Bismarck Promotes Cohesive National Finance

A narrow particularism could not be laid to the charge of Bismarck, who had practically ceased to be a Prussian with the trumpet-call of Koeniggraetz.

Continuing Consolidation of Germany,
our selection from Prince Bismark by Charles Lowe. The selection is presented in six easy 5 minute installments. For works benefiting from the latest research see the “More information” section at the bottom of these pages.

Previously in Consolidation of Germany.

Time: 1881-1890
Place: Germany

Meanwhile Bismarck’s task of consolidating the Reich had been further advanced by the elaboration of a judicature act for the whole empire, which now enjoyed also the benefits of criminal and commercial codes, while the gigantic labor of preparing a code civil was being actively proceeded with. The discussion of the Judicature Act (fixed to take effect in 1879) Bismarck to assume an attitude of such hostility to the provisions of the act relating to the trial of press offences, which he characteristically wished to make as rigorous as possible, that another conflict with Parliament was avoided only by the usual compromise. But on the question of establishing the Supreme Court of the Empire at Leipsic no compromise was possible, unless, indeed, it could have been agreed to locate this seat of justice half way between the Saxon city and Berlin. On this question Bismarck had to yield, for, as previously remarked, Prussia had been out-voted on the subject by the Federal Council from motives that were mixed, and there was now presented the strangely “particularist” spectacle of German Sovereignty being enthroned in one capital and German Justice in another.

In all this there was little, certainly, of the semblance of that national unity which Bismarck had been struggling so hard to complete. But the want of mere semblance here was nothing to the lack of positive substance elsewhere, above all in a field where he had hoped to find another most effective rivet, for the Reich Germany was still divided among no fewer than sixty-three railway administrations, and the Chancellor’s dearest aim was to evolve harmony out of all this chaos by nationalizing the lines. He had little hope that the Herculean task would be accomplished in his own lifetime, and yet he was bent on doing his utmost to translate into a living truth that article of the constitution by which the Federal sovereigns had bound themselves to convert all the various lines into one systematized net. In 1873 an imperial railway board had been created; but time passed, and the only field of its jurisdiction continued to be Alsace-Lorraine, with its strategic lines. Moltke had pointed out that the triumph of Bismarck’s system would be an additional bulwark of defense to the nation, “railways in our time having become one of the most important means of warfare”; and though Parliament feared that, with a railway revenue of eight hundred million marks the Imperial Government would become independent of its will, Bismarck scoffed at the idea of “German freedom and unity being swept away by the first Imperial locomotive.”

But the opposition of Parliament, combined with the apathy of the Federal States, proved too much for him, and all that he could do meanwhile, as a preliminary step in the desired direction, was to induce his own Prussia to perform “an act of abdication in favor of the empire.” A narrow particularism could not be laid to the charge of Bismarck, who had practically ceased to be a Prussian with the trumpet-call of Koeniggraetz. Devoted as he was to the institutions of his “engeres Vaterland” the interests of Germany, as a whole, were nevertheless very much nearer his heart, and his broad and patriotic views in this respect had even swelled the number of his foes among the Prussian Junkers. “I hold it,” he said, “to be my primary duty to strengthen the power of the empire, and not that of a Grand-Prussianism (Gross- Preussentkum); “and for this reason he advocated a railway “act of abdication in favor of the empire.” In the course, therefore, of the next few years the Prussian Government had bought up all the railway lines within its own territory, and though the Prussian Diet also passed a law empowering the Government to transfer these lines to the Emperor, the latter has never shown any inclination to carry out the Chancellor’s policy to its full extent.

Prominent among the motives that had induced Bismarck to espouse this policy was the desire to improve the finances of the empire, and render it independent of the “matricular contributions” which, in the event of a deficit, it was entitled to receive from its component States. “An empire,” he said in 1872, “that is founded on the theory of ‘matricular contributions’ lacks the strong bond of cohesion that is furnished by a common system of finance.” In 1875 he had failed to impose a tax on beer and bourse transactions; and two years later, just after assuring Parliament that he was meditating a thorough scheme of financial reform, the nation was startled with the news that the Chancellor had resigned. His health was bad; his foes at Court were active; he was at serious variance with some of his Ministerial colleagues, notably Herr von Stosch, Chief of the Admiralty; he was being thwarted on every hand, and nothing went right with him. But neither Germany nor Europe (just on the eve of the Russo-Turkish War) would hear of his resignation, and still less the Emperor, who hastened to write his famous “Never!” on the margin of the Prince’s “request for leave to resign.” It has been said that no man is indispensable, but at this time that was certainly not the belief, either of the old Emperor William or of the majority of his subjects.

The Prince’s official labors were now lightened by the creation of a new post — that of Vice- Chancellor — which was held for about three years by Count Stolberg-Wernigerode, and then practically fell into abeyance. Herr von Bennigsen went to Varzin to negotiate the forming of a Government party out of the Conservatives and National Liberals (the latter having always proved true to Bismarck in any great emergency) ; the Emperor exercised the necessary pressure on Herr Camphausen, Finance Minister, and his lukewarm colleagues, and in the spring of 1878 the speech from the throne announced the introduction of bills for raising the tobacco-tax and levying further stamp-duties, with the view of rendering the Reich independent of its “matricular contributions,” which Bismarck termed its “outdoor support.”

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