic in the late seventeenth and early eighteenth has been mentioned. So have been the literary activities of the national heroes in the late seventeenth century rising in the Croatian north, Counts Francis Frankopan and Peter Zrinski (Zrinyi). Otherwise in the seventeenth century the influence of the Counter Reformation in plays with ecclesiastic subjects was dominant. In general, religious literary trends followed the Jesuit patterns. Secular literature in the late seventeenth century—pseudohistoric epics, glorifying the Habsburg campaigns against the Turks—had little artistic value. Counterreformatory activities, in particular the various seminaries in Italy 28 Anton Slodnjak, Geschichte der slowenischen Literatur (Berlin, 1958), pp. 86161; Pypin and Spasovic, Geschichte der slawischen Literaturen, I, 376-395; Fischel, Der Panslawismus his zum Welt\rieg, pp. 125-130.

From Late Enlightenment to Liberalism

397

for Croatian candidates for the priesthood were focused on missionary activities in the territories occupied for generations by the Turks. This helped to increase Italian cultural influence. It was less prevalent in the literary field than in the fine arts. The monuments of the Venetian renais¬ sance in Dalmatia were followed by a less spectacular but longer lasting influence of the Italian Baroque on Croatian architecture, painting, and sculpture well beyond the coastal lands. In addition to the direct Italian impact in these fields, there was also an influence of German Baroque modified by Italian designs. Croatian folk art preserved its independent, original character during that era, although its influence abroad remained limited. The direct impact on Croatia of the Enlightenment in the Maria Theresan and Josephin reform era is not as apparent as in regard to the Slovene territories. The constitutional relationship to Hungary and the military character of the Frontier regime help to understand this. Matija Rjelkovic, a frontier officer from Slavonia (1732-1798), who spent several years during the third Silesian war as prisoner of war in Prussian captivity exhorted his countrymen in a strange epic, Satir, to adopt the institutions of the west and to renounce the old customs and folk poetry. With this philosophy he ran counter, not only to a century-old tradition of the past, but also to the romantic tendencies of the literary renaissance movement of the following generation. Its character however, was changed by the previously noted activities of Ljudevit Gaj (1809-1872) whose personality combined features of Romanticism, political nationalism, and political ex¬ pediency. The last was more apparent than with most other leaders of Slavic renaissance movements. The idea of cultural union between Croats and Slovenes was not new. The two peoples shared the Catholic-Latin heritage. Furthermore, Kopitar had done much to emphasize the linguistic affinity in his grammatical studies. Yet his concepts of a Catholic-Slav union could be considered political only in a broad ideological sense. Gaj, who had studied at the University of Vienna and was at the same time exposed to Kollar’s mystic Panslavism, went further in his political objectives. He pursued them with scholarly achievements inferior to those of Kopitar, but with a superior sense for political timing. He strove for the further-reaching aim of lin¬ guistic union of the Serb and Croatian main branches of the Southern Slav orbit to the west of the Bulgarians. He hoped to achieve this union by turning to a southern Dalmatian dialect as basis of a linguistic com¬ promise between Croats and Serbs rather than to insist on subordination to the existing Croatian literary language with its strong western ties. To

39#

History of the Habshurg Empire

the extent that the bulk of the Serbs, then still under Turkish rule, was farther removed from the impact of western culture than Croats and Slovenes, this plan appeared to be a Croatian concession to Southern Slav union. Yet as far as the concept if Illyrism was decidedly western, Latin in character and associated with an alleged Roman (Illyrian) tradition along the eastern shores of the Adriatic, it had also an anti-orthodox, anti-Magyar, and pro-Catholic tinge. All three features were agreeable to the pre-March policy of the Austrian government. Various concessions that Gaj obtained, such as the permission to establish an Illyrian Book Founda¬ tion and a newspaper with a literary supplement, seemed to indicate smooth relations to the authorities in Vienna. Actually allegations spread by Gaj’s orthodox Serb opponents that he was a Metternich agent were probably unfounded. The truth is simply that his activities concurred with the policies of the minister of the Interior, Count Kolowrat, the relatively most enlightened member of the government in Slavic questions. With great skill Gaj had stressed the potential dangers of a Panslav (that meant, pro-Russian) orthodox orientation of the Austrian Southern Slavs. Il¬ lyrism, on the other hand, promised a western version of the union move¬ ment under Croatian leadership, even though a linguistic understanding with far-reaching concessions to the Serbs had been initiated in cultural matters. The question remained, whether the ties of Illyrism with the Habsburgs could be maintained, if and when a Croatian compromise with the Magyars could be achieved. For the time being Illyrism had mended its political fences with the government in Vienna and had encouraged further cultural advance, unimpeded by governmental actions. One of its first outstanding literary representatives was Stanko Vraz (1810-1851), a poet who had moved from Slovene territory to Zagreb and had accepted the Croatian (or, in Gaj’s terms, the new Serbo-Croatian) language which should follow the southern Dalmatian pattern. Vraz, founder of the literary review Kolo, was a collector of folksongs, a lyric poet, writer of ballads,

and—characteristic for Croatian

literature—

satires. Ivan Mazuranic (1814-1890) revived the national epic of the Southern Slav task of defending Christianity. Petar von Preradovic (18141872), an imperial officer, the most romantic of the new Southern Slav lyrical poets, glorified also the Southern Slav Illyrian mission in the present and future world. The national legal and social historian Ivan Kukuljevic, supported the bishop of Djakovo, Josip Strossmayer, in creat¬ ing the Yugoslav Academy (1851) and the university (1874), both in Zagreb. Luka Botic, who belonged to the school of Mazuranic, perceived in his epic poetry, against mounting parochial Croatian opposition to the

From Late Enlightenment to Liberalism

399

Illyrian unification idea, an even wider union concept, namely the recon¬ ciliation of Southern Slav Christianity and Mohammedanism. Here the future problems of Bosnia within a prospective Southern Slav political union were envisaged.29 c)

THE SERBS

As noted in Chapter IV the Serbs in southern Hungary enjoyed a limited religious and cultural autonomy granted by Emperor Leopold I in 1690-1691. At times restricted, this autonomy never developed beyond the levels of elementary education and church administration. Moreover, during most of the eighteenth century pressures were exerted for cultural union with the Croatians and for Germanization. The first partition of Poland in 1772, which led to the establishment of a Cyrillic printing press in Vienna primarily on behalf of the Ruthenians, offered the Serbs limited facilities for literary publications also but the basic ideas of the Enlightenment reached the Serbs in Hungary, the Banat, and Dalmatia not from Vienna but from Belgrad. Dosjtije Obradovic (around 1740 to 1811), a Serb from the Banat who had studied in Vienna and Halle and was impressed by Joseph IPs reforms, established an autonomous educa¬ tional system under over-all Turkish sovereignty after his return to Old Serbia. The autobiography, letters, and essays on practical enlightened philosophy of this remarkable man could be read only with difficulty in Hungary, because the Old Slavonic Church language was used almost ex¬ clusively by the clergy and the idiom of the south Hungarian Serbs did not lend itself as yet to the transmission of complex ideas. Obradovic and his followers E. Jankovic, Bishop Lucian Musicki of Karlowitz (Carlovci), J. Vujic, and others tried with moderate success to raise the standards of the vernacular by translations from the German and Italian. Largely due to the influence of Kopitar on his foremost student Vuk Stefanovic Karadzic (1787-1864)

a better solution was initiated. In

1813, Karadzic, born in Serbia and engaged in various revolutionary activities against the Turks, was forced to flee to Vienna where Kopitar prevailed on him to develop and raise a Southern Serb idiom to the literary language of the great Southern Slav hinterland beyond the Sava. Karadzic wrote a Serb grammar in 1814 and edited his famous collection of folksongs admired by Goethe in the revised language. It represented 29 Paul Diels, Die slawischen Vo\er mit einer Liter aturubersicht von Alexander Adamczy\ (Wiesbaden, 1963), pp. 248-253; Franjo Trograncic, “Literature (18th Century),” in Francis H. Eterovich and Christopher Spalatin, eds., Croatia, II, 215239, and K. B. K., “Literature (1835-1895),” ibid. I, 242-256; Zvanc Crnja, Cultural History of Croatia (Zagreb, 1962), pp. 281-321.

400

History of the Habsburg Empire

essentially a combination of Hercegovinian and southern Dalmatian idioms, written in a simplified Cyrillic alphabet. Karadzic may indeed be called the initiator of the joint Serbo-Croatian literature of the still distant future. In his time, cultural and political tra¬ ditions and rivalries, beyond the issue of the Latin versus the Cyrillic alphabet, prevented the early amalgamation of the-two languages which might have led to the early evolution of a genuine joint Serbo-Croatian literature. Nevertheless, the principles of a common Serbo-Croatian liter¬ ary language were recognized by the foremost Southern Slav philologists against much opposition of the orthodox, largely pro-Russian, conservative clergy. Consequently, the first followers of Karadzic came from Habsburg territories in southern Hungary: Branko Radicevic, the lyric poet, and Jovan S. Popovic, the playwright, in the first half of the nineteenth cen¬ tury, as well as R. Jovan Jovanovic, a lyric poet and journalist in the second half. There existed little doubt that the spectacular success of the Slavic renaissance among the Czechs, Polish Messianism, and New Hel¬ lenism, all had the effect of strengthening the forces of romantic and gradually liberal nationalism against cultural isolation and an intellectual cast system. Above all, the revised and elevated idioms of the people had prevailed against a decaying and sterile Church language. In fact the new spirit with its double appeal to romantics and liberals initiated by Karadzic was strong enough to give to the Hungarian Vojvodina well into the 1870^ the character of an enclave of Serb literary nationalism. The activi¬ ties of the secret nationalist youth organization Omladina until its dissolu¬ tion in 1872 30 were particularly significant. Only the establishment of a fully sovereign Serbia in 1878 moved the center of gravity of Serb cultural activities toward the newly strengthened political center. Major intellectual steps toward this situation had gone on for a century. Their limited success revealed the difficulties resulting from an oppressive and divisive political past. Yet something else became clear: the substantial political achievements brought about by the challenge of a great cultural problem fought against enormous odds.31

30 A

dissolution brought about by the anti-Slavic oriented Hungarian govern¬ ment with obliging assistance from the conservative Turkish vassal government in Belgrad. 31 Ernest Denis, La Grande Serbie (Paris, 1915), pp. 86—93; Paul Diels and Alex¬ ander Adamczyk, Die lawischen Vdl\er (Wiesbaden, 1963), pp. 251-253; Pypin and Spasovic, Geschichte der slawischen Literaturen, I, 263-312; Duncan Wilson, The Life and Time of Vu\ S. Karadzic (Oxford, 1970), pp. 190-313.

From Late Enlightenment to Liberalism H.

401

The Latins

The Italians and Roumanians, separated from each other by the whole length of the Habsburg empire from west to east, had few cultural rela¬ tions and those that existed were hardly based on ethnic affinity.32 Affinity was limited in any case by the Slavic streak within the Rumanian na¬ tion. They shared the fact, that their cultural history within the Habsburg empire was to a greater degree determined by their conationals across the Habsburg borders than was true of other groups in a seemingly similar position such as the Poles, Ruthenians, and Serbs. The Serbs could de¬ velop some limited autonomous cultural life in Hungary before that chance was given to them in Serbia proper. The Poles represented (at least after 1867-1868) a powerful political force within the empire. Even though the cultural center gradually had become Congress Poland again, the weight of the Austrian Poles was bound to be felt within the in¬ tellectual life of the whole nation. The Ruthenians went through a dif¬ ferent political, religious, and linguistic history than most of the Ukrainian nation. This factor, too, gave their cultural life within the empire con¬ siderable significance. Regarding the Italians, the cultural impact of the, nation state south of the Trentino and west of the Adriatic was so over¬ whelmingly powerful, that even the most active cultural life of the Austro-Italians counted relatively little within the Italian cultural body. The Roumanians were a politically suppressed national group in Tran¬ sylvania, legally until 1863 and practically again after 1867. This was not true to the same degree in the Bukovina, yet here they were slightly out¬ numbered by the Ruthenians. Furthermore, the history of a permanent separate administration of the crownland goes back only to 1849. Con¬ sidering these factors it is amazing how diverse Roumanian cultural life in the empire was, even though it too could reflect only its secondary aspects. a) THE ITALIANS

An active center of Italian enlightened reform ideas existed in Rovereto, where a learned academy was established in 1750. An eminent professor of natural law and member of the legal codification commis¬ sion under Maria Theresa, Carl Anton von Martini (1726-1800), came from this region. Complete assimilation became so easy for him as for

32 It

might be noted in passing that Morlaks, a group of Roumanian ethnic stock had settled in the Middle Ages in northern Dalmatia. By the eighteenth century they had become completely slavicized, however.

/j02

History of the Hahshurg Empire

many other distinguished Italians at the center of the imperial adminis¬ tration, that his Italian background was forgotten. Girolamo Tartarotti, his contemporary, remained in the Trentino and became an advocate of legal reforms in the spirit of Beccaria. One of the most interesting per¬ sonalities in the Rovereto circle was Count Antonio Rosmini-Serbati (I797_I^55)- A priest, equally versed in philosophy and theology, he was for a time minister of education in the papal state under Pius IX. Rosmini developed an original philosophical system, which tried to combine fea¬ tures of an idealistic and a Cartesian philosophy. In 1849 this doctrine was put on the Index, though by the end of the century it was finally cleared. As for literature, Giovanni Prati (1815-1884), a notable lyric poet and writer of novellas, changed his loyalties from Habsburg to Savoy. Andreas Mafiei (1797-1855) became an outstanding translator of Schiller, Goethe, and Milton. Concerning Dalmatia, the impact of the Italian minority on various as¬ pects of Southern Slav culture, in particular Croatian, had been great throughout the late Middle Ages and early Modern Times. Beginning with the Enlightenment Italian influence declined, although traces were still marked in the nineteenth century, such as those shown by the linguist Tommaseo of Sebenico (1802-1874). When he became involved in antiAustrian revolutionary activities he had to leave the country. In the Littoral, Capo d’Istria was an Italian cultural center like Rovereto in the Trentino, and in 1793 an academy was established there too. Interests were focused on social reforms. The southward orientation of Italian cul¬ tural life in Austria was not only a consequence of the general unification drive but also of the lack of Italian institutions of higher education in the Habsburg empire after 1866. The universities of Padua and Milan, particularly the latter, had been centers of anti-Habsburg activities as long as they were under Austrian administration. The establishment of an Italian university on Austrian soil after 1866, if operated in a free at¬ mosphere of learning, might well have eased the development of irredentism. Alienated Austro-Italian students might have modified their feelings if given the chance to study at an Italian university in their home country. The shortsightedness of the government, but above all German nationalist tendencies prevented this. There was, indeed, little middle ground between integral nationalism and more or less deliberate dena¬ tionalization, that is, Italian cultural activities of outright irredentist character and those contributions of Italians which merged completely with the central governmental political and educational structure.33 33Fortunat Demattio, “Italienische Literatur,” in

[Crownprince Rudolf]

Die

From Late Enlightenment to Liberalism

403

b) THE ROUMANIANS

The rise of the status of the Roumanians in Transylvania was chiefly related to two events: the introduction of a Uniate Church at the end of the seventeenth century and the conferral of citizenship status on them almost a century later under Joseph II. Both actions helped the suppressed serfs to strengthen their national consciousness. Even though this slow evolution fell short of the attainment of equality with the Magyars, Szekels, and Germans, the member groups of the estates in the threenation state, these modest concessions sufficed to lay the groundwork for a vigorous evolution o£ national culture. The Vienna-educated Uniate priest, and subsequently bishop, George Sincai, and his nephew Samuel Klein were coauthors of a new Roumanian grammar The Element of the Dacian-Roman or Wallach language. Klein who also had received his theological training in the Uniate seminary in Vienna, edited also a prayer book in the language revised according to the principles of the new gram¬ mar. Petru Maior (1754-1821), likewise a Uniate priest, went an important step further in his effort to establish the national identity of the under¬ privileged Transylvanian Vlachs. After the publication of his sermons his History of the Origin of the Roumanians in Dacia came out in 1812. Based in part on previous studies by Sincai this book was indeed a pioneer work of Roumanian national history.34 George Baritiu (18121893), also a historian, became the editor of the first Roumanian-language journal in Transylvania (1838). August Trebonia Laurian (1810-1881) and Nicolas Bala§escu (1819-1852), as early as the 1840’s, were editors of a historical journal. Alexander Odobescu (1834-1895) was a distinguished archeologist. Most of these men had a distinctly anti-Magyar orientation, but shared a limited trust in the Austrian government until 1848-1849. Their gradual disappointment in the 1850’s and 1860’s was one reason why the eminent Roumanian cultural leader, the archbishop Andrei Saguna (1809-1873), head of the Orthodox Church in Transylvania, stood for a cautious policy of reconciliation with the Magyars. It met consider¬ able opposition among the Roumanians. Yet in several ways the govern¬ ment in Budapest had more reasons to accommodate the Orthodox with osterreichisch-ungarische Monarchic, Vol. Tirol und Vorarlberg, pp. 402-416; Anton Zernitz, “Italienische Literatur,” in Vol. Kiistenland, pp. 249-256; Alfred Mussafia, “Italienische Literatur,” in Vol. Dalmatien, pp. 213-231. 34 Dacia is generally to be understood as the area of the former Roman province between Tisza river in the west, Carpathians in the north, the Dniester in the east and the Danube to the south. This territory thus covers only very roughly the Roumanian ethnic area.

404

History of the Habshurg Empire

their wide backing in the Slavic world to the east than the Uniates. Considerable concessions in regard to Church autonomy and lesser conces¬ sions in the Nationality Law of 1868 were made. The prestige of the arch¬ bishop, in some ways a parallel figure to that of Strossmayer among the Croats, helped to keep Roumanian policies in Translyvania on an even keel. Saguna’s cultural contributions, in particular, the establishment of the journal Transylvania for the cultivation of the Roumanian language and literature were instrumental in strengthening national consciousness in an era of steady political oppression. There was less oppression in the Bukovina. Here Jon Budai-Deleanu (1760-1820) published a Roumanian-German dictionary and a grammar as early as 1805. In 1848, a newspaper was founded in the capital Czernowitz (Cernauti), a literary journal in 1865. Eudoxious Hurmuzaki (1812-1874) was a historian, well able to handle the medieval sources of Roumanian national history. Roumanian and Ruthenian national cultural progress in the Bukovina suffered indirectly, however, from the German domination of intellectual life, particularly in the capital and the new university founded in Czernowitz in 1875. Apart from the training fa¬ cilities in theology for the orthodox priesthood it could be called a German institution. Without overt pressure it became clear to young intellectuals in the Bukovina, that a career in the free professions and in government service was easier in the German language orbit than in the Roumanian, whose national base in the Bukovina was much smaller than in Transylvania. Limitations in numbers worked directly as much against the Roumanians here as outright political oppression there. In the light of these difficulties Roumanian cultural progress was indeed impressive.35 I.

Summary

All things considered cultural life among the national groups of the Habsburg empire had made astounding progress in the era that leads from the Enlightenment to liberalism. For the Austro-Germans it was, of course, easier than for any other national group, except possibly the Italians, to establish a working two-way cultural communications system with the wide German hinterland. Even here the consequences of cultural isolation before the Enlightenment were fully overcome only at the be35 Nicolai Jorga, Histoire des Roumains de Transylvanie et de Hongric, 2 vols. (Bucharest, 1915-1916), see II, 173-305; Johann Sbiera, “Die rumanische Literatur und Sprache,” in [Crownprince Rudolf] Die osterreichisch-ungarische Monarchic, Vol. Bu\owina, pp. 376-393; Constantin Daicoviciu and Miron Constantinescu, Breve Histoire de la Transylvanie (Bucharest, 1965), pp. 326-343; Cornelia Bodea, The Roumanians1 Struggle for Unification, 1834-1839 (Bucharest, 1970), pp. 31-63; Ladislas Makkai, Histoire de Transylvanie (Paris, 1946), pp. 284-299.

From Late Enlightenment to Liberalism

405

ginning of the nineteenth century. This did not pertain to the same extent to the Italians, where the cultural community preceded the political union all throughout modern and in part even medieval history. As for the Magyars, the limited range of their language orbit represented a serious impediment. Nevertheless they had become as fully associated with western European literature in the Romantic era as the Poles. In the nineteenth century the Roumanians too had reached a similar stage of literary development in their relations to the west. The linguistic premises for such breakthrough had become fully effective by 1848. The same had indeed become gradually true for all Slavic national groups in the Habsburg empire. Because of the differences in specific social and political conditions of national groups, their cultural achieve¬ ments can neither be standardized nor truly compared. It can be said, however, that by mid-nineteenth century, under the powerful impact of the Slavic renaissance, they all had achieved a level of linguistic develop¬ ment which placed intellectual accomplishment within reach, although on political grounds not necessarily within early realization. The discussion ot one general problem should conclude this chapter: the question of the influence of the cultural achievements of one group within the empire on all others. Only for the Germans was such in¬ fluence uncontested on an empire-wide scale. A direct impact of Czech on Slovak civilization and of Polish on the superstructure of the Ruthenians is as discernible (though not always as clearly) as for instance that of the Italians on the Croats. But above all the three Southern Slav groups, Croats, Serbs, and Slovenes, each in its own way, shaped general Southern Slav developments. Other influences existed, such as those ra¬ diating from and into the Magyar orbit. Yet they were primarily indirect and, in part, imposed on politically weaker national groups. This, of course, is true for the Germans as well. But unlike the German impact, such influences were not outright accepted or rejected but rather digested without specific intent in the course of times. Much of this kind of de¬ velopment can be seen between Magyars on one side and Slovaks and Transylvanian Roumanians on the other. Beyond this, the fascinating problem of cultural interaction between national groups pertains only to the more recent stages of their development. By mid-nineteenth century a process of mutual give and take had become fully conscious in regard to all groups, although it did not take place necessarily on an equal footing. The question will be taken up in the final chapter of this study in regard to the cultural-intellectual development during the last half-century of the empire’s existence.

CHAPTER VIII Decline and Discord (i879-!9i4)

A.

Politics in Austria-Hungary

a) FOREIGN POLICY

The day after the conclusion of the Austro-German alliance of 1879 Count Andrassy resigned as foreign minister, largely because he had antagonized the German, and particularly the Magyar, liberals and na¬ tionalists with the Bosnian occupation. Moreover, although the crown had approved the Austro-German alliance, the emperor still considered it humiliating to have to coordinate his policy from now on with that of Bismarck’s Germany, the power in the center of the continental po¬ litical stage. Andrassy’s successor, Baron Heinrich Haymerle, his former aide, was committed to continue this foreign policy. After his sudden death in 1881 he was succeeded by Count Gustav Kalnoky, former am¬ bassador in St. Petersburg, who until his resignation in May, 1895, over an issue of Church prerogatives versus Magyar liberalism pursued a more independent policy. Faithful to the German alliance, but anxious to preserve Austria-Hungary’s freedom of action in the Balkans and in particular in relations with Russia, he did not succeed fully in either respect. The situation faced by Andrassy’s successors was focused primarily on the Habsburg empire’s relations to Russia, which had been strained from the beginning of the Oriental crisis in 1876 and had certainly not im¬ proved after the Congress of Berlin of 1878. In the 1880’s, a conservativeinspired Panslav nationalism developed at an accelerated pace in Russia. It was favored by the new tsar Alexander III, who unlike his father assassinated in March, 1881, was neither anxious to preserve cordial 406

Decline and Discord

407

relations with Germany nor to keep those with Austria at least on an even keel. The chief battleground between Austria and Russia were the Balkans, as hotly contested spheres of interest of both countries. Here Austria could expect little direct benefit from the German alliance. In his famous Reichstag speech of December, 1876, Bismarck had made it clear that the whole Balkan problem was not worth the sacrifice of the straight limbs of a single Prussian grenadier. The best means to protect and to restrain Austria seemed to him to bring her and Russia to an understand¬ ing based on the foundation of monarchic solidarity. This was the premise of the so-called Alliance of the Three Emperors of June, 1881, concluded for three years and renewed for another three years in 1884. The term “alliance” for the interrelationship between the three empires —in contrast to the genuine Austro-German alliance of 1879—was a euphemistic misnomer because Russia would never have been willing to enter into far-reaching commitments with Austria. Neither would the Austro-German alliance in case of strong Austro-Russian ties have pre¬ served its raison d’etre. The covenant was no more than a neutrality agreement between the three powers, which agreed furthermore to con¬ sult if the territorial status of Turkey should be threatened. The principle of the closure of the Dardanelles was recognized as well as the Austrian claim to convert the occupation of Bosnia-Hercegovina into permanent annexation,1 The union between Bulgaria, still a Turkish satellite state, and the autonomous Turkish province East Roumelia was recognized in principle. Since Austria thus seemed safe for the time being from a con¬ frontation with Russia she could afTord to reach a profitable agreement of ten years duration with Serbia, whose conclusion was facilitated by liberal subsidies for the absentee sovereign, King Milan. Austria promised to support eventual Serbian expansion in the south, while Serbia pledged even to conclude no agreements with other powers without Austria’s ap¬ proval. Thus the Habsburg empire’s predominance in the western Bal¬ kans seemed to be well secured. The conversion of the Austro-German Dual Alliance of 1879 into the Austro-German-Italian Triple Alliance of May, 1882, was meant by Bis¬ marck primarily to strengthen the protection of Germany’s western and southern flanks in case of a two-front war with Russia and France. An important secondary objective of this genuine but shaky alliance was to check Italy’s designs to liberate at the appropriate time the eastern coast of the Adriatic and the Trentino. This Bismarck strategem, applied 1 This agreement, which lapsed in 1887, did not preclude the necessity for the approval of the other signatory powers of the Congress Act of 1878.

408

History of the Habshurg Empire

repeatedly—namely to turn mutual enemies into friends by joining them as junior partners in an alliance—worked no better than the AustroGerman-Russian associations, namely the Three Emperors’ League of 1873 and the so called Three Emperors’ Alliance of 1881 in regard to Austro-Russian relations. The Triple Alliance of 1882 between Austria, Germany, and Italy, it is true, offered much protection to Italy against a French attack but little additional security to her allies. Germany was hardly in need of Italian support against France. Only in case of the involvement of Austria and Germany in a two-front war against Russia and France could the Italian alliance be of possible use. Yet even this depended on the doubtful assumption of Italian military proficiency and on the re¬ liability of Italy’s loyalty to the treaty. Neither Bismarck nor Kalnoky were blind to these facts but they hoped that even a dubious ally was better than a country without commitments that could be won over easily to an opposing camp. Furthermore the very fact of the alliance might put an end to the covert support of Italian irredentist activities in Austria. A secret alliance with Roumania, concluded in October, 1883, against Russia,2 soon joined by Germany and Italy, was no more successful. This agreement was based more or less on the two eyes of the Hohenzollern king of Roumania, Carol I, whose loyalty to the Central European powers could be relied on. Although the Roumanians resented the forced cession of southern Bessarabia to Russia in 1878, they were even more interested in the liberation of the Roumanians in Transylvania and Bukovina. This national priority was in part due to the fact, that AustriaHungary was not as strong a power as Russia. Considering further the French orientation of the ruling classes in Roumania, lack of popular support for this secret alliance was so clearly predictable, that its public disclosure was impossible, despite continuous Austrian and German pres¬ sure. Thus the assumption that Roumania would honor a treaty concluded with the lesser evil (Austria) rather than with the bigger one (Russia) because a feeble covenant was better than none, proved to be illusionary. During the following four years, critical ones in the relationship be¬ tween the Central European powers and Russia, the effectiveness of the new lineup of alliances was tested. In September, 1885 a revolt in East Roumelia began with the aim to unite the province with Bulgaria. Within

2 The

terms of the treaty did not mention Russia, but the meaning of the alliance was unmistakable.

Decline and Discord

4°9

a year this move succeeded. Its immediate consequences were a Bulgarian conflict with Serbia, in which the advance of Bulgarian troops under the command of the new Bulgarian sovereign Alexander, Prince of Battenberg, was stopped only by an Austrian ultimatum. This was the first in a series of similar Austrian interventions in Balkan affairs but this first time—ironically enough—initiated on Serbia’s behalf. Tsar Alexander III opposed the rule of Alexander of Battenberg, a prince with English dynastic connections, who appeared to him too in¬ dependent, too liberal, and too western. In the fall of 1886 a Russiansponsored officers’ revolt removed Alexander and restored Russian more or less indirect overlordship in Bulgaria, stepping up the Austro-Russian crisis. The casus foederis could now arise for Germany to support Austria over a Balkan issue—the kind of conflict Bismarck wanted to avoid at all costs. He believed he could do so by assuaging Austria’s and—secretly— Russia’s concerns as well, but above all to keep his hands at the steering wheel of the Triple Alliance. In early February, 1886, he encouraged Austria’s adherence to a British-sponsored agreement of the Mediter¬ ranean powers with the exception of France. The declared objective was to maintain the status quo in the Mediterranean and indirectly to block French intentions in regard to Egypt and Russian designs to force the openings of the Dardanelles. Likewise in February, the Triple Alliance was renewed and in view of the critical situation in the Balkans Italy was able to raise her price for further adherence to the treaty: a qualified pledge on the part of the Central European powers to support Italian interests in North Africa against France and—more important for Austria —an agreement diat any expansion in the Balkans would entitle the partner to territorial compensations.3 This concession to future Italian aspirations in the Balkans limited Austria’s freedom of action. Bismark was not naive enough to put all his policy eggs in the basket of an increasingly illusionary monarchical solidarity of the three eastern empires. He was concerned with a rapid deterioration of GermanFrench relations, due primarily to the unexpectedly fast recovery of France after 1870-1871. More specific issues for the approaching crisis were the dictatorial aspirations of the chauvinist French minister of war, General Boulanger. A frontier incident provoked by Germany in

3 Exempted

from this concession was the conversion of the status of BosniaHercegovina from an occupied to an annexed province. Such change would not entitle Italy to compensatory claims.

4io

History of the Habsburg Empire

Alsace-Lorraine added fuel to the fire. In consideration of such factors Bismarck now moved to direct negotiations with Russia, embodied in the famous secret Reinsurance Treaty of June, 1887. The first part of the treaty pledged mutual neutrality between Germany and Russia in case of conflict with other powers. Excepted from this obligation were aggressive wars on the part of Germany against France or of Russia against Austria. To put it in other words, Germany was not obliged to support her ally, Austria, in an offensive war against Russia. The determination of what constituted aggression was to be left to the contracting parties. Much has been written on the question, whether this agreement was compatible with the Austro-German alliance of 1879. As far as the letter of the treaty goes, the answer should clearly be in the affirmative. Since the alliance of 1879 was defensive in character, the new German pledge did not conflict with it directly. In regard to the spirit of the agreement we face another problem. The question concerning the differences between offensive and defensive wars appeared even more controversial than it is today. Furthermore, the secrecy of the agreement suggested that Bismarck wanted it to be interpreted entirely accord¬ ing to German interests. This meant in regard to the Balkan questions, to curb Austrian aspirations. As it turned out, if that policy would have been consistently adhered to up to and including the July crisis of 1914, the treaty could have been as much in Austria’s as in Germany’s interest. Far less commented on in historical literature was the second part of the agreement, in which Bismarck without knowledge of his Austrian ally promised to recognize a predominant Russian sphere of interests in Bul¬ garia as well as diplomatic support for Russia’s intent to open the Straits. Inasmuch as he prevailed on Austria in December, 1887, to sign a second Mediterranean agreement with Italy and Great Britain, whose objective was to preserve Turkey’s control of the Dardanelles and noninterference in Bulgarian affairs, this part of the Reinsurance Treaty represented a clear case of duplicity. At the same time, to pacify Austria’s feelings, aroused by Bismarck’s refusal to support her openly in Balkan affairs, he agreed to a publication of the Austro-German alliance treaty of 1879. By this time, however, its existence was hardly a secret to the European cabinets. In fact there is good reason to believe that the Austrians suspected the existence of the Reinsurance Treaty as well. Yet for the time being further escalation of the crisis was averted, and with the fall of Bismarck from power in March, 1890, the new German emperor Wilhelm II allowed the Reinsurance Treaty to lapse. Eastern affairs quieted down briefly and the new prince of Bulgaria,

Decline and Discord

4i i

Ferdinand of Koburg, a former Austrian officer, was recognized by Russia in 1896. In 1897 an: to take Belgrad as security and then submit the contested issues to arbitrai: tion by the other powers. Yet here insufficient military preparation made it doubtful whether Austro-Hungarian forces would have been able to hold Belgrad. Furthermore, the isolation of the two Central Powers in a coming international conference against the Triple Entente and Italy was certain. The latter, the third partner in the Triple Alliance, declared her neutrality on August 3 and soon began to ask for compensation, not primarily in the Balkans but in the Trentino and the Littoral, that .2 is, in Austrian territory. Yet all the true or alleged wrongs which, the empire’s top officials genuinely believed, had been committed against Austria’s existence by W the Serb and Italian irredenta as well as by the activities of Russian

1 Panslavism directed from St. Petersburg, should have generated the 3 resolve to avoid war at all costs. Defeat by an overpowering alliance

§ against an empire torn by national strife and an ally eventually to be k exhausted by the confrontation with superior man- and seapower, and ir overwhelming economic strength in regard to raw materials was prac» tically inevitable. What other course could have been taken? Hope,

^22

History of the Habshurg Empire

however dim, exists as long as life exists, and the hope for accommodation with Austria’s enemies in the future could not be dismissed as long as time could be gained. This argument is not based on hindsight but on common sense. It should have been clear even to those in warring camps on both sides who ignored humanitarian considerations.9 b) AUSTRO-HUNGARIAN COOPERATION

The operation of the Compromise between the dual states after 1867 led to a strengthening of the Hungarian position and a corresponding weakening of the Austrian. Nevertheless the differences in AustroHungarian relations, as they came to the fore, particularly in the pre¬ scribed economic negotiations every ten years, did not seriously undermine the structure of the empire in peace time. The transition to a new currency, based entirely on the gold standard, was effected smoothly in 1892. Henceforward the crown replaced the guilder in a relationship of 1: 2. The joint tariff system had to yield gradually to two separate but al¬ most identical systems.10 Altogether the replacement of the common tariff and the commercial alliance of 1867 by a mere commercial treaty system in 1907, had fewer direct than indirect economic-political conse¬ quences. Henceforward the Hungarian government claimed the right to be a party and signatory to international commercial treaties. This might eventually have served as precedent in the conduct of foreign relations in general. The outbreak of the war in 1914 made this danger meaning¬ less in the face of far greater threats. It should be noted also, that despite protracted wrangling between the representatives of the Austrian and Hungarian governments, there was a peaceful adjustment of the quota for joint expenditures by the two states, in 1867 originally 70 per cent to be paid by Austria and 30 per cent by Hungary, and in 1907 63.4 per cent and 36.6 per cent respectively. Finally, the administration of BosniaHercegovina under the supervision of the joint Austro-Hungarian minis9 Pribram, Austrian Foreign Policy, pp. 55-67; Kanner, Kaiserliche Katastrophenpolitil{, pp. 192-346; Fay, The Origins of the World War, II, 547-558; Pierre Renouvin, The Immediate Origins of the War (New Haven, 1928), pp. 331355; Hermann Kantorowicz, Gutachten zur Kriegsschuldfrage 1914 (Frankfurt am Main, 1967), pp. 413-444; Kann, Kaiser Franz Joseph und der Aushruch des Welt\rieges; contrary to the varying opinions cited above, Hugo Hantsch, Leopold Graf Berchtold, 2 vols. (Graz, 1963), II, pp. 541-647 and Musulin, Das Haus am Ballplatz, pp. 195-248. See also Vladimir Dedijer, The Road to Sarajevo (New York, 1966); Fritz Klein in F. Klein, ed., Osterreich-Ungarn in der Welpoliti\, 1900-1918, pp. 155-162; Fritz Fischer, Der Krieg der lllusionen: Die deutsche Politi\ von 1911-1914 (Diisseldorf, 1969), pp. 542-585. 10 The most important of these exceptions became the introduction of a surtax on sugar imports between the two dual states in 1907.

Decline and Discord

423

try of common finances did not lead to major friction between the dual states.11 More serious were conflicts in the military sphere. Here differences in the Austrian and Hungarian versions of the Compromise provided the Hungarian government with a convenient handle to avoid the passing of the annual quota of draftees in time, as prescribed in the common Defense Law of 1868 (revised 1889). This quota, in line with the popu¬ lation increases, went steadily up, so the Hungarian government was in the position to exercise pressure to exact concessions from the crown. They led to a gradual weakening of the common defense structure and an un¬ dermining of the principle of the common language of command: Ger¬ man. From 1902 to 1912, when defense legislation could finally be passed, a continuous crisis existed in these respects. A hortatory imperial mani¬ festo, issued after the annual maneuvres of 1902 at Chloppy—“Joint and unified as they have been, shall my armed forces remain . .

—was of

little avail. The institution of national Hungarian regiments using Magyar as language of command gained steadily in practice, if not in principle. The national Hungarian militia (the Honveds), which by law were under the exclusive jurisdiction of the Hungarian government, increased in political importance in comparison with its counterpart, the Landwehr and Landsturm in Austria, who played a more modest and entirely nonpolitical role. In fact it was largely the demand for a Hungarian national army, which in Hungary in 1905-1906 led to the only really critical situation in Austro-Hungarian relations between 1867 and October, 1918. It will be discussed below in connection with Hungarian domestic developments. Yet even this crisis was weathered for the time being as long as the Compromise, at least in foreign affairs, stood the test of time—although such time clearly was running short. That the service obligation—three years in the line for the common soldier and one year only for reserve officers candidates who had passed the equivalent of a higher secondary education—was essentially undemocratic in a social sense in both dual states is another matter.12 All kinds of major and minor differences between Austria and Hungary notwithstanding, 11 Adolf Beer, Der Staatshaushalt Osterreich-Ungarns (Prague, 1881), pp. 444509; Heinrich Benedikt, Die wirtschajtliche Entwic\lung der Franz Joseph Zeit, Vienna, 1958), pp. 104-118. Kristina M. Fink, Die osterreichisch-ungarische Monarchic als Wirtschajtsgemeinschajt (Munich, 1968), pp. 51-81; Peter Hanak, in Ervin Pamlenyi, ed.. Die Geschichte Ungarns (Budapest, 1971), pp. 399-479. 12 See Edmund Bernatzik, Die osterreichischen Verfassungsgesetze mit Erlauterungen (Vienna, 1911), pp. 688-713; Gmeiner, Grundzuge der Verfassung Ungarns,

pp. 119-125.

424

History of the Habshurg Empire

this simple fact symbolized the basic solidarity of interests in the alliance between the German and Magyar social superstructure. B.

ClSLEITHANIAN AUSTRIA

a) DOMESTIC ADMINISTRATION The centralistic governmental structure in a country increasingly weak¬ ened by national strife faced great difficulties. They affected the stability of the administration. Thus in Germany, where the powers of the legisla¬ tive branch of government were encumbered with limitations similar to those in Austria, only five chancellors headed the cabinet between 1871 and 1917. In the dual states of the Habsburg empire the situation was different. Hungary had seventeen prime ministers and Cisleithanian Austria twenty 13 during that period. Several of them in Austria headed *

mere caretaker governments during protracted crises, some governed by emergency decrees while parliament was recessed on the strength of Article 14 of the basic statute 141 of 1867. Important during that period were the cabinets headed by Count Taaffe for a tenure incredibly long under Austrian conditions (1879-1893), Windischgratz (1893-1895), and Badeni (1895-1897) with brief care¬ taker or transitional cabinets in between and afterward until 1900, when Korber (1900-1904) took office. The Koerber cabinet was followed by the ministries Gautsch (1904-1906) and Beck (1906-1908), again with a pro¬ visional cabinet sandwiched in between. Of the following three cabinets, only that headed by Count Stiirgkh (1911-1916) was very significant. With his assassination in the midst of the First World War the next to last chapter in Austrian history was closed. Although the Austrian cabinets were not technically dependent on a confidence vote of parliament, successful conduct of business was possible only if the legislature did not obstruct the activities of the executive branch of government, as frequently happened during the second part of the era under discussion from the fall of Badeni in 1897 to 1914. In this sense the composition of parliament and the political party structure was of vital importance. It will be discussed in the next section. After direct but not equal franchise was introduced in 1873, the deputies were no longer delegates of the diets but elected by the voters as members of parliament. Still, they presented four very unequal social curias—large estates owners, chambers of commerce and trade, towns,

13 Actually

even more cabinets held office during that period, but some prime ministers in Austria (Gautsch, Korber) and in Hungary (Wekerle and the younger Tisza) headed several ministries.

Decline and Discord

423

and rural communities. Membership in these curias depended on landed property or tax contributions (with a minimum of ten guilders annually). This eliminated practically all urban and rural daily wage earners and a sizable part of the small peasants and craftsmen. Due to obvious social pressures, resulting mainly from industrialization in the towns and dis¬ satisfaction of indebted peasants in rural communities, the property quali¬ fications were lowered from ten to five guilders in 1882. This, of course, changed little, but from here on the question of electoral reforms tend¬ ing in the direction of general, equal, male franchise came more to the attention of the public. Demands of bourgeois parties catering to the vote of the so-called little man still carried more weight than socialist calls to action. Taaffee himself proposed a compromise solution in 1893 according to which the four curias of voters should remain intact but general franchise should be introduced in the two lower curias of towns and rural communities, qualified mainly by the requirements of literacy and at least token tax contributions. This proposal was turned down by conservatives and German liberals. Taafife’s main motivation for the re¬ form was the belief that the extension of the franchise to the agricultural and industrial workers would diminish the acuteness of the national conflict, led primarily by the educated and half-educated middle class. Their influence on the conduct of public affairs should be reduced now. Whether this assumption was right or wrong, Taafife had failed and he resigned. In 1896 under Badeni the basic features of the Taaffe reform became law in somewhat changed form. A new, fifth, curia of voters was added to the existing four. It would elect 72 deputies in addition to the existing body of 353. This fifth curia was based on the principle of general franchise, curbed, however, by the fact, that a number of voters in other curias obtained an additional vote in the fifth curia. Even now five and a half million voters in this new curia elected only 72 deputies, as compared to the 85 elected by some 5,000 large estates owners in the first curia and 21 deputies by the limited number of members of the chambers of trade and commerce. Nearly 400,000 propertied voters in the towns elected 118 deputies and almost 1,500,000 in the rural communities 129.14 The electoral reform of 1896 was more a product of social pressure than the reform attempts of 1893 and in line with the figures given above it 14 Gustav Kolmer, Parlament und Verfassung in Osterreich (Vienna, 1910), VI, 152-172; William A. Jenks, Austria under the Iron Ring, i8yg-igi3 (Charlottesville, Va., 1965), pp. 293-302; Kulisch, Beitrdge zum osterreichischen Parlamentsrecht, PP- 97-143-

426

History of the Habsburg Empire

was still unsatisfactory. Victory for the rising demands for general, male franchise seemed possible only, if the forces working for social progress would coalesce with those fighting for a better national equilibrium. This finally occurred in 1907 and brought the electoral reform campaign in the western half of the monarchy to a successful conclusion. Actually the representation of the relatively privileged national groups in parliament was never as disproportionately high than the parliamen¬ tary composition in regard to national wealth. The leading German posi¬ tion in Austria rested less on inordinate parliamentary strength than on an economically privileged status anchored in various educational and social advantages. The Germans like the Poles lost some seats in parliament, the Czechs gained correspondingly slightly in parliamentary strength. The relatively most favorable national quota of the Italians remained almost untouched like those of the Roumanians and of the Austrian Croats and Serbs. Main winners of the reform in regard to national objectives were Slovenes and Ruthenians. The former increased the percentage of their representation by more than 25 per cent. The previously grossly underprivileged Ruthenians had their national quota more than doubled. Still, it remained well below par. Yet these changes as to national distribution were not decisive. They could not have a major impact in the eleven years left to the empire. Even if it had not disintegrated so soon after the passage of the reform, it is highly unlikely that the new franchise order could have substantially affected the course of events. Whatever major changes came about and were to be expected resulted more from the shifts in the social than in the national composition of parliament, brought about by the elections of 1907 and 1911 under the new legislation. The representa¬ tion of the still predominantly conservative small peasants was strength¬ ened, that of more radical labor in relative terms somewhat weakened. This state of affairs did not make major changes in peace time likely.15 The formation of the Taaffe cabinet in 1879 represented a switch from the German liberal regime to a coalition of Poles, moderate and conserva¬ tive Czechs, and German Catholic Conservatives as the so-called Iron Ring around German liberalism. The fourteen-year life span of this cabinet, in which neither the prime minister nor any of his colleagues were out¬ standing personalities, can be explained by several factors. Brilliancy was the least quality the emperor looked for. In fact original ideas were sus-

15 See

William A. Jenks, The Austrian Electoral Reform of igoj (New York,

1950), PP- 126-198; Britta Skottsberg, Der osterreichische Parlamentarismus (Goteborg, 1940), pp. 104-110.

Decline and Discord

427

picious to him. He did not have to fear their injection in the course of government by the old friend of his youth Taaffe, whom he could fully trust. Besides, Taaffe had come to power at the top of a rising current of conservatism, not only in Austria, but also in Germany and France. This trend continued well into the 1890’$ and Taaffe fell from power when he cautiously tried to change it with his electoral reform proposals of 1893. Yet although not endowed with brilliance Taaffe was skilled in administrative and legislative matters. In social questions he was not an outright reactionary. A cynic, like several Austrian statesmen from Kaunitz and Metternich on, he is credited with saying that the secret of government in Austria consists in keeping all national groups in a state of well-tempered dissatisfaction. There was some truth in these words. Neither able nor capable to introduce comprehensive national reforms, Taaffe avoided at least the pitfalls of an outright German course and met Slavic demands to the limited extent that led neither to their nor to the German liberals’ open parliamentary revolt. The liberals, organized in 1881 under the misleading label United Parliamentary Left (Vereinigte deutsche Linke), pitied themselves on account of alleged governmental discrimination, while they continued to enjoy all privileges of the domi¬ nant ethnic and social group as before. Yet this mild deviation from the German course sufficed to secure for Taaffe the support of the Czechs, among whom the Young Czechs gained steadily ground against the Old Czechs. The prime minister also managed to keep the backing of the Poles. With this support Taaffe had the Austrian railway net expanded, the port facilities of Trieste improved, and above all and for the first time a policy of social reforms initiated—still modest, but notable in comparison to other countries. In seven years, from 1883 to 1889, workers’ health and accident insurance, limitations of the working day to eleven hours (!), trade and craft inspectorates to enforce these and other mea¬ sures, were introduced. In part, the fear of a growing Socialist movement, which had constituted itself for the first time as a united political party at Plainfeld in Lower Austria in 1888, accelerated then long overdue and largely insufficient reforms. Yet the workers and their leaders could be credited only with a rather indirect influence at that time. Apart from the policy of governmental expediency to weaken the liberal middle and upper middle class, a genuine interest existed in social questions as expression of Christian concern, as represented for instance in the writ¬ ings of Karl von Vogelsang. Its impact on public opinion may have been greater than that of a socially still isolated labor class.16 16 Jenks, Austria under the Iron Ring, pp. 158-220.

zp.8

History of the Hahsburg Empire

Contemporaries of the Taaffe era would have considered one event during that period as of paramount importance in the shaping of Austrian history: the suicide of Crownprince Rudolf, probably as the consequence of a illicit love affair. Allegations that fear of discovery of a conspiracy between Rudolf and Hungarian aristocrats against the emperor were the real reason for his death could never be proved. The crown prince’s sui¬ cide and the initial attempts by the government to hush it up damaged the prestige of the devout Catholic dynasty. More important, Rudolf’s death was felt to be a shattering blow to the German liberals, who esteemed the archduke as their ideological ally. Such philosophy can indeed be deduced from the archduke’s partly secret intercourse with liberal writers and journalists and some of his public speeches. On the other hand, we know now from his papers, published after 1918, that in foreign affairs he followed an'imperialist policy in the east, which might have led to a major war with Russia. Considering the shifty, tense, and in the last years of his life neurotic features of the crown prince’s char¬ acter, there is little reason to believe that his reign would have offered an auspicious future for Austria. By a macabre twist of fate his death is related to the disintegration of Austria, because Archduke Francis Ferdinand succeeded Rudolf as heir apparent. The new heir’s death at Sarajevo opened the gate for the apocalyptic riders in 1914.37 After Taaffe’s resignation a ministry headed by the conservative aristo¬ crat Prince Alfred Windischgratz (1893-1895) returned the United German Left—actually a center party—for a span of two years into the ranks of the government coalition. Meanwhile the growing radicalization of the Czechs led to their withdrawal from support of the cabinet. This ministry fell as the result of a conflict concerning the national language problem in southern Styria, this time a minor issue between Germans and Slovenes. The national conflict increasingly became the most conspicuous though not necessarily the most basic issue during the last two decades of Austrian government. In June, 1895, Count Casimir Badeni, governor of Galicia, was ap¬ pointed prime minister, with a program to solve the issue in one of the most sensitive areas of binational strife: Bohemia. As we have seen, Badeni’s cabinet tackled first the problem of electoral reform. This piecemeal legislation was rated at that time a considerable political suc¬ cess. Under Badeni the last outstanding legislative judicial compila17 Oskar von Mitis, Das Leben des Kronprinzen Rudolf, revised edition by A. Wandruszka (Vienna, Herold, 1971). Kann, N ationalitatenproblem, II, 186-191, 351 354 -

-

Decline and Discord

429

tion in Austria, the Code of Civil Procedure was enacted in 1895. Credit belonged, of course, primarily to the efforts of previous cabinets. Further¬ more a revised and from the point of social justice improved system of graded personal income tax was passed by parliament in 1896. Yet Badeni’s name is primarily associated with what should have been his supreme achievement and turned out to be his catastrophic failure, the attempt to settle the national language conflict between Czechs and Germans. The language problem at issue will be discussed in section B-c. Badeni’s reform proposals, though not the methods which he employed, were basically constructive. But the violent obstruction and counterob¬ struction which they encountered dealt Austrian parliamentarism a blow from which it never recovered.18 Badeni’s successors as prime ministers tried to patch up the conflict by minor concessions to the Czechs but in substance they wanted to restore the status before his reform attempts in favor of the Germans. In doing so they encountered stiff Czech opposition without, however, securing the support of the Germans. Accordingly only an unsatisfactory pro¬ crastination could put off the collision of opposing Czech and German forces, concomitant with any comprehensive attempts to solve national problems. The ministry headed by Ernst von Korber (1900-1904), an ingenious ;

and capable bureaucrat, came close to the settlement of the language issue in Bohemia, and yet Korber failed, too, possibly in part because the heir apparent Archduke Francis Ferdinand feared a decline of the influence of the crown as arbiter between the feuding parties.19 Korber also hoped to divert national demands from their sterile track by advanc-

i

ing Austrian industrial programs, particularly the communication system. He succeeded to a point, but he could not make the parties agree to a

i

concept of economic priorities before national priorities. Thus his cabinet

J

too fell largely over the language issue, this time because of Czech

3

opposition. The ministries Paul von Gautsch (1904-1906) and Max von Beck (1906-1908), tackled again the question of electoral reform. Beck,

3

one of the ablest statesmen throughout the last decades of the empire’s

3

existence actually succeeded in this respect, as he did in bringing about a

1

new ten-year lease of life for the Austro-Hungarian economic settlement.

\

18Kolmer, Parlament und Verfassung, VI, 1-351 passim; Berthold Sutter, Die Badenischen Sprachenverordnungen von i8gj (Graz-Cologne, 1960-1965), II, 402-

#

4

4

442-44519 See Rudolf Sieghart, Die letzten ]ahrzehnte einer Grossmacht (Berlin, 1932), pp. 462 f.; see also Alfred Ableitinger, Ernest von Korber und das Verfassungsproblem im Jabre 1900 (Vienna-Cologne, 1973), pp- 82-121.

430

History of the Habshurg Empire

Yet as the socialist leader Victor Adler put it, political democracy was like air, you could not live without it, but you could not live from it alone. Thus general equal franchise could not save the empire, apart from the fact that Beck himself had to resign because the archduke Francis Ferdinand could not tolerate it that one of his intimate advisers would lend the emperor his services as prime minister before his own accession. The last prime minister appointed in peacetime, Count Karl Stiirgkh (1911-1916), became the initiator of wartime absolutism in Austria and one of its major victims. His adjournment of parliament in March, 1914, with resort to Article 14 (basic statute 141 of 1867) in the face of national obstruction was no longer considered as extraordinary measure, yet it paved the way for the elimination of parliament until May, 1917. Even more important, it deprived the Austrian peoples in the July crisis of 1914 of the opportunity to raise their voices through elected representa¬ tives and to force the Conrads and Berchtolds to listen to them. This was the supreme tragic effect of temporary absolutist government in Austria20 b) POLITICAL PARTIES

The emphasis given to national problems throughout the period 18791914 does not mean that social problems were of secondary importance in Cisleithanian Austria. Conflicts between labor, petty bourgeoisie, and capital, and between industry and agriculture, and various cultural prob¬ lems played as important a role as in any other country. Yet the accentua¬ tion of the national problem means, that the broad issues of social conflict were by and large channeled into the bed of diverse narrow national interests. Thus during the era under discussion some forty political parties, or¬ ganized in about twenty parliamentary clubs, operated or more often obstructed the course of government. The party names and club affilia¬ tions were continuously changing which would make it confusing to discuss here in detail the intricacies of the parliamentary lineup. National groups were represented by one or more deputies, who stood for different social and cultural interests, conservative, agrarian, clerical, liberal, later 20 Technically foreign policy was beyond the purview of the Cisleithanian Austrian parliament, practically the members had the opportunity to alert public opinion to its problems. On the legislative and administrative record of the whole period from 1879-1904 see Kolmer, Parlament und Verfassung, Vols. Ill to VIII. On the same subject, with chief emphasis on the administration, the less sophisticated and interpretative work by Alois von Czedik, Zur Geschichte der W. osterreichischen Ministerial 18611916, 4 vols. (Teschen-Vienna, 1917-1920).

Decline and Discord

43i

also socialist. These deputies of the nine recognized Cisleithanian national groups were organized in loose roof organizations, such as the Czech or Polish club, the German United Left, or since 1910 the so-called German Nationalverband, which comprised about ten political parties. Of major parties only the German Christian Socials almost to the end of the First World War and the Socialists all throughout stayed clear of these clubs, which put strange political bed fellows together. They were frequently linked by nothing but national interests, or more often national prejudices. The decline of the German liberals discussed in Chapter VI had led to a political regrouping in the elections of 1879. This proved that the industrial management sector—in international affairs German-oriented and in church-state and cultural relations, anticlerical—had become too small a base to govern Austria. Too small, that is, as long as it was no longer propped up by an unjust franchise system. This was still the case. Thus the decline of the German liberals was as yet only moderate in the elections of 1886 (loss of fifteen seats). Even after those of 1891 some 170 Germans faced about 160 Slav deputies. A Latin Italian-Rumanian group did not dip the scales. It was rather the support of the German conservatives and various pacts with the German liberals, which enabled Count Taaffe to continue in office after the Young Czechs, the actual victors, had left the government coalition. A new German party, the Christian Socials, as yet with only fourteen members, appeared in the newly elected parliament. Also nearly a score of German nationalist deputies had split by that time from the rank of the liberals. The elections of 1897, which followed Badeni’s very limited franchise reform, almost doubled the number of Christian Social deputies. The Young Czechs now fully dominated Czech politics, and the conservative Old Czechs, who a generation before had monopolized Czech party politics, dis¬ appeared from the scene. In this parliament Socialists (fifteen in num¬ ber) showed up for the first time. In 1900 the German moderate Left lost some seats to the German national Right, the Young Czechs to the German Agrarians and both Christian Socials and Socialists lost slightly, a circumstance partly to be explained by a conservative trend, which followed the Badeni crisis and partly by the intricacies of the franchise law. In the elections of 1907, the first elections held under general equal and secret male franchise, all this changed more radically in a social than in a national sense. The Christian Socials increased their number now from twenty-two to sixtyeight, and in the election of 1911, the last to be held in imperial Austria, to seventy-six. Even more spectacular was the rise of the Socialists from

432

History of the Habshurg Empire

ten to eighty-seven in 1907, followed by a slight decline to eighty-two in 1911. The German national radicals, divided in various splinter groups, continued to decline. Yet their influence on public opinion continued to be greater than could be deduced from their parliamentary representation, which had never exceeded about 5 per cent of all parliamentary seats. The electoral reform gave Slovenes and particularly Ruthenians some more adequate parliamentary representation. Thus the Slavs now held a rela¬ tive majority against the Germans. This, however, was obscured by the fact that the numerically strongest party, the Socialists, who were offi¬ cially not committed in the national conflict, had their largest representa¬ tion in German territory and leaned somewhat to the German side. Moreover, the last cabinets barely managed to survive by fluctuating support from the moderate, conservative, and clerical parties; at that, with little regard to national 'affiliation. The Polish club of about seventyfive deputies remained as the most solid progovernmental block. Of the new parties, or perhaps more correctly party movements, the decisive changes occurred in the German orbit. The greater leverage of German parties is explained by the incongruous franchise system, until 1918 by the tradition of the centralistic system, and by a control of key economic positions including German dominance of the primary news¬ papers: the liberal Neue Freie Presse, after 1888 the socialist Arbeiter Zeitung, and after 1894 the clerical Reichspost. Radical German national¬

ism, on the other hand, cannot be associated with any specific major paper, but rather with a series of rapidly appearing and disappearing dailies and periodicals. By 1879 German liberalism in a parliamentary sense comprised many conflicting trends and group interests, among them few genuine progres¬ sives, and more adherents of a capitalist industrialist system, whose liberalism was expressed chiefly in their aversion to social legislation, anti¬ clericalism and anti-Semitism. There were further tendencies to give the petty bourgeoisie, small crafts and trades, a better representation. Labor had practically no representation and agriculture only a negligible one within the liberal tent.21 Pervasive throughout the left as well as right wing of liberalism was a noticeable, but officially not yet acknowledged anti-Semitic trend, deeply anchored in the Austrian tradition and at¬ tributed to an alleged inordinate influence of the Jews in the political, 21 A small Viennese-centered left wing of the Liberals under the leadership of deputy Ferdinand Kronawetter represented to a limited degree interests of labor in the 1880’s and 1890’s. It was soon superseded by the Socialists. German spokesmen for agrarian interests were as yet chiefly clerical conservatives.

Decline and Discord

433

cultural, and economic life of the liberal era. No single party could in the long run serve all these interests. New alignments were clearly shaping up.22 In September, 1882, some left-wing German liberals in Linz drew i

up the so-called Linz program with emphasis on national and social

;

questions. Participants were the nationalist radical deputy Georg von Schonerer

(1842-1921), the young lawyer Robert Pattai, the writer

Engelbert Pernerstorfer, the young physician Victor Adler (1852-1918), and the historian Heinrich Friedjung. Of these four, Schonerer soon be¬ came the leader of the nationalist Pan-German racist movement in Austria, and Pattai became a prominent right-wing Christian Social parlamentarian. Pernerstorfer was to become a prominent representative of moderate German national trends in the future Social Democratic party, and Adler its founder and undisputed leader. Friedjung, like Adler of Jewish background, soon dropped out of politics, but as the only one of the four remained faithful to the old liberal program. The Linz program asked for the union of all German-speaking Austrian lands, including Bohemia and Moravia. Administrative separation of Dalmatia and Galicia from the bulk of the Austrian lands was demanded to secure a solid German majority in parliament. German should be¬ come the state language. The Austro-German alliance supplemented by a customs union was to be anchored in the constitution.23 Relations to Hungary were to be reduced to purely dynastic ties.24 The racial factor—the exclusion of Jews from the new movement and as far as possible from public life—was still lacking in these postulates. But within two years Schonerer added demands to that effect as basic principles to the program of the German National Association. Joined to it was a passionate anti-clericalism, the “Los von Rom” movement. Anticlericalism was fed by opposition to the infallibility dogma of the Vatican Council of 1870. In that respect the program was part of the liberal heritage. But in another it was anchored in racialism and attacked i a double-faced enemy, Christian universalism and liberal pseudo-egali;

tarianism. Hence the slogan: “Ohne Juda, ohne Rom, bauen wir den

[ deutschen Dom.”

■a U

1

Hitler glorified Schonerer in Mein Kampf, but deplored Schonerer’s

22 Jenks,

The Austrian Electoral Reforms of igoy, pp. 176-214; Julius Sylvester, Vom toten Parlament (Vienna, 1928), pp. 16-44; Kami, Nationalitatenproblem, II, 225-232,365-368. 23 Public opinion had long surmised the existence of an Austro-German alliance of 1879 made public only in February, 1888. 24 Kann, Nationalitatenproblem, I, 98-99, 294.

434

History of the Habshurg Empire

lack of organizational talent. Because of this deficiency Pan-Germanism never reached great parliamentary strength and split up in mutually feuding sectarian movements. Criticism of Schonerer’s and his ideologi¬ cal friends’ deficiencies, as seen from Hitler’s viewpoint, may have been valid. Yet lack of organization was hardly the main reason why the parliamentary strength of the movement never was at par with its ideological impact. Schonerer, Karl H. Wolf, and other bitterly feuding Pan-German leaders, never themselves believed that they had a chance of bringing about the success of their program in its most radical form. It would have meant the splitup of the Habsburg monarchy, whose German crownlands would have been joined to the Reich, further, the creation of Slavic satellite states, the reduction of the Jews to helots, and the replacement of the Catholic Church by a strange kind of Protestantism, similar to the German Christianity of the totalitarian future. These were dream goals, which could not be achieved while the Habs¬ burg empire was still at least nominally a great power. Propagation of this program in parliament meant a wasting of votes. Yet just because these were dream goals—to the majority of the Austro-Germans still those of bad dreams—they were discussed and promoted in all kinds of private associations, such as athletic clubs (Turnvereine) or the powerful Ger¬ man School Association (Deutscher Schulverein). In particular, govern¬ ment officials in the lower and middle ranks, who by law were restricted in their political activities, found here an outlet to work for their “cul¬ tural” interests. In this sense the seeds of the movement had a powerful impact—which could be harvested half a century later.25 In the meantime many of its sympathizers voted secretly for a rival party, whose leader, whatever his weakness, could not be charged with lack of organizational ability. Dr. Karl Lueger, a lawyer (1844-1910), came originally from the liberal fold, like Schonerer. Lueger, not less a demagogue than Schonerer, but more skillful a tactician, saw a chief weakness of liberalism in the pauperization of crafts and small shop¬ keepers in the face of rising industrialization. He was also concerned with the lot of the small peasants, whose forest and pasture lands were gradu¬ ally taken over by saw mills and the big estates owners. To fight these conditions was certainly justifiable but Lueger realized that a fight on purely economic issues directed against the rich would deprive him of 25 Paul Molisch, Geschichte der deutschnationalen Bewegung in Osterreich (Jena, 1926), pp. 106-266 passim; Andrew G. Whiteside, Austrian National Socialism before igi8 (The Hague, 1962), pp. 14-15, 60-66, 81-86; Kann, Nationalitdtenproblem, I, 98-102, 376-382.

Decline and Discord

435

support of the establishment. Like Schonerer, he saw the best means of promoting his program in deflecting it from the abstract issues to a per¬ sonified enemy, allegedly responsible for these conditions, the Jew, and in particular the liberal Jew. As seen from an intellectual and not a social viewpoint, Lueger appealed to basically more conservative strata. To them liberalism in literature, press, theater, and universities appeared as what later became known as cultural bolshevism. Statements like the one by the Christian Social local politician H. Bielohlavek, in the Viennese city council, “I am fed up with books, you find in books only what one Jew copies from another” or Lueger’s own publicly expressed opinion that the liberal scholars should shut up, until one of them could invent arti¬ ficial grass which a real cow could eat, were specimen of the new move¬ ment’s propaganda techniques.26 The fact that Lueger’s followers, radical in verbiage but basically con¬ servative in sentiments, did reject Pan-Germanism and remained faith¬ ful to the Church, did not diminish their vitriolic anti-Semitism, although it was anchored in social causes and at least officially not in racial ones. In practice the distinction was frequently negligible. The Christian Socials, developed from a merger of various antiliberal associations (1885-1888) to a political party organization. This changed the image of clericalism in Austria radically. The new party rejected moderation, the stand against demagogy and religious and political prejudices taken by the Austrian episcopate. The lower clergy, on the other hand, widely realized the propaganda value of the Lueger program, and its adherents had reason to rejoice that the image of a union of Catholicism with conservatism, as represented by the German Catholic People’s party in the Alpine lands, were rapidly superseded by the new movement. It was to become more radical in words than in deeds. Only gradually did it become clear that craftsmen and small shopkeepers could no longer be saved in the face of widespread industrialization. Lueger, though more mindful of the social problems of the impoverished urban lower middle class than the Pan-Germans, made his peace with industry as long as it was not “officially” Jewish controlled. As for the peasantry, a scion of one of the richest landowning aristocratic families, Prince Alois Liechten¬ stein became one of the leaders of the party. The Christian Socials, better adapted to the image techniques of modern times than the liberals, be¬ came the chief carriers of the policies of the establishment with the elec¬ tions of 1907. This remained true till 1918 and well beyond. 26 See Kann, A Study in Austrian intellectual History, pp. 108-110 and the sources quoted there.

436

History of the Hahsburg Empire

If this process of evolution had been realized sooner by men more sophisticated than Francis Joseph’s advisers, the confirmation of Lueger’s election as mayor of Vienna in the face of a routed liberal party would not have met the stubborn refusal from the crown, which in the end only helped Lueger to establish himself more firmly in the saddle of the mayoralty.27 The emperor finally yielded in April, 1897, and found that the Christian Socials in government—though as yet only local govern¬ ment—were more moderate than as members of an entirely irresponsible opposition. No general conclusion can be drawn from this experience—least of all in regard to national socialism in whose accession to power the reverse proved to be true. The Christian Socials were in essence never a revolu¬ tionary party. They supported the existing structure of the dual mon¬ archy. They stood firmly against Magyar tendencies to weaken the Compromise of 1867, and their leader, apart from his doubtful demagogic talents, had uncontested ability as administrator. Neither did Lueger lack a measure of social consciousness in regard to urban ecology, transfer of public utilities to the public domain, conservation of natural resources, and other reform measures.28 While Lueger’s record in this respect was quite good, it was good only on the local level and it certainly was not good enough even in its farther reaching social demands to meet the needs of the underprivileged labor class. Here help could only be self-help by labor. It resulted in the decisions of the Hainfeld Congress December 30, 1888, to January 1, 1889, which established a common platform of the various trends and factions within the labor movement, syndicalism, economic cooperative tendencies and trade unionism. Above all, the desire for a joint political program was met. The anarchistic adherents of individual action had previously done the image of labor great harm in the eyes of public opinion. Terror had little direct influence on the modest social reform program of the TaafTe regime, but it had led to repressive measures such as the infamous an27 Fearful of the allegedly revolutionary character of the Christian Social party, the emperor denied Lueger between 1895 and 1897 four times confirmation of his election as mayor of Vienna, although the majority behind him increased after every one of the undemocratic dissolutions of the town council, ordered by the authorities. 28 Kurt Skalnik, Dr. Karl Lueger (Vienna, 1954), pp. 53-165; on the history of the Christian Socials see Reinhold Knoll, Zur Tradition der christlichsozialen Partei (Graz-Cologne, 1973); Hugo Hantsch, Geschichte Osterreichs (Graz, 1947), II, 442-446, 458-459; Kann, Nationalitatenproblem, I, 102-104, 380-383.

. [

Decline and Discord

437

archist law of 1886 which exempted major political crimes from the juris¬ diction of jury trials. The new Social Democratic party under the leader¬ ship of Victor Adler stated its clear intention to fight for improvement of social conditions and against exorbitant demands of the military, the big landowners, and industry according to democratic principles, in parlia¬ ment. The only extraparliamentary means used—seldom enough—was to be strikes and demonstrations. The latter were used effectively in the struggle for equal general franchise. Altogether the program was to be understood as extension of social reform measures rather than as de¬ mands for socialization. They were not seriously raised in imperial Austria. As mentioned, the Pan-German movement benefited from support from the lower and middle Austrian bureaucracy, the lower judiciary, and altogether from the provincial middle-class intelligentsia. This greatly helped the radical German Nationals to establish an influence far beyond the parliamentary strength expressed in numbers of votes. The Chris¬ tian Socials in their later history could count on the help of the estab¬ lishment, the Social Democrats (as supporters of democratic means to socialist ends) had economic change going for them. With the rapid progress of industrialization in the cities and the slower advance in agri¬ culture, the ranks of the labor force—from here on organized labor— would inevitably swell. It may be added that a sizable section of the leadership, including that in the lower echelons came from the liberals. They were equally alienated by the lack of social understanding in the liberal party machine, operative in the United Left and later the Nationalverband (a roof organization of bourgeois German parties), as by Chris¬

tian Social and Pan-German slogans. Much progress was thus achieved in adult education and various cultural activities, above all in the establish¬ ment of a well-written and reasoned labor press. In 1899 the Social Democrats in the nationality program of Briinn (Brno) affirmed, at least indirectly, adherence and loyalty to a reformed Austrian empire. This program called for the solution of the nationality problem by a broad system of territorial autonomy for the various national groups. Yet labor had national problems of its own. In 1911 the Czech party separated from the over-all Austrian Cisleithanian organization, because of alleged inordinate German influence in the leadership. Not )

entirely without reason. A residue of Marx’s and Engels’ ideological in-

l

heritance, national prejudices were still noticeable in the ranks of Ger-

t

rnan-Austrian labor. Yet the differences could have been bridged just as

1

much as the deficiencies of the program of territorial autonomy which

438

History of the Habshurg Empire

did not do justice to the problem of minorities in nationally mixed areas. More important was the fact that labor and its leadership believed in the future of a restructured Austrian empire. The government ignored this cooperative outlook.29 The Pan-Germans by their partial control of the lower and middle bureaucracy influenced the course of government. In the last decade of the monarchy, the Christian Socials were frequently represented in the cabinets and had considerable indirect influence even before. The Social¬ ists, from the standpoint of the government, were considered to be be¬ yond the social pale of official collaboration, despite inofficial and occa¬ sional contacts with some right-wing socialist advocates of national and cultural reforms, like Karl Renner and Engelbert Pernerstorfer. This is not to say that the Austrian government perceived the Socialists as the vaterlandslose Gesellen as the'German emperor Wilhelm II did. At this time the loss of a great opportunity was caused more by adherence to a stuffy tradition, than by fear of social revolution. c) ISSUES OF THE CONFLICT BETWEEN THE NATIONAL GROUPS

The struggle for national equality on the part of the underprivileged national groups against the privileged elite was complex enough in theory, but even more difficult to solve in practice. In many cases privileged national groups were unwilling to yield advantages, nor were they compelled to do so. In other instances underprivileged national groups asked in theory for nothing but equality, but as soon as it seemed to be achieved or within reach, this attitude changed to implied demands for national predominance in some areas. All this may have been due to a general human weakness, particularly characteristic in the national struggle, namely the inability to project oneself into the position of the other fellow, in this case the other national group, whether privileged or deprived. Strangely, while the basic issues of the national conflict were cer¬ tainly broad, the fight usually raged over very specific points, often seem¬ ingly insignificant except to legalistic minds and often incomprehensible to the broad masses. This latter aspect of the problem may have had its roots in part in the bureaucratic structure and tradition of the Austrian 29 Ludwig Briigel, Geschichte der osterreichischen Sozialdemo\ratie, 5 vols. (Vienna, 1922-1925), see IV, and V, 10-143; Hans Mommsen, Die Sozialdemo\ratie und die Nationalitatenfrage im habsburgischen Vielvol\erstaat, 1867-igoy (Vienna, *963), I, 88-450 passim. Kann, Nationcditatenproblem, I, 104-108, 383-384 and, concerning the national question, II, 160-182, 342-351.

Decline and Discord

439

state. Discussion of a few particularly significant problems may illustrate the point. The core issue of the national problem was the language question in nationally mixed areas. The problem was important in schools and in the communications between individual citizen and government in mat¬ ters of administration and court proceedings as well as in communica¬ tions between government agencies. The court-backed practice in grade and secondary schools was that minorities of at least 20 percent in any given area were entitled to schools or at least classes with instruction in the vernacular of the students. In higher education, chiefly gymnasiums and universities, the question was more complex. The Windischgratz cabinet fell because of German National opposition to Slovene parallel classes in a gymnasium in Cilli (Celje) in southern Styria. German vio¬ lent opposition also prevented the establishment of an Italian law faculty in Innsbruck in 1904. On the other hand, the partition of the German university in Prague in a German and a Czech institution was ac¬ complished peacefully in 1882, and the separation of the boards of educa¬ tion followed there in 1890. The Polish university in Lwow gradually set up a number of chairs with instruction in Ruthenian and the Croatian university of Zagreb, established in 1874, was significant also for Austrian Southern Slav students. Storm centers of strife in the nationally mixed areas were the crownlands with the culturally most advanced population, particularly Bohemia with its roughly three-fifths to two-fifths relationship between Czechs and Germans. Here the distinction between language of the land (Landessprache) and language customary in the lands (landesiibliche Sprache) has to be introduced. The former notion meant that a language of the land was any language spoken as vernacular by at least 20 percent of the people. That applied to Bohemia and Moravia in regard to the Czech and German languages, in Silesia to the Polish as well.30 According to a language ordinance of 1880, administrative actions should be taken in the language in which they were initiated by an individual party with interpreter service provided for the other party, if necessary. The other concept, the language “customary in the land” was for the Germans in Bohemia and Moravia the language prevalent in any given district. The Czechs did not recognize any distinction between the two concepts in 80 According to the official Austrian census of 1910, 63.2 percent Czechs and 36.8 percent Germans lived in Bohemia, 71.8 percent Czechs and 27.6 percent Germans in Moravia, and 43.9 percent Germans, 31.7 percent Poles, and 24.3 percent Czechs in Silesia.

440

History of the Habshurg Empire

these two crownlands. The Germans stressed the importance of the distinction. It looked like a hair-splitting theoretical issue, yet in practice the consequences were far-reaching. The Czechs demanded that the Czech language should, on historical grounds be the only official language throughout the two crownlands, even in German districts. The Germans on the other hand held that the official language should be only the one customary in any given district— in the German districts, German. The Germans thereby promoted the administrative separation of Bohemia and Moravia as historic entities, in a Czech and German part. This view was opposed by the Czechs who considered the lands of the Bohemian crown as historically Czech lands once united under the crown of St. Wenceslav. The Czech position would have been stronger if they had taken the same position in regard to Silesia where they were outnumbered by Germans and Poles. There they wanted to perceive the national problems of Silesia as part of a Czech entity of all lands of the Bohemian crown rather than as crownland with German recognized as official language throughout. Even more subjective was the German position. Except for the unjustified demand for full adminis¬ trative partition of Bohemia, the German position would have been arguable there as well as in Moravia, if the Germans had been ready to agree to recognition of the same principles in predominantly Slovene southern Styria or in the Italian part of South Tyrol (the Trentino). Here the Germans insisted that the historic lands must be administered as entities with German majorities, even though Slovenes and Italians had a clear majority in the South of both crownlands. As for the language of administration, a further bone of contention was the administrative practice in regard to a tripartite concept of language use: first, an “external” language used in communicating with the in¬ terested parties, second an “internal” language used within the govern¬ ment agencies for the agenda not to be communicated to the parties, and third the so-called “innermost” language used between lower and higher government agencies, in particular in communicating between the crownland administrations and the ministries in Vienna. The struggle for the use of the internal language in the administration of Galicia was won by the Poles in 1868, by the Czechs not until the 1890’s and only in part.31 Prime Minister Count Badeni, appointed in 1895, believed he could settle the enervating Czech-German language conflict in Bohemia and 31Kann, Nationalitatenproblem, I, 186-199, 416-420; Rudolf Sieghart, Die letzten ]ahrzehnte einer Grossmacht, (Berlin, 1932), pp. 397-402.

Decline and Discord

441

Moravia by two language ordinances o£ 1897 which provided simply for the conduct of business in both languages, Czech and German throughout the crownlands. Badeni consequently ordered that all public officials in Bohemia and Moravia would have to acquire a sufficient command of both national languages within three years. Otherwise they would lose their office. Badeni hoped that if this plan succeeded it could correspond¬ ingly be introduced in other crownlands. Few Czech officials lacked a sufficient knowledge of German, the second language of most educated people in the empire. Few Germans, on the other hand, had a commensurate knowledge of Czech which many arrogantly considered to be the inferior language of a small people. Other Germans simply believed it was too difficult to learn and of only limited practical use. Many took Badeni s decrees as insult and challenge to their feeling of national superiority. German nationalists and liberals started filibustering in parliament. Badeni might have attempted to com¬ promise on the time limit of three years and thus might have split the opposition to his basically valid principles. Fie put himself in the wrong, however, by trying to break the filibuster by the questionable tactics of introducing a new order of parliamentary procedure. The filibuster now turned to open violence in parliament, and spilled from there into the streets of Vienna and Graz as well as the German towns of Bohemia. The earlier German nationalist and German liberal oppositions were now supported by Christian Socials and Social Democrats and the battle was joined on the opposing sides by almost all Czechs, but also Southern Slavs, and some Ruthenian and Polish deputies. The police dragged a score of deputies from the halls of parliament. Riots in the streets en¬ sued and the emperor had to yield to force and dismiss Badeni. The following cabinets modified and in 1899 rescinded the decrees. Czech fili¬ buster replaced the German filibuster practically to the end of the empire. Open violence had ceased but so had a working system of Austrian par¬ liamentarism. It was generally recognized now that Austria was torn far too much by internal conflict to allow for evolutionary reforms of the 1

centralistic system.32 Actually it was not only blind obstinacy and nationalist prejudices, which were responsible for this state of affairs. Both existed on either side of the conflict, though they were more conspicuous in the German camp. Yet a fundamental lack of understanding of the political process

32 Kolmer,

\\ .)

Parlament und Verfassung, VI; Munch, Bohmische Tragodie, pp. 405-458; Berthold Sutter, Die Badenischen Sprachenverordnungen von 189J (GrazCologne, 1960-1965), I, passim, II, 50-175.

442

History of the Habshurg Empire

in regard to the handling of minorities prevailed in all Europe, not only in Austria. It was widely held that the key to the solution of the national problem in mixed areas was territorial autonomy for the settlements of various ethnic groups. To make them nationally homogeneous would have required, however, the establishment of such small districts, that their administration would have become unmanageable. But in larger administrative areas territorial autonomy could in effect mean the sub¬ ordination of substantial scattered minorities to a narrow majority. Re¬ form proposals of this kind, though frequently advanced, thus missed their objective of national justice. The ingenious Socialist deputy, Dr. Karl Renner (1870-1950) later chancellor of the first and second Austrian republics and eventually head of state, proposed another scheme, so-called personal autonomy. This meant that national status corrected was not to be conferred on the population in a nationally mixed territory but linked to the individuals themselves, regardless of their domicile. People could register in a public record book as nationals of their own choosing. They were then eligible to vote in a national curia, German, Czech, or whatever, for a predetermined number of deputies. Some public agenda, particularly the most controversial cultural-educational matters, were to be administered by nationally homogeneous agencies. In 1905 a compromise of this kind was reached between Czechs and Germans in Moravia, another in 1910, between Ruthenians, Roumanians, Germans, and Jews in the Bukovina,33 and the enactment of a third in Galicia be¬ tween Poles and Ruthenians was only blocked by the outbreak of the First World War. The principle of personal autonomy, even though it was a more sophisticated instrument of national justice than that of territorial auton¬ omy, would not in the long run have resolved the problems of national conflict. In the last analysis most national groups in the Habsburg empire, like any other who were or felt to be oppressed, wanted statehood and not just national equality based on a perfect legal structure. Personal auton¬ omy though more equitable than territorial autonomy, actually seemed 33 Kann, Nationalitdtenproblem, I, 199-201, 331-335, 420-421, 471-472, and by the same author “Karl Renner,” Journal of Modern History, XXIII (1951), 243-249. Austrian legal practice did not recognize the Jews as a separate national group in terms of Article XIX of the basic law 142 of 1867. Neither did the majority of Jews desire such recognition. After 1900, however, the rise of Jewish national sentiments, furthered by the new Zionist movement, led increasingly to demands for separate Jewish national status, particularly in the crownlands with the rela¬ tively largest Jewish population, Galicia and Bukovina. The national compromise of 1910 in the Bukovina met these demands halfway by incorporating a number of dietal seats reserved for Jews into the German curia.

Decline and Discord

443

farther removed from the semblance of the desired identity of nation and state. The nation appeared to be anchored in the public records rather than in conspicuous territorial jurisdiction, however limited. Never¬ theless, as long as the empire lasted within the setting of the centralistic systems in the dual states, personal autonomy could have provided national justice to a degree which no other institutional system could grant under existing conditions. Moreover, reforms on this basis pre¬ cluded the sweeping innovations of a federal structure, which probably could not have been brought about without conflicts with Hungary and ensuing intervention from neighboring countries. Thus, although the personality principle would not have solved the Austrian national prob¬ lems, it might have helped to arrest the creeping disease of national dis¬ integration for some time. This, however, was the most a desperately sick patient could have hoped for. d)

INDIVIDUAL NATIONAL GROUPS AND NATIONAL CONFLICT

German political developments have been sketched in the preceding survey of political party movements. Major problems of the Czechs have likewise been touched upon. Here, the national leadership of the former Old Czech leader, Frantisek Rieger, was superseded in the early 1890’s by the brilliant Young Czech parliamentarian Dr. Karel Kramar who tended in the direction of a moderately conservative Panslavism. His predecessors in the leadership of the new movement, Dr. Karel Sladkovsky, a revolu¬ tionary of 1848, and the brothers Dr. Edward Gregr and particularly Julius Gregr, had given it a decidedly pro-Russian orthodox orientation. Only shortly before and during the First World War were western as¬ sociations equally cultivated. The Young Czechs, who displayed various features of an intransigent nationalism, at the same time had no more understanding for social questions than the German liberals. The party had reached its peak around 1897 and from then on had to share repre¬ sentation of Czech interests with an agrarian and a so-called National Socialist party, actually a moderately left oriented liberal group, to the right of the Socialists. After 1900 the great personality of Thomas G. Masaryk (1850-1937), former Young Czech deputy and after 1900 leader of the small moderately left liberal Realist party, became the ideological leader of the Czech people. The future founder of the first Czech republic secured this position not by parliamentary maneuvering but by the strength of his personality, his humanitarianism, his courage in the fight against prejudices, and his scholarly wisdom. Not yet ready to abandon Austria, his program between 1900 and 1914 consisted in de-

444

History of the Hahshurg Empire

mands for social and political justice, to be brought about by evolutionary reform. It honors the Czech people that they acknowledged the moral leadership of a man, who in imperial Austria did not share, desire, or lay claim to any of the paraphernalia of power on which political careers are generally based in parliamentary systems.34 As for the Poles, steady cooperation with the government continued on the basis of the Galician administrative autonomy. It secured the Poles, at the expenses of the Ruthenians, farther-reaching language rights than the Czechs had ever possessed in imperial Austria. Gradually, however, clouds came up on the political horizon. The anti-Polish policy of the Biilow cabinet in Germany and in particular Prussia (1900-1909) also led to a radicalization of Polish nationalism in Austria. Resentment was stirred up earlier, with the Austrian electoral reforms of 1907, which «»

increased the number of Ruthenian parliamentary seats, chiefly at the ex¬ pense of the Polish representation. A Polish-Ruthenian compromise, al¬ though never enacted because of the outbreak of the World War, forced the Poles to new concessions. It resulted largely from fear of the activities of a Ruthenian irredenta in case of a conflict with Russia. Several polit¬ ical leaders, only losely affiliated with the establishment of the Polish Szlachta, played a role here, especially Roman Dmowski of the new National Democratic party, which was pro-Russian, anti-German, antiRuthenian, and anti-Semitic. Unorthdox in the sense of the Polish club in the Austrian parliament were also the policies of the leader of the Polish socialists, Ignaz Daszynski, a brilliant parliamentary orator. Neither Daszynski nor Dmowski had as yet a large following in Galicia, but the personalities of these men were powerful enough to destroy the image of a monolithic conservative Polish policy. A contribution to this effect was also made by the agrarian leader of the Small Peasant party, Wincenty Witos, like Daszynski a prime minister of the future Polish republic, of which Dmowski was to become a foreign minister.35 The Ruthenians in the era under discussion were a national group on 34 Munch, Bohmische Tragodie, pp. 553-627; Jan Havranek, “The Development of Czech Nationalism,” Austrian History Yearbook, 111:2 (1967), 248-260; Kann, N'ationalitdtenproblem, I, 197-209, 419-424; Horst Glassl, Der mdhrische Ausgleich (Munich, 1967), passim. 35 Wilhelm Feldman, Geschichte der politischen Ideen in Polen seit dessen Teilungen iygy,-igi4 (Osnabriick, 1964), pp. 298-304, 401-431; Estreicher in Cam¬ bridge History of Poland, II, 449-460; Piotr S. Wandycz, “The Poles in the Habsburg Monarchy,” Austrian History Yearbook, III :2 (1967), 279-286; J6zef Buszko, “Revolutionare Bewegungen in Osterreich-Ungarn zu Anfang des 20. Jahrhunderts und die Teilnahme von Polen daran,” La Pologne au Xlle Congres International des Sciences Historiques a Vienne (Warsaw, 1965), pp. 101-114; Kann, Nationalitdten¬ problem, I, 228-233, 433-434*

Decline and Discord

445

the upswing in Austria. It was an ominous sign of the creeping disinte¬ gration of the empire that such changes of national status for the better did rather weaken than strengthen loyalty to the empire. Among the Ruthenians, the pro-Ukrainian Young Ruthenians outnumbered the orthodox pro-imperial Old Ruthenians in parliamentary representation by four to one in 1907 and more than ten to one in 1911. The relationship was to some extent similar to that between Old and Young Czechs, al¬ though corresponding to their firmer grip on the national representation, the loyalty of the Young Ruthenians was considerably more doubtful than that of the Young Czechs before 1914. At that time the Young Ruthenians had succeeded to have a language law passed by the Galician diet which secured near equality with the Poles, except for communica¬ tions with the central authorities and continued inferiority as to uni¬ versity education. In the Bukovina they achieved full equality with the other major national groups by the previously discussed crownland com¬ promise of 1910. Able leaders were Julijan Romanczuk, founder of an Ukrainian National Council in East Galicia in the 1880’s, and the younger E. Lewyckyj, an expert in the intricate language problems of multinational areas. Both, Romanczuk and Lewyckyj, in principle favored an under¬ standing with the Poles.36 Of the empire’s Southern Slavs nearly 3,000,000 lived in Hungary in¬ cluding Croatia-Slavonia, more than 2,000,000 in Austria, and less than 2,000,000 in Bosnia-Hercegovina (population census of 1910). BosniaHercegovina represented a wholly Southern Slav territory, in which the proportional relation between Serbs and Croats was about two to one. In Hungary including Croatia-Slavonia, the Southern Slavs at that time had a share of 14 percent within the total population of whom nearly twothirds were Croats, the remainder Serbs. In Austria only 7.3 percent of the population were Southern Slavs, of whom more than three-fifths were Slovenes, the remainder Serbo-Croats.37 On the basis of these population figures it would have been reasonable to assume that the Southern Slav union movement, the genuine leitmotif of Southern Slav politics in the era from 1879 to 1914, should have started 36 Borys Krupnicky, Geschichte der Ukraine (Wiesbaden, 1963), pp. 242-263; Ivan L. Rudnitzky, “The Ruthenians under Austrian Rule,” Austrian History Yearbook, 111:2 (1967), 407-429. 37 The Austrian official statistics, unlike the Hungarian, did not distinguish be¬ tween Croats and Serbs and comprised both groups under the heading of SerboCroats. On linguistic and religious grounds it is impossible to assign the 34 percent Mohammedans of the total Bosnian population to either Croats or Serbs. There is no doubt, however, that according to ethnic principles they must be recognized as Southern Slavs.

446

History of the Habsburg Empire

in Bosnia, and if not there in Hungarian-controlled Croatia. Actually until about 1903 the center of the movement was in Austria and later in Serbia, for the following reasons. Until 1908 Bosnia-Hercegovina was an occupied territory under the administration of an enlightened absolutism in regard to agriculture, industrial development, and communications. This regime had little regard for claims of national autonomy and less for social justice on behalf of the exploited peasants. The grant of a crownland constitution at the time of the annexation in 1908 changed little. This anachronistic estates’ constitution exposed bills passed by the Bosnian diet to the threefold veto of the joint Ministry of Finance and of the Austrian and Hungarian parliaments. Yet even if the new crownland constitution had been more democratic, it presumably would not have made much difference. By 1903, with the replacement of the pro-Austrian Obrenovic dynasty in Serbia by the pro-Russian house of Karadjordjevic the kingdom had moved definitely into the sphere of Panslav agitadon and alliances hostile to Austria. Presumably this change in Serbian atti¬ tudes would have happened anyway because of the inevitable trend toward integral nationalism even without the violent events of 1903 in Belgrad. In any case, Southern Slav nationalism had now become largely irredentist, and a strong irredentist movement could be directed effec¬ tively only from abroad. In domestic policies the harassment tactics of the Hungarian government continued, not only in Hungary proper but also in Croatia. Here the banus, Count K. Khuen-Hedervary (1883-1903) and most of his successors would play Serbs and Croats against each other. Accordingly concerted Southern Slav action generating from Zagreb became increasingly difficult. Before the twentieth century, Croatian-Serb rivalries and not Serb irredentism had primarily impeded the union movement. The Croats in the Habsburg empire, a historic national group of long standing endowed with autonomous rights in Hungary, had consistently claimed leadership of Southern Slav national interest. They had considered the orthodox Serbs as a junior, culturally less advanced partner of their nation. Un¬ doubtedly remnants of the traditions of Illyrism played also a part, not intended by its ancestor Ljudevit Gaj. Yet the influence of the conserva¬ tive late nineteenth century and prewar twentieth century Croatian leaders Ante Starcevic (founder of the Party of Right) and later Josip Frank (founder of the Party of Pure Right) 38 was declining. Both

38 “Right”

to be understood as Croatian rights, interpreted and represented by a conservative party. In this sense the policies of the later Frank party were even more out of line with the course of Southern Slav unionism than those of Starcevic.

Decline and Discord

447

parties were strongly national Croatian, which meant in the case of Frank’s followers pro-trialist under Croatian leadership but above all strongly anti-Serb. Neither of them could deliver the goods of a trialistic program which would have given the Southern Slavs under Croatian leadership equal constitutional status with Austria and Hungary. Neither did these politicians understand the social problems of the poor peasants, particularly in Serbia and the Serb regions of Bosnia, but to a lesser ex¬ tent in all other Southern Slav territories as well. Gradually it became clear that, irrespective of national claims, Serbs and Croats had many social issues in common. The new peasant party under Ante and Stjepan Radic and the new Croatian Progressive party represented such issues in the past prewar decade. A remarkable change of policies took place in 1905, when the Croatian opposition was disappointed by emperor-king Francis Joseph’s legally correct refusal to negotiate with Austrian Croatian deputies from Istria and Dalmatia on behalf of their oppressed brethren in Hungariancontrolled Croatia-Slavonia. The Croatian opposition leaders now decided to cooperate with the Magyar anti-dualistic Independence party. In return for Croatian support the nationalist Magyar opposition pledged a liberal interpretation

of

the

Hungaro-Croatian

compromise

of

1868

(the

Nagodba), as well as initiation of democratic reforms in Croatia. The Magyar and the Croatian opposition also agreed on the demand that Dalmatia should be joined to the triune kingdom. On October 4, 1905, this understanding was endorsed by a convention of Austrian and Hungarian-Croatian deputies in opposition to their governments, in Rijeka (Fiume). Two Austrian Croats from Dalmatia who were not exposed to the vengeance of the government in Budapest, Frano Supilo and Dr. Ante Trumbic, subsequently Yugoslav minister of foreign affairs, took a leading role in these proceedings. Less than two weeks later twenty-six Austro-Serb deputies agreed in the resolution of Zadar (Zara) in Dalmatia to the program of Rijeka. A second, this time joint, Croatian-Serb meeting at Zadar coordinated common objectives still further. Croats and Serbs declared now to be one nation, bound to fight for the same program. This political philosophy, however, was endorsed neither by the People’s party, the adherents of the old Starcevic party of Right, nor by Frank’s Party of Pure Right. Un¬ disputed Croatian leadership in a Southern Slav union program was then still the foremost issue. Even a party anchored in a socially broader base, the new Peasant party under the charismatic leadership of Stjepan Radic, did not suport the Croat-Serb coalition of Zadar but came out for some¬ what vague ideas of broad, empirewide federal objectives.

448

History of the Habshurg Empire

Yet the policy of the strong Croat-Serb coalition operative in the diet in Zagreb was not destroyed from inside but from outside, because of the nationalist intransigence of the Magyar Independence party which, in 1905, formed the nucleus of the so-called Hungarian coalition govern¬ ment. It stood in strong opposition to the previous and future semi¬ liberal establishment. In 1907, the intolerant nationality policy of this regime imposed, contrary to previous promises, a new Magyarizing language legislation on Croatia. It was answered by Croatian obstruc¬ tion in the Hungarian parliament and an electoral victory of the CroatSerb coalition which by now had reversed its collaboration with the Hun¬ garian government. The coalition opposed the annexation of Bosnia-Hercegovina in 1908, a major factor in the high-treason trial of Zagreb in 1909 against the Serb leaders of the coalition.39 A subsequent libel suit in Vienna showed that the convictions in this trial were largely based on forged evidence, probably with the foreknowledge of Austro-Hungarian authorities. The defendants of Zagreb were fully exonerated in a legal sense, and the un¬ scrupulous methods of Hungarian political justice were proved. The non¬ judicial question of loyalty of those convicted in Zagreb to the Habsburg monarchy was, of course, a different matter. After suspension of the Croatian constitution of 1912 as sanction for obstructionism, the new Tisza government in Hungary succeeded to paper over the conflict with Croatia by withdrawing the objectionable language legislation. Strict adherence to the Nagodba of 1868 was pledged again. Yet in essence none of the major problems between Hungary and Croatia were solved because they were all caused by the broad ethnic issue, not by the constitutional problem in a narrow sense. In this respect a genuine long-range understanding on joint Serbo-Croatian pol¬ icies beyond declaratory statements and issues of immediate concern may have been still remote as far as the majority of both peoples in the empire was concerned. But a common opposition, supported by a strong ma¬ jority, against Austria-Hungary’s foreign policy, against the nationalistic spirit of the Hungarian government, and less directly against discrimi¬ nation in Austria came ever more clearly to realization. Such was the situa¬ tion when war broke out in July, 1914.40 To be sure, the union program 39 The issue will be touched upon again in the context of Hungarian domestic policy in Section C: a of this chapter. 40 Wendel, Der Kampf der Sudslawen, pp. 385-620; Rudolf Kissling, Die Kroaten (Graz-Cologne, 1956), pp. 62-90; Dimitrje Djordjevic, “The Serbs as an Integrating and Disintegrating Factor,” Austrian History Yearbook, 111:2 (1967), 70-82; Carlile A. Macartney, The Habsburg Empire ijgo-1918 (New York, 1969), pp.

Decline and Discord

449

of Zara (Zadar) in its full extent has not been fulfilled to this day because of the undeniable difference in cultural and social structure and tradi¬ tion between the Serbs and Croats. The sizable Slovene minorities in the crownlands of Styria and Carnithia were strongly discriminated against by Germans. Their status was better, though still in some respects not fully equal with that of the Germans, in Carinola, where they represented a majority of more than 90 percent. In Goricia too, where they also formed an absolute majority, the government favored the Italian minority. In all these crownlands Catholic conservative leadership was dominant among the Slovenes. It represented Slovene interests with some success. In 1885, in return for support of the Taaffe government the Slovenes secured a more adequate representation in the diet of Carniola where previously 6 percent Germans had held two-thirds of all seats. They also gained considerably by the electoral reform of 1907; limited language rights were secured in Carinthia and Styria. Consequently, in 1912 the conservative Slovenes and Croats, united by the common Roman-Catholic tradition, in the declara¬ tion of Ljubljana (Laibach) came out for a Croat-Slovene union, in effect an anti-Serb alliance. This Slovene policy, however, lead by the clerical conservative Dr. Antonin Korosec, was opposed by the small group of Socialists who stood for a comprehensive concept of Southern Slav union, including not only Serbs but Bulgarians as well. Eventually the liberal na¬ tional movement gained the upper hand also among the Slovenes; this development was indeed inevitable even though the majority of Slovene deputies in the Austrian parliament and in the diet in Carniola were still conservative. One of their leaders close to the Christian Socials was Father (Prelate) Janez Krek. But the Slovenes, the smallest of the South¬ ern Slav national groups, had nowhere to go except in conjunction with the Croats. In Austria they were an isolated group. Thus when the Croats saw the need for a common program with the Serbs, it was clear that the Slovenes would have to join under the flag of Southern Slav unionism. This unionism, however, could not be materialized as long as the Com¬ promise of 1867 was in force, and that meant practically as long as the em¬ pire lasted. Neither trialism stood a chance, nor even less subtrialism,

767-77°; Mirjana Gross, Vladavina Hrvats\o-Srps\e Koalicije igo6-igoy (Beograd, i960), pp. 228-232, and by the same author Povijest Pravas\e Ideologije, (Zagreb, 1:973), pp. 223-429, 431-440; Stanko Guldescu in Francis H. Eterovich and Chris¬ topher Spalatin, eds., Croatia, II, 50-70; see further, Denis, La Grande Serbie, pp. 130-165; See also not 51 in this chapter. Kann, Nationalitdtenproblem, I, 254-264, 29(^298, 441-443, 455-456.

4$o

History of the Hahshurg Empire

the concept of subordination of a union of the empire’s Southern Slavs as a junior partner of minor rights to the dual states. Trialism was opposed by the Austro-Hungarian establishment, subtrialism was rejected by the Magyars and the Southern Slavs themselves. The fact that the largest body of Serbs in the Habsburg monarchy lived in Bosnia as the oppressed brethren at the gates of the Serbian kingdom voided the possibility of a solution within the empire. This was one reason why unionism was promoted from Serbia. Even if the governments of the dual states had agreed to a trialistic solution within the empire, the time for its realiza¬ tion had run out with the nineteenth century.41 As for the Latin national groups, united in the Austrian parliament under a loose roof organization, the Unio Latina', the Roumanians in Cisleithanian Austria represented less than i percent of the total popula¬ tion. Most of them lived in the Bukovina, where their national rights were adequately secured by the compromise, incorporated in the crownland constitution of 1910.42 This does not mean that the Austro-Roumanians considered this as a definitive solution. Such a solution was perceived only in a union with their brethren in Hungarian Transylvania and those in the independent Roumanian kingdom. The fact that Roumania was Austria-EIungary’s ally, although only in secret, put at least some limited restraint on irredentist propaganda from outside. The Austro-Roumanians could thus settle for a temporary, fairly comfortable arrangement with the government. The struggle for Roumanian rights under conditions not comfortable but outrageous took place in Hungary. In the context of the discussion of Hungarian political conditions we will return to the Roumanian problem. If it has been said that the secret Roumanian alliance impeded irredenta activities against the monarchy, it seems to be suggestive that this con¬ sideration should doubly apply to the status of the Italians in the empire. In this case Italy was not only a secret but a publicly professed partner of the Triple Alliance. Things worked out quite differently, however. Roumania was a relatively small Balkan state, possibly in need of Austrian and German support against Russia. Italy was at least nominally a great power, and courted by Germany and the Russo-France counter alliance. There was no reason for the Italian government to refrain from the support of irredentist activities and to pay more than lip-service respect to 41 Fran Zwitter, “The Slovenes and the Habsburg Monarchy,” Austrian History Yearboo\, 111:2 (1967), 173-182; Kann, Nationalitdtenproblem, I, 305-307, 459. 42 Richard Wenedikter, “Bukowina,” in Karl Gottfried Hugelmann, Das Nationalitatenrecht des alten Osterreich (Vienna, 1934), pp. 724-734; Kann, Nationalitdten¬ problem, I, 332-335, 471-472.

Decline and Discord

451

the Austrian protestations. Up to the end o£ the 1880’s these anti-Austrian activides were partly curbed by the fact that the Italian population in the Trentino, to the south of German South Tyrol, was largely oriented to¬ ward Catholic conservadsm and opposed to radical liberal forces in Italy. The same could not be said for the Austrian Littoral and pardcularly not for Trieste. Here the liberals and Socialists were definitely on the march. In fact, in 1911 the future martyr of the Italian irredenta in Austria, the Socialist Cesare Batdsd, was elected to parliament even in the Trendno. Italians had reason to complain about the brutal and stupid German opposidon which denied them a university on Austrian soil. Sdll they enjoyed a limited administrative autonomy in the Trendno. Furthermore, the disinclination of Austrian bureaucracy to officiate in a Slavic language applied less to Italian. As for the Littoral, the Italians enjoyed a privileged status concerning linguistic rights in comparison with the absolute Slovene majority in Goricia and Gradisca and the rela¬ tive Serbo-Croadan majority in Istria. Privileges for the Italians were even stronger in Dalmatia, where the Italians represented less than 3 per¬ cent of the populadon, compared with more than 96 percent Serbo-Croats. Concerning representadon in parliament, the Italians were the one group that elected a deputy with fewer votes than even the Germans. Inasmuch as che Italians were the smallest national group in Austria (about three-quarters of a million) this generosity—partly meant to be a concession to the unpleasant ally in the South—had little long-range significance. No constellation was conceivable in which the Italians, if given the opportunity, would not turn against the empire and join their conationals in the kingdom. Counterarguments, which refer to the reladvely superior standard of living of the Austro-Italians as compared with the Italians in the mother country frequently do not acknowledge that the superiority applies only to Italian averages and only in part to Lombardy and Venetia, the neighboring provinces. Yet even if the standards of living of the Austro-Italians would have been much higher and those in the kingdom even lower, the course of events is inevitable for a small minority bound to a vast ethnic majority across the border, when the hour strikes.43 43 Robert K. Greenfield, “The Italian Problem of the Austrian Empire,” Austrian History Yearbook, III :2 (1967), 501-526; Georg Pockels, “Tirol,” and Alfred Manussi-Montesole, “Die Adrialander,” in Hugelmann, Das Nationalitatenrecht, pp. 545-568 and 569-684; Theodor Veiter, Die Italiener in der osterreichischungarischen Monarchic (Vienna, 1965), pp. 7-92. On the attitude of the Italian government to the issue of irredentism in Austria, see the memoirs of the Austrian ambassador to Italy, 1904-1910, Heinrich von Liitzow, Im diplomatischen Dienst der Y 6* Y Monarchic (Munich, 1971), pp. 110-171.

History of the Habsburg Empire

45^ C. a)

Hungary

DOMESTIC ADMINISTRATION AND PARTY STRUCTURE

The Kalman Tisza cabinet of 1875—liberal in terms of a hardly re¬ strained Manchester liberalism—continued in office until 1890. It re¬ quired a skillful tactician to remain in the saddle so long, when the Magyar position was attacked by the nationalities on the one side and within Magyarism itself from the other for alleged subservience to Austria. By maintaining a grossly unrepresentative franchise system, based on gerrymandering, Tisza was capable of containing the opposition of the suppressed national groups. It was different with the opposition from the Left, radical in national terms and rather moderately left in social ones, as represented by the Party of 1848. Its parliamentary mem¬ bers were not to be appeased by concessions concerning the interpretation of the Compromise, according to them dictated by Vienna. Actually the Hungarian establishment was threatened more by dissension within its own ranks. The so-called united opposition of 1878 organized in 1892 as National Party, and led by the brilliant Count Albert Apponyi and Dezso Szilagyi illustrated this well. These more conservative nationalists, like the members of the Independence party, were serious when they asked for revision of the Compromise, yet they were quite content with business as usual in regard to social questions. Their representatives came after all from the same class as the supporters of the government. A candidate for parliament stood little chance for election if he did not represent the social interests of the Magyar upper and middle class, pref¬ erably rural but possibly urban as well. As for the national question, the opposition had objected to a defense bill, which offered the Hungarian Honveds a field of activity too limited in their view. In 1888-1889 serious trouble arose about the passage of the general defense bill, which the opposition and many government supporters rejected as an undue bow to the hated German language of command in the armed forces. Faced by these difficulties Tisza took the opportunity to resign in 1890 over a minor issue, the question of the recognition of Hungarian citizenship of the exile Louis Kossuth. Under the elder Tisza, particularly because of the efforts of Gabriel von Baross, minister of commerce, public works and communications, much had been done to centralize and improve the railway and canal system including the major problem of preventing Danube floods. Com¬ merce and industry prospered to a degree under the system. Yet little

Decline and Discord

453

had been done to tackle the closely related nationality and social problems. The unsatisfactory state of both was illustrated by the at times violent flareup of anti-Semitism particularly in the countryside. As in Austria it was partly based on racial ethnic features and partly on social issues. Yet there were also different aspects. The heavy immigration of Jews from the east—even larger than the substantial immigradon to Austria— played a major part. The number of Jews in Hungary between 1870 and 1914 nearly doubled to almost one million as compared with an over-all population increase of only about one-third during that period. That meant an increase from 3.7 percent to almost 5 percent of the total population.44 This anti-Semitism could not take umbrage at the unques¬ tionable Jewish loyalty to the country. Charges that Jews were the spear¬ heads of the leftist revolutionary movement were taken seriously only after the turn of the century. The splendid Jewish contribution to Hun¬ garian social and cultural life could not be questioned, except in the problematical sense that the Jews had progressed more than any other national group. It was charged also that some Magyarized Jews wanted to be more Magyar than the Magyars themselves in their stand against the demands of the nationalities for equal rights. Furthermore it was held that sizable strata of the economically and culturally most ad¬ vanced Jews, who originally had come from eastern Europe, considered Hungary as a transit station on their path to further migration to the west. After they had moved to the west their place was taken by poor Jews from Russia and Poland. Thus Hungary had to pay the bill for westernization to the advantage of other countries. These were real problems, although hardly problems for which the Jews could be blamed in terms of individual responsibility. Inasmuch as anti-Semitism is an indication of unjust social conditions, these were certainly not im¬ proved by the Tisza government.45 44 Comparable figures for Austria would be an increase from 820,000 to 1,300,000 during the same period. The Jews in Austria represented little more than 4 percent of the population in 1870 and still less than 5 percent in 1910. Both the Austrian and Hungarian figures are based, of course, on religious and not ethnic racial statistics, which can only be surmised. Yet as far as they can be surmised, conversions on the whole pertained mainly to the upper strata of the Jewish population. See also Robert A. Kann, “Hungarian Jewry during Austria-Hungary’s Constitutional Period (1867-1918),” Jewish Social Studies, VII14 (1945), 357-386. See also the excellent study by William O. McCagg, Jewish Nobles and Geniuses in Modern Hungary (New York, 1972), pp. 48-109. 45 Gusztav Gratz, A Dualizmus Kora: Magyaroszag Tortenete i86y-igi8 (Buda¬ pest, 1934), I, 204-269; Kosary, History of Hungary, pp. 282-304; Berthold Sutter, “Die innere Lage Ungarns vor dem ersten Weltkrieg in der Beurteilung deutscher

d$4

History of the Habshurg Empire

The next cabinet, headed by Count Gyula Szapary (1890-92), followed in principle the Tisza policy with a slight deviation toward the Inde¬ dependence party. Just the same the national opposition forced Szapary’s resignation over the question of increased administrative centralization versus the historic comitat (county) system. The comitats could indeed have become the basis of a grassroot democracy on the local level, work¬ ing its way gradually toward genuine nationwide democratic institutions. Actually this institution served the Independents mainly to protect historic privileges in a parochial sense.46 Szapary’s successor as prime minister was Alexander Wekerle (18921895), a statesman experienced in economic questions. Endowed with considerable political skill and an equal degree of opportunism, he tried to reconcile the Independence party. Liberals and Independents saw eye to eye on major issues, such as"curbing of the power of the Church, which seemed to the nationalists to impair Hungarian independence and to the liberals to suppress freedom of conscience. In 1895, against considerable conservative opposition, obligatory civil marriage was introduced and mixed marriages between Catholics, Protestants, and Jews were legal¬ ized. This was an extraordinary feat of legislation in a predominantly Catholic country under the rule of a devout dynasty, which, however, to the national opposition appeared to be a foreign one. This legislation undoubtedly contributed to Wekerle’s fall, although as skillful compro¬ miser he was called to the office of prime minister twice again.47 The new prime minister, Baron Deszo Banffy (1895-1899) tried to win favor with the liberals by continuation of the anticlerical policies and with the Magyar nationalists by a particularly ruthless Magyarization policy in Transylvania. Yet the old stratagems did no longer work. Banffy lost the confidence of the ruling Liberal party, when he agreed to have the ten-year economic compromise ratified by parliament, even though it had to be octroyed in Austria by emergency degree. He pre¬ ferred to resign over this issue rather than by reason of a more immediate conflict with the papal nuncio.48 Under Banffy the gradual splitup of the huge government party began. The left wing of the Liberals joined the opposition under the leadership Diplomaten,” Sudostdeutsch.es Archiv (Munich, 1970-1971), XIII, 119-194, XIV, 188-224; McCagg, Jewish Nobles and Geniuses, pp. m-166. 46 Gratz, A Dualizmus Kora, I, 270-335. 47 Ibid., pp. 306-334; Moritz Czaky, Der Kultur\ampj in Ungarn (Graz-Cologne, 1969), pp. 29-110; see also Bucsay, Geschichte des Protestantismus in Ungarn, pp. 176-178. 48 Gratz, A Dualizmus Kora, I, 336-393; Czaky, Der Kultur\ampf in Ungarn.

Decline and Discord

455

of the younger Andrassy, who was later to become the empire’s last minister of foreign affairs in 1918. Furthermore, a new Catholic People’s party began to make some headway, which promoted a program similar to that of the Austrian Christian Socials. Also, Magyar industrial labor began to stir and accepted the Austrian Hainfeld program of 1889 as political objective. This meant in essence the gradual shift from mere trade unionism49 supplemented by some modest welfare legislation con¬ cerning rural cooperatives and industrial workers’ sick and unemploy¬ ment benefits, to a genuine political program. Prime Minister Kalman von Szell (1899-1903) succeeded once more to reconcile the rifts between government and Independents. But his cabinet, like that of Tisza before him, stumbled over the defense bill including in¬ tense parliamentary opposition to the hated German language of com¬ mand. Here even more so than in Austria the deep causes of social un¬ rest and dissension were covered up by passionate conflicts over secondary issues of national prestige. Still they could generate trouble. A cabinet under the banus of Croatia Khuen Hedervary (1903), a man much hated by all Southern Slavs, failed to solve the conflict. The king-emperor’s manifesto to the armed forces of September 1903 made it clear that he was not prepared to yield on the issue of unified command.50 He now entrusted Kalman Tisza’s son, (Count) Istvan Tisza (1861-1918) with the formation of the government, with the understanding that the new prime minister’s cabinet (1903-1905) would be able to ram the essential defense legislation through parliament. From his standpoint Francis Joseph could not have selected a better man, even though the task before him exceeded his powers. The younger Tisza, a courageous and stub¬ born character, made of much sterner stuff than his father, deeply believed in the mission of a Magyar Hungary as first among equals in the Compromise. At the same time he considered the Compromise as the supreme guarantee of safety for this Magyar-controlled Hungary, sur¬ rounded by Germans, Slavs, and Roumanians, to whom he was unwilling to make concessions. Since the Compromise could not survive without the passage of the defense bill, Tisza forced it through parliament by approximately the same kind of dubious tactics which Badeni had used in Austrian parliament—and with little better results. The new elections 49 Recognized in Hungary, though with various restrictions, by legislation of 1872 and 1884. See Tibor Stile, Sozialdemo\ratie in Ungarn (Cologne-Graz, 1967), pp. 1-74. 60 Gratz, A Dualiszmus Kora, I, 394-413, II, 1-26. Kosary, History oj Hungary, 304-310.

456

History of the Habsburg Empire

held in January, 1905, on a doubtful constitutional basis led to a crushing defeat of the government majority. The parliamentary opposition gained 229 parliamentary seats, 159 of them held by the Independence party alone. It was the good fortune of the government in Vienna that this now powerful party was led by a paper tiger, Ferenc Kossuth, whose main attraction rested in the charismatic name of his father. Francis Joseph was ready to appoint a new coalition government con¬ sisting of the Independence party, the Catholic People’s party, and the Andrassy Liberals, provided they would drop the demand for the revision of the Compromise, in particular in regard to the creation of a Flungarian national army. When the coalition refused, a nonparliamentary interim government under Geza von Fejervary, a general faithful to the old Habsburg army tradition, remained nevertheless in office (1905-1906). Parlia¬ ment was recessed several times and freedom of assembly and press cur¬ tailed. In 1906 parliament was altogether dissolved by a royal military commissioner. A tax strike of incensed voters threatened and it seemed out of the question to have the annual recruit quota passed by legal means. Just at this critical juncture when the possibilities of either revolu¬ tion or permanent royal absolutism had to be faced, the coalition sur¬ rendered. It actually took office under Alexander Wekerle (1906-1910), but—and this was the decisive qualification—under the terms of the Compromise of 1867, unchanged in basic matters. The success of the coalition, led by the feeble younger Kossuth, had thus become meaning¬ less and a new sweeping electoral victory, in which some Socialists entered parliament for the first time, changed matters little. Actually the crown was the victor by a simple but elective device. It had introduced a general, equal franchise reform bill in parliament. The adoption of this reform would have toppled the Hungarian political and social structure. No doubt it would have given the nationalities at least a near-majority and together with the Magyar Left (People’s party and Socialists) probably a majority. This would have meant the victory of small peasants and agricultural and industrial workers, welcome neither to the Magyar establishment nor to the crown. In the face of a threaten¬ ing social revolution the coalition dropped the political revolution. This concurred fully with Francis Joseph’s intention. He supported the Austrian electoral reform to a measure, but there he was under greater pressure from industrial labor and better organized political organiza¬ tions of national groups than those existing in Hungary. The only power close to the crown which took the Hungarian franchise reform seriously was the heir apparent, Archduke Francis Ferdinand—not because he

Decline and Discord

457

wanted to democratize the empire, but because he hoped to take Magyar aspirations one peg down. This opened vistas of possibly revising if not revoking the Compromise after his accession to the throne. The outcome of the crisis had proved convincingly that the national prestige issues raised by the coalition and supported in an underhand way by the Liberals were not taken seriously enough to move the Magyar masses to a revolution against the crown. This held doubly true for the other national groups. At the same time the crisis had shown that the Magyar establishment, divided in political matters but united in de¬ fense of social privilege, was strong enough to block radical political and social changes. The status quo continued with minor changes until a truly revolutionary situation arose in the fall of 1918.51 Under the coalition an industrial insurance act was passed and a new code of civil procedure was prepared, and adopted by the following gov¬ ernment in 1910. Yet in regard to the nationality issue, the minister of edu¬ cation, Court Apponyi, managed to push the process of Magyarization and concomitant suppression of the nationalities further by the Educa¬ tion Act of 1907. It made government subsidies of the sectarian schools among non-Magyar national groups dependent on expanded use of the Magyar language among teachers and students. Apponyi was seconded by Minister of Commerce Ferenc Kossuth, who infringed on Croatian language rights, contrary to the Hungaro-Croatian Compromise of 1868. The coalition government had disappointed its supporters, particularly the truly liberal left wing under Gyula Justh. It had embittered the op¬ position. It felt that the strength of the Habsburg empire had suffered from the protracted conflict about the interpretation of the Compromise, while the coalition had not secured one single tangible concession. The restricted political nation eligible to vote, was tired of this performance and gave the former Liberals, headed now by Tisza a large majority. He organized the 237 parliamentary members of his party as National Labor party, which indicated the obvious truth that liberalism was neither in vogue any longer nor had it ever been the genuine leitmotif of the party. But parliament was not yet ready to accept the leadership of the strong man Tisza. Two transitional cabinets, Khuen Hedervary (1910-1912) and Lukacs (1912-1913), followed. They had to face strong opposition in Croatia by Croatians and Serbs alike. In particular the latter had scored a major propaganda victory in 1908-1909, when the previously noted mis51 Gratz, A Dualizmus Kora, II, 127-170; Kosary, History of Hungary, pp. 304311; Julius Miskolczy, Ungarn in der Habsburger Monarchic (Vienna, 1959), pp. 170-181; Kann, Nationalitatenproblem, I, 135-138, 399-401.

45#

History of the Habshurg Empire

carriage of justice in a treason trial in Zagreb against Serb politicians was exposed in the eyes of Europe by a subsequent jury trial in Vienna. The evidence admitted by the court in Zagreb was fabricated, but the antiHabsburg and anti-Magyar sentiments of the defendants were genuine. This added indeed an element of satire to a tragedy.52 In 1912 labor troubles of major proportions followed, including aborted attempts at a general strike in support of the franchise reform in Hun¬ gary. In 1913 parliament was ready for a new Tisza regime (1913-1917). A defense bill could finally be passed in parliament. A course was ini¬ tiated according to which the government was ready to live up to the pro¬ visions of the Compromise in terms of the narrowest interpretation of joint Austro-Hungarian affairs. But this sufficed to strengthen somewhat the military forces of the empire and thus it was hoped its position in in¬ ternational relations. As Tisza saw it, this policy stood for rejection of any concessions to the nationalities, particularly in the question of franchise reform; and as for Magyars and non-Magyars alike, repression of a pro¬ gressive social reform movement. Surely this course of action was out¬ dated, but if one man could give it at least a new brief lease of life it was the puritan Tisza, an incorruptible man of determination, ability, and political blindness.53 b) PROBLEMS OF THE CONFLICT BETWEEN THE NATIONAL GROUPS

The Southern Slav problem in the empire including Hungary has been discussed briefly in section B-c of this chapter on the nationality problems in Austria, since the union movement because of political restrictions could not start from Hungarian soil. Further references to the over-all national¬ ity problems in Hungary have been made also throughout the preceding subsection C-a. It is necessary, however, to consider some remaining na¬ tional issues germane exclusively to Hungary, especially that of the Slo¬ vaks. Suppression, tightened after conclusion of the Compromise, in¬ creased further under the regime of Kalman Tisza (1875-1890). The ac¬ tivities of the Slovak literary society Matica were suspended, several high schools closed, and Magyarization by governmental pressure at its ugli¬ est promoted by the Hungarian writer Bela Griinwald, an adherent of 52 Here the Austrian historian Heinrich Friedjung, who had testified to the genuineness of incriminating documents, probably forged with full knowledge of the Austrian legation in Belgrade, had to make a humiliating confession of having been deceived. Friedjung’s personal good faith was not in doubt, but his judgment was exposed as deplorable. See Kann, Nationalitatenproblem, I, 293-296, 455-456. 53 Gratz, A Ducilizmus Kora, II, 170-281; Miskolczy, Ungarn in der Habsburger Monarchic, pp. 181-194.

l

!

Decline and Discord

459

Apponyi. What made the Slovak situation especially difficult was the fact, that the Church autonomy granted to the Greek Orthodox, Greek Catholic, and Uniate churches, from which Carpatho-Ruthenian and Serb national aspirations benefited at least to some extent, was of no help to the partly Lutheran and partly Catholic Slovaks. The Roman Catholic Church cautiously refrained as far as possible from taking sides in the national struggle and the Lutherans were not granted full Church auton¬ omy by the government. Individual Protestant pastors and Catholic priests, the former represented by Martin Razus (1888-1937), the latter by Father Andrej Hlinka (1864-1938) were leaders of the movement for Slovak autonomy within Hungary and godfathers of the Slovak People’s party, which gained seven seats in the Hungarian parliamentary elections of 1906. Under the existing oppressive conditions this was to be rated as a great success. The so-called Cernova massacre of the same year in which about a dozen people were killed in a brutal attack by Hungarian gendarmery when a new church was dedicated in Hlinka’s birthplace, was a blow directed against his charismatic leadership of the peasants. Even¬ tually, by spring 1918, Hlinka, steadily harassed and several times im¬ prisoned by the Hungarian authorities, turned to the concept of Czecho¬ slovak union. None of the Slovak leaders could more strongly rely on the loyalty of his followers. Some Slovak intellectuals, among them Milan Hodza, now a member of the Hungarian parliament, had hoped for help from Archduke Francis Ferdinand. But communications between this future prime minister of Czechoslovakia and the heir apparent, whether they related to federaliza¬ tion of the empire or a Slovak territorial autonomy within Hungary, never went beyond a vague blueprint stage. That much seems sugges