Documents related to the Creation of the Confederation of the
Rhine
The destruction of the Holy Roman Empire, begun in
the treaties of Basel and Campo Formio, was finally completed by the
organization of the Confederation of the Rhine. The most important
feature of document A is the relationship which it creates between
France and each of the confederated states. By subsequent acts of
accession nearly all the German states, except Austria and Prussia
became members. In the other documents the important features are the
explanations for the action that is taken.
Treaty for Establishing the Confederation. July 12, 1806.
His Majesty the Emperor of the French, King of Italy, of the
one part, and of the other part their Majesties the Kings of Bavaria
and of Wurtemburg and Their Serene Highnesses the Electors, the
Archchancellor of Baden, the Duke of Berg and of Cleves, the Landgrave
of Hesse-Darmstadt, the Princes of Nassan-Usingen and Nassau-Weilburg,
the Princes of Hohenzollern-Heckingen and Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen, the
Princes of Salm-Salm and Salm-Kirburg, the Prince of Isneburg-Birstein,
the Duke of Aremberg and the Prince of Lichenstein, and the Count of
Leyen, wishing, by suitable stipulations, to assure the internal peace
of the south of Germany, for which experience for a long time past and
quite recently still more has shown that the Germanic Constitution can
no longer offer any sort of guarantee...
- The States of . . . [names of the parties of the second
part] shall be forever separated from the territory of the Germanic
Empire and united among themselves by a separate Confederation, under
the name of the Confederated States of the Rhine....
- Each of the Kings and Confederated Princes shall renounce
those of his titles which express any relations with the Germanic
Empire; and on the 1st of August next he shall cause the Diet to be
notified of his separation from the Empire.
- His Serene Highness the Archchancellor shall take the
titles of Prince Primate and Most Eminent Highness. The title of Prince
Primate does not carry with it any prerogative contrary to the
plenitude of sovereignty which each of the Confederates shall enjoy....
- The common interests of the Confederated States shall be
dealt with in a Diet, of which the seat shall be at Frankfort, and
which shall be divided into two Colleges, to wit: the College of Kings
and the College of Princes....
- His Majesty the Emperor of the French shall be proclaimed
Protector of the Confederation, and in that capacity, upon the decease
of each Prince Primate, he shall appoint the successor of that one....
- There shall be between the French Empire and the
Confederated States of the Rhine, collectively and separately, an
alliance in virtue of which every continental war which one of the High
Contracting Parties may have to carry on shall immediately become
common to all the others....
- The contingent to be furnished by each of the Allies in
case of war is as follows: France shall furnish 200,000 men of all
arms: the Kingdom of Bavaria 30,000 men of all arms; the Kingdom of
Wurtemburg 12,000; the Grand Duke of Baden 8,000; the Grand Duke of
Berg 5,000; the Grand Duke of Darmstadt 4,000; Their Serene Highnesses
the Dukes and the Prince of Nassau, together with the other
Confederated Princes, shall furnish a contingent of 4,000 men.
- The High Contracting Parties reserve to themselves the
admission at a later time into the new Confederation of other Princes
and States of Germany whom it shall be found for the common interest to
admit thereto.
Note of Napoleon to the [Imperial] Diet. August 1, 1806
The undersigned, charge d'affaires of His Majesty the
Emperor of the French and King of Italy at the general Diet of the
German Empire, has received orders from His Majesty to make the
following declarations to the diet:
Their Majesties the Kings of Bavaria and of Wurtemberg, the
Sovereign Princes of Regensburg, Baden, Berg, Hesse-Darmstadt and
Nassau, as well as the other leading princes of the south and west of
Germany have resolved to form a confederation between themselves which
shall secure them against future emergencies, and have thus ceased to
be states of the Empire.
The position in which the Treaty of Pressburg has explicitly
placed the courts allied to France, and indirectly those princes whose
territory they border or surround, being incompatible with the
existence of an empire, it becomes a necessity for those rulers to
reorganize their relations upon a new system and to remove a
contradiction which could not fail to be a permanent source of
agitation, disquiet and danger.
France on the other hand, is directly interested in the
maintenance of peace in Southern Germany and yet must apprehend that,
the moment she shall cause her troops to recross the Rhine, discord,
the inevitable consequence of contradictory, uncertain and ill-defined
conditions, will again disturb the peace of the people and reopen,
possibly, the war on the continent. Feeling it incumbent upon her to
advance the welfare of her allies and to assure them the enjoyment of
all the advantages which the Treaty of Pressburg secures them and to
which she is pledged, France cannot but regard the confederation that
they have formed as a natural result and a necessary sequel to that
treaty.
For a long period successive changes have, from century to
century, reduced the German constitution to a shadow of its former
self. Time has altered all the relations in respect to size and
importance which originally existed among the various members of the
confederation, both as regards each other and the whole of which they
have formed a part.
The Diet has no longer a will of its own. The sentences of the
superior courts can no longer be executed. Everything indicates such
serious weakness that the federal bond no longer offers any protection
whatever and only constitutes a source of dissension and discord
between the powers. The results of three coalitions have increased this
weakness to the last degree. An electorate has been suppressed by the
annexation of Hanover to Prussia. A king in the north has incorporated
with his other lands a province of the Empire. The Treaty of Pressburg
assures complete sovereignty to their majesties the Kings of Bavaria
and of Wurtemberg and to His Highness the Elector of Baden. This is a
prerogative which the other electors will doubtless demand, and which
they are justified in demanding; but this is in harmony neither with
the letter nor the spirit of the constitution of the Empire.
His Majesty the Emperor and King is, therefore, compelled to
declare that he can no longer acknowledge the existence of the German
Constitution, recognizing, however, the entire and absolute sovereignty
of each of the princes whose states compose Germany today, maintaining
with them the same relations as with the other independent powers of
Europe.
His Majesty the Emperor and King has accepted the title of
Protector of the Confederation of the Rhine. He has done this with a
view only to peace, and in order that by his constant mediation between
the weak and the powerful be may obviate every species of dissension
and disorder.
Having thus provided for the dearest interests of his people
and of his neighbors, and having assured, so far as in him lay, the
future peace of Europe and that of Germany in particular, heretofore
constantly the theatre of war, by removing a contradiction which placed
people and princes alike under the delusive protection of a system
contrary both to their political interests and to their treaties, His
Majesty the Emperor and King trusts that the nations of Europe will at
last close their ears to the insinuations of those who would maintain
an eternal war upon the continent. He trusts that the French armies
which have crossed the Rhine have done so for the last time, and that
the people of Germany will no longer witness, except in the annals of
the past, the horrible pictures of disorder, devastation and slaughter
which war invariably brings with it.
His Majesty declared that he would never extend the limits of
France beyond the Rhine, and he has been faithful to his promise. At
present his sole desire is so to employ the means which Providence has
confided to him as to free the seas, restore the liberty of commerce
and thus assure the peace and happiness of the world.
[signed] BACHER.
Regensburg, August 1, 1806.
Declaration of the Confederated States. August 1, 1806.
The undersigned, Ministers Plenipotentiary to the General Diet
of the Germanic Empire, have received orders to communicate to Your
Excellencies, in the name of their most high Principals, the following
declaration:
The events of the last three wars which almost without
interruption have disturbed the repose of Germany, and the political
changes which have resulted therefrom, have put in broad daylight the
sad truth that the bond which ought to unite the different Members of
the Germanic Body is no longer sufficient for that purpose, or rather
that it is already broken in fact; the feeling of this truth has been
already a long time in the hearts of all Germans; and however painful
may have been the experience of latter years, it has in reality served
only to put beyond doubt the senility of a constitution respectable in
its origin, but become defective through the instability inherent in
all human institutions; Doubtless it is to that instability alone that
the scission which was effected in the Empire in 1795 must be
attributed, and which had for result the separation of the interests of
the North from those of the South of Germany. From that moment all idea
of a fatherland and of common interests was of necessity bound to
disappear; the words war of the Empire and peace of the
Empire became devoid of meaning; one sought in vain for Germany in
the midst of the Germanic Body; The Princes who bordered upon France;
left to themselves and exposed to all the evils of a war to which they
could not seek to put an end by constitutional means, saw themselves
forced to free themselves from the common bond by separate peace
arrangements.
The Treaty of Lunéville, and still more the Recez
of the Empire of 1803, should no doubt have appeared sufficient to give
new life to the Germanic Constitution, by causing the feeble parts of
the system to disappear and by consolidating its principal supports.
But the events which have occurred in the last six months; under the
eyes of the entire Empire, have destroyed that hope also and have again
put beyond doubt the complete insufficiency of the existing
Constitution. The urgency of these important considerations has
determined the Sovereigns and Princes of the South and West of Germany
to form a new Confederation suited to the circumstances of the time. In
freeing themselves, by this declaration, from the bonds which have
united them up to the present with the Germanic Empire, they are only
following the systems established by anterior facts, and even by the
declarations of the leading States of the Empire. It is true, they
might have preserved the empty shadow of an extinct constitution; but
they have believed that it was more in conformity with their dignity
and with the purity of their intentions to make frank and open
declaration of their resolution and of the motives which have
influenced them.
Moreover, they would flatter themselves in vain upon attaining
the desired aim, if they were not at the same time assured of a
powerful protection. The Monarch whose views are always found to be in
conformity with the true interests of Germany charges himself with that
protection. A guarantee so powerful is tranquilizing under a double
aspect. it offers the assurance that His Majesty the Emperor of the
French will have at heart, as well for the interest of his glory as for
the advantage of his own French Empire, the maintenance of the new
order of things and the consolidation of the internal and external
tranquility. That precious tranquility is the principal object of the
Confederation of the Rhine, of which the Co-States of the sovereigns in
whose name the present declaration is made will see the proof in the
opportunity which is left to each of them to accede to it, if his
position makes it desirable for him to do so.
In discharging this duty, we have the honor to be,...
[Signed by the representatives of thirteen sovereigns.]
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