SCHLESWIG-HOLSTEIN QUESTION, the name given to the
whole complex of diplomatic and other issues arising in the 19th
century out of the relations of the two “Elbe duchies,” Schleswig
and Holstein, to the Danish crown on the one hand and the
German Confederation on the other, which came to a crisis with
the extinction of the male line of the reigning house of Denmark
by the death of King Frederick VII. on the 15th of November
1863. The central question was whether the two duchies did
or did not constitute an integral part of the dominions of the
Danish crown, with which they had been more or less intimately
associated for centuries. This involved the purely legal question,
raised by the death of the last common male heir to both Denmark
and the duchies, as to the proper succession in the latter, and
the constitutional questions arising out of the relations of the
duchies to the Danish crown, to each other, and of Holstein to
the German Confederation. There was also the national question:
the ancient racial antagonism between German and Dane,
intensified by the tendency, characteristic of the 19th century, to
the consolidation of nationalities. Lastly, there was the
international question: the rival ambitions of the German powers
involved, and beyond them the interests of other European
states, notably that of Great Britain in preventing the rise of a
German sea-power in the north.
To take the racial question first, from time immemorial the
country north of the Elbe had been the battle-ground of Danes
and Germans. Danish scholars point to the prevalence of Danish
place-names[1]
far southward into the German-speaking districts
as evidence that at least the whole of Schleswig was at one time
Danish; German scholars claim it, on the other hand, as essentially
German. That the duchy of Schleswig, or South Jutland
(Sönderjylland), had been from time immemorial a Danish fief
was, indeed, not in dispute, nor was the fact that Holstein had
been from the first a fief of the Germano-Roman Empire. The
controversy in the 19th century raged round the ancient
“indissoluble” union of the two duchies, and the inferences to be
drawn from it; the “Eider Danes”[2]
claimed Schleswig as an
integral part of the Danish monarchy, which, on the principle of
the union, involved the retention of Holstein also; the Germans
claimed Holstein as a part of Germany and, therefore, on the
same historic principle, Schleswig also. The history of the
relations of Schleswig and Holstein thus became of importance
in the practical political question.
Though the designation of Schleswig-Holstein, implying the
fusion of the duchies of Schleswig and Holstein in a single Prussian
Early history
of the duchies.
|
province, only dates from 1866, the history of the duchies
has since the 14th century been so closely interwoven
that it is impossible to treat them separately. Something
must, however, be said about their origins and
their separate history up to the time of their first union under the
Holstein counts.
When it first appears in history South Jutland was inhabited by
mingled Cimbri, Angles, Jutes and Frisians, upon whom the Danes
exercised an unceasing pressure from the north. To
the south of Schleswig what is now Holstein was
inhabited mainly by Saxons, pressed upon from the east
by the Wends and other Slavonic races. These Saxons were the
last of their nation to submit to Charlemagne (804), who put their
country under Frankish counts, the limits of the Empire being
pushed in 810 as far as the Schlei in Schleswig. Then began the
secular struggle between the Danish kings and the German emperors,
and in 934 the German king Henry I. established the Mark of
Schleswig (Limes Danarum) between the Eider and the Schlei as an
outpost of Germany against the Danes. South of this raged the
contest between Germans and Slavs. The latter, conquered and
Christianized, rose in revolt in 983, after the death of the emperor
Otto II., and for a while reverted to paganism and independence.
The Saxon dukes, however, continued to rule central Holstein, and
when Lothair of Supplingenburg became duke of Saxony
(1106), on the extinction of the Billung line, he invested
Adolf I. of Schauenburg with the countship of Holstein.
Adolf I.'s son, Adolf II. (1128-1164), succeeded in reconquering
the Slavonic Wagri and founded the city and see of Lübeck
to hold them in check. Adolf III. (d. 1225), his successor, received
Dithmarschen in fee from the emperor Frederick I., but in 1203 the
fortunes of war compelled him to surrender Holstein to Valdemar II.
of Denmark, the cession being confirmed by the emperor Frederick II.
in 1214 and the pope in 1217. Valdemar appointed Albert of
Orlamünde his lieutenant in Holstein, and the Schleswig-Holstein
question might have been thus early settled but for Valdemar's
ill fortune in being taken prisoner in 1223. During his captivity
Albert of Orlamünde was beaten at Mölln by Count Adolf III., to
whom Valdemar restored his countship as the price of his own
release. A papal dispensation from oaths taken under duress
excused a new war; but Valdemar himself was beaten at Bornhövede
on the 22nd of July 1227, and Holstein was permanently
secured to the house of Schauenburg. After the death of Adolf IV.
in 1261, Holstein was split up into several countships by his sons
and grandsons: the lines of Kiel, Plön, Schauenburg-Pinneberg and
Rendsburg.
In 1232 King Valdemar II., who had retained the former German
Mark north of the Eider, erected South Jutland (Schleswig) into a
Duchy of Schleswig
or South Jutland.
|
duchy for his second son, Abel. On the death of the
latter's descendant, Duke Eric, in 1319, Christopher II.
of Denmark attempted to seize the duchy, the heir of which,
Valdemar V., was a minor; but Valdemar's guardian
and uncle, Gerhard III. of Holstein-Rendsburg (1304-1340),
surnamed “the Great” and a notable warrior, drove back
the Danes and, Christopher having been expelled, succeeded in
procuring the election of Valdemar to the Danish throne. His
reward was the duchy of Schleswig and the famous charter, known
as the Constitutio Valdemariana, which laid down the principle
The Constitutio
Valdemariana 1326.
|
that the duchy of South Jutland was never to be incorporated
in the kingdom of Denmark or ruled by the same
sovereign (7 June 1326). Thus Schleswig and Holstein
were for the first time united. The union was, indeed, as
yet precarious. In 1330, Christopher II. was restored to his
throne and Valdemar V. to his duchy, Gerhard having to be
content with the reversion in the case of the duke dying without
issue. Gerhard, however, was assassinated in 1340 by a Dane, and
it was not till 1375, when the male lines both in the kingdom and
the duchy became extinct by the deaths of King Valdemar IV.
and Duke Valdemar V., that the counts of Holstein seized on their
inheritance, assuming at the same time the style of “lords of
Jutland.” In 1386 Queen Margaret allowed their claim in return
for the usual homage and promise of feudal service, and directed that
Union of Schleswig
and Holstein.
|
one of their number should be elected duke of Schleswig.
The choice fell on Gerhard VI., grandson of Gerhard III.
of Rendsburg, who after the extinction of the line of Kiel
(1390) obtained in 1403 the whole of the countship of
Holstein, except the small Schauenburg territories. With
this begins the history of the union of Schleswig and Holstein.
Gerhard VI. died in 1404, and soon afterwards war broke out
between his sons and Eric of Pomerania, Margaret's successor on the
throne of Denmark, who claimed South Jutland as an integral part
of the Danish monarchy, a claim formally recognized by the emperor
Sigismund in 1424.[3]
It was not till 1440 that the struggle ended
with the investiture of Count Adolf VIII., Gerhard's son, with the
hereditary duchy of Schleswig by Christopher III. of Denmark. On
the death of Christopher eight years later, Adolf's influence secured
the election of his nephew Count Christian of Oldenburg to the
vacant throne.
On the death of Adolf in 1459 without issue, King Christian I.,
though he had been forced to swear to the Constitutio Valdemariana,
King-dukes of the
Oldenburg line.
|
succeeded in asserting his claim to Schleswig in right of
his mother, Adolf's sister. Instead of incorporating
South Jutland with the Danish kingdom, however, he
preferred to take advantage of the feeling of the estates
in Schleswig and Holstein in favour of union to secure
both countries. On Schleswig the Schauenburg counts had no
claim; their election in Holstein would have separated the countries;
and it was easy therefore for Christian to secure his election both as
Charter of Ribe, 1460.
The “indissoluble union.”
|
duke of Schleswig and count of Holstein (5 March 1460).
The price he paid was a charter of privileges, issued first
at Ribe and afterwards at Kiel, in which he promised
to preserve the countries for ever as “one and indivisible,”
and conceded to the estates the right to refuse to elect
as count and duke any Danish prince who should not
undertake, on becoming king, to confirm their privileges. By
these privileges the union between South Juliana and Holstein,
established under the Schauenburg line, was officially recognized.
For external affairs the two countries were to be regarded as one,
the bishop of Lübeck and five “good men” elected by the estates
of each country forming an advisory and executive council under
the duke-count. For internal affairs duchy and county were to
retain their separate estates and peculiar customs and laws. Above
all, Holstein remained a German, Schleswig a Danish fief. The claims
of the Schauenburg counts were surrendered for a money payment;
it was not till 1640 however, that the extinction of their
line brought Schauenburg itself to the Danish crown.
Finally, in 1472 the emperor Frederick III. confirmed
Christian I.'s overlordship over Dithmarschen, and
erected Dithmarschen, Holstein and Stormarn into the duchy of
Holstein.
On the death of King Frederick I. (1523-1533), under whom the
Reformation had been introduced into the
duchies,[4]
occurred the
Subdivision
of the duchies.
|
first of several partitions of the inheritance of the house
of Oldenburg; the elder son, Christian III., succeeding
as king of Denmark, the younger, Adolphus (Adolf) I.,
founding the line of the dukes of Gottorp. In 1581 a
further partition was made, by a compact signed at Flensburg,
between King Frederick II. and his uncle Duke Adolphus I., under
which the rights of overlordship in the various towns and territories
of Schleswig were divided between them; the estates, however,
remained undivided, and the king and duke ruled the country
alternately. To make confusion worse confounded, Frederick II.
in 1582 ceded certain lands in Hardersleben to his brother John,
who founded the line of Schleswig-Sonderburg, and John's grandsons
again partitioned this appanage, Ernest Günther (1609-1689),
founding the line of Schleswig-Sonderburg-Augustenburg, and
Augustus Philip (1612-1675) that of Schleswig-Beck-Glücksburg
(known since 1825 as Holstein-Sonderburg-Glücksburg).
Meanwhile the Gottorp dukes were making themselves a great
position in Europe. Frederick III., duke from 1616 to 1659,
established the principle of primogeniture for his line,
and the full sovereignty of his Schleswig dominions was
secured to him by his son-in-law Charles X. of Sweden by
the convention of Copenhagen (12 May 1658)[5]
and to
his son Christian Albert (d. 1694) by the treaty of Oliva, though it
was not till after years of warfare that Denmark admitted the claim
by the convention of Altona (30 June 1689). Christian Albert's
son Frederick IV. (d. 1702) was again attacked by Denmark, but
had a powerful champion in Charles XII. of Sweden, who secured his
rights by the treaty of Travendal in 1700. Frederick was killed at
the battle of Klissow in 1702, and his brother Christian Augustus
acted as regent for his son Charles Frederick until 1718. In 1713
the regent broke the stipulated neutrality of the duchy in favour
of Sweden and Frederick IV. of Denmark seized the excuse to expel
the duke by force of arms. Holstein was restored to him by the
peace of Frederiksborg in 1720, but in the following year Frederick
IV. was recognized as sovereign of Schleswig by the estates and by
the princes of the Augustenburg and Glücksburg lines.
The situation was ultimately simplified by the marriage of Duke
Charles Frederick with the tsarevna Anna Pavlovna, and the
Russia resigns her
rights in the duchies,
1767, 1773.
|
recognition in 1742 of their son Charles Peter Ulrich as
cesarevitch by the empress Elizabeth of Russia. For
Peter as duke of Gottorp, Adolphus Frederick, bishop
of Lübeck, son of Christian Augustus, acted as regent
until 1745; in 1751 he became king of Sweden.[6]
But the
rulers of Russia had no interest in maintaining their part
of Holstein and their confused and disputed common
rights in Jutland, and in 1767 the empress Catherine II.
resigned them, by the treaty of Copenhagen, in the name of her son
Paul, who confirmed this action on coming of age in 1773. Oldenburg
and Delmenhorst, surrendered by the Danish king in
compensation, were handed over to Frederick Augustus, bishop of
Lübeck, the second son of Christian Augustus, who thus founded
the younger line of the house of Gottorp. Schleswig and Holstein
were thus once more united under the Danish king.
On the abolition of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806, Holstein
was practically, though not formally, incorporated in Denmark.
Under the administration of the Danish prime minister Count
Bernstorff, himself from Schleswig, many reforms were carried out
in the duchies, e.g. abolition of torture and of serfdom; at the same
time Danish laws and coinage were introduced, and Danish was
made the official language for communication with Copenhagen.
Since, however, the Danish court itself at the time was largely German
in language and feeling, this produced no serious expressions of
resentment.
The Congress of Vienna, instead of settling the questions involved
in the relations of the duchies of Denmark once for
all,[7] sought to
Congress of
Vienna, 1815.
|
stereotype the old divisions in the interests of Germany.
The settlement of 1806 was reversed, and while Schleswig
remained as before, Holstein and Lauenburg were
included in the new German Confederation. The opening
up of the Schleswig-Holstein question thus became sooner or later
inevitable. The Germans of Holstein, influenced by the new national
enthusiasm evoked by the War of Liberation, resented more than
ever the attempts of the government of Copenhagen to treat them
as part of the Danish monarchy and, encouraged by the sympathy
of the Germans in Schleswig, early tried to reassert in the interests
of Germanism the old principle of the unity of the duchies. The
political atmosphere, however, had changed at Copenhagen also;
and their demands were met by the Danes with a nationalist temper
as intractable as their own. Affairs were ripe for a crisis, which the
threatened failure of the common male heirs to the kingdom and the
duchies precipitated.
When Christian VIII. succeeded his father Frederick VI.
in 1839 the elder male line of the house of Oldenburg was obviously
Question of
the succession.
|
on the point of extinction, the king's only son and heir
having no children. Ever since 1834, when joint
consultative estates had been re-established for the
duchies, the question of the succession had been
debated in this assembly. To German opinion the solution
seemed clear enough. The crown of Denmark could be inherited
by female heirs; in the duchies the Salic law had never been
repealed and, in the event of a failure of male heirs to Christian
VIII., the succession would pass to the dukes of
Augustenburg.[8]
Danish opinion, on the other hand, clamoured for a royal
pronouncement proclaiming the principle of the indivisibility of the
monarchy and its transmission intact to a single heir, in accordance
with the royal law. To this Christian VIII. yielded so far
as to issue in 1846 letters patent declaring that the royal law
in the matter of the succession was in full force so far as Schleswig
was concerned, in accordance with the letters patent of August
22, 1721, the oath of fidelity of September 3, 1721, the guarantees
given by France and Great Britain in the same year and the
treaties of 1767 and 1773 with Russia. As to Holstein, he stated
that certain circumstances prevented him from giving, in regard
to some parts of the duchy, so clear a decision as in the case of
Schleswig. The principle of the independence of Schleswig and
of its union with Holstein were expressly reaffirmed. An appeal
against this by the estates of Holstein to the German diet
received no attention. The revolutionary year 1848 brought
matters to a head. On the 28th of January, Christian VIII.
issued a rescript proclaiming a new constitution which, while
preserving the autonomy of the different parts of the country,
incorporated them for common purposes in a single organization.
The estates of the duchies replied by demanding the
incorporation of Schleswig-Holstein, as a single constitutional
state, in the German Confederation. Frederick VII., who had
succeeded his father at the end of January, declared (March 4)
that he had no right to deal in this way with Schleswig, and,
yielding to the importunity of the Eider-Danish party, withdrew
the rescript of January (April 4) and announced to the people
of Schleswig (March 27) the promulgation of a liberal constitution
under which the duchy, while preserving its local autonomy,
would become an integral part of Denmark.
Meanwhile, however, the duchies had broken out into open
insurrection; a provisional government had been established
Prussian
Intervention, 1848.
|
at Kiel; and the duke of Augustenburg had hurried
to Berlin to secure the assistance of Prussia in asserting
his rights. This was at the very crisis of the revolution
in Berlin, and the Prussian government saw in the
proposed intervention in Denmark in a popular cause an excellent
opportunity for restoring its damaged prestige. Prussian troops
were accordingly marched into Holstein; and, the diet having
on the 12th of April recognized the provisional government
of Schleswig and commissioned Prussia to enforce its decrees,
General Wrangel was ordered to occupy Schleswig also.
The principles which Prussia was commissioned to enforce
as the mandatory of Germany were: (1) that they were
independent states, (2) that their union was indissoluble,
(3) that they were hereditary only in the male line.
powers. But the Germans had reckoned without the European
powers, which were united in opposing any dismemberment
of Denmark, even Austria refusing to assist in enforcing
the German view. Swedish troops landed to assist the Danes;
Nicholas I. of Russia, speaking with authority as representing
the elder Gottorp line, pointed out to King Frederick William
IV. the risks of a collision; Great Britain, though the Danes
rejected her mediation, threatened to send her fleet to assist
in preserving the status quo. Frederick William now ordered
Wrangel to withdraw his troops from the duchies; but the
general refused to obey, on the plea that he was under the
command not of the king of Prussia but of the regent of Germany,
and proposed that, at least, any treaty concluded should be
presented for ratification to the Frankfort government. This
the Danes refused; and negotiations were broken off. Prussia
was now confronted on the one side by the German nation
urging her clamorously to action, on the other side by the
European powers with one voice threatening the
worst consequences should she persist. After painful
hesitation, Frederick William chose what seemed
the lesser of two evils and, on the 26th of August 1848,
Prussia signed at Malmoe a convention which yielded practically
all the Danish demands. The Holstein estates appealed to the
German parliament, which hotly took up their cause; but it
was soon clear that the central government had no means of
enforcing its views, and in the end the convention was ratified
at Frankfort.
The convention was only in the nature of a truce establishing
a temporary modus vivendi, and the main issues, left unsettled,
continued to be hotly debated. At a conference held in London
in October, Denmark suggested an arrangement on the basis
of a separation of Schleswig from Holstein, which was about
to become a member of the new German empire, Schleswig
to have a separate constitution under the Danish crown. This
was supported by Great Britain and Russia and accepted by
Prussia and the German government (27th January 1849). The
negotiations broke down, however, on the refusal of Denmark
to yield the principle of the indissoluble union with the Danish
crown; on the 23rd of February the truce was at an end, and on
the 3rd of April the war was renewed. At this point the tsar
intervened in favour of peace; and Prussia, conscious of her
restored strength and weary of the intractable temper of the
Frankfort government, determined to take matters into her
own hands. On the 10th of July 1849 another truce was signed;
Schleswig, until the peace, was to be administered separately,
under a mixed commission, Holstein was to be governed by a
vicegerent of the German empire — an arrangement equally
offensive to German and Danish sentiment. A settlement
seemed as far off as ever; the Danes still clamoured for the
principle of succession in the female line and union with Denmark,
the Germans for that of succession in the male line and union with
Holstein. In utter weariness Prussia proposed, in April 1850,
a definitive peace on the basis of the status quo ante bellum and
the postponement of all questions as to mutual rights. To
Palmerston the basis seemed meaningless, the proposed settlement
to settle nothing. The emperor Nicholas, openly disgusted
with Frederick William's weak-kneed truckling to the Revolution,
again intervened. To him the duke of Augustenburg
was a rebel; Russia had guaranteed Schleswig to the Danish
crown by the treaties of 1767 and 1773; as for Holstein, if the
king of Denmark was unable to deal with the rebels there, he
himself would intervene as he had done in Hungary. The threat
was reinforced by the menace of the European situation.
Austria and Prussia were on the verge of war, and the sole
hope of preventing Russia from throwing her sword into the
scale of Austria lay in settling the Schleswig-Holstein question
in the sense desired by her. The only alternative, an alliance
with “the devil's nephew,” Louis Napoleon, who already
dreamed of acquiring the Rhine frontier for France at the
price of his aid in establishing German sea-power by the cession
of the duchies, was abhorrent to Frederick William.
On the 2nd of July 1850 was signed at Berlin a treaty of
peace between Prussia and Denmark. Both parties
reserved all their antecedent rights; but for Denmark
it was enough, since it empowered the king-duke to restore
his authority in Holstein with or without the consent of the
German Confederation.
Danish troops now marched in to coerce the refractory duchies;
but while the fighting went on negotiations among the powers
continued, and on the 2nd of August 1850 Great Britain, France,
Russia and Norway-Sweden signed a protocol, to which Austria
subsequently adhered, approving the principle of restoring
the integrity of the Danish monarchy. The Copenhagen government,
which in May 1851 made an abortive attempt to come
to an understanding with the inhabitants of the duchies by
convening an assembly of notables at Flensburg, issued on the
6th of December 1851 a project for the future organization
of the monarchy on the basis of the equality of its constituent
states, with a common ministry; and on the 28th of January
1852 a royal letter announced the institution of a unitary state
which, while maintaining the fundamental constitution of
Denmark, would increase the parliamentary powers of the estates
of the two duchies. This proclamation was approved by Prussia
and Austria, and by the German federal diet in so far as it affected
Holstein and Lauenburg. The question of the succession was
The Succession
Protocol of London, 1852.
|
next approached. Only the question of the Augustenburg
succession made an agreement between the
powers impossible, and on the 31st of March 1852 the
duke of Augustenburg resigned his claim in return
for a money payment. Further adjustments followed.
After the renunciation by the emperor of Russia and others
of their eventual rights, Charlotte, landgravine of Hesse, sister
of Christian VIII., and her son Prince Frederick transferred
their rights to the latter's sister Louise, who in her turn
transferred them to her husband Prince Christian of Glücksburg.
This arrangement received international sanction by the protocol
signed in London on the 8th of May 1852 by the five great
powers and Norway and Sweden.[9]
On the 31st of July 1853
King Frederick VII. gave his assent to a law settling the crown
on Prince Christian, “prince of Denmark,” and his heirs male.
The protocol of London, while consecrating the principle of
the integrity of Denmark, stipulated that the rights of the
German Confederation in Holstein and Lauenburg should
remain unaffected. It was, in fact, a compromise, and left the
fundamental issues unsettled. The German federal diet had
been unrepresented in London, and the terms of the protocol
were regarded in Germany as a humiliation. As for the Danes,
they were far from being satisfied with the settlement, which
they approved only in so far as it gave them a basis for a more
vigorous prosecution of their unionist schemes. On the 15th
of February and the 11th of June 1854 the king of Denmark,
after consulting the estates, promulgated special constitutions
for Schleswig and Holstein respectively, under which the
provincial assemblies received certain very limited powers. On
the 26th of July 1854 he published a common constitution
Danish Unitary
Constitution of 1855.
|
for the whole monarchy; this, which was little more
than a veiled absolutism, was superseded on the 2nd
of October 1855 by a parliamentary constitution of
a modified type. The legality of this constitution
was disputed by the two German great powers, on the
ground that the estates of the duchies had not been consulted
as promised in the royal letter of the 6th of December 1851;
the diet of the Confederation refused to admit its validity so
far as Holstein and Lauenburg were concerned (11th February
1858).
The question was now once more the subject of lively
international debate; but the European situation was no longer so
favourable as it had been to the Danish view. The Crimean
War had crippled the power of Russia, and Nicholas I. was dead.
France was prepared to sell the interests of Denmark in the
duchies to Prussia in return for “compensations” to herself
elsewhere. Great Britain alone sided with the Danes; but
the action of British ministers, who realized the danger to British
supremacy at sea of the growth of German sea-power in the Baltic,
was hampered by the natural sympathy of Queen Victoria and
the prince consort with the German point of
view.[10] The result
was that the German diet, on the motion of Bismarck, having
threatened federal intervention (July 29), King Frederick VII.
issued a proclamation abolishing the general constitution so
far as it affected Holstein and Lauenburg, while retaining it
for Denmark and Schleswig (November 6).
Though even this concession violated the principle of the
“indissoluble union” of the duchies, the German diet, fully
occupied at home, determined to refrain from further action
till the Danish parliament should make another effort to pass a
law or budget affecting the whole kingdom without consulting the
estates of the duchies. This contingency arose in July 1860,
and in the spring of the following year the estates were once
more at open odds with the Danish government. The German
diet now prepared for armed intervention; but it was in no
condition to carry out its threats, and Denmark decided, on the
advice of Great Britain, to ignore it and open negotiations
directly with Prussia and Austria as independent powers. These
demanded the restoration of the union between the duchies, a
question beyond the competence of the Confederation. Denmark
replied with a refusal to recognize the right of any foreign power
to interfere in her relations with Schleswig; to which Austria,
anxious to conciliate the smaller German princes, responded
with a vigorous protest against Danish infringements of the
compact of 1852. Lord John Russell now intervened, on behalf
of Great Britain, with a proposal for a settlement of the whole
question on the basis of the independence of the duchies under
the Danish crown, with a decennial budget for common expenses
to be agreed on by the four assemblies, and a supreme council of
state consisting in relative proportion of Danes and
Germans.[11]
This was accepted by Russia and by the German great powers,
and Denmark found herself isolated in Europe. The international
situation, however, favoured a bold attitude, and she met the
representations of the powers with a flat defiance. The retention
of Schleswig as an integral part of the monarchy was to her a
matter of life and death; the German Confederation had made
Denmark
repudiates the
compacts of 1852.
|
the terms of the protocol of 1852, defining the intimate
relations between the duchies, the excuse for
unwarrantable interference in the internal affairs of
Denmark; and on the 30th of March 1863 a royal
proclamation was published at Copenhagen repudiating
the compacts of 1852, and, by defining the separate
position of Holstein in the Danish monarchy, negativing once
for all the claims of Germany upon Schleswig.[12]
The reply of the German diet to this move was to forward
a note to Copenhagen (July 9) demanding, on pain of federal
Danish
Constitution
of 1863.
|
execution, the withdrawal of the proclamation and the
grant of a fresh constitution, based on the compacts
of 1852 or on the British note of the 24th of September
1862. Instead, King Frederick VII. issued on the
28th of September 1863 a new constitution for “our kingdom
of Denmark-Slesvig.” The diet now resolved on federal execution;
but action was delayed, partly through British efforts
at mediation, partly because Bismarck judged the time for a
satisfactory solution of the whole question had not yet come.
Encouraged by this hesitating attitude, the Danish parliament
passed the new constitution on the 13th of November. Two days
later Frederick VII. died.
The “Protocol-King,” Christian IX., who now ascended the
throne, was in a position of extraordinary difficulty. The
Accession of
Christian IX., 1863.
|
first sovereign act he was called upon to perform was to
sign the new constitution. To sign was to violate the at
terms of the very protocol which was his title to reign;
to refuse to sign was to place himself in antagonism
to the united sentiment of his Danish subjects. He chose what
seemed the remoter evil, and on the 18th of November signed
the constitution. The news was received in Germany with
violent manifestations of excitement and anger. Frederick, duke
of Augustenburg, son of the prince who in 1852 had renounced
the succession to the duchies, now claimed his rights on the
ground that he had had no share in the renunciation. In Holstein
an agitation in his favour had begun from the first, and this
was extended to Schleswig on the terms of the new Danish
constitution becoming known. His claim was enthusiastically
supported by the German princes and people, and in spite of the
negative attitude of Austria and Prussia the federal diet decided
Decree of
federal
execution.
|
to occupy Holstein “pending the settlement of the
succession.” On the 24th of December Saxon and
Hanoverian troops marched into the duchy in the
name of the German Confederation, and supported by
their presence and by the loyalty of the Holsteiners the duke
of Augustenburg assumed the government under the style of
Duke Frederick VIII. With this “folly” — as Bismarck roundly
termed it — Austria and Prussia, in the teeth of violent public
opinion, would have nothing to do, for neither wished to risk
Attitude of Austria
and Prussia.
|
a European war. It was clear to Bismarck that the
two powers, as parties to the protocol of 1852, must
uphold the succession as fixed by it, and that any
action they might take in consequence of the violation
of that compact by Denmark must be so “correct” as to deprive
Europe of all excuse for interference. The publication of the new
constitution by Christian IX. was in itself sufficient to justify a
declaration of war by the two powers as parties to the signature
of the protocol. As to the ultimate outcome of their effective
intervention, that could be left to the future to decide. Austria
had no clear views. King William wavered between his Prussian
feeling and a sentimental sympathy with the duke of Augustenburg.
Bismarck alone knew exactly what he wanted, and how
to attain it. “From the beginning,” he said later
(Reflections,
ii. 10), “I kept annexation steadily before my eyes.”
The protests of Great Britain and Russia against the action
of the German diet, together with the proposal of Count Beust,
on behalf of Saxony, that Bavaria should bring forward in that
assembly a formal motion for the recognition of Duke Frederick's
claims, helped Bismarck to persuade Austria that immediate
action must be taken. On the 28th of December a motion was
introduced in the diet by Austria and Prussia, calling on the
Confederation to occupy Schleswig as a pledge for the observance
by Denmark of the compacts of 1852. This implied the recognition
of the rights of Christian IX., and was indignantly rejected;
whereupon the diet was informed that the Austrian and Prussian
governments would act in the matter as independent European
powers. The agreement between them was signed on the
16th of January 1864. An article drafted by Austria, intended
to safeguard the settlement of 1852, was replaced at Bismarck's
instance by another which stated that the two powers would
decide only in concert on the relations of the duchies, and that
they would in no case determine the question of the succession
save by mutual consent.
At this stage, had the Danes yielded to the necessities of the
situation and withdrawn from Schleswig under protest, the
Austria and Prussia
occupy the duchies.
|
European powers would probably have intervened, a
congress would have restored Schleswig to the Danish
Prussia crown, and Austria and Prussia, as European powers,
would have had no choice but to prevent any attempt
upon it by the duke of Holstein. To prevent this
possibility Bismarck made the Copenhagen government
believe that Great Britain had threatened Prussia with
intervention should hostilities be opened, “though, as a matter of
fact, England did nothing of the kind.” The cynical stratagem
succeeded; Denmark remained defiant; and on the 1st of
February 1864 the Austrian and Prussian forces crossed the
Eider.
An invasion of Denmark itself had not been part of the original
programme of the allies; but on the i8th of February some
Diplomatic developments
during the Danish War.
|
Prussian hussars, in the excitement of a cavalry
skirmish, crossed the frontier and occupied the village
of Kolding. Bismarck determined to use this circumstance
to revise the whole situation. He urged upon
Austria the necessity for a strong policy, so as to settle
not only the question of the duchies but
the wider question of the German Confederation;
and Austria reluctantly consented to press the war. On the 5th
of March a fresh agreement was signed between the powers,
under which the compacts of 1852 were declared to be no longer
valid, and the position of the duchies within the Danish monarchy
as a whole was to be made the subject of a friendly understanding.
Meanwhile, however, Lord John Russell on behalf of Great
Britain, supported by Russia, France and Sweden, had intervened
with a proposal that the whole question should once more be
submitted to a European conference.[13]
The German powers
agreed on condition that the compacts of 1852 should not be
taken as a basis, and that the duchies should be bound to Denmark
by a personal tie only. But the proceedings of the conference,
which opened at London on the 25th of April, only revealed the
inextricable tangle of the issues involved. Beust, on behalf
of the Confederation, demanded the recognition of the Augustenburg
claimant; Austria leaned to a settlement on the lines of
that of 1852; Prussia, it was increasingly clear, aimed at the
acquisition of the duchies. The first step towards the realization
of this latter ambition was to secure the recognition of the
absolute independence of the duchies, and this Austria could
only oppose at the risk of forfeiting her whole influence in
Germany. The two powers, then, agreed to demand the complete
political independence of the duchies bound together by common
institutions. The next move was uncertain. As to the question
of annexation Prussia would leave that open, but made it
clear that any settlement must involve the complete military
subordination of Schleswig-Holstein to herself. This alarmed Austria,
The Powers and
Augustenburg.
|
which had no wish to see a further extension of Prussia's
already overgrown power, and she began to champion
the claims of the duke of Augustenburg. This contingency,
however, Bismarck had foreseen and himself
offered to support the claims of the duke at the conference
if he would undertake to subordinate himself in all naval
and military matters to Prussia, surrender Kiel for the purposes
of a Prussian war-harbour, give Prussia the control of the
projected North Sea Canal, and enter the Prussian Customs Union.
On this basis, with Austria's support, the whole matter might
have been arranged without — as Beust pointed out (Mem. i. 272)
— the increase of Prussia's power beyond the Elbe being any
serious menace to Austrian influence in Germany. Fortunately,
however, for Bismarck's plans, Austria's distrust and jealousy
of Prussia led her to oppose this settlement and at her instigation
the duke of Augustenburg rejected it.
On the 25th of June the London conference broke up without
having arrived at any conclusion. On the 24th, in view of the
end of the truce, Austria and Prussia had arrived at a
new agreement, the object of the war being now
declared to be the complete separation of the duchies
from Denmark. As the result of the short campaign
that followed, the preliminaries of a treaty of peace were signed
on the 1st of August, the king of Denmark renouncing all his
rights in the duchies in favour of the emperor of Austria and the
king of Prussia. The definitive treaty was signed at Vienna on
the 30th of October 1864. By Article XIX., a period of six years
was allowed during which the inhabitants of the duchies might
“opt” for Danish nationality and transfer themselves and
their goods to Denmark; and the right of “indigenacy” was
guaranteed to all, whether in the kingdom or the duchies, who
enjoyed it at the time of the exchange of ratifications of the
treaty.[14]
The Schleswig-Holstein Question from this time onward
became merged in the larger question of the general relations
The last phase
of the question.
|
of Austria and Prussia, and its later developments are
sketched in the article Germany: History.
So far as
Europe was concerned it was settled by the decisive
result of the war of 1866. It survived, however, as
between Danes and Germans, though narrowed down to the
question of the fate of the Danish population of the northern
duchy. This question is of great interest to students of
international law and as illustrating the practical problems involved
in the assertion of the modern principle of “nationality.”
The position of the Danes in Schleswig after the cession was
determined, so far as treaty rights are concerned, by two instruments
— the Treaty of Vienna (October 30, 1864) and the Treaty of
Prague (August 23, 1866). By Article XIX. of the former treaty
subjects domiciled in the ceded territories had the right,
within six years of the exchange of ratifications, of opting
for the Danish nationality and transferring themselves, their
families and their personal property to Denmark, while
keeping their landed property in the duchies. The last paragraph
of the Article ran: “Le droit d'indigénat, tant dans le royaume
de Danemark que dans les Duchés, est conservé à tous les individus
qui le possèdent a l'epoque de l'échange des ratifications du présent
Traité.” By Article V. of the Treaty of Prague Schleswig was
ceded by Austria to Prussia with the reservation that “the
populations of the North of Schleswig shall be again united with Denmark
in the event of their expressing a desire so to be by a vote freely
exercised.” Taking advantage of the terms of these treaties, about
50,000 Danes from North Schleswig (out of a total population of
some 150,000) opted for Denmark and migrated over the frontier,
pending the plébiscite which was to restore their country to them.
But the plébiscite never came. Its inclusion in the treaty had
been no more than a diplomatic device to save the face of the
emperor Napoleon III.; Prussia had from the first no intention of
surrendering an inch of the territory she had conquered; the
outcome of the Franco-German War made it unnecessary for her even
to pretend that she might do so; and by the Treaty of Vienna of
October 11, 1878, the clause relating to the plébiscite was formally
abrogated with the assent of Austria.
Meanwhile the Danish “optants,” disappointed of their hopes,
had begun to stream back over the frontier into Schleswig. By
doing so they lost, under the Danish law, their rights as Danish
citizens, without acquiring those of Prussian subjects; and this
disability was transmitted to their children. By Article XIX. of
the Treaty of 1864, indeed, they should have been secured the rights
of “indigenacy,” which, while falling short of complete citizenship,
implied, according to Danish law, all the essential guarantees for
civil liberty. But in German law the right of Indigenat is not
clearly differentiated from the status of a subject; and the supreme
court at Kiel decided in several cases that those who had opted for
Danish nationality had forfeited their rights under the Indigenat
paragraph of the Treaty of Vienna. There was thus created in the
frontier districts a large and increasing class of people who dwelt in
a sort of political limbo, having lost their Danish citizenship through
ceasing to be domiciled in Denmark, and unable to acquire Prussian
citizenship because they had failed to apply for it within the six
years stipulated in the Treaty of 1864. Their exclusion from the
rights of Prussian subjects was due, however, to causes other than
the letter of the treaty. The Danes, in spite of every discouragement,
never ceased to strive for the preservation and extension of their
national traditions and language; the Germans were equally bent
on effectually absorbing these recalcitrant “Teutons” into the
general life of the German empire; and to this end the uncertain
status of the Danish optants was a useful means. Danish agitators
of German nationality could not be touched so long as they were
careful to keep within the limits of the law; pro-Danish newspapers
owned and staffed by German subjects enjoyed immunity in accordance
with the constitution, which guarantees the liberty of the
press. The case of the “optants” was far other. These
unfortunates, who numbered a large proportion of the population, were
subject to domiciliary visits, and to arbitrary perquisitions, arrest
and expulsion. When the pro-Danish newspapers, after the
exulsion of several “optant” editors, were careful to appoint none
but German subjects, the vengeance of the authorities fell upon
“optant” type-setters, printers and printers' devils. The Prussian
police, indeed, developed an almost superhuman capacity for
detecting optants: and since these pariahs were mingled indistinguishably
with the mass of the people, no household and no business was
safe from official inquisition. One instance out of many may serve
to illustrate the type of offence that served as excuse for this systematic
official persecution. On the 27th of April 1896 the second
volume for 1895 of the Sönderjyske Aarböger was confiscated for
having used the historic term Sönderjylland (South Jutland) for
Schleswig. To add to the misery, the Danish government refused
to allow the Danish optants expelled by Prussia to settle in Denmark,
though this rule was modified by the Danish Nationality Law of
1898 in favour of the children of optants born after the passing of
the law. It was not till the signature of the treaty between Prussia
and Denmark on the 11th of January 1907 that these intolerable
Treaty of
January 11, 1907.
|
conditions were ended. By this treaty the German
government undertook to allow all children born of
Danish optants before the passing of the new Danish
Nationality Law of 1898 to acquire Prussian nationality
on the usual conditions and on their own application. This provision
was not to affect the ordinary legal rights of expulsion as exercised
by either power, but the Danish government undertook not to
refuse to the children of Schleswig optants who should not seek to
acquire or who could not legally acquire Prussian nationality permission
to reside in Denmark. The provisions of the treaty apply
not only to the children of Schleswig optants, but to their direct
descendants in all degrees.
This adjustment, brought about by the friendly intercourse
between the courts of Berlin and Copenhagen, seemed to close the
last phase of the Schleswig question. Yet, so far from allaying, it
apparently only served to embitter the inter-racial feud. The
“autochthonous Germans of the Northern Marches” regarded the
new treaty as a betrayal, and refused “to give the kiss of peace”
to their hereditary enemies. For forty years Germanism, backed
by all the weight of the empire and imposed with all the weapons
of official persecution, had barely held its own in North Schleswig;
in spite of an enormous emigration, in 1905, of the 148,000 inhabitants
of North Schleswig 139,000 spoke Danish, while of the
German-speaking immigrants it was found that more than a third
spoke Danish in the first generation; and this in spite of the fact
that, from 1864 onward, German had gradually been substituted
for Danish in the churches, the schools, and even in the playground.
But the scattered outposts of Germanism could hardly be expected
to acquiesce without a struggle in a situation that threatened them
with social and economic extinction. Forty years of dominance,
secured by official favour, had filled them with a double measure
of aggressive pride of race, and the question of the rival nationalities
in Schleswig, like that in Poland, remained a source of trouble and
weakness within the frontiers of the German empire.
Authorities. —
The literature on the subject is vast. From the
German point of view the most comprehensive treatment is in
C. Jansen and K. Samwer, Schleswig-Holsteins Befreiung (Wiesbaden,
1897); see also H. C. L. von Sybel, Foundation of the German Empire
(Eng. trans., New York, 1890-1891); Bismarck's Reflections and
Reminiscences, and L. Hahn, Bismarck (5 vols., 1878-1891). The
Danish point of view is ably and moderately presented in La Question
du Slesvig, a collection of essays by various writers edited by F. de
Jessen (Copenhagen, 1906), with maps and documents.
(Walter Alison Phillips)
[1]
I.e. place-names according to popular usage, not the official
names given in German maps (e.g. Haderslev for Hadersleben).
See La Question du Slesvig, p. 61 seq., “Noms de lieux.”
[2]
I.e. the party at Copenhagen which aimed at making the Eider,
the southern boundary of Schleswig, the frontier of the Danish
kingdom proper.
[3]
Question du Slesvig, p. 78.
[4]
The Church (Lutheran) was organized under a Probst (provost)
and consistory, the king himself assuming the jurisdiction of summus
episcopus.
[5]
The king by a convention of the same date secured the full
sovereignty for his own particular appanage in Schleswig. The
attempt of the dukes of Gottorp to partition the actual government
of the duchy broke on the opposition of the estates.
[6]
Adolphus Frederick had renounced his rights in Schleswig by
an agreement with the Danish king signed on the 25th of April
1750.
[7]
The best solution, which afterwards had the support of Napoleon
III., would have been to partition Schleswig on the lines of nationality,
assigning the Danish part to Denmark, the German to Holstein.
This idea, which subsequently had supporters both among Danes
and Germans, proved impracticable later owing to the intractable
temper of the majority on both sides. See La Question
dedu Slesvig,
p. 135 seq., “Historique de l'idée d'un partage du Slesvig.”
[8]
This was the argument of Karl Samwer, the German jurist, in
his Die Staatserbfolge der Herzogthümer Schleswig und Holstein,
published in 1844 at the instigation of the duke of Augustenburg.
[9]
Hertslet, Map of Europe, ii. 1151.
[10]
See Queen Victoria to Lord Malmesbury, 1st of May 1858, in
Letters (pop. ed., 1908), iii. 280. Compare the letters to Palmerston
of 21st of June 1849, ii. 222, and 22nd of June 1850, ii. 279, with
Palmerston to Russell, 23d of June 1850, and Queen Victoria to
Russell, ii. 250.
[11]
Note of Sept. 24, 1862. For the diplomatic correspondence on
the duchies see Parl. Papers, lxxiv. (1863).
[12]
For this and later correspondence see Parl. Papers, lxiv. (1864),
p. 40 seq.
[13]
Parl. Papers (1864), lxv. 124 seq. Beust (Mem. i. 252) says that
Queen Victoria personally intervened to prevent British action in
favour of Denmark.
[14]
The full text of the treaty is in La Question du Slesvig, p. 173
et seq.
Britannica Index
Reminiscences
of Carl Schurz