THE GERMAN NATION 



509 



it saw fit, except that no State should do 

 anything to injure another member of 

 the confederation. 



Before Frederick the Great, Germany- 

 had been striving to crystallize around 

 Austria, but, with the ascendency of 

 Prussia, most of the States gathered 

 around her. While the attention of Aus- 

 tria was occupied with subduing the Hun-' 

 garian rebels Prussia proposed a plan of 

 unification of the German States, with 

 herself as the center of the union. Sev- 

 eral States agreed ; Austria countered 

 with a rival confederation. 



Thereupon the Seven Weeks' War 

 broke out. Bismarck had prepared Prus- 

 sia for this eventuality. He had formed 

 an alliance with Italy under which Prus- 

 sia undertook not to make peace until 

 Austria had surrendered Venice to Italy. 



A series of Prussian victories, ending 

 with Sadowa, resulted in the peace of 

 Prague, through which Austria finally 

 stepped down and out of German affairs. 

 But, after Austria stepped out, the States 

 could not get together, as Prussia had 

 hoped, and the future was not pleasing 

 in prospect. 



the; FRANCO-PRUSSIAN WAR 



Just about this time there was a va- 

 cancy in the Spanis^li throne. It was 

 tendered to obscure Leopold of Hohen- 

 zollern. He refused it. Thereupon 

 France, remembering what had happened 

 to her when the War of Spanish Suc- 

 cession was on, wanted Germany to prom- 

 ise that no German prince ever would 

 aspire to the Spanish throne. Germany 

 wouldn't promise, and the Franco-Prus- 

 sian War was the result. This war united 

 all the German States. The principalities, 

 constantly quarreling heretofore, were 

 able to get together and to form the 

 German Empire as we know it today. 



the; IMPERIAI. government 



The constitution of the German Em- 

 pire dates from April i6, 1871. It binds 



4 kingdoms, 6 grand duchies, 5 duchies, 

 7 principalities, 3 free cities, and i terri- 

 tory — 26 States in all — into "an eternal 

 union for the protection of the realm and 

 the care and welfare of the German peo- 

 ple." 



In Prussia the voters are divided into 

 three classes. Every male adult who 

 pays an income tax is entitled to vote, 

 but his vote is not direct. The aggregate 

 of the income taxes collected is divided 

 into three equal parts, beginning with the 

 man who pays the most and down to him 

 who pays but a copper. The list of the 

 heaviest tax-payers, who are first on the 

 rolls and who pay one-third of the total 

 income taxes, composes the first class of 

 electors. The names of those next on 

 the roll, who pay in the aggregate the 

 second third of the taxes, compose the 

 second class of electors. All the others 

 are comprised in the third class. Taking 

 the income tax list and the election re- 

 turns of the past several elections, it is 

 found, on striking an average, that the 

 first class of primary voters embraces 

 only 3 per cent of the whole number, the 

 second class 12 per cent, and the third 

 class 85 per cent, although in the larger 

 towns the disparity is much greater. 



Each class of electors in each par- 

 liamentary constituency meets and each 

 chooses one elector. Then the three 

 electors, as chosen by the three classes 

 of voters separately, meet and choose the 

 deputy to represent the constituency in 

 the Prussian diet. As a matter of course, 

 the first and second class electors, repre- 

 senting only 15 per cent of the voters, 

 outvote the one elector representing 85 

 per cent of the people. That is the reason 

 that the Socialist-Democratic party, by 

 far the largest political organization in 

 Prussia, never was able to elect even a 

 single deputy to the Prussian diet until a 

 recent election, when a veritable land- 

 slide captured the second-class voters in 

 seven constituencies and seven Socialists 

 were elected. 



