Metternich and the Slavs

Abstract

On April 11, 1848, František Palacký—the “Bohemian of Slavic stock,” as he described himself—wrote his famous reply to the Committee of Fifty at the Frankfurt National Assembly. In explaining why an Austrian Slav could not participate in a German parliament, he stressed the need for Austria's separate existence and also warned that the splitting up of the Austrian empire into a group of small republics would result in the establishment of a universal Russian monarchy. “Truly,” he exclaimed, “if the Austrian empire had not already been long in existence, we would have to hurry and create it in the interest of Europe and in the interest of humanity itself.” Yet, he went on to ask, why did this state, which nature and history had given the task of shielding Europe, appear so helpless in the face of storm and crisis? Why? Because for all too long Austria, in her disastrous blindness, had failed to admit the very legal and moral grounds for its existence: the fundamental principle of complete equality of rights and consideration for its nationalities. Palacky singled out the person he held responsible for this failure: Metternich! “Metternich,” he wrote, “did not fall just because he was the worst foe of freedom but also because he was the most irreconcilable enemy of all Slavic nationalities in Austria.”2