either to submit to it unconditionally or to reject it altogether. It was rejected, as might have been expected from the good sense and integrity of the Belgians; but by an unparalleled subterfuge it was nevertheless declared to be accepted, and thus it came about that our country was oppressed by a constitution imposed by Holland.

If this Fundamental Law had at least been properly executed in all its provisions, in time, perhaps, and with the aid of the progress which the arbitrary conduct of the ministers compelled us daily to make in the career of constitutional opposition, it might have become the hope of Belgian liberty.

But far from this being the case, freedom of conscience was violated, education fettered, the press condemned to be nothing more than an instrument of the government or forced into silence, . . . and the right of petition was disregarded. The despotic imposition of a privileged language, . . . and an enormous debt and expenditure, were the only portion which Holland brought to us at the time of our deplorable union. Add to these grievances taxes, overwhelming by their amount and still more by the manner in which they were apportioned, laws always voted by the Dutch for Holland only and always against Belgium, . . . and, lastly, the most offensive partiality in the distribution of civil and military appointments by a government in whose eye the name of Belgian was a disgrace; in a word, all Belgium treated as a conquered province, as a colony, everything, in short, conspired to render a revolution necessary and inevitable and hastened its approach. Such just and real grievances could only lead to one result.

We rose against despotism to reconquer our rights, and we were treated by tyranny as rebels. Our cities were burned; the most barbarous treatment was inflicted even upon old men and upon women; the rights of humanity, the laws of war, were trampled underfoot. Such conduct testifies to the ferocity of our enemy and calls down blessings on the victory of the people which has cleared our territory of them.

The fruit of this victory has been independence. The people have proclaimed it through us, and have called you together, gentlemen, as the organ of its wishes to establish it forever.

192. The

ation

(June 8,

1815)

Section 51. Germany and the Reaction after 1814

The German liberals came out of the struggle against Napoleon with high hopes. They desired that the many German states might be bound together into a really firm national union, under a constitutional government. Prussia favored this plan at the Congress of Vienna, but Austria opposed it for obvious reasons, and the German Act of Confederation, drawn up by the Congress, established a very loose union of sovereign princes, who dealt with one another almost like independent rulers. Nevertheless this constitution lasted Germany from 1815 to 1866, and formed a transition from the ancient Holy Roman Empire, which Napoleon had destroyed, to the present German Empire.

In the name of the Most Holy and Indivisible Trinity:

The sovereign princes and free towns of Germany, animated German Act by the common desire to carry into effect Article VI of the of Confeder- Peace of Paris of May 30, 1814, and convinced of the advantages which would result for the security and independence of Germany and for the repose and equilibrium of Europe from a firm and lasting union, have agreed to unite themselves in a perpetual confederation, and have for this purpose invested their envoys and deputies at the Congress of Vienna with full powers, viz.:

Metternich's grandeur

His Imperial and Royal Apostolic Majesty; the Sieur Clement Wenceslas, Prince of Metternich-Winneburg-Ochsenhausen, Knight of the Golden Fleece, Grand Cross of the Royal Order of St. Stephen of Hungary, Knight of the Order of St. Andrew, of the Order of St. Alexander Newsky and of St. Anne of the First Class; Grand Cordon of the Legion of Honor; Knight of the Order of the Elephant, of the Order of the Annunciation, of the Black Eagle, of the Red Eagle, of the Seraphim, of St. Joseph of Tuscany, of St. Hubert, of the Golden Eagle of Würtemberg, of the Fidelity of Baden, of St. John of Jerusalem,

and of several others; Chancellor of the Military Order of Maria Theresa; Curator of the Imperial and Royal Academy of Fine Arts; Chamberlain and Active Privy Councilor of his Majesty the emperor of Austria and king of Hungary and Bohemia; his Majesty's Minister of State and of Conferences, as well as Minister of Foreign Affairs and first plenipotentiary at the Congress, and the Sieur John Philip, baron of Wessenberg; Grand Cross of the Royal Sardinian Order of St. Mauritius and St. Lazarus, and of the Royal Order of the Crown of Bavaria, etc.; Chamberlain and Active Privy Councilor of his Imperial and Royal Apostolic Majesty, and his Majesty's second plenipotentiary at the Congress.

His Royal Majesty of Prussia; the Prince Hardenberg, his Chancellor of State.1

GENERAL PROVISIONS

ARTICLE I. The sovereign princes and free towns of Germany, including their Majesties the emperor of Austria and the kings of Prussia, of Denmark, and of the Netherlands; to wit, the emperor of Austria and the king of Prussia, for all of their possessions formerly belonging to the German Empire2; the king of Denmark for Holstein; and the king of the Netherlands for the grand duchy of Luxemburg, -unite in a perpetual union which shall be called the German Confederation.

II. The aim of the same shall be the maintenance of the external and internal safety of Germany and of the independence and inviolability of the individual German states.

III. All members of the union have, as such, equal rights. They all engage alike to maintain inviolate the Act of Confederation.

IV. The affairs of the Confederation shall be confided to a Voting Diet of the Confederation, in which all members of the union the Diet shall vote through their plenipotentiaries, either individually

1 It has not been deemed necessary to give the names of all the plenipotentiaries. All the states enumerated in Article IV were represented at the Congress.

2 I.e. the Holy Roman Empire.

System of voting on

or collectively, in the following manner, without prejudice to

V. Austria shall preside in the Diet of the Confederation. Each member of the union has the right to make and support propositions, and the presiding state is bound within a determined period to bring them under deliberation.

VI. Whenever fundamental laws of the Confederation are to be enacted or amended, or measures are to be adopted special occasions relative to the Act of Confederation itself or organic institutions of the Confederation, or other arrangements of common interest are under consideration, the Diet shall form itself into a general assembly (Plenum), in which the distribution of the votes, based upon the respective extent of the individual states of the union, has been arranged as follows : 1

1

VOTES

2

15. Saxe-Weimar

I

4

16. Saxe-Gotha

I

4

17. Saxe-Coburg

I

4

18. Saxe-Meiningen.

I

4

19. Saxe-Hildburghausen.

I

20. Mecklenburg-Strelitz

I

3

21. Holstein-Oldenburg

9. Grand duchy of Hesse

3

22. Anhalt-Dessau

1 The system of voting which now prevails in the Federal Council (Bundesrath) of the German Empire is based on this plan of 1815.

!

The Diet of the Confederation, in deliberating on the Reference organic laws of the union, shall take into consideration whether the great readjustme the mediatized estates of the former empire shall be granted of 1803 any collective votes in the Plenum.

...

VIII. When the organic laws shall have been drawn up, the Diet of the Confederation shall take into consideration the future permanent order of voting to be adopted. In so doing they shall deviate as little as possible from the regulations of the former Diet, especially as based upon the provisions of the Decree of the Imperial Commission of 1803.

IX. The Diet of the Confederation shall sit at Frankforton-the-Main. The first meeting is fixed for the 1st of September, 1815.

XI. All members of the Confederation pledge themselves to protect Germany as a whole, as well as every single confederated state, against attack, and mutually guarantee their entire possessions, so far as those are included within the Confederation.

When war is once declared on the part of the Confederation no member shall negotiate separately with the enemy, or conclude an armistice or make peace.

XII. The members of the Confederation reserve to them- Members selves the right of forming alliances of all kinds. They pledge reserve the right to for themselves, however, to contract no engagement which shall alliances be directed against the safety of the Confederation or that of any individual state within the union.

The members of the Confederation pledge themselves likewise not to make war among themselves upon any pretense, or to follow up their contentions with force, but to submit these to the Diet. It shall devolve upon this body to attempt arbitration by means of a commission. Should this fail and a