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Conference on
GERMAN AND GERMAN-AMERICAN DIMENSIONS OF THE CIVIL WAR
Max Kade Institute, Madison March 3 to 5, 2011
In the middle of the 18th century Europe still lived in a three class
society i.e. nobility, clergy and a third class initially mostly farmers,
some tradesmen but also rich bankers and businessmen. Although in the French
revolution this tièrs état was swept to power
their representatives were incapable of stabilizing a new order based on the
majority of the people. The bourgeoisie eventually became tired of all the
continuous turmoil. They called for a strong man and hailed Napoleon to
power who brought order and law (his law) thus saving their assets.
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Emperor Napoleon, bourgeoisie's choice
or the pendulum swung Back
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Code
Civil, Napoleon's order and law
for occupied Europe |
In invading Europe Napoleon exported his Code Civil
to the occupied countries. It was a strange situation: On the one hand the
satellite states profited from the liberation of the feudal regime, on the
other hand they suffered terribly from France's trade monopoly but even more
so from their men's death toll. This in particular when they had to march as
Napoleon's allies to Moscow and never returned. Following the Emperor's
Waterloo the Vienna Congress in 1815 restored the old order on the continent
but not quite. In keeping the Code Napoleon the princes back in power had
to grant their subjects some say.
There were subtle differences in the German territories although. While
in Prussia the king eventually imposed a constitution, the grand duke of
Baden ratified a constitution that had been worked out by a team of liberal
law makers. However, by the year 1848 these differences were history.
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Heinrich Heine, exiled in Paris, wrote:
Als ich auf dem Sankt Gotthard stand,
Da hört ich Deutschland schnarchen;
Es schlief da unten in sanfter Hut
Von sechsunddreißig Monarchen.
When I stood on the Gotthard pass
I listened to Germany snoring
Sleeping in soft custody
Of thirty-six monarchs ignoring.
Indeed, the press was censored, military power was in the hands of
the princes, and court decisions were taken without a jury.
Enter two of our heroes Friedrich Hecker and Gustav Struve. Both
originated from Baden and had received an education as lawyers,
Hecker had a doctor's degree; Struve was of lower nobility but
dropped his "von" already in 1847.
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Hecker with hat and blouse explaining with
others listening with Struve standing left of him. Hecker is wearing the blouse
or wagoner's gown,
overshirt made from linen or
cotton, in
France the
wear of the so-called working class and
dress of the revolutionaries in Belgium in
1830 and in France in 1848. Therefore it was adopted by Hecker and
other republican apes.
(as translated from Herders Conversations-Lexikon 1854-1857)
 Hecker was politically active in Baden's Lower House and Struve as
an agitator. As early as September 1847 they had sent a motion to their
parliamentary colleagues demanding:
People shall be armed
and elect their officers
freely,
Absolute liberty of the press,
Courts with a jury like in Britain.
And they added a fourth demand [Haum01]:
Immediate formation of a
German parliament
That Britain is mentioned here should not be misleading as from the start
Hecker and Struve disapproved of a constitutional monarchy but
unconditionally fought for a German Republic. The American example was
always on their minds e.g. when Struve demanded the people's right according
to the North American Bill of Rights of September 1789. It is obvious that
taken the circumstances both opted for a middle-class republic for in
Germany's Southwest in 1848 a worker's class movement was quasi inexistent.
Struve
although is sometimes accused of socialistic ideas and referred to as
being a red socialist.
Hecker's and Struve's amateurish attempts to force a republican
government in Baden - the Heckerzug in April and
the Struwwelputsch in September 1848 – both
aborted. Both men initially fled to Switzerland where they published as sort
of a justification their memoirs in which they often allude to the United
States they eventually emigrated to.
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