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third and fourth of May. The Committee might, in case of need, call the Assembly before then.

A committee of fifty was chosen to cooperate with the confederation of princes to effect the election of the Constituent Assembly. This met and opened its sittings on the 1st of May, and on the 29th of June chose a Vicar of the future empire, which choice fell upon Archduke John of Austria. A special committee of seventeen had also drafted a constitution, which was laid before the Constituent Assembly, and is at this moment the subject of deliberation.

The principal features of their projected constitution are essentially different from any thing that Germany has had before. Although the idea of restoring the old Germanic empire and union under it has been the general watchword, yet we find the new sketch entirely different from the one we have before given of the old empire, and very properly so. All the present Germanic states are to form one Federal State with an hereditary chief, called emperor, at the head of the government. The independence of the different German states which constitute the confederation is maintained, but is limited so far as the unity of Germany demands it. This limitation consists, partly, in this: that some special affairs of state shall come under the exclusive dominion of the imperial power; and in part, that certain fundamental rights and certain institutions are guaranteed to the people. The rights and duties of the federal government are essentially the same which are reserved for our American federal government, and those of the emperor are the same with our president, except that his person is inviolable and irresponsible, but his ministers are responsible, and all ordinances emanating from him must be signed by at least one minister.

The Diet or Congress of the empire is to consist of two chambers. The maximum number of the Upper Chamber is to be two hundred members, consisting of the reigning princes or their substitutes, delegates from each of the four free towns, and councillors of the empire, being men deserving well of their country, to be chosen for twelve years, in such a manner that one third of them are renewed every four years. The right of election is to be divided among the different states in proportion to their population. In those states which only delegate one councillor, he is to be appointed by the legislatures, and so in the four free towns; in those states which delegate more than one, one half shall be appointed by the

legislative bodies, the other by the respective governments; the councillors of the empire are to be natives of the states which appoint them, and must have attained their fortieth year.

The Lower Chamber shall consist of deputies of the people chosen for six years-one third to be renewed every two years. One deputy is to be returned for every 100,000 souls. Every independent citizen who is of age, with the exception of those under condemnation for crime, is an elector, and those who have attained their thirtieth year are eligible, no matter to what state of Germany they belong. The functionaries elected need no sanction from the government. Each member of the Diet represents all Germany, and shall not be bound by instructions. Each chamber is to have the right of proposing laws and impeaching the ministers. The budget of the empire is first to pass through the Lower Chamber. The result of the vote of this latter can only be rejected in toto by the Upper Chamber, who cannot change any separate article. The Diet is to meet annually, and the emperor may call an extra session; he may also dissolve the same, but new elections must then take place fifteen days after the dissolution; if this is not done, the former diet shall meet three months after its dissolution. The sittings of the two chambers are to be public.

A Court of Judicature of the empire, consisting of twentyone members, is also to be instituted. They shall be appointed for life, in part by the emperor and in part by the Lower Chamber. The jurisdiction of this court is mainly the same with that of our federal Supreme Court of the United States, but it is to have more extensive powers; namely, in regard to disputes on the order of succession, or the required capacity to govern in the different states; in regard to complaints raised by private individuals against reigning princes and against states; in regard to disputes between the government of a state and its diet on the validity of the interpretation given to the constitution of the state; in all cases where justice has been refused, or impediments thrown in the way; in regard to accusations against the ministers of the empire, or against the ministers of particular states.

The fundamental rights of the German people guaranteed to them are, in substance, a popular representation, with a deliberate voice regarding legislation and taxes, and the responsibility of the ministers; a free municipal constitution, based on an independent administration in communal affairs;

the independence of tribunals, oral and public pleadings in the courts of justice, with trial by jury for all criminal and political offences; the execution, throughout the whole of the empire, of the sentences rendered by the German tribunals; equality of all classes as regards the charges of the state and of the communes and eligibility to office; the establishment of a national guard; the right of assembling; unlimited right of petition; the right of appealing to the Diet against the acts of any functionary, after having appealed in vain to the established authorities and to one of the chambers; the freedom of the press from all censorship, privileges, and caution money, and trial by jury in offences of the press; guarantee against arbitrary arrests and domiciliary visits, by virtue of an act of habeas corpus; the right of every citizen to reside anywhere in the empire; the right of emigration; religious liberty, and freedom of conscience in public and private worship; equality of all religious sects as regards civil and political rights.

To change the constitution of the empire, the consent of the Diet and of the Chief of the empire is requisite, and in each chamber the presence of three fourths, at least, of the members, and a majority of three quarters of the members present.

These are the outlines of the constitution proposed for the new German empire. No extravagant demands are made in it; on the contrary, it must surprise any one that it was thought necessary to insert provisions for certain rights which relate to personal safety and liberty of conscience, and might have existed before in perfect harmony with the absolute monarchial principle of government. The principal aim is to secure to the German people a country in common, so that the intercourse of the citizens from all parts shall be untrammelled and free, and their political rights essentially the same wherever they may reside, in order to remove all jealousies and sectional feeling between the members of the same nation, which it was the interest of the princes to engender and foster.

The question now arises, WILL it be possible to establish this projected German Union and establish the sovereignty of the German people?

The principal difficulty we conceive to be, the independent sovereignty which thirty-four princes have for a long time. arrogated to themselves. Two states among them, Prussia and Austria, have acquired a national importance among the great powers of Europe, so that their names are taken as denoting distinct nationalities. Now they are called upon to

lay aside all their individual importance, and to be merged in the general German nationalty; their intercourse with foreign nations is to cease, and the central power of all Germany is to assume the dignity which was doled out in homoeopathic quantities upon thirty-eight distinct bodies. The results of the wars that have been waged, of the unhallowed blood shed in those wars, the unmitigated and unwearied exertions made with the sacrifice of all that is holy and just, which have made Prussia what she now is, all this is to be swept away at one swoop, and the king of Prussia is to become a mere provincial governor and an executive of prescribed laws! As regards the princes, then, particularly those of the great states, this projected union calls forth a strife for life or death. They are preparing to wage this battle with all available means, and the result will and must be most sanguinary. Every post, almost, brings us new tidings of émeutes or mobs, as they are called, in the three principal cities - Berlin, Vienna, and Frankfort, the scenes of the great drama now struggling through its dénouement. All law and order seem to be subverted, and barbarous acts have already been perpetrated on both sides, which may stand by the side of the atrocities witnessed in the first French revolution. No one can regret them more than we do; yet we must say, that we have been for years waiting with fear and dread for the sanguinary conflict of which we have as yet seen, as we believe, only the beginning. We look upon it with the same sympathy that we feel for a man in a raging fever, in whom the seeds of disease have been accumulating for years, and who must now pass through a crisis the more fearful the longer it has been delayed.

From the grossness of the violation of the natural rights of the people in Germany, may be inferred the magnitude of the crisis which this country has to go through before a healthy state will be restored. The absolutism in the different states must first be crushed. Though this work has been fairly begun, yet it will be some time before it can be finished. The retrograde movement and reactionary spirit on the part of the princes, and especially on the part of Prussia, will bring matters to a crisis, and we believe that the agitation in that state will not subside until the king and his royal brother are satisfactorily disposed of.

The other question that arises is, whether the people of the different states will give their ready assent to this consolidation. We may safely say, that, generally speaking, they will

do so; nay, they desire and call loudly for this union. But we cannot disguise from ourselves the difficulty that arises from the spirit of separatism, so to speak, which it has been the object and interest of the princes to engender and to foster for centuries; so that we now hear many in Prussia cry out that they want to remain Prussians and will not be Germans. Here, however, we must take into consideration the legion of civil office-holders, the countless number of military officers and noblemen, who, together with the king, are to battle for their very existence, and will leave no means untried to accomplish their design. The quiet and sedate merchants and tradesmen who only look to their daily gains, and dread any innovation from which they cannot calculate their immediate profits-may also, for the time, object to this new order of things, on account of the troubles which they see arise from the conflict of the parties in endeavouring to establish it. Add' to this the spirit which the crown had the power to infuse and strengthen through education and religion, both being under its own direct control and superintendence.

The more elevated desire to unite kindred elements into one symmetrical whole, does not move the masses of people; they are necessarily more influenced by material interests. But also, in this view of the question, there can exist no doubt but the union would give an impulse to commerce and trade which would make itself felt throughout all classes, and do away, in a measure, with the present crying wants of the proletarian population. We hold to the doctrine that the more untrammelled and free the intercourse between man and man, the greater is the result of his activity, and so much less the fluctuation. The merchant and tradesman would, therefore, soon cling to the new state of things with that peculiar patriotism of their own which would make them soon forget that once they had to pay their taxes into the treasury of a government called Prussian, or by some other name.

On the part of the people of the different states, then, we apprehend less difficulty; but as regards their present rulers, we believe that this difficulty can be removed only by removing them. As long as they are left in their hereditary dignity and sovereignty, even if their powers be crippled for a time, they will use every exertion to recover what they have lost, in the same way as their ancestors knew how to arrogate and secure to themselves this power under the old empire. We therefore do not look forward to a solid and powerful union of

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