Austria and the Problem of Reform in the German Confederation, 1851–1863

Abstract

IN the great struggle for Germany that emerged from the revolutions of I848, the central issue was the German Confederation or Deutscher Bund. All factions in Germany-to say nothing of all Europe-had a vital interest in the fate of this unloved institution. For the national-liberals the problem was to transform the Confederation into a liberal and democratic Bundesstaat. For Austria, the problem was to strengthen the federal authority as a weapon against Prussia and as a sop to the national-liberal movement, and if possible to create a Mitteleuropa by extending the frontiers of the Confederation to embrace all the provinces of the Habsburg Empire. For Prussia, the other great power in Germany, the problem was, at the least, to safeguard her sovereignty by vetoing all plans designed to reinforce the Confederation, and, at the most, to reorganize Germany in a manner that would give her equality with Austria, if not hegemony in a Germany united by the exclusion of Austria. There remained the princes of the middle and small states that belonged to the Bund. They alone were satisfied with the status quo; yet even their satisfaction was tempered by the fear that so unpopular an institution could not long withstand the revisionist demands of Prussia or the nationalliberal movement. It was not impossible that these foes of the Confederation would join forces, the one contributing an army, the other mass enthusiasm, to mediatize the middle states and drive Austria out of the Bund. It was this danger that joined Austria and the middle states in an effort to preserve the Confederation through timely reform. The more loudly the potential revolutionists clamored for a powerful national state and the more openly Prussia toyed with a kleindeutsch solution of the German problem, the more vigorously did the friends of the Confederation strive to salvage its prestige. At first, the reform movement was led by Prince Schwarzenberg of Austria. Although he had failed at the Dresden conference of I85I to bring the eastern provinces of the Habsburgs into the Confederation and had had to be content with a restoration of the old Bund, he endeavored by other means to strengthen the federal authority. By insisting on the legality of majority decisions in broad areas of legislation and by endeavoring to transfer to the Bund the prerogatives of the Prussian-dominated Zollverein, he hoped to keep both revolution and the Prussian state well