Note (Back) — Chapter XII

266. The Revolution of 1848.—The dawn of constitutionalism was, however, near. The fundamental law under which Prussia still is governed was a product—one of the few which endured—of the widespread revolutionary movement of 1848. Upon the arrival in Berlin of the news of the overthrow of Louis Philippe (February 24) at Paris and of the fall of Metternich (May 13) at Vienna, the Prussian Liberals renewed with vigor their clamor for the establishment in Prussia of a government of a constitutional type. The demand was closely related to, yet was essentially distinct from, the contemporary project for the inauguration of a new constitutional German Empire. As was proved by the vagaries of the Frankfort Parliament (May, 1848, to June, 1849), conditions were not yet ripe for the creation of a closely-knit empire;[363] and one of the reasons why this was true was that a necessary step toward that culmination was only now about to be taken, i.e., the introduction of constitutional government in the important kingdom of Prussia. Apprehensive lest the scenes of violence reported from Paris should be re-enacted in his own capital, Frederick William acquiesced in the demands of his subjects in so far as to issue letters patent, May 13, 1848, convoking a national assembly[364] for the consideration of a proposed constitution. Every male citizen over twenty-five years of age was given the right to participate in the choice of electors, by whom in turn were chosen the members of this assembly. May 22, 1848, the assembly met in Berlin and entered upon consideration of the sketch of a fundamental law which the king laid before it. The meeting was attended by disorders in the city, and the more radical deputies further inflamed public feeling by persisting in the discussion of the abolition of the nobility, and of a variety of other more or less impracticable and revolutionary projects. The king took offense because the assembly presumed to exercise constituent functions independently and, after compelling a removal of the sittings to the neighboring city of Brandenburg, he in disgust dissolved the body, December 5, and promulgated of his own right the constitutional charter which he had drawn.