536 INTERNATIONAL LAW 



And here my digression to the field of general constitutional history 

 must be stopped; l enough has been said to bring into evidence the 

 peculiar nature, the originality of our institutions, and to enable 

 my hearers to draw inferences as to the vigorous individuality of 

 the people whose national genius has created those institutions. 

 That such a national individuality can hardly be absorbed into an 

 artificial political settlement, that independence is the very law 

 of her nature, seems to be the clear result of even so much insight 

 into the workshop of her historical evolution. Thus prepared, we 

 can now consider the problem which is to be the subject of my present 

 address with a clearer perception of its constitutive elements. 



II 



The Austrian dynasty, the dynasty of Hapsburg, was called to the 

 Hungarian throne in 1526, after the disastrous battle of Mohacs, 

 in which the Turks annihilated the military force of Hungary. It 

 was the epoch of Charles V, that Emperor of Germany and King of 

 Spain who boasted that in his domains the sun never set. His 

 brother Ferdinand was elected King of Hungary in the hope that 

 the power of this mighty dynasty would assist us against the Turks. 

 But not only was there no intention of melting the old Kingdom of 

 Hungary into the Austrian domains, but the election and coronation 

 of Ferdinand took place on the express condition that the independ- 

 ence of the Hungarian Crown and the constitution of the realm 

 should remain unimpaired. That condition was accepted and sworn 

 to by the new king; it has been confirmed by the coronation 

 oaths of all his successors belonging to the same dynasty; whatever 

 practical encroachments may have occurred, this legal state of things 

 never became altered. 



During the first period of the Hapsburg rule in Hungary, which 

 period extends to the year 1723, no sort of juridical tie was formed 

 between her and the other domains of the dynasty, which, to simplify 

 matters, we shall henceforth call by their later collective name, 

 Austria. It was even impossible that such a tie should exist, because 

 Hungary remained the semi-elective kingdom she had been, while 

 those other domains were hereditary possessions. The connection 

 was at this time a merely casual one, like that which existed for 

 some time between England arid Hanover. 



Matters took a different aspect when hereditary right to the 

 Hungarian Crown was conferred on the Hapsburg dynasty, first on 



1 To those readers who wish for ampler information on this matter, the 

 author recommends Professor Akos v. Timon's most valuable history of Hun- 

 garian law, published this year in a very good German translation. The Ger- 

 man title of the book is Unyarische Verfassungs und Rechtsgeschichte. von Akcs 

 v. Timon. (Berlin, 1904: Puttkammer und Miihlbrecht.) 



