Land constitutional comparison of inheritance

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Cover sheet of the Land constitutional estate comparison
Signatures and seals

The Land constitutional hereditary settlement (LGGEV) of 1755 represented the state constitution of the Mecklenburg state (with the exception of the Principality of Ratzeburg ). It was established in accordance with the provisions of the Hamburg settlement of Duke Christian Ludwig II , the ruling duke of the Schwerin region , with representatives of the state estates Completed in Rostock on April 18, 1755. For the Strelitz region , the settlement was ratified on July 11, 1755 by its ruling duke, Duke Adolf Friedrich IV . The formal ratification by the Knights and Landscapes of the Stargardischer Kreis took place as a counter-insurance of the estates only on November 25, 1755 at the state parliament, confirmed here with 84 signatures and sigels.

The contract, comprising 25 articles and 530 paragraphs, subsequently formed the framework for all social, political, economic and cultural developments in both parts of the Mecklenburg region and remained as the basic law of the state constitution (in Mecklenburg-Schwerin with a short interruption in 1849/50) until the end of the monarchy 1918 applicable law.

prehistory

The LGGEV is at the end of several centuries of political disputes and power struggles between the Mecklenburg dukes and the Mecklenburg estates , consisting of the knighthood , the cities and initially also the clergy. These had already formed in Mecklenburg in 1523 in a " Union of the Land estates " , which from then on worked as an alliance of interests against the dynastic attempts to divide the Princely House. The growing political and economic power of the rural union prevented the sovereigns from implementing absolutist rule and developed into the strongest political force of the Mecklenburg state, which they held together as an iron bracket for centuries.

In the early 18th century the conflict between the sovereign and the estates reached a new high point. In 1708, the Mecklenburg-Schwerin Duke Friedrich Wilhelm introduced a “consumption and tax order” to overcome the consequences of the Thirty Years' War (1618 to 1648) as well as the Northern War (1700 to 1721). In addition to the taxation of the knighthood and the clergy, the “Consumption and Tax Code” included the abolition of the peasants' bondage dependence on their landlords. The serfdom of the peasants was in a Vererbpachtung converted, forced labor should be replaced by cash benefits.

His brother and successor Karl Leopold tried to enforce this with great severity against the knighthood and against the seaside city of Rostock, allied with them. He asked the estates to grant him additional taxes in order to build up a standing army, then forced the Rostock council to renounce his privileges and ruthlessly enforced his tax claims against the knighthood. Mecklenburg-Schwerin was a staging area and theater of war during the Northern War, and with the help of a standing army, Karl Leopold intended to end the stay of foreign troops in Mecklenburg-Schwerin.

This created a sharp contrast between the duke and the estates.

After complaints from the Mecklenburg estates under Andreas Gottlieb von Bernstorff before Emperor Karl VI. against Karl Leopold's violations of the law and autocratic efforts, the execution of the Reich against the Duke was imposed in 1717 . The director of the Lower Saxony Reich Circle, Elector Georg Ludwig von Hannover, was entrusted with carrying out the execution of the Reich . Curiously, in 1719 a nobleman from a Mecklenburg family led the execution of the imperial execution on his behalf - Cuno Josua von Bülow .

The execution of the imperial execution took place in the spring of 1719. Karl Leopold left the country soon afterwards. The government in Mecklenburg-Schwerin was taken over by the Elector of Hanover and the King of Prussia. After the death of George I (1727) the execution of the Reich was lifted.

Since the conflict initially failed to settle, Karl Leopold was finally deposed in 1728 by the Reichshofrat in Vienna in favor of his brother Christian Ludwig II .

In Mecklenburg-Strelitz , the estates tried to win the future heir to the throne as a guarantor of their cause. When the succession to the throne suddenly occurred there in 1752, the situation escalated again, as troops of the Schwerin Duke occupied the Strelitz part of the country and wanted to enforce its political independence after decoupling from the state of Mecklenburg. The outcome of the Strelitz succession dispute of 1752/53 brought about the further strengthening of the estates.

The political and administrative fragmentation of the country is worsening. The power of the dukes was increasingly lost and, as always, the population suffered.

Consequences

The conclusion of the LGGEV basically represented an act of surrender by the princely sovereignty in Mecklenburg. In 1755 Christian Ludwig II had to bow to a far-reaching constitutional dictate of the estates, which primarily enforced their legal positions in this treaty. Both the two sons of Christian Ludwig, the dukes Friedrich (1717–1785, the pious) and Ludwig (1725–1778), as well as in the Mecklenburg-Strelitz ratification treaty (Strelitzer accessions act of July 11 and September 30, 1755) the mother of Adolf Friedrich IV, Duchess Elisabeth Albertina, in her capacity as guardian of all other descendants of the Mecklenburg-Strelitz line. 271 representatives of the knight and landscape were co-signers on the part of the estates. After all sorts of legal accessories, the contract received the imperial confirmation on January 14, 1756.

See also

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. Pecar, Andreas: Proceedings: Constitution and reality of life. The state constitutional inheritance comparison of 1755 in its time, Rostock April 22, 2005-23. April 2005