The Germanic Empire: the ultimate Megadeutschland wank TL

[Mario]

CHAPTER 7: MAISONNEUVE AND THE CONTINENTAL BROTHERHOOD (1846-1849)​

The Hanoverian War also had other less apparent effects apart that moving borders across the continent. The Liberal movements of the continent, which were already on the rise by the decade of 1830, reinforced their anti-British sentiment with a major dose of anti-local nationalisms rhetoric. The comparison between the chaotic drift of the chauvinistic Second French Republic and the prosperity and stability achieved by the Low Countries and other territories who prioritized international collaboration (like the customs unions) over nationalistic projects, gave enough reasons to the Liberals to impulse their own continental project, concreted in the birth of the Continental Brotherhood in 1844.

Paradoxally, the indisputable leader of the Brotherhood was already a Frenchman. Bertrand Maisonneuve, born in 1802, belonged to a rich Bonapartist family from the vicinity of Lyon and passionately defended the ideals of the French Revolution during his early youth. However, he grew disenchanted and abandoned France during the French Revolution of 1828 and relocated to Salzburg, where he married an Austrian woman. Later, he returned to the Austrian-occupied southeastern France and collaborated with the Austrian occupation, as he strongly distasted the Second French Republic. In Lyon, he met other French Liberals who opposed the regime in Paris and they concluded that the best solution for France (and for the whole continental Europe) was to integrate into a continental association which would exclude the United Kingdom. Thus, the Continental Brotherhood was created.

The Loge du Change, first see of the Continental Brotherhood in Lyon.

The somehow utopian ideals of the Brotherhood did not prosper in the Republican France, which was still devoured by nationalistic flames and the strong aim to revenge and restore its former borders. However, the Austrians allowed the Brotherhood to thrive in the occupied area, opening important delegations in Lyon, Marseille, Avignon and Arlès. Soon the Brotherhood also thrive in the western part of the Germanic Confederation, following the so-called 'Prosperity Axis': Denmark, the Low Countries, Hanover, the valley of the Rhine, the Swiss Cantons and Northern Italy. Following the success of the Brotherhood in these areas, Maisonneuve decided to move first to Bern in 1847, and later to Amsterdam in 1849. The Brotherhood ideals were concerningly welcome in all those territories that Prussia had recently annexed, including Thuringia, because the local burgeoisie prefered to engage in a Liberal system of association between minor entities, like the Twelve Provinces or the Swiss Cantons, rather than depending on the pretty conservative Prussian core, dominated by the Junkers.

Thus, Prussia was soon alarmed by the spread of the Continental Brotherhood and tried to ban it in its own territory, but unlike in the French case, the success of the Liberal ideals was hard to stop at that moment. In the opposite side, Austria was quite comfortable with them and hoped that their success would force new reforms inside the Germanic Confederation, as well as consolidated the Austrian power in southeastern France and Northern Italy, tampering all kind of local nationalitic movements. The discontent among the intellectuals and the burgeoisie with the current confederal system would lead to the events which triggered the First Germanic Revolution in 1850.

 

[skarosianlifeform]

Wouldn't the Arras Strip throw a wrench in the British-French friendship ?

 

[Mario]

Wouldn't the Arras Strip throw a wrench in the British-French friendship ?

No, because now it is controlled by Prussia, with the assistance of the other Germanic members.

 

[skarosianlifeform]

No, because now it is controlled by Prussia, with the assistance of the other Germanic members.

I missed that.
Yeah, of course, now Britain and France are probably "the best of friends".

 

[Mario]

I missed that.
Yeah, of course, now Britain and France are probably "the best of friends".

Well, not the best of friends because all the recent past, but surely forced allies to confront the expansion of the Germanic Confederation.

Both the Arras Strip and the Verdun Strip are mainly managed by Prussia now, with some assistance of other Germanic members, while occupied southeastern France is managed by Austria.

 

[skarosianlifeform]

Well, not the best of friends because all the recent past, but surely forced allies to confront the expansion of the Germanic Confederation.

Both the Arras Strip and the Verdun Strip are mainly managed by Prussia now, with some assistance of other Germanic members, while occupied southeastern France is managed by Austria.

All is missing is Russia in collision with Austria and the Germanic Confederation.... and then we would have WWI-like alliances.

 

[Mario]

ANNEX IV: THE IDEALS OF THE CONTINENTAL BROTHERHOOD​

The Continental Brotherhood was an anti-nationalistic movement supported mainly by Liberal intellectuals, most of the burgeoisie and the merchant lobbies, who pushed for a more unified continental market under a customs union and even a unified currency. They largely despised most of the ideals of the French Revolution as well as they were united by a quite strong anti-British sentiment.

The summary of their main ideals can be listed as follows:

- Opposition to the French ideal of state-nation: their model would be similar to the Twelve Provinces of the Low Countries or the Swiss Cantons, meaning an alliance between minor entities centred in a major city which acts as a political and economical pole.
- Support to the customs union between the continental polities. Some of them also supported the creation of a common currency. Unification of markets and boost of industrialization and trade routes were also popular ideas among them.
- They were mostly anti-Republican, but they neither supported the traditional monarchies in the continent, as they tipped them as too conservative. Their prefered model was a constitutional monarchy where the monarch would be just a figurehead. They were more pro-Austrian than pro-Prussian.
- In the international field, they opposed both the United Kingdom and the Second French Republic. They had no common vision on Russia: some of them appreciated the Russian alliance with the Germanic Confederation, but in general the autocratic regime of the Tzars was quite despised. They also supported the liquidation of the obsolete Ottoman power in the Balkans and the Germanic expansion into there.
- In the confederal side, they strongly supported to enhance the powers of the Parliament in Frankfurt over the Germanic monarchies and performing a deep reformation of the system in all levels. However, they did not support any kind of centralized Germanic superstate, even if some of them supported the creation of a common army.

 

[Zurirach Adankar]

Their prefered model was a constitutional monarchy where the monarch would be just a figurehead

Twelve Provinces of the Low Countries or the Swiss Cantons

Which means that both Austrian and Prussian monarchs would see them as a threat.
They are threatening the powerful position of the monarch and advocate for a massive decentralization.
Certainly each province/canton should have a local assembly which could decide everything except free trade and common defense, which means that the Prussian King or Austrian Emperor would be without any power.
A decentralization would mean restoring autonomy and self-determination of previously annexed or puppetized smaller countries.

Not every Republic was liberal or progressive.
The historic Swiss Cantons (before the French Revolution) where either Oligarchic Republics controlled by few influential patrician families (like the city-state of Bern, Luzern ... ), or minor rural mountain valley republics (Obwalden, Glarus ...) . Large regions of Switzerland where subservient to the sovereign cantons without any political power. Delegates from all sovereign cantons meet regularly to decide about matters of common importance. So the old Swiss Confederation was a loose entity, without any real executive.
A 19. century Liberal would view this model as very antiquated and impractical. For example organizing a common postal service, agreeing to abolish tariffs or starting railway projects are difficult in such a system.
In OTL several Cantons modernized their constitutions between 1815 and 1848. Only in 1848 Switzerland became a functional federal country. And liberals pushed this modernization and liberalization. (Of course this would not happen under a heavily Austrian influenced Switzerland in your timeline. The Austrians would pressure the cantons to maintain their antiquated and impractical system of governance)

- In the confederal side, they strongly supported to enhance the powers of the Parliament in Frankfurt over the Germanic monarchies and performing a deep reformation of the system in all levels. However, they did not support any kind of centralized Germanic superstate, even if some of them supported the creation of a common army.

A more powerful parliament is inconsistent with seeing the Swiss Cantons as a role model. Such a parliament could try to revoke or limit local autonomy.

They also supported the liquidation of the obsolete Ottoman power in the Balkans and the Germanic expansion into there.

This seems to be inconsistent with their rejection of powerful nation states and their idealization of smaller sovereign territories. I mean advocating for a Germanic expansion is a nationalist idea.

 

[Mario]

Which means that both Austrian and Prussian monarchs would see them as a threat.
They are threatening the powerful position of the monarch and advocate for a massive decentralization.
Certainly each province/canton should have a local assembly which could decide everything except free trade and common defense, which means that the Prussian King or Austrian Emperor would be without any power.
A decentralization would mean restoring autonomy and self-determination of previously annexed or puppetized smaller countries.

As explained, Prussia did consider them a threat and promoted their ban. The Austrians thought they could use them for their interests, but maybe they underestimated the real strength of the Brotherhood's ideals.

Not every Republic was liberal or progressive.
The historic Swiss Cantons (before the French Revolution) where either Oligarchic Republics controlled by few influential patrician families (like the city-state of Bern, Luzern ... ), or minor rural mountain valley republics (Obwalden, Glarus ...) . Large regions of Switzerland where subservient to the sovereign cantons without any political power. Delegates from all sovereign cantons meet regularly to decide about matters of common importance. So the old Swiss Confederation was a loose entity, without any real executive.
A 19. century Liberal would view this model as very antiquated and impractical. For example organizing a common postal service, agreeing to abolish tariffs or starting railway projects are difficult in such a system.
In OTL several Cantons modernized their constitutions between 1815 and 1848. Only in 1848 Switzerland became a functional federal country. And liberals pushed this modernization and liberalization. (Of course this would not happen under a heavily Austrian influenced Switzerland in your timeline. The Austrians would pressure the cantons to maintain their antiquated and impractical system of governance).

Just to clarify, ITTL the Swiss Cantons product of the end of the extended Napolenoic Wars in 1820 were more similar to the provinces in the Low Countries, as those oligarchies did not survive the Wars. The Austrian Emperor was just a figurehead head of state there, just as in Modena or Savoy. The Continental Brotherhood indeed pushed for the abolition of the tariffs, but Vienna blocked the expansion of the customs union south of Hesse, so the Swiss were not guilty of that.

A more powerful parliament is inconsistent with seeing the Swiss Cantons as a role model. Such a parliament could try to revoke or limit local autonomy.

Giving the Parliament in Frankfurt real powers in defense, economy or trade should not clash with the idea of granting full autonomy to the cantons or provinces in their day-to-day affairs. The Continental Brotherhood advocated to enhance the Parliament in all those policies which exceeded the local politics (customs, currency, diplomacy, defense etc.), which by 1850 still relied de facto on the governments of the member states, specially Prussia and Austria.

This seems to be inconsistent with their rejection of powerful nation states and their idealization of smaller sovereign territories. I mean advocating for a Germanic expansion is a nationalist idea.

By expanding the Germanic model I do not mean an expansionism in the classical nationalistic idea, but implementing this idea of association of provinces and cantons in other territories of Europe. The Continental Brotherhood considered (possibly in an utopian way) that this model could be implemented everywhere in Europe, excepting the UK and probably Russia.

 

[Mario]

CHAPTER 8: THE FIRST GERMANIC REVOLUTION (1850)​

Following the great discontent of the burgeoisie, the merchants and the Liberal intellectuals with the political system running in the Germanic Confederation, the first Germanic Revolution broke out in March 1850, when a mob took the see of the Parliament in Frankfurt, in order to proclaim their demands. Similar actions replicated in other cities of the Western part of the Germanic Confederation during the following days, spreading the revolutionary flame by the most important poles of the so-called 'Axis of Prosperity' (Denmark, Low Countries, former Hanover, Rhine valley, Swiss cantons, Austrian-occupied France and northern Italy).

The main demand of the demonstrators was the implementation of the 'Romberg's System', an administrative polity designed by Norbert Romberg, one of the most prominent leaders of the Continental Brotherhood in the Prussian Rhineland. This system, inspired in a mixture of the Twelve Provinces and the Swiss Cantons, promoted the creation of cantons groupped in self-governing provinces, focused in the main cities which would give name to the provinces, overwritting other historical names that could promote nationalistic ideals. As an example, the proposed Province of Hamburg would include several cantons centred in cities which did not belong to the historical Hanseatic territory, but which are closely tied to the city of Hamburg due to proximity and economical links.

This vision was not supported in the cores of the traditional monarchies, even in the more Liberal Austria. However, Vienna realized that the territories outside their direct sovereignty (the Swiss cantons, occupied France and the northern Italian duchies) needed of a renewed political structure, as the existing ones were pretty obsolete. Prussia was more reluctant to concede changes to the revolutionaries, because unlike Austria, the territorial demands affected all its populated western half (Hanover, Rhineland and Thuringia) as well as its puppetized states of Netherlands and Denmark. As a consequence of the Revolution, the Duchy of Luxembourg was abolished.

Map of the areas which supported the First Germanic Revolution: it affected the whole territory of Denmark, Netherlands, Mecklenburg and Hesse; the western half of Prussia, the non-directly ruled territories of Austria, the Alsatian provinces of Baden and the Bavarian exclave of the Rhenish Palatinate. Saxony and Wurttemberg were the only states not affected at all.

The first Germanic Revolution did not have much success because of the lack of more popular support (it could be considered an 'elitist' revolution), but the Liberals finally achieved the approval to form 'Confederal Provinces' by the Parliament in Frankfurt. However, they would not be removed at all from their corresponding sovereignties (i.e. the proposed Province of Cologne would be still placed under Prussian sovereignty), but the main cities of the Axis could access to some self-government and limited own voting rights in the Parliament. They were also free to form their own customs union.

Maybe the revolutionary ideals would have not reached more goals if the agreement in Frankfurt would have been fully implemented at this stage, as the Continental Brotherhood and its supporters realized that they had not enough popular support for pushing for more. But the Prussian refusal to compromise with the reforms and the implementation of the provincial system gave renewed strength to the revoltionaries for a second revolutionary episode.

 

[NedStark]

Since Europe was way more of a complete mess than IOTL, I fully expect much larger European immigration to America during the 1840s-1860s, including revolutionaries fleeing Europe, which would be projected to rise from the 1860s onwards.

Voila, you now have another model for the Liberals that is neither British, French, nationalist nor monarchical.

(As you don't cover America at all, I expect the US to develop the same way as IOTL).

 

[Mario]

Since Europe was way more of a complete mess than IOTL, I fully expect much larger European immigration to America during the 1840s-1860s, including revolutionaries fleeing Europe, which would be projected to rise from the 1860s onwards.

Voila, you now have another model for the Liberals that is neither British, French, nationalist nor monarchical.

(As you don't cover America at all, I expect the US to develop the same way as IOTL).

These events in Europe should not affect the developments in the Americas significantly, but as you said, it is likely that European immigration to the Americas would be boosted.

 

[Mario]

CHAPTER 9: THE BALKAN WAR OF 1852​

When the first Germanic Revolution was not still fully over, the Austrian Empire was dragged by the Russian Empire to a conflict with the Ottoman Empire, known as the Balkan War of 1852. The Russians invoked the Agreement of 1820 in order to gain the support of both Prussia and Austria in their own interests to gradually expulse the Ottoman rule out of the Balkans.

The Ottoman Empire lived a serious crisis since an anti-Turkish revolt in Egypt broke out in 1849 and later spread to other Asian provinces in 1850 and 1851. The government of Sultan Abdulmejid I imposed a series of martial laws in spite of containing the quick replication of the riots, something that caused the Russian protest as Saint Petersbourg considered that those laws were being used for arbitraily repressing the Orthodox population in the Ottoman Balkans. However, this was just a mere pretext for Russia to intervene in the region, as they were waiting it for long time. Now that the Ottomans were in a weak position, the Russian Empire could take advantage of the situation for expanding its rule into the Balkan area.

Prussia supported the Russian intervention but refused to take part directly. The Austrian Empire had high interests in the region and would not let Russia alone to carve out the territories they wanted. The war itself was a brief conflict as the Ottoman troops were pretty overwhelmed by the anarchic situation, so both Russia and Austria could occupy most of their neighbouring Ottoman territories. Greece also took part in the conflict in order to expand its borders northwards. However, Austria did not support the Russian aim to completely erase Ottoman rule from the Balkan as Vienna considered that it might subsume the region into the chaos, specially in the areas where Turkish population was significant. The United Kingdom also threatened to intervene if Russia tried to push the borders too close to Constantinople.

In November 1852 the Treaty of Athens was imposed by the allies to the Ottoman Empire, who had to accept it in order to avoid harsher consequences. Russia annexed Moldavia and Wallachia (including most of Dobrudja) as autonomous principalities under the Imperial Russian sovereignty; Austria annexed the territories of Bosnia, Herzegovina, Sandjak and Montenegro while Greece annexed the northern part of Tessalia, a bit of Macedonia, including the city of Thessaloniki, and the island of Cordu and the surrounding mainland coast. Constantinople was also forced to grant special autonomy to both Serbia and Bulgaria, which would be supervised by both Russia (in the Bulgarian case) and Austria (in the case of Serbia).

Territorial consequences of the Treaty of Athens in 1852.

Other European powers like the United Kingdom or France protested the Treaty as it upset the power balance in the region, but after the recent defeat of both countries in the Hanoverian War they were unable to intervene in the region without high costs. The Southern Italian Kingdom, neutral at the Balkan War, tried to be awarded with outposts in the Albanian coast, but Austria rejected that pretension, even if Russia did not disapprove it. This fact caused some resentment in Naples towards the Austrians, something that would be amplified the following years about the Papal States issue.

In the internal Confederal scope, the victory allowed Austria to gain new territories that might compensate the likely loss of the western non-directly ruled polities, which had already formed their own Confederal provinces by 1852 and thus they were attached to Vienna only nominally from then on. However, this gave the opportunity to Austria to start the withdrawal of troops from southeastern France while the effective power was being gradually transferred to the new provinces created in the area.

 

[Mario]

ANNEX V: CONSTITUTION OF THE FIRST CONFEDERAL PROVINCES​

After the First Provincial Agreement was passed by the Parliament in Frankfurt (May 1851) as part of the pack of measures approved at the aftermath of the First Germanic Revolution, the first Confederal Provinces started to implement their constitution inside their corresponding Germanic monarchies.

The Provinces adapted to the Romberg's System in different ways: i.e. the Province of Amsterdam split from the preceding and bigger Province of Holland and created six cantons from scratch (Amsterdam, Hilversum, Haarlem, Alkmar, Horn and Der Helder), while in the case of Switzerland, some of the existing cantons groupped in new Provinces (i.e. the Province of Lucerne was formed out of the union of the cantons of Lucerne, Glarus, Uri, Schwyz, Nidwalden and Obwalden) while other bigger cantons transformed themselves in provinces with new smaller cantons inside (i.e. the Province of Sitten was created based on the former canton of Valais, now subdivided in four smaller cantons: Sitten, Martigny, Brig and Zermatt).

The Rohan Palace in Strasbourg, transformed into the see of the Council of the new Province of Strasbourg.

In the Austrian-controlled southeastern France, the Continental Brotherhood designed brand new provinces based on their own internal administrative system i.e. the Provinces of Lyon, Valence or Grenoble followed the same territorial division of the regional committees of the Brotherhood. As the Austrian sovereignty over these French lands was not legally recognized from an international point of view (it was just considered an 'occupied territory'), the creation of these Provinces in still-legally-French territory caused great concern in the Second French Republic and other countries like the UK.

The provinces and cantons adopted a bilingual toponymy in most cases: the Continental Brotherhood promoted the Standard Continental Germanic (SCG) language (a restyled form of the Standard High German) as the lingua franca between the provinces as well as the main communication language to be used in the Parliament in Frankfurt, but they also promoted the respect to the local languages and dialects. Thus, the Province of Sitten would be officially known as Province of Sitten/Sion (in SCG, Provinz Sitten/Sion) or the Canton of Martigny as the Canton of Martinach/Martigny (in SCG Kreis Martinach/Martigny). In some cases, some 'creative' toponymy was created for the SCG toponyms (like 'Adhemarberg' for the Province of Montélimar).

By 1852, most of the provinces in the former Netherlandic realm, Denmark, Switzerland, Alsace, Palatinate, Austrian-controlled France and Northern Italy had been created. However, Prussia had blocked the constitution of the proposed provinces in both its own territory and Mecklenburg. The discussion about the unblocking of this process and the Prussian resistance would lead to the Second Germanic Revolution.

 

[skarosianlifeform]

I expect the French and British to pounce on the weakened Confederation during the Second Revolution...

 

[Mario]

I expect the French and British to pounce on the weakened Confederation during the Second Revolution...

Who said it is weakened?

The Confederation is under a process of internal restructuration, but it does not mean it is weakened. The Continental Brotherhood has emerged as a third party power and its regional militias have a reasonable good control of the territory. Moreover, the Austrian an Prussian armies are still on place, so it makes an anarchical and chaotic power like the Second French Republic quite hard to try a new military intervention without external help.

 

[skarosianlifeform]

Right now, it's not weakened.
But it would likely be, later, during the Second Germanic Revolution (assuming it's a civil war, or a major political crisis at the very least). Well, we shall see.

 

[Mario]

CHAPTER 10: TOWARDS A NEW REVOLUTION (1852-1853)​

In December 1852, the new Emperor Franz Joseph I, took possession of the Austrian throne after the recent success of the country in the Balkan War, which reported new territorial gains in Bosnia, Herzegovina, Sandjak and Montenegro. The Emperor and his ministers were determined to take advantage of this good moment to start the Austrian withdrawal from southeastern France and to transfer the Austrian nominal sovereignty in the other western polities to the Parliament in Frankfurt.

The prolonged military Austrian occupation in France had become a big headache for the administration in Vienna due to the costs and the logistic challenges. The rise of the Continental Brotherhood there was seen as a good opportunity to transfer the military administration to a new civil one which would be friendly to the Austrian interests. Many provincial militias had been formed and trained since 1846, and Austria considered that it was time for them to acquire that responsibility under the Austrian army supervision. Vienna was also adamant to end its nominal sovereignty over the Swiss cantons and the former Italian duchies now that they were transforming into Confederal Provinces, as the previous scenario did not report any substantial benefit to them.

Franz Joseph I, Emperor of Austria since 1852.

Thus, in March 1853 Vienna signed an agreement with the Provincial powers under the Continental Brotherhood rule to start a transition period of transference of powers (mainly military as the rest were just nominal) to be finished by the end of that year, when the Southern Provinces (a term applied to the Provinces formerly under Austrian rule, opposed to the Northern Provinces under previous Prussian and allies rule) would be directly attached to the Parliament in Frankfurt. However, Austria ensured that Vienna would not lose its political and economical influence over those territories, i.e. promoting a new 'Southern customs union' between Austria and the Southern Provinces, different to the Northern one created by Prussia.

Prussia was obviously angry at these Austrian plans, because Berlin did not want to relinquish its administration over the revolutionary Provinces and blocked its formation in both Prussian and Mecklenburgian territory (but not in Denmark and the Netherlands). The Continental Brotherhood successfully promoted protests and riots in the Rhineland and Hanover against the Prussian administration during the spring of 1853. In June, Franz Joseph I met the Prussian King Frederick William IV and asked him to unblock the creation of the confederal provinces and follow the same model that Austria had managed to impose to the Southern Provinces, compromising to respect the Prussian influence over the Northern Provinces. However, Frederick William IV refused to do so and accused Vienna to undermine the Prussian sovereignty in its own territory.

The continued Prussian opposition to reach an agreement would finally lead to the breakout of a second revolutionary episode in the Germanic Confederation, starting with the violent assault of Continental Brotherhood mobs to the Council of the Prussian Rhineland in Cologne by the end of August 1853.

 

[Mario]

CHAPTER 11: THE BIRTH OF A NEW EMPIRE (1854)​

The Second Germanic Revolution broke out in August 1853 with violent episodes first centered in the Prussian Province of the Rhine, but they quickly spread to other parts of the Confederation, like Mecklenburg, Denmark, Thuringia, Hesse and Hanover. Prussia unsuccessfully tried to repress the new revolutionary episode, also accusing Vienna of secretly supporting it, but it soon reached the streets of Berlin and the Prussians then tried to negotiate a compromise with the Continental Brotherhood.

This time the Revolution had gained more popular support due to the dissatisfaction with the Prussian policies which blocked any attempt to reform the institutions. The Continental Brotherhood was at its peak of popularity in the western half of the Confederation, and Maisonneuve was conscious that they were at the right time to push for a more radical reformation. Berlin did not want to risk to a civil war that could damage the integrity of the Prussian core and at the beginning of 1854, accepted to negotiate with Maisonneuve and Austria a deeper reformation of the Germanic Confederation.

Maisonneuve demanded that all the revolutionary territories could convert into self-governing provinces only attached to the sovereignty of the Parliament in Frankfurt, which would acquire new powers through a brand new Constitution. In order to compensate both Austria and Prussia, he proposed to revamp the Germanic Confederation as a constitutional Germanic Empire with the King of Prussia and the Emperor of Austria as co-emperors. The balance of power in the Parliament would be adjusted in order to ensure that none of the blocks (the Northern Block led by Prussia and the Southern Block led by Austria) could implement reformations without a wide and transversal agreement.

The Germanic Empire in 1854. The Provinces directly depending on Frankfurt are displayed in green.

Meanwhile, popular pressure started to dethrone other minor Germanic monarchs across the Empire: the unpopular King Karl of Denmark had to abandon the country in March and exiled in Berlin, with the grand dukes of Hesse and Mecklenburg following shortly after. Also minor monarchs inside Prussia like the the dukes of Oldenburg and Brunswick had to renounce their titles and relocate to the eastern Prussian provinces. The constitution of new provinces in western Prussia was unavoidable at this point and finally the government in Berlin surrendered to the petitions of the empowered Continental Brotherhood.

The announcement of the agreement for a new Constitution put the end to the Second Germanic Revolution. Maisonneuve was appointed as the first provisional Imperial Chancelor in Frankfurt and the peace returned to the streets of the western cities by the end of 1854. However, the legal sanction over the provinces created in still legal French territory was clearly going to create new troubles in the area.

 

[Mario]

ANNEX VI: THE IMPERIAL CONSTITUTION OF 1854​

The Imperial Constitution of 1854 (not approved until 1855) redefined the Germanic Confederation as the Germanic Empire (Germanische Kaiserreich) in order to provide a more suitable political scenario for the newly created Imperial Provinces. The new definition, however, did not alter the concept of sovereignty of the surviving monarchies of the former Confederation, but created a constitutional umbrella for the self-ruling provinces, which were neither republics nor monarchies themselves.

The new title of Germanic Emperor was created just as a constitutional figurehead with no real powers outside their own monarchies, with the Emperor of Austria and the King of Prussia holding it at periods of two years each one, and it will be obviously not hereditary, but sanctioned by the Parliament in Frankfurt. Thus, the sovereignty of the provinces will directly rely on the Parliament and not in any monarch. The Austrian Empire (better known as the Habsburgs Dominion after 1855, in order to do not confuse both concepts of Empire), the Kingdoms of Prussia, Saxony, Bavaria and Württenberg, and the Grand Duchy of Baden will keep their own sovereignty shared with the Parliament as before.

The distribution of the power in the Parliament was redesigned in order to ensure a proper balance between the Northern Block (Prussia, Saxony and the Northern Provinces) and the Southern Block (Austria, Bavaria, Baden, Württenberg and the Southern Provinces), but a new concept of demographic majority was also introduced. The so-called Obergföll's System was implemented in order to make the Parliament to work as a Congress and a territorial Senate at the same time. The political matters were divided in three categories: demographical, territorial and sensitive:

- The demographical matters would require a majority of 'demographical votes', which would be assigned to every polity (province or monarchy) according to its census, with one vote per 50 thousand inhabitants. It means that a province with 70k inhabitants would have two votes, and one with 240k will have five, and so on. However, this category will be assigned at first to mostly minor matters which would not require real compromises between the blocks.

- The territorial matters would require a majority of 'territorial votes', which would be distributed in a way that every block would hold the same amount. Most of the political issues would fall at first in this category, ensuring that its approval would need the compromise between both blocks or the desertion of some of their members in order to support the other block.

- The sensitive matters (such as war declarations), would require a double majority (both demographical and territorial) in order to be approved.

Session at the Parliament in Frankfurt, 1855.

The administration of the military marches of Arras and Verdun was also transferred to Frankfurt, and the Imperial Provinces were granted with the possibility of articulate their own militias in an embryo of an Imperial Army (something that will be delayed for some time). However, the customs union remained divided: the Northern one created by Prussia applied for the whole Northern Block while in the South several customs union co-existed with special treaties between them (with the Austrian-Venetian, Swiss-Burgundian and Alpine-Tuscany being the most relevant ones).

The newly created Imperial Chancellery, with Bertrand Maisonneuve as the first provisional Chancelor, had at one of its first targets to unify all the Imperial customs unions as a first step to introduce a unified currency, something that the trading and commercial lobbies, very influent inside the Continental Brotherhood, had started to demand. The Continental Brotherhood also reformed into the first all-Imperial party, the Germanic Liberal Party (GLP) and their unofficial black-red-yellow revolutionary flag was officially adopted as the Imperial Germanic flag, including a shield with an eagle in the centre.