Baden is a historical state on the east bank of the Rhine River in the southwest of Germany, now the western part of the Baden-Württemberg (state) of Germany.
It came into existence in the 12th century as the Margraviate of Baden and subsequently split into different lines, which were unified in 1771. It became the much-enlarged Grand Duchy of Baden through the dissolution of the Holy Roman Empire in 1803–06 and remained a sovereign country until it joined the German Empire in 1871, remaining a Grand Duchy until 1918 when it became part of the Weimar Republic as the Republic of Baden. Baden was bounded to the north by the Kingdom of Bavaria and the Grand Duchy of Hessen-Darmstadt; to the west and practically throughout its whole length by the River Rhine, which separated it from the Bavarian Rhenish Palatinate and Alsace in modern France; to the south by Switzerland, and to the east by the Kingdom of Württemberg, the Principality of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen and partly by Bavaria.
After World War II in 1945, the French military government created the state of Baden (originally known as "South Baden") out of the southern half of the former Baden, with Freiburg as capital. This southern half of Baden was declared in its 1947 constitution to be the true successor of the old Baden. The northern half of the old Baden was combined with northern Württemberg as part of the American military zone and formed the state of Württemberg-Baden. Both states became states of West Germany upon its formation in 1949.
In 1952 Baden merged with Württemberg-Baden and Württemberg-Hohenzollern (southern Württemberg and the former Prussian exclave of Hohenzollern) to form Baden-Württemberg. This is the only merger of states that has taken place in the history of the Federal Republic of Germany.
The history of Baden as a state began in the 12th century, as a fief of the Holy Roman Empire. A fairly inconsequential margraviate that was divided between various branches of its ruling family for much of its history, it gained both status and territory during the Napoleonic era, when it was also raised to a grand duchy. In 1871 it became one of the founder states of the German Empire. The monarchy came to an end with the end of the First World War, but Baden itself continued in existence as a state of Germany until the end of the Second World War.
12th century
During the Middle Ages, various counts ruled the country that now forms Baden. The counts and duchy of Zähringen figure prominently among these. In 1112 Hermann, son of Hermann, Margrave of Verona (d. 1074) and grandson of Berthold, duke of Carinthia and count of Zähringen, having inherited some of the German estates of his family, called himself Margrave of Baden, and from this time the separate history of Baden dates. Hermann appears to have called himself margrave rather than count, because of the family connection to the margrave of Verona. His son and grandson, both called Hermann, added to their territories, which were then divided, and the lines of Baden-Baden and Baden-Hochberg were founded, the latter of which divided about a century later into Baden-Hochberg and Baden-Sausenberg. The family of Baden-Baden was very successful in increasing the area of its holdings, which after several divisions were united by the margrave Bernard I in 1391. Bernard, a soldier of some renown, continued the work of his predecessors, and obtained other districts, including Baden-Hochberg, the ruling family of which died out in 1418.
13th - 17th centuries
During the 15th century, a war with the count palatine of the Rhine deprived the Margrave Charles I (died 1475) of a part of his territories, but these losses were more than repaired by his son and successor, Christophe I of Baden. In 1503 the family Baden-Sausenberg became extinct, and the whole of Baden was united by Christophe, who divided it, however, before his death in 1527 among his three sons. One of these died childless in 1533, and in 1535 his remaining sons, Bernard and Ernest, having shared their brother's territories, made a fresh division and founded the lines of Baden-Baden and Baden-Pforzheim, called after 1565 Baden-Durlach. Further divisions followed, and the weakness caused by these partitions was accentuated by a rivalry between the two main branches of the family. This culminated in open warfare, and from 1584 to 1622 Baden-Baden was in the possession of one of the princes of Baden-Durlach.
Religious differences increased the family's rivalry. During the period of the Reformation some of the rulers of Baden remained Catholic and some became Protestants, and the house was similarly divided during the Thirty Years' War. Baden suffered severely during this struggle, and both branches of the family were exiled in turn. The Peace of Westphalia in 1648 restored the status quo, and the family rivalry gradually died out.
18th century
During the wars of the reign of Louis XIV of France the margravate was ravaged by French troops, and the towns of Pforzheim, Durlach, and Baden were destroyed. The margrave of Baden-Baden, Louis William (died 1707), figured prominently among the soldiers who resisted the aggressions of France.
It was the life's work of Charles Frederick of Baden-Durlach to give territorial unity to his country. Beginning to reign in 1738 and coming of age in 1746, this prince is the most notable of the rulers of Baden. He was interested in the development of agriculture and commerce, sought to improve education and the administration of justice, and proved in general a wise and liberal ruler of the Enlightenment.
In 1771 Augustus George of Baden-Baden died without sons, and his territories passed to Charles Frederick, who thus finally became ruler of the whole of Baden. Although Baden was united under a single ruler, the territory was not united in its customs and tolls, tax structure, laws or government. Baden did not even form a compact territory, consisting of a number of isolated districts lying on either bank of the upper Rhine. His opportunity for territorial aggrandisement came during the Napoleonic wars.
The French Revolution and Napoleon
When the French Revolution threatened to be exported throughout Europe in 1792, Baden joined forces against France, and its countryside was devastated once more. In 1796 the margrave was compelled to pay an indemnity, and to cede his territories on the left bank of the Rhine to France. Fortune, however, soon returned to his side. In 1803, largely owing to the good offices of Alexander I, emperor of Russia, he received the bishopric of Konstanz, part of the Rhenish Palatinate, and other smaller districts, together with the dignity of a prince-elector. Changing sides in 1805, he fought for Napoleon, with the result that by the peace of Pressburg in that year he obtained the Breisgau and other territories at the expense of the Habsburgs. In 1806 he joined the Confederation of the Rhine, declared himself a sovereign prince, became a grand-duke, and received other additions of territory.
The Baden contingent continued to assist France, and by the Peace of Vienna in 1809 the grand-duke was rewarded with accessions of territory at the expense of the kingdom of Württemberg. Having quadrupled the area of Baden, Charles Frederick died in June 1811, and was succeeded by his grandson, Charles, Grand Duke of Baden, who was married to Stéphanie de Beauharnais (1789-1860), a cousin of Empress Josephine's first husband who had been adopted by Napoleon I.
Charles fought for his father-in-law until after the Battle of Leipzig in 1813, when he joined the Allies.
Baden in the German Confederation
In 1815 Baden became a member of the German Confederation established by the Act of the 8th of June, annexed to the Final Act of the Congress of Vienna of June 9. In the haste of the winding-up of the Congress, however, the vexed question of the succession to the grand-duchy had not been settled. This was soon to become acute.
By the treaty of the 16th of April 1816, by which the territorial disputes between Austria and Bavaria were settled, the succession to the Baden Palatinate was guaranteed to king Maximilian I of Bavaria, in the expected event of the extinction of the line of Zähringen. As a counterblast to this the grand-duke Charles issued in 1817 a pragmatic sanction (Hausgesetz) declaring the counts of Höchberg, the issue of a morganatic marriage between the grand-duke Charles Frederick and Luise Geyer von Geyersberg (created countess Höchberg), capable of succeeding to the crown. A controversy between Bavaria and Baden resulted, which was only decided in favour of the Höchberg claims by the treaty signed by the four great powers and Baden at Frankfurt on July 10, 1819.
Meanwhile the dispute had produced important effects in Baden. In order to secure popular support for the Hochberg heir, Grand-Duke Charles in 1818 granted to the grand-duchy, under article xiii of the Act of Confederation, a liberal constitution, under which two chambers were constituted and their assent declared necessary for legislation and taxation. The outcome was of importance far beyond the narrow limits of the duchy; for all Germany watched the constitutional experiments of the southern states.
In Baden the conditions were not favourable to success. The people had during the revolutionary period fallen completely under the influence of French ideas, and this was sufficiently illustrated by the temper of the new chambers, which tended to model their activity on the proceedings of the National Convention (1792 - 1795) in the earlier days of the French Revolution. On the other hand, the new Grand Duke Louis I (ruled 1818 - 1830), who had succeeded in 1818, was unpopular, and the administration was in the hands of hide-bound and inefficient bureaucrats.
The result was a deadlock; and even before the promulgation of the Carlsbad Decrees in October 1819 the Grand Duke had prorogued the chambers, after three months of sterile debate. The reaction that followed was as severe in Baden as elsewhere in Germany, and culminated in 1823, when, on the refusal of the chambers to vote the military budget, the Grand Duke dissolved them and levied the taxes on his own authority. In January 1825, owing to official pressure, only three Liberals were returned to the chamber; a law was passed making the budget presentable only every three years, and the constitution ceased to have any active existence.
In 1830 Grand Duke Louis was succeeded by his half-brother Grand Duke Leopold (ruled 1830 - 1852), the first of the Höchberg line. The July Revolution (1830) in France led to no disturbances in Baden; but the new Grand Duke from the first showed liberal tendencies. The elections of 1830 proceeded without interference; and resulted in the return of a Liberal majority. The next few years saw the introduction, under successive ministries, of Liberal reforms in the constitution, in criminal and civil law, and in education.
In 1832 the adhesion of Baden to the Prussian Zollverein did much for the material prosperity of the country. With the approach of the revolutionary year of 1848, however, Radicalism once more began to lift up its head. A popular demonstration held at Offenburg on September 12, 1847 passed resolutions demanding the conversion of the regular army into a national militia which should take an oath to the constitution, a progressive income tax and a fair adjustment of the interests of capital and labour.
Revolution of 1848/49
The news of the revolution of February 1848 in Paris brought the agitation to a head. Numerous public meetings occurred and adopted the Offenburg programme, and on March 4, under the influence of the popular excitement, the lower chamber accepted this programme almost unanimously. As in other German states, the government bowed to the storm, proclaimed an amnesty and promised reforms. The ministry remodelled itself in a more Liberal direction; and sent a new delegate to the federal diet at Frankfurt, empowered to vote for the establishment of a parliament for a united Germany.
The disorders, fomented by republican agitators, nonetheless continued; and the efforts of the government to suppress them with the aid of federal troops led to an armed insurrection. For the time this was mastered without much difficulty; the insurgents, led by Friedrich Hecker and Franz Joseph Trefzger, lost at Kandern on April 20, 1848; Freiburg, which they held, fell on April 24; and on April 27 a Franco-German legion, which had invaded Baden from Strasbourg, was routed at Dossenbach.
At the beginning of 1849, however, the issue of a new constitution, in accordance with the resolutions of the Frankfurt parliament, led to more serious trouble. It did little to satisfy the Radicals, angered by the refusal of the second chamber to agree to their proposal for the summoning of a constituent assembly (February 10, 1849).
The new insurrection that now broke out proved a more formidable affair than the first. A military mutiny at Rastatt on May 11 showed that the army sympathised with the revolution, which was proclaimed two days later at Offenburg amid tumultuous scenes. On the same day (May 13) a mutiny at Karlsruhe forced Grand Duke Leopold to flee, and the next day his ministers followed, while a committee of the diet under Lorenz Brentano (1813-1891), who represented the more moderate Radicals as against the republicans, established itself in the capital to attempt to direct affairs pending the establishment of a provisional government.
This was accomplished on June 1, and on June 10 the constituent diet, consisting entirely of the most "advanced" politicians, assembled. It had little chance of doing more than make speeches; the country remained in the hands of an armed mob of civilians and mutinous soldiers; and, meanwhile, the Grand Duke of Baden had joined with Bavaria in requesting the armed intervention of Prussia, which Berlin granted on the condition that Baden should join the League of the Three Kings.
From this moment the revolution in Baden was doomed, and with it the revolution in all Germany. The Prussians, under Prince William (afterwards William I, German Emperor), invaded Baden in the middle of June 1849. Afraid of a military escalation, Brentano reacted hesitantly, afraid of military escalation - too hesitantly for the more radical Gustav Struve and his followers, who overthrew him and established a Pole, Ludwig Mieroslawski (1814-1878), in his place.
Mieroslawski reduced the insurgents to some semblance of order. On June 20, 1849 he met the Prussians at Waghausel, and suffered complete defeat; on June 25 Prince William entered Karlsruhe; and at the end of the month the members of the provisional government, who had taken refuge at Freiburg, dispersed. Such of the insurgent leaders as were caught, notably the ex-officers, suffered military execution; the army was dispersed among Prussian garrison towns; and Prussian troops occupied Baden for a time. Franz Trefzger managed to escape to Switzerland.
Grand Duke Leopold returned on August 10, and at once dissolved the diet. The following elections resulted in a majority favourable to the new ministry, which passed a series of laws of a reactionary tendency with a view to strengthening the government.
1850 - 1866
Grand Duke Leopold died on April 24, 1852, and was succeeded by his second son, Frederick, as regent, the eldest, Louis II, Grand Duke of Baden (died January 22, 1858), being incapable of ruling. The internal affairs of Baden during the period that followed have comparatively little general interest. In the greater politics of Germany, Baden, between 1850 and 1866, was a consistent supporter of Austria; and in the Austro-Prussian War of 1866 her contingents, under Prince William, had two sharp engagements with the Prussian army of the Main. Two days before the affair of Werbach (July 24, 1866), however, the second chamber had petitioned the Grand Duke to end the war and enter into an offensive and defensive alliance with Prussia.
Towards the German Empire
Grand Duke Frederick I (ruled 1856 - 1907) had from the first opposed the war with Prussia, but had perforce yielded to popular resentment at the policy of Prussia in the Schleswig-Holstein question. The ministry, now at one, resigned; Baden announced her withdrawal from the German Confederation; and on August 17, 1866 signed a treaty of peace and alliance with Prussia. Bismarck himself resisted the adhesion of Baden to the North German Confederation: he had no wish to give Napoleon III of France so good an excuse for intervention; but the opposition of Baden to the formation of a South German confederation made the ultimate union inevitable. The troops of Baden took a conspicuous share in the Franco-Prussian War of 1870; and it was Grand Duke Frederick of Baden, who, in the historic assembly of the German princes at Versailles, was the first to hail the king of Prussia as German emperor.
Kulturkampf
The internal politics of Baden, both before and after 1870, centre in the main round the question of religion. The signing on June 28, 1859 of a concordat with the Holy See, which placed education under the oversight of the clergy and facilitated the establishment of religious orders, led to a constitutional struggle which ended in 1863 with the victory of Liberal principles, making the communes responsible for education, though admitting the priests to a share in the management. The quarrel between Liberalism and Catholicism, however, did not end. In 1867, on the accession to the premiership of Julius von Jolly (1823-1891), several constitutional changes in a Liberal direction occurred: responsibility of ministers, freedom of the press, compulsory education. In the same year (September 6) a law compelled all candidates for the priesthood to pass government examinations. The archbishop of Freiburg resisted, and, on his death in April 1868, the see remained vacant.
In 1869 the introduction of civil marriage did not tend to allay the strife, which reached its climax after the proclamation of the dogma of papal infallibility in 1870. The Kulturkampf raged in Baden, as in the rest of Germany; and here as elsewhere the government encouraged the formation of Old Catholic communities. Not until 1880, after the fall of the ministry of Jolly, did Baden reconcile with Rome; in 1882 the archbishopric of Freiburg was again filled.
Baden in the German Empire
The political tendency of Baden, meanwhile, mirrored that of all Germany. In 1892 the National Liberals had but a majority of one in the diet; from 1893 they could maintain themselves only with the aid of the Conservatives; and in 1897 a coalition of Ultramontanes, Socialists, Social Democrats and Radicals (Freisinnige) won a majority for the opposition in the chamber.
Amid all these contests the wise and statesmanlike moderation of the Grand Duke Frederick won him universal esteem. By the treaty under which Baden had become an integral part of the German Empire in 1871, he had reserved only the exclusive right to tax beer and spirits; the army, the post-office, railways and the conduct of foreign relations passed under the effective control of Prussia.
In his relations with the German empire, too, Frederick proved himself rather a great German noble than a sovereign prince actuated by particularist ambitions; and his position as husband of the emperor William I's only daughter, Louise (whom he had married in 1856), gave him a peculiar influence in the councils of Berlin. When, on September 20, 1906, the Grand Duke celebrated at once the jubilee of his reign and his golden wedding anniversary, all Europe combined to do him honour. King Edward VII sent him, by the hands of the Duke of Connaught, the order of the Garter. But more significant, perhaps, was the tribute paid by Le Temps, the leading Parisian paper:
Nothing more clearly demonstrates the sterile paradox of the Napoleonic work than the history of the Grand Duchy. It was Napoleon, and he alone, who created this whole state in 1803 to reward in the person of the little margrave of Baden a relative of the emperor of Russia. It was he who after Austerlitz aggrandized the margravate at the expense of Austria; transformed it into a sovereign principality and raised it to a Grand Duchy. It was he too who, by the secularization on the one hand and by the dismemberment of Württemberg on the other, gave the Grand Duke 500,000 new subjects. He believed that the recognition of the prince and the artificial ethnical formation of the principality would be pledges of security for France. But in 1813 Baden joined the coalition, and since then that nation created of odds and ends ("de bric et de broc") and always handsomely treated by us, had not ceased to take a leading part in the struggles against our country. The Grand Duke Frederick, Grand Duke by the will of Napoleon, has done France all the harm he could. But French opinion itself renders justice to the probity of his character and to the ardour of his patriotism, and nobody will feel surprise at the homage with which Germany feels bound to surround his old age.
Grand Duke Frederick I died at Mainau on September 28, 1907; his son, the Grand Duke Frederick II (ruled 1907 - 1918, died 1928), succeeded him.