Revolutions of 1848

1
Revolutions of 1848

• Thwarted Ambitions of Liberalism

2
Early Attempts at Reform
3
Russia

• The Decembrist Revolt of 1825
• a failed attempt at increasing liberalism in
  Russia
• resulted in greater conservatism and a state
  which became the bastion of conservatism
• It began in the army, in the wake of Napoleonic
  Wars
• Russian officers had become exposed to French
  Revolutionary and Enlightenment ideas
• realized just how backward Russia was
• they plotted for a revolution to occur in 1826

4
Russia

• November 1825
• Tsar Alexander I died unexpectedly
• younger brother Nicholas, a conservative, was
  named as the successor of the dead Tsar

5
Russia

• When alerted about political intriguing in army,
  Nicholas took the throne and demanded loyalty
  oaths from the officer corps.
• Moscow regiments refused, and marched on Moscow
• they were dispersed by violence
• the army rebellion was crushed
• its leaders were executed or sent into Siberian
  exile
• From then on, Nicholas was a reactionary leader
• would sent his troops anywhere in Europe to crush
  forces of rebellion or liberalism

6
France

• Restored Bourbon monarchy lasted only from
  1815-30. Louis XVIII died in 1824
• succeeded by his brother Charles X
• Charles X
• believed in the divine right of kings
• lowered interest rates on bonds (loans made to
  the monarchy) to reimburse the émigrés who had
  lost land in the revolution
• enraged the rising merchant classes, who were
  hurt financially
• restored primogeniture
• restored strict religious laws in accordance with
  the Catholic Church
• enraged liberals

7
Louis XVIII
8
Coronation of Charles X
9
France

• Elections in 1827 and 1829
• returned liberal ministers to the government
• Charles tried to undertake a royalist seizure of
  power
• Charles' Four Ordinances
• restricted freedom of the press
• dissolved the new Chamber of Deputies
• called for new elections under a severely
  restricted franchise

10
France

• Liberals called for a revolution
• working people, burdened by high taxes, took to
  the streets
• over 1,800 people died at the barricades.
• The Bourgeois King"
• on August 2, Charles 10th abdicated
• more liberal cousin Louis Phillipe was proclaimed
  monarch

11
Louis Phillipe
12
France

• Government reformed
• monarch could not dispense with laws on his own
  authority
• flag of the Bourbons was replaced with the
  revolutionary tricolor
• Catholicism went back to being only the biggest
  religion, rather than the official religion
• censorship was abolished
• franchise, though still restricted, was extended
  to the middle class

13
France

• Socially, however, Louis Phillipe's was still
  quite a conservative revolution
• landed oligarchy retained its economic, political
  and social dominance
• much corruption in government
• Although the industrialists were somewhat happier
  under Louis Phillipe, the monarchy displayed
  little sympathy for the lower classes

14
General Thoughts

• Economic depression was spread throughout Europe
• marked by rising food prices after a poor harvest
• recession that followed the industrial expansion
  in the early 1840s.
• Revolts of 1848 not triggered by one group or
  incident
• arose out of similarly bad conditions in all the
  European countries
• severe food shortage
• commercial and industrial recession
• widespread unemployment
• Dynamic force for the revolts came not from the
  working classes
• rather from political liberals generally of
  middle-class origins

15
Revolution
16
France

• February 22, 1848
• banquet to protest the government's inflexibility
  was planned
• government banned it
• crowds gathered in the streets
• minor skirmishes with police erupted
• workers barricades
• revolution began

17
France

• February 24, 1848
• National Guard refused to cheer for their king,
  Louis Phillipe
• he abdicated to his grandson
• Second Republic declared from the Hotel de Ville

18
France

• June 24-26, 1848
• French government dissolved the national
  workshops
• lower class revolted and was crushed by
  republican troops
• over a thousand people were killed in three days
• possibly up to 3,000 died
• thousands more were sent to prison or exile
• this conflict between classes is known as June
  Days
• was the evidence that proved to Karl Marx that
  democracy couldn't work

19
France

• December, 1848
• nation-wide elections in France give Louis
  Napoleon Bonaparte 70 of the popular vote
• Louis Napoleon played on fears of social unrest
  to stymie the National Assembly for three years
• a series of moves after this resulted in a
  plebiscite that proclaimed him emperor

20
Louis Napoleon
21
Austria/Hungary

• March 3, 1848
• Lajos Kossuth called for a representative
  government in front of the Hungarian Diet
• March 12, 1848
• revolution broke out in Vienna.
• shortly after this Austria and Hungary bring
  serfdom to an end

22
Lajos Kossuth
23
Austria/Hungary

• May, 1848
• Hungary began to gain autonomy
• Austrians began to demand a representative
  government
• Metternich resigned and universal manhood
  suffrage was granted.
• emperor flees Vienna
• as unwilling parts of the Hungarian Republic, the
  Croats, Czechs, and Rumanians begin to demand a
  similar autonomy as that granted to Hungary

24
Austria/Hungary

• June, 1848
• pan-Slav congress met in Prague
• Czechs refused to send representatives to the
  Frankfurt Assembly
• said that Slavs should not be subject to the will
  of Germans

25
Austria/Hungary

• December, 1848
• Prince Felix con Schwarzenberg fills Metternich's
  post and convinces Ferdinand I to abdicate to his
  18 year old son Francis Joseph I
• January, 1849
• Austria invades Hungary, is pushed back
• June, 1849
• With the aid of Prussian troops, Austria quashes
  the revolutions in the Rhineland, Saxony, and
  Bavaria
•  June, 1849
• Russians intervene and seal the fate of the
  Hungarian Republic

26
Germany

• March 15, 1848
• revolution broke out in Berlin
• March, 1848
• 600 delegates meet in Frankfurt in a
  pre-parliamentary assembly
• -- called for a universal manhood suffrage
  election to form a national assembly to govern a
  unified Germany 
• May, 1848
• 830 delegates met in Frankfurt
• mostly from the small states in the liberal West
• began to form a democratic constitution that gave
  the assembly itself executive control over a
  unified Germany

27
Germany

• September, 1848
• riots erupt in Frankfurt
• assembly is forced to call for Prussian and
  Austrian aid to restore peace
• March, 1849
• Frankfurt Assembly completes the German
  constitution
• elects Frederick William IV of Prussia as German
  emperor
• he refuses to rule the revolutionary state
• Assembly dissolves
• new revolutions arise in the Rhineland, Saxony,
  and Bavaria

28
Italy

• March 18, 1848
• revolution broke out in Milan
• Papal States were given a constitution
• Milanese defeated the Austrians
• March 22, 1848
• revolution broke out in Venice
• Venetian Republic was reestablished

29
Italy

• May, 1848
• With his prime minister Count Camillo di Cavour,
  Victor Emmanuel strengthened Sardinia
• made an alliance with Great Britain and France
• provoked war with Austria
• Piedmont declared war on Austria with a papal
  blessing and his troops
• Pius IX soon pulled out saying he could not fight
  a Catholic Austria
• with France' help, Sardinia won several crucial
  victories against Austria
• Sardinia provoked the northern Italians to throw
  off their unpopular rulers and unite with Sardinia

30
Italy

• Southern Italy
• a more radical strain of Italian nationalism
  appeared in the south
• in the person of Giuseppe Garibaldi
• volunteer army of "Red Shirts"
• goal was both national unity and socialism
• Garibaldi attacked the reactionary Kingdom of the
  Two Sicilies
• after taking Sicily, his forces crossed over to
  Naples and began advancing on Rome

31
Italy

• Victor Emmanuel and Garibaldi
• Victor Emmanuel became concerned that an attack
  by Garibaldi's forces on the Papal States would
  offend France
• France had been the traditional military
  protector of the Papal States
• Victor Emmanuel and Cavour were also concerned
  about Garibaldi's radical political views
• Victor Emmanuel personally led an army south to
  meet Garibaldi's crusade
• Victor Emmanuel persuaded Garibaldi to give up
  his own ambitions rather than destroy their
  common dream of national unity for Italy

32
Italy

• July, 1848
• Austrians attack Piedmont
• overwhelmingly victory
• capture Milan
• November, 1848
• Roman Republic declared
• May, 1849
• Neapolitan armies retake all of Sicily
• Roman Republic bows to French troops and is
  restored to the pope
• August, 1849
• Venetian Republic falls to Cholera and starvation