Drastic Changes

Abstract

This chapter describes how the members of the Swedish Diet spent much time and energy on discussing large-scale legal reform. In particular, they were engaged in family law and in whether or not an egalitarian inheritance system ought to be introduced. Such a proposal had come up as early as 1809, but it was still on the list of unresolved issues in 1844. Consequently, equal rights of inheritance still applied only in urban areas and among the clergy. The vast majority of the population, the peasantry, accorded women smaller shares than men, as did the nobility. At one point during the deliberations, the nobleman von Troil attacked those opposed to the reform, arguing that there was no rational ground for withholding equal inheritance rights from women.