William Tyler
The Emperor Franz Josef
William Tyler - The Emperor Franz Josef
- I am indeed. Thanks very much indeed, Judi. And welcome to everybody who’s just Zoomed in to join me this evening here. It’s evening here in Southern Britain, or whatever time it is, wherever you are, you are more than welcome. Let me begin by saying something basic about Franz Joseph. Franz Joseph ruled the Habsburg Empire of Central and Eastern Europe as the emperor of Austria. From his accession, aged just a lad of 18 in 1848, until his death in 1916, some 68 years later at the age of 86. He ruled from 18 to 86. He oversaw the emergence of Vienna as the cultural and intellectual capital of Europe. The sort of Vienna that many of us given an opportunity to travel in a time machine would like to travel back to the Vienna of the 1890s or early 20th century. And to dance perhaps, and to listen to the music of Strauss, and to indulge in intellectual conversation in the coffee houses and maybe even book an appointment with Mr. Freud. Yet, Franz Joseph also oversaw the final chapter in Habsburg and Austrian Imperial history during the first World War, 1914-18. The Hapsburgs and their empire outlived Franz Joseph by just two years. By 1918, it was all over, far as anyone can possibly say, forever. Now, my next three talks, today and the following two, all include Franz Joseph. Today, I want to look at the question, What sort of empire did Franz Joseph inherit? Because it’s a different empire than that of the Habsburg’s we’ve previously spoken about. And under what conditions did he inherit that empire? Next week, we return again to that endless problem of centuries that Habsburgs never solved. How do you turn a family empire into an empire of, well, a united empire rather than an empire of individual ethnicities and nationalities?
How you mould the empire into one? A problem that Franz Joseph grapple with throughout his life. And many would argue, and I would be one of those, that they began to see a way forward in 1867 when they divided the empire into two halves, an Austrian half and a Hungarian half, so much that the name of the empire changed from the Austrian Empire to Austro-Hungarian Empire in the so-called compromise. But in effect, it was too little and it was too late. And the problem was unresolved of how you moulded one people out of these many ethnicities, nationalities when World War struck in 1914. And it was only Austria’s defeat, that the empire’s defeat in 1918, that allowed the empire not to come together as one, but to split into multiple parts, and to change the face of Europe forever. And the final talk about Franz Joseph in a fortnight’s time will be a look at that war itself and how Austria lost the 1418 war, and found itself, well, on its knees, flat on its back, ended, whatever words you want to use, it was all over in 1918. So that’s just a little bit of broad breakdown. And I don’t apologise to those of you who know all of that and could have said it much better than me, but for those who perhaps are not so familiar with it, or even for those who like a reminder or simply to hear a different voice saying the things, I rather like hearing people talk about things I know, because they don’t talk about it in the same way that I would talk about it. So I hope all of you gain just a little bit from that introduction. Now into sort of the meat of it, if you like.
Franz Joseph, I said, was 18 when he ascended the throne in 1848. And even me with my rather poor effort in GCE mask of workout, that he was born in 1830. He was born in 1830. He died in 1916. And he ruled the Austrian empire from 1848 to his death in 1916. But the story doesn’t really begin there. It doesn’t begin in 1848. Rather, I suggest to you that it began in 1805. The death now of the Austrian Habsburg empire was sounded in 1805, but it took a century for that death to come. And it sounded because of, oh, Wendy’s joined us, because I’ve lost my pictures, so I don’t bother with that. So welcome, Wendy. And we’re really right at the beginning. And I’m saying that Franz Joseph’s story doesn’t begin when he becomes emperor in 1848, but actually begins in 1805. Two months after the British, that is the say, Nelson had defeated Napoleon’s Navy of Cape Trafalgar. Two months after that, Napoleon himself won arguably his greatest of all victories at the Battle of Austerlitz. Austerlitz which is in modern day Czech Republic. And Napoleon won against a combined Russian and Hapsburg army. So my story begins with one emperor, Napoleon, and ends with a second emperor, Franz Joseph. Franz Joseph and Napoleon are the two emperors that are, as it were, the book ends of my story today. 1805, Napoleon’s victory at Austerlitz marks the beginning of the end of the Hapsburg Empire. If you were doing a university course, that will be the essay I would set you to write by next week. A year later, 1806, therefore, as Jacob Field writes in his history of Europe, he writes this, “Napoleon in 1806 created the Confederation of the Rhine, a string of German states that recognised him as their protector. This ended the Holy Roman Empire.” This ended the Holy Roman Empire, and thus ended Hapsburg rule in Germany. The Empire now became an empire of Central and Eastern Europe, and their access to Western Europe was ended by Napoleon Bonaparte with the destruction of the Holy Roman Empire in 1806.
That is why I’ve laboured the point as I began this talk of saying that Franz Joseph was emperor of Austria, and after 1876, emperor of Austria and King of Hungary. We’ll come to all of that in due course. But the Habsburgs weren’t prepared to give up that easily. And three years later, in 1809, they attempted to turn the tide of war by going to war yet again with Napoleon’s France. And yet again, surprise, surprise, they are defeated. The story of Austrian arms in truth, right the way through to 1918 is of an army that is third rate. Third rate compared to France, third rate compared even, and I say even, to the Russia of the 19th century. So they are defeated by Napoleon again in 1809. And that saw Napoleon at the very height of his European power. But his failure to control the channel, either before or after the Battle of Trafalgar, meant that any attempt that he might have thought of making, and he certainly did from Brulon for an invasion of Britain, was simply forgotten about. Instead, he made the worst decision of his military career, which we all know is the advance on Moscow and the subsequent retreat from Moscow in 1812. And it’s all downhill for Napoleon from 1812 onwards. As William Pitt, prime minister of Great Britain, said, “A month after the Battle of Trafalgar, we have saved ourselves said Pitt by our exertions, and we have saved Europe by our example. And Pitt was right. Because in 1813 at the so-called Battle of the Nation’s fought outside Leipzig, Napoleon is fundamentally defeated by a European army, a European army without Britain, because the British army is still fighting Napoleon’s Spain. But in 1813, Napoleon is roundly defeated, Leipzig is forced to advocate, and is sent by the allies to exile on the Mediterranean island of Elba, from which you all know, he escaped in 1815, and is finally brought to the last battle of his career on the plains of Waterloo by a combined British and Prussian German, Prussian force, and roundly defeated, forced to abdicate, and is sent off to St. Helena in the South Atlantic.
And Europe, can’t forget about him because he’s changed the face of Europe forever, but he’s out of sight and he’s powerless. And the allies who had met following Napoleon’s defeat at Leipzig, who had met him Vienna in 1814, continued to meet in Vienna after Waterloo in 1815 to redraw the map of Europe. They wanted as far as they could to restore Europe to pre-French revolutionary borders that is prior to 1789 or in effect 1791 as France is concerned, they wanted put clock back to before the French Revolution territorially, but they also wanted to put the clock back politically. They wanted to crush the ideas of the French Revolution. I said, as far as they could, and one of the things they could not do was to wave a magic wand and bring back the Holy Roman empire. Why not? Because Prussia is the power in Germany, and it has no intentional of allowing Austria back in to what is we call and they called Germany. And we know the story. We know that in 1870, it was Prussia under Von Bismarck, that United Germany, a Prussian Germany with all that implied for the 20th century with the Second and the Third Reich. But I don’t think there was ever a chance, frankly, even if the Holy Roman Empire had been put back, that the Habsburg would ever have been able to unite Germany. They weren’t interested in that. Divide and rule was their ideal in Germany, nor do I think Prussia would ever have let them do it. But it so happens it was a French that dealt the globe to the Holy Roman Empire rather than a Northern German in terms of oppression.
So the Holy Roman Empire has gone, yet fascinatingly, the most influential, powerful politician of the Congress of Vienna was the Austrian chancellor Von Metternich. And Metternich such an interesting figure. Metternich realises the Holy Roman Empire had gone. Today, many historians writing about the Holy Roman Empire said, "Frankly, its time was up at the end of the 30 years war, halfway through the 17th century and 1648.” But it took a long time to die, and it didn’t die until 1806. Metternich is far too astute man, far too a man of the moment to want to go back to that. Not at he didn’t. What he wanted to do was to shore up this new empire of Austria. New empire? Well, because Francis II of the Habsburg last emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, seeing how the wind was blowing during the Napoleonic war, simply unilaterally said, “Oh, by the way, I am now.” This was after Napoleon, who crowned himself, Emperor of France. Francis II, the Holy Roman Emperor, realising the Holy Roman Empire was tottering to its death. Announced he would no longer be the archduke of Austria, but the emperor of Austria. It’s as though George VI having cease to be emperor of India, declared himself emperor of Britain, which, of course, he didn’t, but that’s what Francis did. I suppose if you’re an emperor, you’d be slightly reluctant to give up the title. I think probably, if I was honest, if everyone had called me Your Imperial Highness, I don’t think I’d been awfully keen to lose it. But if any of you meet Prince Andrew in the near future, ask him what he feels about losing the title.
Well, Francis II, the Habsburg last Holy Roman emperor knew Don well, he didn’t want to lose it. Hence, why we get emperors of Austria. Britain also wasn’t happy about… Britain wasn’t really happy period about anything in the Congress of Vienna. It didn’t like the idea that people like Metternich, who was a conservative small sea, and sought to put the clock back and to forget about all these ideas and ideals of the French Revolution. Ideas like written constitutions, freedom of worship, freedom of assembly, freedom of the press, ideas of nationalism, all of which in the early 19th century were lumped together under the heading of liberalism. That’s what Metternich was against. Why? Because he thought liberalism led to radicalism, and radicalism led to anarchy. And he pointed to the reign of terror of Robespierre and the reign of terror as he saw it, that Napoleon carved through the whole continent of Europe. And Britain, Britain you see didn’t see itself like that. Britain didn’t see itself as conservative, Britain saw itself as liberal, as democratic. When the first engagement took place in the channel between a French frigate and an English frigate shortly after the French Revolution, the French soldiers were convinced that all they had to do was to encourage the English sailors to murder their officers, and revolution would come on the ship, and then henceforth in England. And the French shouted words to the effect, “Be free, through your officers overboard.” And the English sailors replied, “we are free.” Now, they weren’t free in any modern sense of democracy, but they saw themselves as free. And the British saw themselves as free. And they didn’t like to be linked with this continental obsession after 1815 to put the clock back, whether it was Russia, Prussia, or Austria, or wherever it was, even France of thought ‘cause of Bourbon come back in France and Britain wanted none of that. And in the end, Britain withdrew from the system of peace that Metternich had created, often called the Metternich System from 1815 to 1848, sometimes called the Congress System or the Concert of Nations.
What it means in modern terminology is a system of summit meetings. So if one country came out of line i.e. today, Russia over the Ukraine, the other countries would say, “Look, if you invade Ukraine, we will take you out.” Interestingly, of course, they could have done that in the 19th century. In the 21st century, it looks even with America that might be impossible to achieve. Metternich will be astonished that we were so divided in Europe. But he shouldn’t have been, because we didn’t, that is the British didn’t want anything to do with his conservative policies. And anyhow, we had a global empire to win and run and profit from. So Britain turned its back on Europe and looked at the globe. And America had turned its back on Europe during the Napoleonic war and certainly wasn’t going to get involved in Europe post the Napoleonic war. So both Britain and America had taken the same view of Europe. It was politically backward, and we, Britain or Americans were politically modern and forward looking. And whatever the American thought about Britain, that is how Britain thought about itself. Isn’t it interesting that in 2022, over the Ukraine, arguably that is still an Anglo-American view of Europe, certainly an Anglo-American view of Germany, probably also an Anglo-American view of France. I think Metternich would be absolutely staggered that Europe was so divided, 200 years on. He thought he’d set up a system forever, but of course he hadn’t. Metternich was a conservative.
Yes, of course, he was. But he also realised that you couldn’t simply abandon looking at the danger of the ideals and ideas of the French Revolution because they’d taken root across Europe. And he believed that they needed be dealt with. He wanted a little reform. Now, if any of you ever reached power, become prime minister of Britain or Australia or Canada, or president of the United States, remember that you cannot give a little freedom. If you give and grant a little freedom, you can’t hold it. It’s as though you take two bricks out of a dam wall, and say, “Well, look, I’ve done what you’ve wanted, I haven’t dismantled the entire dam, but I’ve taken two bricks out.” And we all know what would happen. The dam wall would come down because you can’t do that. That’s what Gorbachev learned in the dying days of the USSR. You can’t have a little reform. But, Metternich System survived for 30 odd years. It wasn’t challenged by the new ideas from Franz originally. It wasn’t challenged until 1848. The ideas have been bubbly beneath the surface ever since the French Revolution and ever since the French arm had taken these ideas across Europe, west, east, south, and north, and the ideas see, and however much people like Metternich and tally wrong in Franz itself attempted to put the clock back. And even if Metternich did give a little reform, it’s not enough. And the bubbles are bubbling. And sooner or later, like a pressure cooker, the top will come off. But there had been some reform in Austria. Now, I’m speaking now about the empire of Austria as a whole. I’m not talking about Europe as a whole cause those stories are different. Austria’s story under Franz Joseph begins before Franz Joseph comes to throne, before he’s even born in 1830. It comes from Metternich’s chancellor from 1815 onwards. And there is some reform. In the book, A Concise History of Austria by Steven Beller, Beller writes this, “Some reform, especially in the financial area, the National Bank was founded in 1816 to restore Austria’s credit worthiness.
In fiscal policy, the authorities left the vested interest in Habsburg society, relatively undisturbed. Taxation was still largely administered and proportioned on the provincial then. The ARIS paid a small fraction of taxation and the tax burden across the empire remained highly uneven. And that was the problem. They had little reform, a national bank, but they did not go the full hog and have taxation reform. They did a little reform but not enough reform.” Beller goes on to say, “The army was chronically underfunded, and without a well-funded army, Metternich’s diplomacy often amounted a little more than a glorified shell show.” Of course, it did, because whatever Johnson says or Macron says, therapeutic, he won’t take us seriously. We don’t have an army, a European army, a British army, a British and European army that could in any way match Putin. It’s just a lot of hot air. And as for the Americans, the Americans, of course, do have an army. But the question in America’s case is, do they have the will to deploy that army in the defence of Europe again? And Putin may judge that they don’t have the bottle for it, and we don’t know. But the Ukrainian crisis shows us that Europe and America are in a weak position, and that is what Metternich hoped to avoid. Metternich hoped that all the countries would stand up militarily as well as diplomatically against any one country that stepped out of line. And that, of course, was the point of NATO. That if NATO was attacked then all NATO countries would come to its aid. But, of course, Ukraine has not been admitted to NATO. And if Putin was to attack Estonia and not Ukraine, would NATO ever be in a position quickly enough to defend Estonia? These are the same questions that Metternich was dealing with.
And yet at the same time Metternich is having to deal with issues at home that no different than Biden, no different than Johnson, no different than Macron. And the issues he’s having to deal with are these ideas of a French revolution. He needs to modernise Austria to use one simple word, and he tries. This is Beller again. “There was little significant administrative reform.” They needed administrative reform in Austria. Why? To deal with the question of the various ethnicities and nationalities, the Czech, the pols, the Hungarians, the Croats, the certain you name it. How did they deal with these different nationalities? And they couldn’t, the bureaucracy grew. That’s true. But bureaucracy is no good unless it functions well. And the bureaucracy of the Austrian empire did not function well because of this underlying issue of nationalities and ethnicities. Let me just give you one example of change and no change. This is Steven Beller book again, A Concise History of Austria talks about the education system. I think I mentioned last week that the Habsburg educational system by 1914 was splendid. It was an excellent education system with excellent buildings. As an educator, I’m always concerned about quality of buildings, because in Britain, they’d been appalling most of the time. In the Habsburg Empire, the quality of the buildings was top rank. This is what Beller says. “The education system kept expanding, it extended to girls as well as boys. Yet what was being taught and what people were allowed to read and say was severely restricted.” So they censorship of the curriculum. Now we know both in the States and in Britain and elsewhere that there are huge rows on nationally and regionally about the issues of school curricula, what books can and can’t be read. So you might say, “Well it was no different.” Well, no, it wasn’t.
But it says something about British and American democracy today that we even have these debates, let alone imposing nationally or locally rules about books. Then there’s a final little bit, Francis, that’s Francis II, who was the last Hapsburg Holy Roman Emperor. Now Francis I of Austria stated to an educator in 1821. “This is the emperor of Austria, 1821. There are new ideas around that I cannot and shall never approve of. Stay away from these and keep to what you know for I do not need scholars, but rather honest citizens. Your duty is to educate you to be such. Whoever serves me must teach as I order. Anyone who cannot do this or who comes with new ideas can lead or I will arrange it for him.” No, that’s not different than some governors in the States or the Secretary of State for education in Britain. We are not light years away from that, and we should acknowledge the danger of that. So you can with, in historical terms, say, Austria was doing the right thing, super schools, educational girls as well as boys. But, a constricted curricula in the Habsburg case, at least in the early years after 1815, as the emperor says, “I don’t approve of such and such a book. It will not be taught in schools.” So there is a division, if you like, between the political leadership and the intellectual leadership. And that division is going to be more pronounced by the time we get to 1890s Vienna, culturally an intellectual capital of Europe, but sadly, in the wrong country.
Now there will be some of you sitting here listening this evening who know all this story, I’m sure. And you’ll be saying things like, “Yes, but William, you are only telling half the story, because surely there was a lot of industrial development in what had previously been an overwhelmingly agricultural empire.” And you are right. And many of you will know that because it’s linked with the Rothschild. It was the Rothschild who got involved in the development of railways, and for an empire as diverse and huge as was Russian Empire, railways could unite. British India was united by railways. So today, India, in terms of area as well as population is the largest democracy in the world because it’s got British railways. So here in Austria, because Rothschild, why did Rothschild want railways? Well, he wanted them for his business. He wanted them for his iron works. And then he saw he could make money by using them for passenger travel as well. Not much different than the story of railways in Britain, incidentally, it’s industry that drove it. And through that they did other things. But it made a link. You could get on a train in Budapest and you could go to Vienna. You could get on a train in Prague and you could, not direct, but you could reach Budapest. You couldn’t have done that. Railway are fantastic for bringing it together. Now it did not bring the Austrian Empire together. And that’s a question we’ve got to look at on another evening or another day when we’re talking about Franz Joseph. Francis I died in 1835. He was succeeded by his son Ferdinand.
And Ferdinand was a sad creature physically and mentally. And Metternich saw his chance. Metternich thought, “I can pull the strings of this kid who isn’t really with it at all, and I can rule and do what I want.” And that might have just conceivably have modernised the Austrian empires sufficiently for it to survive. But Metternich couldn’t make that because the Archduke that as the brothers of the former emperor took control, and nobody dealt with the seething unrest, seething unrest nationally in Austria and seething unrest socially in Austria. No one dealt with it. And there are plenty of middle class intellectual young men and women in Vienna who are able to put these feelings into words and subsequently into action. And the truth of the matter is that on the 13th of March, 1848, a year which is to see Franz Joseph become emperor is also to see his predecessor Ferdinand run away to save his skin from Vienna itself. If the Austrian Empire was behind the times as a political institution, and it was, it should have failed in 1848, but it didn’t. And like the Russian, it staggered on. In Russia’s case, the 1917, in the Austrian Empire’s case to 1980. It should, it simply should have gone in 1848. 1848 is the year of revolutions across Europe. I’m always pleased to say that in Britain, the revolutionary activity was some very well-behaved and well-dressed middle-class people handing in a petition to Downing Street, the Charters. We had no revolution here. But then we believed ourselves to be free. And many people, the majority of people thought that the Charters were odd.
They didn’t speak for them. But across Europe, France, Germany, and Austria, there is revolution. And Beller writes this. “On the 13th of March, 1848, a band of students, it’s always students say the right wing. On the 13th of March, 1848, a band of students and their sympathisers marched on the Austrian parliament, in the to present a reform petition. Not so different, notice, than what the Charters were doing in London, except they had more to ask to be reformed than the Charters did. Charters wanted things like secret ballots. Protest in Vienna turned to revolution when troops fired on the crowd, killing five and setting off mass rioting. Now, promise me, if you are a prime minister or a president, do not send troops in and let them open fire on your own citizens. That is a path to horror. Of course, they had no choice because these are the days before policeman. But it doesn’t help. Today, if policeman, whichever country it’s in, and if you are American listening, I don’t have to tell you, policeman are going into highly volatile situations. If one of them looses odd a shot, then you have real trouble. And that’s what happened in Vienna in March, 1848. The troops fired on the crowd, killing five, and setting off mass rioting. By nightfall, Metternich had been dismissed, and on the 15th of March, constitutional promised, the so-called Springtime of the Peoples had breached Metternich’s reactionary policies. Metternich was finished. His whole dream at whole in all the countries of holding back the tie to the French revolution, of holding back the political ideas of constitutions and pre-assembly, and all that liberalism cause, warned, Metternich, it will end with people like me swinging from the lampposts. Well, it had.
Beller goes on to say, "Revolution in Vienna did not appear out of thin air. Within the Habsburg monarchy, Habsburg Empire unrested in building with riots in Milan in Italy in Lombardi in January, and an evermore asserted Hungarian parliament in Budapest. There had been a run on the Vietnamese banks owing to doubts about Habsburgs solvency. When the news of another revolution in Paris in the February spread eastward, it found a very receptive audience across Habsburg lands.” So the Habsburgs had lost the Holy Roman Empire in 1806. They couldn’t claw it back in the peace treaters at Vienna in 1814-50. And now 30 years later or so in 1848, they’re in serious problems on their central and eastern European empire. And one of those great rifts of history are between the Austrian and the Hungarian side geographically of the empire split open. The Hungarian parliament approved a reform package. Then there’s a parliament in Vienna, there’s a parliament in Budapest. The parliament in Budapest passes in April, 1848, a list of reforms, freedom of the press. Ministers accountable to the parliament and not simply appointed by the emperor in Vienna, civil and religious equality before the law, a Hungarian national guard, PS, a cover in effect through a Hungarian army. Abolition of the tech tax exemption for the nobility, the very thing that had happened in France in the revolution. Common people can be elected onto juries.
A formation of a Hungarian National Bank to rival on the Austrian one. And then the army in Hungary, which is the Austrian army, is to support the constitution passed by the Hungarian parliament, all political prisoners to be freed and Transylvania, Romania, Transylvania to be united with Hungary in Vienna are those advising the Emperor Ferdinand say, “Look, you’ve got to agree to this, because if you don’t agree to it, we’ll lose Hungary. So we’ll agree to it.” And so they did. The Serbs under Hungarian or Austro-Hungarian rule under Serbs don’t like the idea, and the Serbs go to war with the Hungarians. And as a result of that, radicals in Hungary take control of a parliament or attempt to. So the moderates in the parliament and what they had done was moderate, even though in Vienna, it was seen these reforms as deeply radical agreed to accept the Hungarian radicals into the government. And the end result of that was war between Hungary and Austria. And that led in October 48 to a second round of trouble in Vienna itself. On the 6th of October, 1848, as troops were about to leave Vienna to put down this Hungarian revolution, a crowd of Vietnamese sympathetic to the Hungarian cause, workers, students, even soldiers who muted it, took the violence onto the streets. People taking sanctuary, St. Stephen’s Cathedral were butchered inside of the altar. The Austrian minister of war was captured on his way to work and lynched. The commander of the Vienna garrison had no choice but to evacuate Vienna. And so the emperor fled and they fled to the Czech Republic, what is now in the Czech Republic was, of course, part of the Habsburg lands. But, finally, the government got their act together, an Austrian army and a Croatian army advanced on Vienna in the hands of the revolutionaries stormed the city, and put all the leaders of the resistance to death, only their Polish general managed to escape.
So by October, 1848, the pre-March 1848 situation was restored, Hungary was restored back to the empire. The radicals in Hungary and in Vienna and elsewhere were crushed. And as one historian has written, the gains of the March Revolution were largely lost. And Austria began a phase of both reactory authoritarianism, neoabsolutism, but also liberal reform. That, hang on, hang on, hang on a moment. How can you have that, doesn’t make sense, does it? A phase of both reactiory authoritarianism, neoabsolutism, but also liberal reform. Now if you go back a few weeks, I was talking about enlightened absolutism. Enlightened abs… I’m going to get this word out. Enlightened absolutism. Enlightened absolutism is a monarch like Maria Theresa and Joseph II, who believed that it was them and they alone appointed by God who would make the right decisions for all their subjects, however pour. Now that concept enlightened absolutism was basically dead and buried. The choices between absolutism and constitutionalism, whether constitutionalism is a constitutional monarchy as in Britain or a republic as in the states, a constitutional alternative is the only alternative. Enlightened absolutism simply won’t wash. But, in Austria, it pretty well did wash until 1916, and we’re going to have to look at this in the coming two weeks. So if you didn’t like the title of my first essay, if you were doing this at university to write by next week, what about this one? Attempting a policy of enlightened absolutism in the second half the 19th century was doomed to failure, comment.
All of what I’ve said so far gives us the background to the reign of Franz Joseph, because it’s later that year in 1848 that they realise in Vienna that bringing back Ferdinand is not on. How do you restore faith in a monarchical situation? You bring someone in who’s young and is untainted with either failure or past policies. That is why so many people in Britain today are talking about, should Prince Charles abdicate in favour of Prince William. And it’s possible that those conversations being held in high places in order to secure the future of the monarchy. Who knows? But in Austria in 1848, they did take the decision, and they asked Franz Joseph to become emperor at age 18. Fortunately, he was 18, which technically meant he could rule at that age. Now this is Martyn Rady’s book, The Habsburgs, which I’ve mentioned before and it’s on my blog. And he writes this, “Guided by Metternich, the Austrian Empire emerged from the marginal status recorded it by Napoleon to the main arbiter for Europe, and for almost 40 years a bastion against revolutionary disorder. But now revolutionary disorder had come, Metternich’s plans were in tats, and we have to go forward. And they see in Austria the way forward is to bring about the succession of Franz Josephs.” Rady writes this. He quotes a Austrian politician who’s in London. He’s married to an English woman. This Austrian politician is in London, and he wrote in his diary on the 9th of December, 1848, “Today I received the news of the application of our emperor at his Ferdinand on the second instinct in favour of his nephew, the Archduke Franz Joseph, son of the Archduke Franz Karl, who has renounced his rights to the crown. The ex-emperor has retired to Prague.” So they’ve done the deal.
The men in suits, if you like, have done the deal behind this. They’ve said to Ferdinand, “Look, it’s over, go and retire, have a nice time in Prague.” And the next in line is the Archduke Franz Karl, brother of Francis, the former emperor. And they said to Franz Karl, “No, no, you are too touched by the failures of the regime, that they won’t accept you. You are going to have to abdicate too in favour of your son, Franz Joseph.” And so Franz Joseph by the men in grayson and the military command takes a throne. They hope this will save Austria. And if any of them are looking down from up there, they’ll say what we did right, didn’t we? Because we saved Austria until 1918. It’s not our fault. The mistakes were made in the 1890s and prior to the first World War. Well, that is true, and I think it is absolutely true that giving Franz Joseph the Crown, gave Austria a chance. So he’s going to be nice and cuddly, is he? No he isn’t. On the 6th of October, 1849, the former prime minister of Hungary, count Lajos Batthyány was taken into the courtyard of the main jail at Pest. An Austria military court had condemned into hang for treason on account of his role in promoting Hungary’s independence in 1848. But he slit his throat several days earlier in an unsuccessful attempt at suicide. So the court changed the penalty to death by firing squad. The former prime minister was so weaky had he carried to the place of execution, he died slumped on a chair.
Several hours before at 5:30 AM, 13 generals in what had been the army of independent Hungary for a short space of time were also executed on the same grounds of treason. The majority by hanging. The noose was a harsh punishment for death came not from the sudden breaking in the neck, but from slow suffocation, was intended to be humiliating too for the victim ride in his agony and had expiry his bowels usually opened. And a new period in Austrian history begins with a handsome, unmarried, ladies, get your best dresses out, prepare to get to Vienna post-haste. He’s looking for a bride. There has to be an heir. Oh dear, will come to the problem of heirs in the Austrian Empire at a later date. I’m going to finish with a a little piece from John Van der Kiste’s biography, the Emperor Franz Joseph, again, a book that’s on my blog. And he writes this, “ met Franz Joseph for the first time in 1852 and called Franz Joseph a young man of great promise who combines a noble build and grace with a princely bearing and tack unusual in one so young. In addition, he undoubtedly possesses a talent for organising, which is great in help by a quick comprehension and an unusually good memory.” Well, that’s all put on with a trial. Had the young man had a wider education, and if he’d been allowed to travel abroad, especially in Germany, and acquired information on his own account, he would already through his own natural ability carry far more weight. Damning with faith praise. As emperor says, Van der Kiste Francis Joseph would abide by his military principles.
Having come to the throne at the time of revolution, he never forgot that he’d owed his position on the throne to his generals and troops and their maintenance of law And order. Early in reign as senior general on manoeuvres carried out a small variation on the imperial orders on his own initiative, only to be called up in front of the whole military staff by Francis Joseph and sent back to do it again as he being instructed with the word, “I command to be obeyed.” I command to be obeyed. Does that sound enlightened or does that sound absolutist? We shall find out in the weeks ahead. Thanks for listening, Mike. I’m sure there’s lots of questions. Oh, there are. Can I take them?
[Judi] Yes, of course, William.
Yeah. Where are we?
Q&A and Comments:
Q: When did Britain and Franz get on the same side?
A: Basically, only at the on cord in the shortly before the outbreak of the first World War, we had been in league with France in the crime, Myanmar in 1855. But there was further problems later on in the 19th century and we began building forks again on the south coast, where I am. But despite what the British Prime Minister said about France being our old ally, it’s only been our ally since the beginning of the 20th century. And an uneasy ally, a very uneasy ally on both sides. They think we’re uneasy about the French and French are uneasy about us. Although the French tried to encourage British sailors over the British already felt free.
Q: To what extent the Irish or Scotts share this same feeling.
A: No, they didn’t. It’s nothing to do. Ireland and Scotland have quite different views. However, Ireland and Scotland are quite different in the 19th century. Scotland sees itself as part of Britain. In fact, in the beginning of the 20th century, a Scottish prime minister, a liberal capital L, liberal prime minister, sir Henry Campbell-Bannerman, who was a Scott. His headed note paper from his house in Scotland ended with the two letters NB. And NB stood for North Britain. And they weren’t even using the word Scotland particularly. So the Scotts felt free. The Jacobitism is long dead. The rise of Scottish nationalism is a 20th century phenomenon, not a 19th century phenomenon. Ireland is entirely, of course, different.
Q: Do you think this perception of being a British citizen means being free could explain why most of you has ID cards, but they’re not seen as acceptable here?
A: Yes, yes it does. You are abs… I can’t who ask that? Maxine. I don’t know Maxine, if you are, you are British or non British, but no, you are right. We are very funny. It was like Mrs. Stacher at the time of the bicentenary of the French Revolution, who wrote an article or had an article, I think in Le Figaro, in which she said that we already had liberty long before, you have basically have nothing to teach us. And in fact, we don’t like the word liberty, which is a French word, we prefer to use the word freedom. Interestingly, liberty is, think about the Liberty Bell is a word without those hangups in the States. But in Britain, we will talk about being free, and freedom, and not thinking about it, it’s just the word we would use because liberty is, as I say, not a Saxon English word, it’s a Norman French word. But yes, it is why, and it leads on to, I think, when it’s adult education, you are all big boys and big girls. And if I haven’t made it clear, I voted to remain in Europe. I’m not a Brexit here by any means. And partly that is because this idea of sovereignty is a very misunderstood one. It’s a very complicated legal word to try and analyse, but it to ordinary Britains, when wound up by leaders who talk in those terms.
Yes, it’s the same with the coloured passports we going on about having blue passports. We could have had them under the EU. It’s just silly.
Oh, thank you Max in your British, well, you knew my answer before I gave it. Same problems now as then says Barbara. Yes, unfortunately, human beings are human beings and we keep going back, making the same problems or having the same problems or similar problems. Not exactly if they were absolutely the same, we might be better off solving them, but we don’t see them as that. I don’t suppose Biden or Johnson see the problems with Ukraine as the problems of the Congress system failing in after 1815 and the problems that Britain and America aren’t engaged in that with the Europeans at the level that they should be. And the problem of how do you deal with the French, and how do you deal with now, how do you deal with the Germans. And, of course, the British answer for the Brexiteers is we prefer not to deal with them. But when you’ve got a crisis like the Ukraine, it isn’t like phish. We’ve got to deal with it.
Q: Is Brexit the two bricks you mentioned?
A: Oh, well I don’t know about that. Who’s that? Esther. I don’t know Esther about that. You’ll have to think about that. Vivian, very scary turn events restricting curriculum in Georgia. Yes, it, well, Vivian, you and I are singing from the same hymn sheet. I am extremely worried about political interference in curricula, because if we’ve had it in Britain, but whatever happens in the States will find people here arguing exactly for the same thing. It is terrifying. We aren’t grown up about the school curriculum. We should be. Orthodox is never like change or new ideas spot on.
I met a child of the 60’s says, Rosalind. Well, fifties actually. And my orthodox Jewish parents insisted my sister and I had a good education and did our homework, but their aspiration was for us to get married and to have children. I was not enamoured of this idea and was labelled the black sheep of the family. Well, same today with progressive orthodoxy. You’re not labelled, you are cancelled. Well, all of orthodoxies, religious, it doesn’t have to be Jewish, Christian orthodoxies. There was a evangelical Christian, a member of parliament of conservative party yesterday on the television. And it was extraordinary to me the things he was saying, which seemed to me, actually didn’t seem to me to be particularly Christian, but there you are. And, but it’s also political orthodoxies as well. And they weren’t, you see, Metternich was bright enough and clever enough. He could have thought out of the box. He did, but he didn’t, in an autocracy have the power. He was the chancellor, but he didn’t have the power of a British prime minister or an American president. He couldn’t do what he wanted to do. And maybe he wasn’t. Mark says, soon you’ll be seeing cargo moving European countries to Chinese destination via rail. It’s presently being built. Yes, that’s true. The new Silk Road. And that’s a very fascinating thing because the old Silk Road sort of failed. Once we began that is on the Atlantic seaboard in Britain to travel the globe, in particular, to travel to the States and to travel to Asia, that is now being replaced by Chinese rail. Who controls the rail, will control pretty well everything. That we should be more aware of these things.
Q: Helen ask, on the subject nationally, who should decide what is taught in schools? If not the politicians send the intellectuals, which ones?
A: No, leave it to professional educators. Leave it to educators to decide what they know, what the children are. We can easily ask educators to set it up. We don’t need intellectuals or politicians. And the idea that people in education aren’t political, aren’t intellectual, I would want a challenge or I’m being difficult tonight.
Ellie, politicians should never dictate curriculum, but the left doesn’t tolerate compromise or working together nor debate or difference of opinion. They’re the ones who constantly strive open-minded exploration ideas they dislike. No longer about agreeing to disagree if you don’t believe you are evil. No, it’s not just the left, it’s the right. And our democracy is under attack in western cultures at the moment. Not by the left, but by the right. And we’ve not experienced that for a long time, and it’s difficult to come to terms.
Q: Louie, what is Ferdinand?
A: Franz Joseph was his nephew. No, cousin, sorry. I said nephew. Cousin. Ferdinand, it’s his cousin, Francis it was his nephew. Yes. I think that I knew, I knew, I knew before I looked to ask this question, is Peter, I knew it was you and I just read the question. I hope you’ll not forget. How could I with you in the audience that Franz Joseph had to be crowned in Cathedral in endured the disorder in Vienna in 1848. In fact, the parliament had to move to the Czech Republic.
Peter, you, of course, absolutely has ever spot on. And I didn’t say that and I could have done, and I knew the answer because you had corrected me many years ago. So I didn’t know the answer. Thanks to you. Thanks Peter.
That, well, it’s very nice of you to say you enjoy it. I hope you do. Don’t forget, read for yourself, come to your own conclusions. You don’t have to have mine. But do think as you read the press about Ukraine, think about it in within a historical context. Without knowing history, you begin not to understand what’s going on. Oh, somebody was doing a history degree in Manchester in the 70s. Now I was principal of the College of adult in Manchester in the 80s. I can’t get my head around what passed the Holy Roman Emperor had. Pretty limited. Pretty limited. It’s done by all those independent states. Yes, he could pass edicts, et cetera, but no, it depended. I suppose the real answer is it depended on the character of the individual emperor. The point in the 19th century is that Germany was one of the most intellectually advanced nations, or if you don’t like the word Germany, Germans were, whether they happened to live in Berlin or they happened to live in Munich or they happened to live in Vienna. Germans were some of our most highly educated middle class in Europe. And the Holy Roman Empire was a archaic institution. You’re right, it had to go. The answer is either an Austria dominated Germany, that is to say a greater Austria that would’ve incorporated most of Germany except Prussia in the north, or Prussian dominated Germany, which would govern Germany but without Austria. We get into a state where many of you have come from Central Europe. But from people like me are British for generations, it’s difficult to get your head now. The Austrians are Germans as much as the Germans are Germans. When the issue of German unification comes about, it cannot be put off much longer in the middle of the 19th century.
Will it be Austria that unites the Catholics of Southern Germany in particular Bavaria, or will it be Prussia, the northern powerhouse and Protestant and military who will impose its rule on all of Germany? And the answer is it will be Prussia. And Bismarck stopped gut going for Vienna. Why? Because he did not want all the trouble of Eastern Europe. He realised that if he conquered Austria, he would be lumbered with Transylvanian Croats serves Hungarians. He didn’t want that. So he didn’t bother about Austria. When Hitler wants a greater Germany, there is nothing east of Vienna. He just needs the answers so that all Germans. Now you all know the Germans and other states and that leads to other things in the Second World War. But if I’m just talking about Austria, it explains it. And I’m going to talk about this in my later lecture at the end. The extraordinary thing about Austria is that post 1945, it has managed to sell itself as the land of sound of music. And it isn’t quite that, as many of you know. Benign dictatorship, enlightened absolutism, same thing. Near me. They’re interchangeable. We tend to use the word as to say, historians tend to use the word enlightened absolutism as regards Europe in their 18th century. And, dictatorship has a sort of implication that it isn’t monarchical, but, that’s just my feel. Now, enlightened absolutism and benign dictatorship amount to the same thing.
Oh, Jackie, you’re right. The wonderful thing about adult education is that the tutors do want to teach and the students do want to learn. And the tutors learn as much from the students as the students learn from the tutor. And sometimes the tutor learns more. The tutor is merely a vehicle, a conduit if you like. Youth is wasted on the young. Yeah. Yes. I suppose that’s true. Isn’t it?
Yeah, I mean, you see Ellie, I guess your American great lesson about law and order may want to pass on to President Biden. You see, our politics is changing in Britain and in the States, and most people are unaware of it changing. Most people think the Republican party of today and the States is the Republican party of the past of Reagan, shall we say. Whereas, and in England or in Britain, people think the conservative party of today is the conservative party of Macmillan. Neither statement is true. And people, and in the States, there’s a problem about Biden. I know, I don’t know enough to comment about Biden. The only thing one has to say about Biden is that his age and his mental capacity seem to be limiting his presidency. And whether errors are the result of his of his age and mental challenge is for Americans to decide, it’s very difficult to see quite where the Democratic party will be going, but it won’t be going for somebody of his age. And for goodness sake, if any of you are high up in the Democratic party, do you think you could ask for a medical, physical, and mental before you have candidates?
That’s what we think we should do in Britain as well. The very good book was written by a former British foreign secretary on the health of how ill health has affected government in Britain. And the same can be written in America. It’s by David Owen, who was a labour foreign secretary quite a time ago now. But the interesting question is about mental capacity. I mean, there was mental capacity questions about Trump. That’s true. But the mental capacity questions about Biden are different. They’re age related. I’m very worried about him. I feel sorry for him really. I think he beyond heal to be honest. Oh, and that’s nice of you to say, thank you. Oh, do hang on. Right. Okay. Somebody just said thank you, but also said thank you for quoting from other sources. I like quoting as not only from other historians, but I particularly like quoting contemporary sources. 'Cause, I mean, the man who wrote about Franz Joseph met him from met him. Now, you can say, “But that’s wrong.” Well, fine. But, he actually met him. You can’t dismiss it. If one of you now comes on and says, “I’m American, I’ve met Biden, we were great friends, we play golf together,” and I say you are wrong. Now, I may not be wrong, but I can’t say you are wrong, and that’s nonsense. If you know him, then you are saying that’s your view of him. I’ve got to judge his historian is if your view is shared by other people or for some reason or other, your view is a minority view. But I can’t say it’s wrong. That would be ridiculous. Oh, Rochelle says, “Think we need ID cards in case of accidents know who you are.” That’s the story of the Duke of Edinburgh. You remember that? The Duke of Edinburgh, the story goes, was visiting an old person’s home, and he went up to one very elderly lady and he said to her, do you know who I am? And she said, no dear, but don’t worry, Matron know who you are. I love that. I’m sorry. I like that. Oh, yes. How strong was Czech back here? What was did part they?
That comes into my story next week. The Czechs are very important. But yeah, I will promise I will talk about that next week. You are absolutely right, Barry. I will certainly talk about Czechs. I like that Susan said, perhaps things are tough. Perhaps we should set up our own country. Well, Susan, if you push me just a little bit, I’m prepared to accept the title of Emperor. That’s the problem, you see, that’s the problem. Everyone always wants to be at the top.
Q: Alan says, “How do I prepare it?”
A: Yeah, well, if you want a secret about adult education, it isn’t difficult. What’s difficult is the delivery. The delivery you learn over a period of time. I’m over 50 years, I’ve done adult education. So that you improve, I hope, in time. But the real trick is to have a decent plan on a piece of paper of what you’re going to say. The detail is easy. I wrote this and I wanted a quotation about Franz Joseph at a young age just after he come to the throne. And I thought, “Well, I bet there’s one in the biography by Van Kiste.” So I simply look it up. I could have looked it up on the internet, but I had the book and I knew it’d be in there. It’s structuring it. What makes me cross about university teaching is it’s often unstructured, and it’s often says somebody repeating the same, I’m going to offend people or lecturers from university is this they give the same lecture they’ve given for the past seven years. I had a great friend of mine, sadly passed on who was a professor at University of Nottingham in adult education. And I invited him to speak on something I was organising and he said, “Oh, I’ll tell you what my talk is about this year.” I said, “What do you mean, Michael, your talk this year?” He said, “Well, I’m often asked to give talks to organisations.” I said, “I know you are.” He said, “Well, I just do one talk per year.” And I thought, “Well, and I don’t think that’s very good about education.” I always tear mine up. All my notes I’ve used tonight will be in the bin before I have supper this evening. I’m remembering Russell’s having a conversation with a euro OMP says Jackie, in which I said I was afraid the extreme left as much of the extreme right, to which he replied, it took the wind out myself. He said, “There is no such thing as the extreme left.”
Well, of course, there is. That’s such just a stupid thing to say. There is an extreme left and extreme right, extremes in anything. Somebody mentioned religion. The extremes in religion, extremes in politics are unhealthy because they do not. Think. Those of you who know me in Britain know that I was brought up in a English public school, which was Christian Evangelical. And some of us, on one occasion we had a new assembly hall, and we asked if we could have a dance, the sick form. We asked him we could have a dance with one of the local girls public schools. And we had contacts and we did play games, all sorts of things. And we said, “Could we have a dance?” And the answer we got, don’t laugh. Well, you can laugh. The answer we got from the headmaster was, “Do you think Jesus would’ve danced?” I do regret saying, “Yes, I think he would.” But I mean, it’s that sort of bigotry that’s so unbelievable in my opinion. But you don’t, nobody has to agree with me. Can’t trust some left-wingers teach history, for example, nor right-wingers. Now, Judi and I are very worried about this when it comes to woke, because I think it’s dividing people for or against, and it’s not as simple as that. Not everything woke in history is wrong, and not everything in woke is right. You know, what they say about the British? We always seek a compromise in a middle way. I don’t think there’s anything wrong in that, and I don’t like extremes. You’re right, who ever said that. When Suzanne said, I went from Prague overnight on the train to Budapest. A wonderful journey. Am I overstaying my welcome?
[Judi] Well, I don’t want you to miss yourself, William. It’s going to pass the six. We have another talk start at 7:00 PM UK.
Okay. Well, I’m glad there were lots of questions because obviously people enjoyed listening to the story because it’s such an interesting story.
[Judi] Yes. Well, if you want a copy of the Q&A, I can certainly send it over to you in later on today.
Oh, do that, Judi, that will be great. You can…
[Judi] And just to let you know, we had over 1,600 devices online today.
Fantastic.
[Judi] Thank you William, and thank you to everybody you joined us, and we’ll see everybody a bit later for Judge Dennis Davis. Thank you everybody. Bye-bye.
Bye-bye. Bye-bye.