Diplomacy of the German Confederation
The German Confederation of 1815 was an independent subject of international law and had the purpose of ensuring the external security of its member states. So he was allowed to pursue his own diplomacy and his own foreign policy .
Overall, federal diplomacy was poorly developed because the member states were still allowed to conduct their own foreign policy. The larger states in particular watched over their own rights and interests. The German Confederation had no government and no foreign ministry, but could independently declare war and receive or appoint envoys. These envoys - of which there were only a few - are not to be confused with the envoys of the member states who represented their member state in the Bundestag.
Federal War
The German Confederation could wage war and make peace. According to the Vienna Final Act (Art. 35), a federal war could only be a defensive war that ensured the independence of Germany and the member states. Federal execution and federal intervention were to be separated from the Federal War . They were directed against the government or an insurgent population in a member state. If a member state attacked foreign states in violation of international law, the federal government could intervene with federal execution.
The Bundestag decided on the Federal War. If the federal territory was attacked, war should occur automatically. A member state should also not be allowed to remain neutral in the event of the Federal War. The situation was different if an attack was only feared or the non-federal territory of a member state was attacked (such as northern Austria in Italy). Then the Bundestag decided with a two-thirds majority whether to formally declare a federal war.
The individual states of the German Confederation were still allowed to enter into all kinds of alliances, as stated in Article 11, Paragraph 3 of the German Federal Act . However, such connections could not be directed against the federal government or against other individual states. Michael Kotulla compares this clause with its counterpart in the Peace of Westphalia , which was just as ineffective.
Legation Law
The federal government could send envoys (ambassadors) to foreign states and receive them from foreign states. The member states retained the right to their own embassies. Legation law was regulated by the Federal Decree on the Foreign Relations of the Federation of June 12, 1817. Art. 50 No. 2 of the Vienna Final Act of 1820 supplemented it.
Already in the Old Kingdom there were envoys from foreign powers to the Reichstag. Originally, Austria and Prussia did not want a repetition of the old situation, that foreign powers interfered in German affairs through such envoys, but they gave in. The great powers France, Russia and Great Britain therefore had permanent envoys to the federal government, through the mediation of the Bundestag.
In 1864 the Mexican Emperor accredited an envoy to the Confederation. Baden protested against this, which the Mexican government had not yet recognized. Baden insisted that there could only be a federal envoy if all member states recognized the foreign state. In fact, however, the federal legation law was a separate federal law with which the federal government could participate in the international recognition of foreign states.
Conversely, there were no permanent envoys of the German Confederation to foreign states. In the Vienna ministerial conferences before the Vienna Final Act, the member states decided to send federal envoys only in special cases. An example was the Federal Minister Beust in 1864 at the London conference that discussed Schleswig-Holstein.
In the years 1848 and 1849 the powers of the federal government were exercised by the emerging German Empire during the revolutionary period . The Reich diplomacy at that time sought to recruit imperial envoys abroad and foreign envoys to the central authority (imperial authority, imperial government). That was only partially successful. The great powers in particular wanted to wait (Great Britain, France) or rejected central power (Russia).
The governments of the Netherlands, Denmark and (until 1837) Great Britain were represented by envoys in the Bundestag. The monarchs of these countries were also monarchs of a member state in personal union. Such a monarch appointed the envoy , possibly with the countersignature of a minister. In this way the Dutch king appointed an envoy to the Bundestag for the Grand Duchy of Luxembourg and later also for Limburg . These ambassadors corresponded to the envoys of the other member states (such as Prussia, Bavaria, etc.) and should not be confused with the envoys of foreign great powers.
See also
supporting documents
- ^ Ernst Rudolf Huber: German Constitutional History since 1789. Volume I: Reform and Restoration 1789 to 1830. 2nd edition, Verlag W. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart [u. a.] 1967, pp. 606-608.
- ^ Ernst Rudolf Huber: German Constitutional History since 1789. Volume I: Reform and Restoration 1789 to 1830. 2nd edition, Verlag W. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart [u. a.] 1967, p. 607.
- ↑ Michael Kotulla: German Constitutional Law 1806-1918. A collection of documents and introductions. Volume 1: Germany as a whole, Anhalt states and Baden, Springer, Berlin [u. a.] 2006, p. 111.
- ↑ Michael Kotulla: German Constitutional Law 1806-1918. A collection of documents and introductions. Vol. 1, Springer, Berlin [u. a.] 2006, p. 110.
- ^ Ernst Rudolf Huber: German Constitutional History since 1789. Volume I: Reform and Restoration 1789 to 1830. 2nd edition, Verlag W. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart [u. a.] 1967, p. 605 f.
- ^ Ernst Rudolf Huber: German Constitutional History since 1789. Volume I: Reform and Restoration 1789 to 1830. 2nd edition, Verlag W. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart [u. a.] 1967, p. 606.
- ^ Ernst Rudolf Huber: German Constitutional History since 1789. Volume I: Reform and Restoration 1789 to 1830. 2nd edition, Verlag W. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart [u. a.] 1967, p. 605.
