Imperial Council (Austria)
Imperial Council Reichsrat | |
---|---|
Bicameral | |
Houses | House of Lords House of Deputies |
History | |
Founded | 26 February 1861 |
Disbanded | 12 November 1918 |
Preceded by | Imperial Diet |
Succeeded by | Provisional National Assembly |
Leadership | |
Alfred III (last) | |
President of the House of Deputies | Gustav Groß (last) |
Elections | |
Last election | 1911 |
Meeting place | |
Parliament Building Vienna |
The Imperial Council
The seat of the Imperial Council from 4 December 1883 was in the
Establishment
In the course of the
On 4 March 1849, however, minister-president
In the 1850s, chronic fiscal malaise became acute. The dire nature of the situation was revealed to the Emperor after the Second Italian War of Independence and the bloody defeat of Austrian forces at the 1859 Battle of Solferino. To calm the domestic front and to gain the support of wealthy Bourgeoisie, Franz Joseph issued the October Diploma in 1860. An "Imperial Diet", still meant as a conciliatory body, was supposed to have 100 delegates elected by provincial diets that were to be established for each Austrian crown land. This electoral system, however, satisfied neither the bourgeois liberals nor the Hungarian nobility, who refused to accept any authority higher than the Hungarian Diet.
For this reason, the Diploma was discarded and replaced by the February Patent of 1861, which was drafted by liberal minister-president Anton von Schmerling. This established a bicameral Imperial Council: the upper house was the House of Lords (German: Herrenhaus), and the lower house was the House of Deputies (German: Abgeordnetenhaus).
House of Lords
The House of Lords was convened for the first time on 29 April 1861. It was similar in form to the present day
- Archdukes of the Imperial House
- Lords spiritual – influential Roman Catholic Church archbishops and bishops of various cities, some in the Latin Church and others in one of the Eastern Catholic Churches
- Hereditary peers – selected from certain families among the hereditary landowning nobility
- Life peers – citizens of Austria appointed to the House for life by the Emperor, for services to the state, the church, science, or art
The last meeting of the House of Lords was held on 30 October 1918. The meeting was adjourned within five minutes. The House of Lords chamber of the Parliament Building was destroyed by bombing during the
House of Deputies
Upon establishment of the Imperial Council by the
With the
- 54 from the Kingdom of Bohemia
- 5 from the Kingdom of Dalmatia
- 38 from the Kingdom of Galicia and Lodomeria,
- 18 from the Archduchy of Lower Austria
- 10 from the Archduchy of Upper Austria
- 3 from the Duchy of Salzburg
- 13 from the Duchy of Styria
- 5 from the Duchy of Carinthia
- 6 from the Duchy of Carniola
- 5 from the Duchy of Bukovina
- 22 from the Margraviate of Moravia
- 6 from the Duchy of Upper and Lower Silesia
- 10 from the Princely County of Tyrol
- 2 from Vorarlberg
- 2 from the Margraviate of Istria
- 2 from the Princely County of Gorizia and Gradisca
- 2 from Imperial Free City of Trieste
The next great change to the Imperial Council came in 1873.[6] The number of deputies was increased from 203 to 353. Deputies would no longer be elected by the diets of the crown lands. Instead, they would be directly elected through the curia system for six year terms.[7] The curia of the landowners elected 85 deputies, that of the chambers of commerce 21, that of cities 118, and that of the rural communities 128. Overall, only 6% of the population of the Empire could vote in these elections. Tax requirements for entry into the curiae remained the same, but was lowered to five guilders in 1883.[8]
On October 10, 1893,
Minister-president Paul Gautsch von Frankenthurn introduced the final electoral reform in the history of the House of Deputies in 1906, after mass demonstrations by the rising Social Democratic Party, and despite fierce opposition in the House of Lords.[10][11] Universal suffrage for men was introduced, and the curia system was abolished. The number of deputies was raised to 516, and seats were allotted once again based on the crown lands.[8]
Universal suffrage allowed greater representation for members of the working class, and diminished the power of the German-speaking bourgeoisie. Whilst this was an advance for democracy, it resulted in the splintering of the House of Deputies into numerous factions based on nationality and ideology, which made it dysfunctional. Throughout its existence, the effectiveness of the Imperial Council suffered heavily from conflicts between and within the numerous constituent nationalities of the Empire. Governments of Cisleithania had to rely on loose ad hoc alliances, often with the support of the Polish representatives (Polenklub), and there were as many as 29 Minister-Presidents between 1867 and 1918.
Dissolution
From the July Crisis in 1914, the Imperial Council was suspended.[10] It remained so for the duration of the First World War, until it was finally reconvened in May 1917. It was permanently dissolved on 12 November 1918, the day after the de facto abdication of Emperor Charles.[10]
See also
- Diet of Hungary
- Imperial Diet (Austria)
- Moravian Diet
- Parliament of Croatia
Footnotes
Notes
In-line citations
- ^ a b Victor L. Tapié (1971). The Rise and Fall of the Habsburg Monarchy. New York: Praeger Publishers. p. 301.
- ^ Victor L. Tapié (1971). The Rise and Fall of the Habsburg Monarchy. New York: Praeger Publishers. pp. 306–307.
- ^ Victor L. Tapié (1971). The Rise and Fall of the Habsburg Monarchy. New York: Praeger Publishers. p. 309.
- ^ Oscar Jászi (1929). The Dissolution of the Habsburg Monarchy. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. p. 107.
- ^ "Gesetz vom 21. December 1867, wodurch das Grundgesetz über die Reichsvertretung vom 26. Februar 1861 abgeändert wird". Reichs-Gesetz-Blatt für das Kaiserthum Österreich (in German). Imperial Council of Austria. 21 December 1867. pp. 389–390. Retrieved 31 July 2014.
- ^ Oscar Jászi (1929). The Dissolution of the Habsburg Monarchy. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. p. 104.
- ISBN 0521316251.
- ^ ISBN 3-209-03811-2.
- ^ "Kasimir Felix, count von Badeni". Encyclopædia Britannica. 2014. Retrieved 31 July 2014.
- ^ a b c "Austria". Encyclopædia Britannica. 2014. Retrieved 31 July 2014.
- ^ Oscar Jászi (1929). The Dissolution of the Habsburg Monarchy. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. p. 226.
General references
- Hamman, Brigitte (1999). Hitler's Vienna: A Dictator's Apprenticeship. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-512537-1.
- ISBN 1-85973-627-0.
External links
- Media related to Imperial Council (Austria) at Wikimedia Commons
- AEIOU Encyclopedia on Reichsrat (Imperial Council)
- Website of the Austrian parliament Archived 2016-03-03 at the Wayback Machine
- AEIOU Encyclopedia on Abgeordnetenhaus