Coordinates

41°52′55″N87°37′40″N

{{infobox historical event |event name

Revolutions of 1848 |Image_Name Horace Vernet-Barricade rue Soufflot.jpg |Image_Caption ''Barricade on the rue Soufflot'', an 1848 painting by Horace Vernet. The Panthéon is shown in the background. |AKA Spring of Nations, Springtime of the Peoples, Year of Revolution |Participants Peoples of France, the German states, the Austrian Empire, the Italian states, Denmark, Wallachia, Poland, and others |Location Western and Central Europe |Date 23 February 1848-early 1849 |Result Little overall structural change Significant overall social and cultural change }}

The European Revolutions of 1848, known in some countries as the Spring of Nations, Springtime of the Peoples or the Year of Revolution, were a series of political upheavals throughout Europe. It was the first (and only) Europe-wide collapse of traditional authority, but within a year reactionary forces had won out and the revolutions collapsed. This revolutionary wave began in France in February, and immediately spread to most of Europe and parts of Latin America. Over 50 countries were affected, but there was no coordination or cooperation among the revolutionaries in different countries. Five factors were involved: the widespread dissatisfaction with the political leadership; the demand for more participation and democracy; the demands of the working classes; the upsurge of nationalism; and finally, the regrouping of the reactionary forces based in the royalty, the aristocracy, the army, and the peasants. The uprisings were led by shaky ad-hoc coalitions of reformers, the middle classes and workers, but it could not hold together for long. Tens of thousands of people were killed and many more forced into exile. The only significant reform was the abolition of serfdom in Austria and Hungary. The revolutions were most important in France, Germany, Italy, and Austria, and did not reach Russia, Great Britain, or the United States.

Origins

These revolutions arose from such a wide variety of causes that it is difficult to view them as resulting from a coherent movement or social phenomenon. Numerous changes had been taking place in European society throughout the first half of the 19th century. Both liberal reformers and radical politicians were reshaping national governments. Technological change was revolutionizing the life of the working classes. A popular press extended political awareness, and new values and ideas such as popular liberalism, nationalism and socialism began to spring up. Some historians emphasize the series crop failures, particularly those in the year 1846, that produced hardship among peasants and the working urban poor.

Large swathes of the nobility were discontented with royal absolutism or near-absolutism. In 1846 there had been an uprising of Polish nobility in Austrian Galicia, which was only countered when peasants, in turn, rose up against the nobles. Additionally, an uprising by democratic forces against Prussia occurred in Greater Poland.

Next the middle classes began to agitate. Working class objectives tended to fall in line with those of the middle class. Although Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels had written at the request of the Communist League in London (an organization consisting principally of German workers) ''The Communist Manifesto'' (published in German in London on February 21, 1848), once they began agitating in Germany following the March insurrection in Berlin, their demands were considerably reduced. They issued their "Demands of the Communist Party in Germany" from Paris in March; the pamphlet only urged unification of Germany, universal suffrage, abolition of feudal duties, and similar middle class goals.

The middle and working classes thus shared a desire for reform, and agreed on many of the specific aims. Their participations in the revolutions, however, differed. While much of the impetus came from the middle classes, much of the cannon fodder came from the lower. The revolts first erupted in the cities.

Urban workers

The population in French rural areas had rapidly risen, causing many peasants to seek a living in the cities. Many in the bourgeoisie feared and distanced themselves from the working poor. Many unskilled laborers toiled from 12 to 15 hours per day when they had work, living in squalid, disease-ridden slums. Traditional artisans felt the pressure of industrialization, having lost their guilds. Revolutionaries such as Marx built up a following.

The situation in the German states was similar. Parts of Prussia were beginning to industrialize. During the decade of the 1840s, mechanized production in the textile industry brought about inexpensive clothing that undercut the handmade products of German tailors. Reforms ameliorated the most unpopular features of rural feudalism, while industrial workers remained dissatisfied with these and pressed for greater change.

Rural areas

Rural population growth had led to food shortages, land pressure, and migration, both within Europe and out from Europe, especially to North America. In the years 1845 and 1846, a potato blight caused a subsistence crisis in Northern Europe. The effects of the blight were most severely manifested in the Great Irish Famine.), but also caused famine-like conditions in the Scottish Highlands and throughout Continental Europe.

Aristocratic wealth (and corresponding power) was synonymous with the ownership of farm lands and effective control over the peasants. Peasant grievances exploded during the revolutionary year of 1848.

Role of ideas

Despite forceful and often violent efforts of established and reactionary powers to keep them down, disruptive ideas gained popularity: ''democracy'', ''liberalism'', ''nationalism'', and ''socialism''.

In the language of the 1840s, ''democracy'' meant universal male suffrage. ''Liberalism'' fundamentally meant consent of the governed and the restriction of church and state power, republican government, freedom of the press and the individual. ''Nationalism'' believed in uniting people bound by (some mix of) common languages, culture, religion, shared history, and of course immediate geography; there were also irredentist movements. At this time, what are now Germany and Italy were collections of small states. ''Socialism'' in the 1840s was a term without a consensus definition, meaning different things to different people, but was typically used within a context of more power for workers in a system based on worker ownership of the means of production.

Events

Italian states

Although little noticed at the time, the first major outbreak came in Sicily, starting in January 1848. There had been several previous revolts against Bourbon rule; this one produced an independent state that lasted only 16 months before the Bourbons came back. During those months the constitution was quite advanced for its time in liberal democratic terms, as was the proposal of an Italian confederation of states. The failed revolt was reversed a dozen years later as the Bourbon kingdom of the Two Sicilies collapsed in 1860–61 with the Risorgimento.

France

The "February Revolution" in France was sparked by the suppression of the ''campagne des banquets''. This revolution was driven by nationalist and republican ideals among the French general public, who believed that the people should rule themselves. It ended the constitutional monarchy of Louis-Philippe, and led to the creation of the French Second Republic. This government was headed by Louis-Napoleon, who, after only four years, returned France to a monarchy with the establishment of the Second French Empire in 1852.

Alexis de Tocqueville remarked in his Recollections of the period that "society was cut in two: those who had nothing united in common envy, and those who had anything united in common terror."[4]

German states

The "March Revolution" in the German states took place in the south and the west of Germany, with large popular assemblies and mass demonstrations. Led by well educated students and intellectuals, they demanded German national unity, freedom of the press, and freedom of assembly. The uprisings were not well coordinated but had in common a rejection of traditional, autocratic political structures in the thirty-nine independent states of the German Confederation. The middle class and working class components of the Revolution split, and in the end the conservative aristocracy defeated it, forcing many liberals into exile.

Denmark

Denmark had been governed by a system of absolute monarchy since the seventeenth century. King Christian VIII, a moderate reformer but still an absolutist, died in January 1848 during a period of rising opposition from farmers and liberals. The demands for constitutional monarchy, led by the National Liberals, ended with a popular march to Christiansborg, The new king, Frederick VII, met the liberals demands and installed a new Cabinet that included prominent leaders of the National Liberal Party. The national-liberal movement wanted to abolish absolutism but retain a strongly centralized state. The king accepted a new constitution — see the Constitution of Denmark — agreeing to share power with a bicameral parliament called the Rigsdag. Although army officers were dissatisfied, they accepted the new arrangement which --in contrast to the rest of Europe—was not overturned by reactionaries. The liberal constitution did not extend to Schleswig, leaving the Schleswig-Holstein Question unanswered.

Schleswig

Schleswig, a region containing both Danes and Germans, was a part of the Danish monarchy but remained a duchy separate from the Kingdom of Denmark. Spurred by pan-German sentiment, Germans of Schleswig took up arms to protest a new policy announced by Denmark's National Liberal government, which would have fully integrated the duchy into Denmark. The German population in Schleswig and Holstein revolted, inspired by the Protestant clergy. The German states sent in an army but Danish victories in 1849 led to the Treaty of Berlin (1850) and the London Protocols (1852). They reaffirmed the sovereignty of the King of Denmark, while prohibiting union with Denmark. The violation of the latter provision led to renewed warfare in 1863 and the Prussian victory in 1864.

Habsburg Empire

From March 1848 through July 1849, the Habsburg Austrian Empire was threatened by revolutionary movements, which often had a nationalist character. The empire, ruled from Vienna, included Austrian Germans, Hungarians, Slovenes, Poles, Czechs, Croats, Slovaks, Ukrainians/Ruthenians, Romanians, Serbs and Italians, all of whom attempted in the course of the revolution to either achieve autonomy, independence, or even hegemony over other nationalities. The nationalist picture was further complicated by the simultaneous events in the German states, which moved toward greater German national unity.

Hungary

March 15, 1848 was the day that a group of Magyar nationalists rioted in Pest-Buda (today Budapest) demanding political autonomy for Hungary from Austria. This resulted in Klemens von Metternich, the Austrian prince and foreign minister, resigning. In turn, Emperor Ferdinand promised Hungary a constitution, an elected parliament, and the end of censorship. The new government, led by ministers Szechenyi and Kossuth, imposed the Magyar language on all the other nationalities in Hungary. This angered many people, and uprisings followed. Austria took back Hungary after one and a half years of fighting when Russian Tsar Nicholas I marched into Hungary with over 300,000 troops. Hungary was thus placed under brutal martial law, with the Austrian government restored to its original position.

Switzerland

Switzerland, already an alliance of republics, also saw major internal struggle. The creation of the Sonderbund led to a short Swiss civil war in November 1847. In 1848, a new constitution ended the almost-complete independence of the cantons and transformed Switzerland into a federal state.

Greater Poland

Polish people mounted a military insurrection in the Grand Duchy of Poznań (or the Greater Poland region) against the occupying Prussian forces.

Wallachia

A Romanian liberal and Romantic nationalist uprising began in June in the principality of Wallachia. Closely connected with the 1848 unsuccessful revolution in Moldavia, it sought to overturn the administration imposed by Imperial Russian authorities under the ''Regulamentul Organic'' regime, and, through many of its leaders, demanded the abolition of boyar privilege. Led by a group of young intellectuals and officers in the Wallachian military forces, the movement succeeded in toppling the ruling Prince Gheorghe Bibescu, whom it replaced with a Provisional Government and a Regency, and in passing a series of major liberal reforms, first announced in the Proclamation of Islaz.

Belgium

In Belgium, the uprisings were local and concentrated in the industrial basins of the Provinces of Liège and Hainaut. A more or less greater threat was coming from France, where among the seasonal workers Communism was spread by the small Communist clique of Belgium, basically the people were brought into a Belgian Legion, with the promise of a free ride home and money. The Belgian Legion would 'invade' Belgium by train and travel to Brussels where the government and monarchy had to be overthrown. Several smaller groups managed to infiltrate Belgium, but the reinforced Belgian bordertroops was successful in splitting up the larger groups of the Legion, and the invasion eventually came to nothing.

Latin America

New Grenada

In Spanish Latin America, the Revolution of 1848 appeared in New Grenada, where Colombian students, liberals and intellectuals demanded the election of General José Hilario López. He took power in 1849 and launched major reforms, abolishing slavery and the death penalty, and providing freedom of the press and of religion. The resulting turmoil in Colombia lasted four decades; from 1851 to 1885 the country was ravaged by four general civil wars and fifty local revolutions.

Brazil

In Brazil, the "Praieira revolt" was a movement in Pernambuco that lasted from November 1848 to 1852. Unresolved conflicts left over from the period of the Regency and local resistance to the consolidation of the Brazilian Empire that had been proclaimed in 1822 helped to plant the seeds of the revolution.

English speaking lands

The Revolution had little impact in Britain, its colonies or the United States. However, the Young Irelander Rebellion of 1848 was a small, failed rebellion which broke out in Balingarry, Co. Tipperary. It was led by the Young Ireland movement, inspired by famine conditions in Ireland and the 1848 rebellions throughout Europe.

Elsewhere in Britain, the middle classes had been pacified by general enfranchisement in the Reform Act 1832; the consequent agitations, violence, and petitions of the Chartist movement came to a head with their peaceful petition to Parliament of 1848. The repeal of the protectionist agricultural tariffs called the "Corn Laws" (in 1846) had defused some proletarian fervour there.Henry Weisser, "Chartism in 1848: Reflections on a Non-Revolution," ''Albion: A Quarterly Journal Concerned with British Studies'' Vol. 13, No. 1 (Spring, 1981), pp. 12–26 in JSTOR

Legacy and memory

There were multiple memories of the Revolution. Democrats looked to 1848, as a democratic revolution, which in the long run insured liberty, equality, and fraternity. Marxists denounced 1848 as a betrayal of working-class ideals by a bourgeoisie that was indifferent to the legitimate demands of the proletariat. For nationalists, 1848, was the springtime of hope when newly emerging nationalities rejected the old multinational empires. They were all bitterly disappointed in the short run. 1848, at best, was a glimmer of future hope, and at worst, it was a deadweight that strengthened the reactionaries and delayed further progress.

In the post-revolutionary decade after 1848, little had visibly changed, and most historian considered the revolutions a failure, given the seeming lack of permanent structural changes.

Nevertheless, there were a few immediate successes for some revolutionary movements, notably in the Habsburg lands. Austria and Prussia eliminated feudalism by 1850, improving the lot of the peasants. European middle classes made political and economic gains over the next twenty years; France retained universal male suffrage. Russia would later free the serfs on February 19, 1861. The Habsburgs finally had to give the Hungarians more self-determination in the ''Ausgleich'' of 1867. The revolutions inspired lasting reform in Denmark as well as the Netherlands.

Exceptions

Great Britain, the Netherlands, the Russian Empire (including Congress Poland), and the Ottoman Empire were the only major European states to go without a national revolution over this period. Sweden and Norway were little affected. Serbia, though formally unaffected by the revolt, actively supported the Serbian revolution in the Habsburg Empire.

Russia's relative stability was attributed to the revolutionary groups' inability to communicate with each other. In the Kingdom of Poland and the Grand Duchy of Lithuania, uprisings took place in 1830–31 (the November Uprising) and 1846 (the Kraków Uprising). A final revolt took place in 1863–65 (the January Uprising), but none occurred in 1848. While there were no major political upheavals in the Ottoman Empire as such, political unrest did occur in some of its vassal states. In Serbia, feudalism was finally abolished in 1838 and power of the Serbian prince was reduced with the Turkish constitution. In the Netherlands no major unrests appeared because the king Willem II decided to alter the constitution to reform elections and effectively reduce the power of the monarchy.

Switzerland and Portugal were also spared in 1848, though both had gone through civil wars in the preceding years (the Sonderbund war in Switzerland and the Liberal Wars in Portugal). The introduction of the Swiss Federal Constitution in 1848 was a revolution of sorts, laying the foundation of Swiss society as it is today.

References

Bibliography

Surveys

Breunig, Charles (1977), ''The Age of Revolution and Reaction, 1789 – 1850'' (ISBN 0-393-09143-0)

Chastain, James, ed. (2005) ''Encyclopedia of Revolutions of 1848'' online from Ohio State U.

Dowe, Dieter, ed. ''Europe in 1848: Revolution and Reform'' (Berghahn Books, 2000)

Evans, R.J.W., and Hartmut Pogge von Strandmann, eds. ''The Revolutions in Europe, 1848–1849: From Reform to Reaction'' (2000), 10 essays by scholars excerpt and text search

Pouthas, Charles. "The Revolutions of 1848" in J. P. T. Bury, ed. ''New Cambridge Modern History: The zenith of European power 1830–70'' (1960) pp 389–415 online excerpts

Langer, William. ''The Revolutions of 1848'' (Harper, 1971), standard overview

Rapport, Mike (2009), ''1848: Year of Revolution'' ISBN 978-0465014361 online review, a standard survey

Robertson, Priscilla (1952), ''Revolutions of 1848: A Social History'' (ISBN 0-691-00756-X), despite the subtitle this is a traditional political narrative

Sperber, Jonathan. ''The European revolutions, 1848–1851'' (1994) online edition

Stearns, Peter N. ''The Revolutions of 1848'' (1974). online edition

Weyland, Kurt. "The Diffusion of Revolution: '1848' in Europe and Latin America," ''International Organization'' Vol. 63, No. 3 (Summer, 2009) pp. 391–423 in JSTOR

France

Duveau, Georges. ''1848: The Making of a Revolution'' (1966)

Fasel, George. "The Wrong Revolution: French Republicanism in 1848," ''French Historical Studies'' Vol. 8, No. 4 (Autumn, 1974), pp. 654–677 in JSTOR

Loubère, Leo. "The Emergence of the Extreme Left in Lower Languedoc, 1848–1851: Social and Economic Factors in Politics," ''American Historical Review'' (1968), v. 73#4 1019–1051 in JSTOR

Germany and Austria

Deak, Istvan. ''The Lawful Revolution: Louis Kossuth and the Hungarians, 1848–1849'' (1979)

Hahs, Hans J. ''The 1848 Revolutions in German-speaking Europe'' (2001)

Hewitson, Mark. "'The Old Forms are Breaking Up, … Our New Germany is Rebuilding Itself': Constitutionalism, Nationalism and the Creation of a German Polity during the Revolutions of 1848–49," ''English Historical Review,'' Oct 2010, Vol. 125 Issue 516, pp 1173–1214

Macartney, C. A. "1848 in the Habsburg Monarchy," ''European Studies Review,'' 1977, Vol. 7 Issue 3, pp 285–309

O'Boyle Lenore. "The Democratic Left in Germany, 1848," ''Journal of Modern History'' Vol. 33, No. 4 (Dec., 1961), pp. 374–383 in JSTOR

Robertson, Priscilla. ''Revolutions of 1848: A Social History'' (1952), pp 105–85 on Germany, pp 187–307 on Austria

Sked, Alan. ''The Survival of the Habsburg Empire: Radetzky, the Imperial Army and the Class War, 1848'' (1979)

Vick, Brian (2002): ''Defining Germany The 1848 Frankfurt Parliamentarians and National Identity'' (Harvard University Press ISBN 978-067400911-0).

Italy

Ginsborg, Paul. "Peasants and Revolutionaries in Venice and the Veneto, 1848," ''Historical Journal,'' Sep 1974, Vol. 17 Issue 3, pp 503–550 in JSTOR

Ginsborg, Paul. ''Daniele Manin and the Venetian Revolution of 1848–49'' (1979)

Robertson, Priscilla (1952). ''Revolutions of 1848: A Social History'' (1952) pp 309–401

Other

Feyzioğlu, Hamiyet Sezer et al. "Revolutions of 1848 and the Ottoman Empire," ''Bulgarian Historical Review,'' 2009, Vol. 37 Issue 3/4, pp 196–205

Historiography

Dénes, Iván Zoltán. "Reinterpreting a 'Founding Father': Kossuth Images and Their Contexts, 1848–2009," ''East Central Europe,'' April 2010, Vol. 37 Issue 1, pp 90–117

Hamerow, Theodore S. "History and the German Revolution of 1848," ''American Historical Review'' Vol. 60, No. 1 (Oct., 1954), pp. 27–44 in JSTOR

Jones, Peter (1981), ''The 1848 Revolutions (Seminar Studies in History)'' (ISBN 0-582-06106-7)

Mattheisen, Donald J. "History as Current Events: Recent Works on the German Revolution of 1848," ''American Historical Review,'' Dec 1983, Vol. 88 Issue 5, pp 1219–37 in JSTOR

Rothfels, Hans. "1848 – One Hundred Years After," ''Journal of Modern History,'' Dec 1948, Vol. 20 Issue 4, pp 291–319 in JSTOR

External links

The Revolutions of 1848 begin

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thumb|Painting by August Hunger of Robert Blum between 1845 and 1848 Robert Blum (10 November 1807 – 9 November 1848) was a German democratic politician, publicist, poet, publisher, revolutionist and member of the National Assembly of 1848. In his fight for a strong, unified Germany he opposed ethnocentrism and it was his strong belief that no one people should rule over another. As such he was an opponent of the Prussian occupation of Poland and was in contact with the revolutionists there. Blum was likewise a critic of both antisemitism and catholicism, supported the German Catholics and agitated for the equality of the sexes. In spite of his diplomatic immunity as a member of parliament he was illegally arrested during a stay at the hotel "Stadt London" in Vienna and murdered in a summary execution, making him a martyr of the German revolution.

Biography

Blum grew up in poverty in Cologne, the son of a failed theologian who made a poor living as a cooper. He was ten years old before he could go to school. After his schooling, he worked as a craftsman in different trades. He failed as a goldsmith's apprentice, but completed an apprenticeship as a gardener. After his journeyman's time, he returned to Cologne to work in a lamp factory. His employer put him to work at the counter since he was good at calculations. In 1829, he followed his employer to Berlin where he also continued his education. His work was interrupted by obligatory military service, and on his release, his poor circumstances obliged him to return to Cologne. There, in 1830, he worked serving in a theater company and started writing politically motivated poetry and plays. When the theater closed in the summer, he worked for a sheriff as a scribe.

The political upheavals of 1830 attracted his interest, and ideals of freedom found their way into his poetry. In 1832, he followed the theater troupe to Leipzig. There he came in touch with humanist and liberal circles, contributed to the liberal newspaper ''Zeitung für die elegante Welt'' and joined Leipzig's freemason lodge. By 1840, he had worked his way up to being a cashier in the city theater. That year he also founded the Schillerverein in Leipzig which celebrated the poet's anniversary as a festival in honor of political liberty.

Beginning in 1839, Blum became a leading figure in the Kingdom of Saxony's national-liberal circles; as a gifted orator and organizer, he helped establish Saxony's opposition movement as a serious political force. His initial attempt at a newsletter was suppressed by the censor, but another one continued for four years with occasional lapses due to the censor. He became a German Catholic when Johannes Ronge came to Leipzig, and wrote on that movement's behalf. In 1845, Blum organized the first German Catholic synod in Leipzig that marked the beginning of Germany's humanist free religious movement. In 1844, he gave up his theater job to found a book store.

In 1845, the presence of John of Saxony stirred the masses and the military fired on them. At a turbulent meeting of armed citizens and students of Leipzig, Blum dissuaded them from storming the barracks, and urged conformity to the law. This resulted in his being elected a representative in Leipzig's government.

Blum embraced the upheavals of 1848. He was one of the presidents of the preliminary parliament at Frankfurt which he dominated with his energy, imposing figure and pithy speeches. As a member of the succeeding parliament and leader of the left, he worked to contain the most radical elements. Blum's trustworthiness was questioned when the extreme leftist Arnold Ruge claimed Blum had moved toward his side. As the leader of the radical liberal fraction, he strongly opposed the Malmö Treaty between Denmark and Prussia that abolished Schleswig-Holstein's democratically elected government. He was also one of the most vocal supporters of popular sovereignty.

In October, when revolutionary fighting broke out in Vienna, Blum travelled there and joined the revolutionary forces. On the surrender of the capital to Windischgrätz, Blum was arrested with several of his companions on 4 November. Brought before a military tribunal, he pleaded in vain his privileges as a deputy from the German Diet and was condemned to be hanged, a sentence which was changed to death by the bullet. He was executed on 9 November. His death became a symbol for the futility of Germany's 1848 rebellion; the day of his death marks the first of a series of events that led to November 9 being referred to as Germany's ''Schicksalstag'' (fateful day).

His son Hans Blum was a noted writer and journalist.

References

Wilhelm Liebknecht, Robert Blum und Seine Zeit, (Nuremberg 1896)

External links

Category:1807 births Category:1848 deaths Category:People from Cologne Category:German religious humanists Category:German politicians Category:German revolutionaries Category:Members of the Frankfurt Parliament Category:People from the Rhine Province Category:People executed by the Austrian Empire

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