Silesian convent

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The Silesian Convention was a parliament in Austrian Silesia after the March Revolution in 1848.

The Silesian Princes' Congress had existed in the HRR since the Middle Ages . With the First Silesian War , most of Silesia fell to Prussia in 1742 . Only the Duchy of Opava and the Duchy of Teschen remained with Austria and were combined as the Duchy of Silesia . In 1782 Austrian Silesia was combined with Moravia . It was a prince's day, which the estates of the 4 Silesian principalities ( Bielitz , Teschen , Neisse , Zator ) as well as the Troppauer andJägerndorfer stands should represent.

With the March Revolution the demand for a freely elected representative body was voiced in Silesia. With imperial rescripts of March 18 and 28, 1848, the conversion of the Princely Assembly into a state representation (and renaming to the Silesian Convent) and the creation of a provincial constitution were approved.

On May 9, 1848, the convention decided to increase to 27 members. Of these, 9 seats should go to the large landowners, 9 to the representatives of the cities and 9 to those of the villages. The following electoral regulations should apply in the three Curiae:

  • Large estates: The previous Fürstentag was to provide 5 members, 5 were to be chosen from the principalities of Teschen and Bielitz and 6 from the principalities of Troppau, Jägerndorf and Neisse.
  • For the cities, three MPs from Troppau , two each from Teschen and Bielitz and together from Freiwaldau , Weidenau and Jauernig should be elected. Friedek and Freistadt provided one MP together, and one each from Jägerndorf , Zuckmantel , Wagstadt , Freudenthal , Bennisch and Wigstadtl .
  • The villages were divided into three constituencies. The principality of Neisse, the principalities of Troppau and Jägerndorf and eight the districts of Bielitz and Teschen provided two deputies.

On May 31, 1848, the Convention was elected according to these rules and met for its first session on June 20, 1848. On June 26, the convention decided to increase it to 16 members per group of voters. At the beginning of July 1848 and in Cieszyn Silesia on July 13, the supplementary elections took place. The first session of the enlarged Silesian Convention took place on July 13th.

The first session took place from June 20 to July 19, 1848. The convention adopted its rules of procedure, the provincial constitution and a municipal code. He dealt with the main domestical fund, the replacement of the robot , the position on Bohemia and Moravia and other things.

On July 19, the election of the large committee of the enlarged Silesian convention took place. 5 representatives of the princes and 8 other members were elected. On August 29, 1848, the latter presented the unanimously adopted constitution to the Ministry of the Interior and prepared the second session from November 13 to 18, 1848.

With the strengthening of the reaction , the effectiveness of the Convention ended. On December 30, 1849, the emperor issued an imposed constitution. Thereafter, 30 MPs (10 highest taxed, 10 cities, 10 villages) should be elected. But even this constitution, which fell far short of the 1848 demands, should not apply.

With the New Year's patent , the large committee was repealed. From March 22, 1852 to April 3, 1861 governed the governor Josef Ritter von Kalchberg and the narrower committee of the strengthened public convent (conventual committee). In 1861 the Silesian Landtag was established as a legislature.

literature

  • Dan Gawrecki : The Silesian Parliament. In: Helmut Rumpler , Peter Urbanitsch (ed.): The Habsburg Monarchy 1848–1918. Volume VII / 2: Constitution and Parliamentarism. The regional representative bodies. Publishing house of the Austrian Academy of Sciences, Vienna 2000, ISBN 3-7001-2871-1 , pp. 2105-2130.