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Opposition in France to Louis Philippe

The revolution of 1830 did not bring peace and quiet to France nor to Europe. In France the people grew dissatisfied with their new monarch; in Europe generally they demanded a greater share of liberty. Louis Philippe delayed to extend the suffrage; he used his high position to add to his great riches; he failed to win the hearts of the French, and was widely accused of selfishness and greed. There were risings of legitimist in favor of the Bourbons, while the republican element was opposed to monarchy. No less than eight attempts were made to remove the king by assassination—all of them failures, but they showed the disturbed state of public feeling. Liberty, equality, fraternity became the watchwords of the working classes, socialistic ideas arose and spread, and the industrial element of the various nations became allied in one great body of revolutionists known as the “Internationalists.”

In Germany the demand of the people for political rights grew until it reached a crisis. The radical writings of the “Young Germans,” the stirring songs of their poets, the bold utterances of the press, the doctrines of the “Friends of Light” among the Protestants and of the “German Catholics” among the Catholics, all went to show that the people were deeply dissatisfied alike with the state and the church. They were rapidly arousing from their sluggish acceptance of the work of the Congress of Vienna of 1815, and the spirit of liberty was in the air.

Revolutionary Sentiment in Germany and Italy

The King of Prussia, Frederick William IV., saw danger ahead. He became king in 1840 and lost no time in trying to make his rule popular by reforms. An edict of toleration was issued, the sittings of the courts were opened to the public, and the Estates of the provinces were called to meet in Berlin. In the convening of a Parliament he had given the people a voice. The Estates demanded freedom of the press and of the state with such eloquence and energy that the king dared not resist them. The people had gained a great step in their progress towards liberty.

In Italy also the persistent demands of the people met with an encouraging response. The Pope, Pius IX., extended the freedom of the press, gave a liberal charter to the City of Rome, and began the formation of an Italian confederacy. In Sicily a revolutionary outbreak took place, and the King of Naples was compelled to give his people a constitution and a parliament. His example was followed in Tuscany and Sardinia. The tyrannical Duke of Modena was forced to fly from the vengeance of his people, and the throne of Parma became vacant by the death in 1847 of Maria Louisa, the widow of Napoleon Bonaparte, a woman little loved and less respected.

The Italians were filled with hope by these events. Freedom and the unity of Italy loomed up before their eyes. Only two obstacles stood in their way, the Austrians and the Jesuits, and both of these were bitterly hated. Gioberti, the enemy of the Jesuits, was greeted with cheers, under which might be heard harsh cries of “Death to the Germans.”

Such was the state of affairs at the beginning of 1848. The measure of liberty granted the people only whetted their appetite for more, and over all Western Europe rose an ominous murmur, the voice of the people demanding the rights of which they had so long been deprived. In France this demand was growing dangerously insistant; in Paris, the centre of European revolution, it threatened an outbreak. Reform banquets were the order of the day in France, and one was arranged for in Paris to signalize the meeting of the Chambers.

The Outbreak in Paris

Guizot, the historian, who was then minister of foreign affairs, had deeply offended the liberal party of France by his reactionary policy. The government threw fuel on the fire by forbidding the banquet and taking steps to suppress it by military force. The people were enraged by this false step and began to gather in excited groups. Throngs of them—artisans, students, and tramps—were soon marching through the streets, with shouts of “Reform! Down with Guizot!” The crowds rapidly increased and grew more violent. The people were too weak to cope with them; the soldiers were loath to do so; soon barricades were erected and fighting began.

THE CONGRESS AT BERLIN, JUNE 13, 1878

After the close of the Russo-Turkish War of 1877, a Congress of the European Powers was held at Berlin to decide on the status of Turkey, its purpose being largely to prevent Russia from taking possession of Constantinople. One of its results was to give Great Britain control of the Island of Cyprus.

THE WOUNDING OF GENERAL BOSQUET—

(FROM THE PAINTING BY YVON)

One of the most successful French Marshals in the Crimean War was Pierre Francois Joseph Bosquet. Parliament voted him England’s thanks for the part he played in winning the battle of Inkermann. He also took a leading part in the capture of the Malakoff, Siege of Sebastopol September 8, 1855, where he was seriously wounded.

For two days this went on. Then the king, alarmed at the situation, dismissed Guizot and promised reform, and the people, satisfied for the time and proud of their victory, paraded the streets with cheers and songs. All now might have gone well but for a hasty and violent act on the part of the troops. About ten o’clock at night a shouting and torch-bearing throng marched through the Boulevards, singing and waving flags. Reaching the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, they halted and called for its illumination. The troops on duty there interfered, and, on an insult to their colonel and the firing of a shot from the mob, they replied with a volley, before which fifty-two of the people fell killed and wounded.

Revolt Becomes Revolution

This reckless and sanguinary deed was enough to turn revolt into revolution. The corpses were carried on biers through the streets by the infuriated people, the accompanying torch-bearers shouting: “To arms! they are murdering us!” At midnight the tocsin call rang from the bells of Notre Dame; the barricades, which had been partly removed, were restored; and the next morning, February 24, 1848, Paris was in arms. In the struggle that followed they were quickly victorious, and the capital was in their hands.

The Second French Republic

Louis Philippe followed the example of Charles X., abdicated his throne and fled to England. After the fate of Louis XVI. no monarch was willing to wait and face a Paris mob. The kingdom was overthrown, and a republic, the second which France had known, was established, the aged Dupont de l’Eure being chosen president. The poet Lamartine, the socialist Louis Blanc, the statesmen Ledru-Rollin and Arago became members of the Cabinet, and all looked forward to a reign of peace and prosperity. The socialists tried the experiment of establishing national workshops in which artisans were to be employed at the expense of the state, with the idea that this would give work to all.

Yet the expected prosperity did not come. The state was soon deeply in debt, many of the people remained unemployed, and the condition of industry grew worse day by day. The treasury proved incapable of paying the state artisans, and the public workshops were closed. In June the trouble came to a crisis and a new and sanguinary outbreak began, instigated by the hungry and disappointed workmen, and led by the advocates of the “Red Republic,” who acted with ferocious brutality. General Brea and the Archbishop of Paris were murdered, and the work of slaughter grew so horrible that the National Assembly, to put an end to it, made General Cavaignac dictator and commissioned him to put down the revolt. A terrible struggle ensued between the mob and the troops, ending in the suppression of the revolt and the arrest and banishment of many of its ringleaders. Ten or twelve thousand people had been killed. The National Assembly adopted a republican constitution, under which a single legislative chamber and a president to be elected every four years were provided for. The assembly wished to make General Cavaignac president, but the nation, blinded by their faith in the name of the great conqueror, elected by an almost unanimous vote his nephew, Louis Napoleon, a man who had suffered a long term of imprisonment for his several attempts against the reign of the late king. The revolution, for the time being, was at an end, and France was a republic again.

Effect of the Revolution of 1848 in Europe

The effect of this revolution in France spread far and wide through Europe. Outbreaks occurred in Italy, Poland, Switzerland and Ireland, and in Germany the revolutionary fever burned hot. Baden was the first state to yield to the demands of the people for freedom of the press, a parliament and other reforms, and went so far as to abolish the imposts still remaining from feudal times. The other minor states followed its example. In Saxony, Würtemberg and other states class abuses were abolished, liberals given prominent positions under government, the suffrage and the legislature reformed, and men of liberal sentiment summoned to discuss the formation of new constitutions.

Metternich and His System

But it was in the great despotic states of Germany—Prussia and Austria—that the liberals gained the most complete and important victory, and went farthest in overthrowing autocratic rule and establishing constitutional government. The great Austrian statesman who had been a leader in the Congress of Vienna and who had suppressed liberalism in Italy, Prince Metternich, was still, after more than thirty years, at the head of affairs in Vienna. He controlled the policy of Austria; his word was law in much of Germany; time had cemented his authority, and he had done more than any other man in Europe in maintaining despotism and building a dam against the rising flood of liberal sentiment.

But the hour of the man who had destroyed the work of Napoleon was at hand. He had failed to recognize the spirit of the age or to perceive that liberalism was deeply penetrating Austria. To most of the younger statesmen of Europe the weakness of his policy and the rottenness of his system were growing apparent, and it was evident that they must soon fall before the onslaught of the advocates of freedom.

An incitement was needed, and it came in the news of the Paris revolution. At once a hot excitement broke out everywhere in Austria. From Hungary came a vigorous demand for an independent parliament, reform of the constitution, decrease of taxes, and relief from the burden of the national debt of Austria. From Bohemia, whose rights and privileges had been seriously interfered with in the preceding year, came similar demands. In Vienna itself the popular outcry for increased privileges grew insistant.

The Outbreak in Vienna

The excitement of the people was aggravated by their distrust of the paper money of the realm and by a great depression in commerce and industry. Daily more workmen were thrown out of employment, and soon throngs of the hungry and discontented gathered in the streets. Students, as usual, led away by their boyish love of excitement, were the first to create a disturbance, but others soon joined in, and the affair quickly became serious.

The old system was evidently at an end. The policy of Metternich could restrain the people no longer. Lawlessness became general, excesses were committed by the mob, the dwellings of those whom the populace hated were attacked and plundered, the authorities were resisted with arms, and the danger of an overthrow of the government grew imminent. The press, which had gained freedom of utterance, added to the peril of the situation by its inflammatory appeals to the people, and by its violence checked the progress of the reforms which it demanded. Metternich, by his system of restraint, had kept the people in ignorance of the first principles of political affairs, and the liberties which they now asked for showed them to be unadapted to a liberal government. The old minister, whose system was falling in ruins about him, fled from the country and sought a refuge in England, that haven of political failures.

Flight and Return of the Emperor

In May, 1848, the emperor, alarmed at the threatening state of affairs, left his capital and withdrew to Innsbruck. The tidings of his withdrawal stirred the people to passion, and the outbreak of mob violence which followed was the fiercest and most dangerous that had yet occurred. Gradually, however, the tumult was appeased, a constitutional assembly was called into being and opened by the Archduke John, and the Emperor Ferdinand re-entered Vienna amid the warm acclamations of the people. The outbreak was at an end. Austria had been converted from an absolute to a constitutional monarchy.