Oh so many revolutions and changes…. (2.23.16)

IRELAND

Why was the great famine so devastating?

The condition of the Irish peasantry was truly abominable, living in wretched cottages with limited clothing, in a complete state of poverty. The Irish population skyrocketed due to the extensive cultivation of the potato, early marriage and exploitation of peasants by landlords. The potato could feed a whole family on a very limited plot of land. The Irish men and women married early, lived in makeshift houses where the family barely scraped by, eating only potatoes. As population and potato dependency increased so did the fragility of the state of the Irish well-being. For this reason and the almost complete dependency upon potatoes, the blight that spread over the potato crop for years was truly disastrous. The Great Famine caused widespread starvation and mass fever epidemics.

The British government, continued to store its faith in laissez-faire ideology and the repeal of the Corn-Laws, but were not helpful in that it was too little too late. The Great Famine shattered the growth pattern of the Irish population and intensified anti-British feeling, thereby promoting Irish nationalism.

The Irish and the potatoes before the blight fell upon Ireland. 

FRANCE

The Revolution of 1830 in France:

Louis XVII’s Constitutional Charter of 1814- a ‘gift’ from the king but actually a response to political pressures was a liberal constitution that acknowledged many of the changes of the French revolution and guaranteed civil liberties. The economic and social gains made by the middle class and peasantry in the French Revolution were completely protected, greatly intellectual and artistically free. In addition to this, a parliament with upper and lower houses was created. Instead of catering to the revolutionary changes, Louis appointed moderate royalists as his ministers who sought and obtained the support of a majority of the representatives previously elected to the lower Chamber of Deputies. The Charter could not be considered democratic as only a fraction of the population (wealthiest males) had the right to vote.

Charles X- Louis’ successor, Charles X, is commonly considered a true reactionary, with a pre-1789 mentality, unwilling to lose the throne yet willing to ‘reinstate’ the legitimate rule. Wanting to re-establish the old order in France, Charles turned to military effort in the economic and diplomatic dispute with Muslim Algeria to rally French nationalism. In three weeks, victory and the rebirth of French colonial expansion were complete. Emboldened by victory in Algeria, Charles repudiated the Constitutional Charter in an attempted coup in July 1830. In addition to this, Charles issued decrees that stripped the majority of the wealthy middle class of its voting rights, and censored the press. In “three glorious days”, the government collapsed, Paris boiled with revolutionary excitement and Charles then fled. The upper middle class, seated Charles’ cousin, Louis Philippe on the throne.

Louis Philippe- Louis Philippe accepted the Constitutional Charter of 1814 and adopted the red, white and blue flag of the French Revolution. Admitting that he was just the “king of the French people”, a nation that many, including Perier considered had never really undergone a revolution.

The Revolutions of 1848

A Democratic Republic in France

“Prerevolutionary” outbreaks occurred all over Europe and it took revolution in Paris to turn the expectation of a revolution into a reality. Louis Philippe’s “bourgeois monarchy” was characterized by inaction, complacency, a lack of social legislation, and politics dictated by corruption and selfish interests. The government’s refusal to consider electoral reform led to barricades and the abdication of the throne with favor of his grandson. But the common people would not tolerate a monarchy, therefore there was a proclamation of a provisional republic, headed by a ten-man executive committee and certified by cries of approval from the revolutionary crowd.

The government's refusal to consider electoral reform. 

A lack of unity in desires and social groups of the revolutionary coalition in Paris led to the eventual failure of the republic.

Louis Blanc represented the republican socialists of the provisional government and is well known for his assertion that permanent government-sponsored cooperative workshops should be established for workers (alternative to capitalist employment & decisive step toward a new, noncompetitive social order). To the new Constituent Assembly, a variety of men and women were represented but a clash of ideologies of liberal capitalism and socialism cause a clash of classes. On June 22, the government dissolved Blanc’s national workshops in Paris, giving the workers only two choices: join the army or go to workshops in the provinces. Because of this dissolution, there was a spontaneous and violent uprising that included the erection of barricades. After three “June Days” the republican army triumphed. In place of a generous democratic republic, the Constituent Assembly completed a constitution featuring strong executive leadership.

The Austrian Empire in 1848

The revolution in the Austrian Empire began in Hungary, where nationalistic Hungarians (Magyars) demanded national autonomy, full civil liberties, and universal suffrage. When the monarchy in Vienna hesitated, Viennese students and workers took to the street and peasant disorder broke out in parts of the empire. The Hapsburg emperor Ferdinand I promised a liberal constitution. The old absolutist order seemed to be collapsing.

Soon, the monarchy abolished serfdom and the freed men and women lost their interest in the political and social problems of the urban areas.

The Hungarian revolutionaries were nationalists who wanted a unified and centralized Hungarian nation. At the same time, the Habsburg monarchy took advantage of the fears of the minority groups. Throughout Austria and Germany, the middle class wanted liberal reform with constitutional monarchy that employed limited voting rights and social measures. The middle classes were repulsed by the urban poor’s rise in arms and their demands including Blanc’s socialist workshops and male suffrage.

What so many middle class citizens wanted in liberal reform...

Conservatives followed Emperor Ferdinand I, who was encouraged by the archduchess Sophia to abdicate for her son Francis Joseph. Windischgratz bombarded Prague and put down a working class revolt as Austrian troops re-acquired their land. Following this, the Austrian army attacked the radicals of Vienna and recaptured that city as well. Francis Joseph was soon crowned emperor of Austria.

Prussia and the Frankfurt Assembly

The goals of the Prussian middle class began with an adoption of a liberal constitution (combining German states into a cohesive nation). Frederick William IV promised to grant the Prussian liberals their constitution and create the German nation. Urban workers wanted an even more radical revolution and the wealthy wanted no revolution.

The Frankfurt National Assembly, a group of liberals from a variety of states, met to create a federal constitution for their promised German nation. The assembly contemplated the issue of the provinces of Schleswig and Holstein, but when Fredrick VII tried to integrate them, the Germans revolted. Once the National Assembly completed its constitution and elected Fredrick William the leader of the united German national state, he rejected the assembly itself and took complete control of the state.  

Thank you! I hope this helps! 

Much love, 

Franny <3