1. In addition to the Silesian press, i.e., the Breslauer Zeitung, Privilegierte Schlesische Zeitung, and the Schlesische Chronik, Berlin's traditional papers, the Vossische Zeitung, Haude-und Spenersche Zeitung, and Allgemeine Preussische Zeitung (Staatszeitung) related the weavers' misery and later their uprising in some detail. Other important papers concentrating on events in Silesia were the liberal Weser-Zeitung of Bremen, the Augsburger Allgemeine Zeitung, which catered to the rising bourgeoisie (Heinrich Heine was their Paris correspondent in the 1840s), David Hansemann's Aachener Zeitung, and the Mannheimer Abendzeitung, which—under the editorship of Karl Grün—was one of the few radical papers in the German Diet.

2. And this was not said in jest. Büttner, Wolfgang, “Weberaufstand im Eulengebirge,” Illustrierte Historische Hefte 27 (1982): 12–13.Google Scholar

3. See von Treitschke, Heinrich, Deutsche Geschichte (Leipzig, 1928) 4:490–500;Google ScholarMehring, Franz, Geschichte der deutschen Sozialdemokratie, 3rd ed. (Berlin, 1980), 1:224.Google Scholar The legitimist Friedrich Wilhelm III, cofounder of the Holy Alliance and imbued with strong beliefs in the divine right of kings, was offended by General Espartero's liberal government, which ruled during and after the Carlist Wars in Spain. The king's legitimist policies were thus in part responsible for the weavers’ plight.

4. Wilhelm Wolff, “Das Elend und der Aufruhr in Schlesien,” in Püttmann, Hermann, ed., Deutsches Bürgerbuch für 1845 (Darmstadt, 1845), 174–202.Google Scholar Reprinted in Wolff, Wilhelm, Aus Schlesien, Preussen und dem Reich, ed. Schmidt, Walter (Berlin, 1985), 52–84.Google Scholar On economic hardship in East-Prussia, see “Erörterung der Ursachen des in der Provinz Preussen öfters wiederkehrenden Nothstandes,” Zentrales Staatsarchiv II, Merseburg, Rep. 120, VIII, 1, no. 2.

5. In order to complete a standard-size cloth with a length of sixty Ellen and a width of 1.5 Ellen (one Prussian Elle equals 25.5 inches, or 66.69 cm) a weaver needed at least a fortnight, provided the entire family helped. For the finished product he received one taler, 13 Silbergroschen, which did not even cover half of the three taler, five Silbergroschen needed to pay the ground rent he owed his manorial lord. (See Wolff, “Elend und Aufruhr.”)

6. A cross section of these is collected in Kroneberg, Lutz and Schlosser, Rolf, Weber Revolte (Cologne, 1980), 68–114.Google Scholar For the most part reporting was very realistic and there hardly seemed to have been a voice that did not urge swift action to help the poor.

7. Büttner, “Weberaufstand,” 16.

8. Būttner, ibid., 16; Mehring, Geschichte, 224–25. There were thirty Silbergroschen to the Prussian taler. The provincial governor, the Oberpräsident, earned about 6,000 taler annually, while the family of a weaver had hardly more than 60 taler. See Wolff, “Elend und Aufruhr.” Wolff obtained his information from a report by Eduard Pelz who, under the pseudonym Treumund Welp, published accounts on weavers' living conditions. According to the Berlin Statistical Bureau, a working-class family of five needed on average 105 taler and two Silbergroschen annually to cover its most basic needs. Cost of living varied from province to province; it was highest in the Rhine-province with 140 taler and lowest in Posen with 78 taler. The 93 taler and 10 Silbergroschen calculated for Silesia were still more than 50 percent above the weavers' meager earnings. See Mitteilungen des Statistischen Bureaus in Berlin, 1852, 317–19.

9. See “Der Rechenschaftsbericht des Oberpräsidenten von Merckel über den Zustand Schlesiens im Jahre 1840,” ed. Wutke, Karl, in Zeitschrift des Vereins für die Geschichte Schlesiens, 60 (1926): 210–41.Google Scholar

10. Schneer, Alexander, Über die Not der Leinen-Arbeiter in Schlesien und die Mittel ihr abzuhelfen (Berlin, 1844).Google Scholar Important sections of Schneer's report are reprinted in Kroneberg and Schlosser, Weberrevolte, 114–45.

11. Schneer's research was extensive: with the help of the Regierung at Liegnitz (one of the three Silesian districts) and local Landräte he explored dozens of Kreise, eleven in the district of Liegnitz alone. According to his own testimony he visited fifty villages and small towns, in each of which he saw about fifiteen to twenty families. Schneer observed that poverty was less grinding in areas where estate owners still exercised their manorial rights fully. For most of Silesia, regular poor relief merely existed on paper, he asserted. Fifteen densely populated villages in the Liegnitz district, all of them hard hit by poverty, received the ridiculous amount of 58 Taler poor relief for one entire year. Franz Mehring quotes a contemporary writer who stated that most weavers lived in dwellings “in comparison to which the estate owner's cowshed can be called a state room.” See Mehring, Geschichte, 225.

12. Schneer, Über die Not, 129.

13. For detailed accounts of the insurgency in addition to Büttner and Mehring (225–31), see Obermann, Karl, Deutschland 1815–1849, 4th ed. (Berlin, 1976), 161–64;Google ScholarSchmidt, Walter et al. , Deutsche Geschichte, vol. 4, 1789–1871 (Berlin, 1984), 251–58;Google ScholarNipperdey, Thomas, Deutsche Geschichte 1800–1866 (Munich, 1983), 221–23;CrossRefGoogle ScholarBüttner, Wolfgang, “Der Weberaufstand in Schlesien 1844,” in Reinalter, Helmut, ed., Demokratische und soziale protesbewegungen in Mitteleuropa 1815–48/49 (Frankfurt, 1986), 202–30;Google ScholarWehler, Hans-Ulrich, Deutsche Gesellschaftsgeschichte 1815–1845–49, 2 vols. (Munich, 1987), 1:654–57;Google ScholarSheehan, James, German History 1770–1866 (Oxford, 1989), 643–45.Google Scholar The main uprisings took place in Peterswaldau (5,000 inhabitants) and Langenbielau (13,000 inhabitants), two large villages in the foothills of the Silesian Eulengebirge. Subsequently, minor riots occurred in neighboring village, while in Breslau, Silesia's capital and Prussia's second largest city, “hunger revolts” of pauperized artisans and journeymen took place.

14. On social protest in the 1840s see also Gailus, Manfred, Strasse und Brot (Göttingen, 1990);Google ScholarReinalter, Helmut, ed., Demokratische und soziale Protestbewegungen in Mitteleuropa 1815–1848/49 (Frankfurt, 1986);Google ScholarHerzig, Arno, Unterschichtenprotest in Deutschland 1790–1870 (Göttingen, 1988).Google Scholar On Protestforschung in general see Tilly, Richard, ed., “Sozialer Protest,” Geschichte und Gesellschaft, 3 (1977);Google Scholar Werner Giesselmann, “Protest als Gegenstand sozialgeschichtlicher Forschung,” in Schieder, Wolfgang and Sellin, Volker, eds., Sozialgeschichte in Deutschland, vol. 3 (Göttingen, 1987), 50–77.Google Scholar See also the essays in Volkmann, Heinrich and Bergmann, Jürgen, eds., Sozialer Protest. Studien zu traditioneller Resistenz und kollektiver Gewalt in Deutschland vom Vormärz bis zur Reichsgründung (Opladen, 1984).Google Scholar On the composition of revolutionary crowds in eighteenth- and nineteenth-century Europe, see Rudé's, GeorgeThe Crowd in History (London and New York, 1964).Google Scholar

15. There are detailed reports of the events in the June and July issues of the Deutsche Allgemeine Zeitung, the Haude- und Spenersche Zeitung, Aachener Zeitung, Allgemeine Preussische Zeitung, Triersche Zeitung, and the Weser-Zeitung.

16. Prison sentences varied between three and nine years. Altogether, the eighty defendants were sentenced to 203 years imprisonment, 90 years of fortress, and 330 lashes. See Büttner, “Weberaufstand,” 40.

17. Historians are virtually unanimous on this point. Kehr, Eckart, “Zur Genesis der preussischen Bürokratie und des Rechtsstaates,” in idem, Der Primat der Innenpolitik, ed. Wehler, Hans-Ulrich (Berlin, 1965), 31–53,CrossRefGoogle Scholar even spoke of a “dictatorship,” while Hans Rosenberg in his Bureaucracy, Aristocracy and Autocracy (Cambridge, MA, 1958)Google Scholar and Wehler, Deutsche Gesellschaftsgeschichte, 2:297–322,Google Scholar characterized the rule of officials as ”bureaucratic absolutism.”

18. Gillis, John R., The Prussian Bureaucracy in Crisis 1840–1860 (Stanford, 1971).Google Scholar The third part of Koselleck's, ReinhartPreussen zwischen Reform und Revolution, 2nd ed. (Stuttgart, 1975)Google Scholar also offers an in-depth analysis of the bureaucracy during the 1830s and 1840s.

19. Ibid., 23, “ … and the distance between their ideas and those of their superiors was so great that conflict was virtually inevitable.”

20. Ibid., 39.

21. This point is vigorously advanced by O'Boyle, Leonore, “The Problem of an Excess of Educated Men in Western Europe, 1800–1850,” Journal of Modern History 42 (1970): 471–95.CrossRefGoogle Scholar Koselleck, Preussen, 437–42, points to the same problem.

22. Ibid., 438.

23. On the Konduitenlisten, see the biting criticism by Heinzen, Karl, Die preussische Bürokratie (Darmstadt, 1845), 166–75Google Scholar, and for an example, Acta betreffend die Conduiten Listen über die Regierungs-Präsidenten at Staatsarchiv Merseburg, Rep.77, Titel 184a, no. 4, vol. 1. The section on “sittlicher Wandel” left ample room for criticism.

24. Gillis, Prussian Bureaucracy, 72.

25. First published 1929–1936; see Schnabel, Franz, “Das liberale Beamtentum,” in Deutsche Geschichte im 19. Jahrhundert. Monarchie und Volkssouveränität, 3, Herder Tb., 4 vols. (Freiburg, 1964), 3:247–50.Google Scholar

26. Treue, Wilhelm, Wirtschaftszustände und Wirtschaftspolitik in Preussen, 1815–1825 (Stuttgart, 1937);Google ScholarGerth, Hans H., Bürgerliche Intelligenz um 1800. Zur Soziologie des deutschen Frühliberalismus (Göttingen, 1976), 72 (originally Ph.D. diss., Frankfurt, 1935).Google Scholar

27. In his seminal article “Das Spannungsfeld von Staat und Gesellschaft im Vormärz,” in Conze, Werner, ed., Staat und Gesellschaft im deutschen Vormärz (Stuttgart, 1962), 228.Google Scholar Anearlier version of the article was published as “Staat und Gesellschaft in der frührevolutionären Epoche Deutschlands,” Historische Zeitschrift, 186 (1958): 1–35.

28. Heffter, Heinrich, Die deutsche Selbstverwaltung im 19. Jahrhundert (Stuttgart, 1950), 221.Google Scholar

29. InHartung, Fritz, “Die Blütezeit des bürokratischen Absolutismus von 1815 bis 1848” originally published in the 1940s and reissued in idem, Staatsbildende Kräfte der Neuzeit (Berlin, 1961), 223–48.Google Scholar

30. As, for example, in Schinkel's, Harald “Armenpflege und Freizügigkeit in der preusischen Gesetzgebung vom Jahre 1842,” Vierteljahresschrift für Sozial- und Wirtschaftsgeschichte 50 (1963), 459–79.Google Scholar

31. Sheehan, James, German Liberalism in the Nineteenth Century (Chicago and London, 1983), 19; and 293, note 4.Google Scholar

32. Kocka, Jürgen, “Preussischer Staat und Modernisierung im Vormārz,” in Vogel, Barbara, ed., Preussische Reformen (Königstein, 1980), 49–65, esp. 49–50.Google Scholar

33. In the 1980s the picture became more complex. In his Deutsche Geschichte, Nipperdey pointed to the, as he called it, “Janus face” of the Prussian state after 1815, in which societal reforms were continued (if with reduced vigor), while political restoration, censorship, and repression predominated. And Hans-Ulrich Wehler, while underlining the economic liberalism of officials and the existence of “sozialökonomisch orientierten Frühlibe alismus” as well as the great influence wielded by Smith, Adam (see Deutsche Gesellschaftsgeschichte, [Munich, 1987] 1:404–5)Google Scholar, also noted the resurgence of conservatism among officials (Deutsche Gesellschaftsgeschichte, 2:442, 313)Google Scholar. Wehler's analysis is partly based on Barbara Vogel's perspicacious essay, “Beamtenkonservatismus,” where she contended that conservative forces had gained the upper hand within the bureaucratic apparatus well before 1820. In an earlier article Vogel had even gone so far as to argue that the reforms had been imposed on an overwhelmingly conservative bureaucracy by a small group of men around Hardenberg, such as Christian Scharnweber, Johann Gottfried Hoffmann, and Christian Rother. See Barbara Vogel, “Beamtenkonservatismus. Sozial- und verfassungsgeschichtliche Voraussetzungen der Parteien in Preussen im frühen 19. Jahrhundert,” in Stegmann, Dirk, Wendt, Bernd-Jürgen, and Witt, Peter-Christian, eds., Deutscher konservatismus im 19. und 20. Jahrhundert (Bonn, 1983);Google Scholar and Vogel, Barbara, “Reformpolitik in Preussen,” in Puhle, Hans-Jürgen and Wehler, Hans-Ulrich, eds., Preussen im Rückblick (Göttingen, 1980), 202–23.Google Scholar

34. See “Akten betreffend Lehrer Wander in Hirschberg wegen politisch verdächtigen Treibens,” at Zentrales Staatsarchiv II, Merseburg, Rep. 77, VI, no. 17, vol. I (17.7.1843–1.12.1856), 1–6.

35. Ibid., 3, verso.

36. 17 August 1844, “Duncker an Minister des Innern,” at Zentrales Staatsarchiv II, Merseburg. Rep. 77, VI, no. 125. vol. I (22.10.1843–5.4.1845), 236–47 verso (“Akten betreffend den vormaligen Buchhändler, jetzigen Freigutsbesitzer Eduard Pelz, in Seitendorf als Verfasser verbreiteter revolutionärer Schriften”).

37. See Zentrales Staatsarchive II, Merseburg, Rep. 120 D, XXII, 1, no. 1, vol. 1, 1844–1847, 1. “Akten betreffend die Bildung von Vereinen für das Wohl der arbeitenden Klassen (Hand- und Fabrikarbeiter) sowie die Errichtung eines Centralvereins für solche.”

38. Ibid., 2.

39. Haude- und Spenersche Zeitung, no. 133, 10 June 1844. The carefully worded proclamation betrayed clemency and human concern for the local population. It was probably reprinted on government orders in the otherwise strictly censored newspaper in order to convince Berliners that the armed power of the state was proceeding with all the forbearance possible under the circumstances.

40. Magdeburgische Zeitung, no. 138, 15 June 1844.

41. Through Marx, Rutenberg became a member of the editorial staff of the Rheinische Zeitung. “Rutenberg weighs on my conscience,” Marx wrote in a letter to Ruge on 9 July 1842, “I brought him into the editorial office of the Rheinische, and he proves wholly devoid of ideas. Sooner or later, he will get the sack,” See Heinz, and Pepperle, Ingrid, eds., Die Hegelsche Linke. Dokumente zu Philosophie und Politik im deutschen Vormärz (Leipzig, 1985), 850.Google ScholarIn another letter to Ruge of 30 November Marx complained about Rutenberg's “total lack of critical faculties and independence” ( ibid., 852), ridiculing the Prussian government for considering Rutenberg a dangerous journalist (“though he wasn't dangerous to anyone except himself and the Rheinische Zeitung”). See also, Marx, Karl and Engels, Friendrich, Der Briefwechsel, 1844–1883. ed. Oncken, Hermann, DTV-Reprint, 4 vols. (Munich, 1983).Google Scholar

42. The Breslauer Zeitung reported on 17 June 1844 (no. 139) that some the Literaten (the closest English rendition is “free-floating intellectuals”) declined participation for fear of retaliatory police measures. See also Zentrales Staatsarchiv II, Merseburg, “Akten betreffend die Bildung von Vereinen,” Rep. 120 D, XXII, I. no. 1, vol. I, 7–8 verso.

43. Reporting on the first meeting, the Schlesische Zeitung emphasized that “there was no shortage of reference to communist endeavors in different neighboring countries. Attempts to repel this threat for Germany and especially Prussia were applauded …” See Schlesische Zeitung, no. 139, 17 June 1844.

44. “That authorities will oppose such an organization by refusing attestation can hardly be expected: in addition to guarantees for strictly legal behavior, provided in the personalities of the elected committee, police authorities will be reluctant to put obstacles in the path of foundation of such a society, since by doing so, it might appear as if lower classes’ want and misery were of no concern to them.” See Magdeburgische Zeitung, no. 138, 15 June 1844.

45. See Hansen, Josef, Rheinische Briefe und Akten zur Geschichte der politischen Bewegung 1830–1850 (Essen, 1919) 674–75;Google ScholarReulecke, Jürgen, Sozialer Frieden durch soziale Reform (Wuppertal, 1983), 60–63.Google Scholar The cabine order had been circulating among Ministers, Oberpräsidenten, and other high provincial officials between November 1843 and April 1844, before it was made public in July 1844.

46. See Treitschke, Deutsche Geschichte, 5:241.Google Scholar Nothing was said about how and under what conditions this was to be achieved, just as the whole idea seems to have sprung from the king's romantic idealization of the Middle Ages. Treitschke hinted that “the beautiful old tombstones of the Knights of the Swan at the collegiate church at Ansbach” may well have been the crucial factor for the order's reestablishment.

47. It was again a police report prompted by fear Literaten that provided first details of the new foundation. See Zentrales Staatsarchiv II, Merseburg, Rep. 120 D, XXII, I, no. 1, vol. 1, 15. A membership list, dated 26 October, showed that the dreaded oppositional intellectuals had joined the new Centralverein. In addition to Meyen and Rutenberg there was Karl Nauwerck, a fellow Left-Hegelian and former university lecturer, who had been dismissed from his post for his radical political views by Prussia's conservative culture minister Eichhorn. Nauwerck, who published regularly in the Hallesche Jahrbücher, known as the mouthpiece of the radical Left, had been accused of politische Tendenzschriftstellerei, and was therefore a man to be kept under surveillance. See Lenz, Max, Geschichte der königlichen Friedrich Wilhelms Universität zu Berlin, 4 vols. (Berlin, 1910–1918), 2:73–79.Google Scholar The old Verein zum Wohl der arbeitenden Klassen petered out during the early fall of 1844.

48. See Zentrales Staatsarchiv II, Merseburg, “Die Bildung von Vereinen,” Rep. 120 D, XXII, I, vol. 1, 40–40 verso.

49. Ibid., 18. “Verzeichnis der Mitglieder des Central-Vereins für das Wohl der arbeitenden Klassen.”

50. See Rohr, Donald G., The Origins of Social Liberalism in Germany (Chicago, 1963).Google Scholar

51. Ibid., 139.

52. Even among historians there were some who mistook the Centralverein for a government foundation. Donald Rohr, for example, wrote that “the Prussian government, after the shock of the Silesian riots founded in Berlin a “Central Society for the Welfare of the Working Classes.” (Ibid., 139).

53. Ibid., 17–17 verso. The amount of the donation should not be overestimated, since it was the king's habit to give liberally. To the Verein für Tierschau und Pferderennen (Association for Animal Display and Horse Racing) which neither counted needy paupers among its members nor did anything for their benefit, the king donated 30,000 taler. See Wolff, Aus Schlesien.

54. See Stiebel, Nora, “Der Zentralverein für das Wohl der arbeitenden Klassen im vormärzlichen Preussen” (Ph.D. diss., Heidelberg 1922).Google Scholar

55. Ibid., Merseburg, 34–35; 23–24 verso. The beginning of public activity seemed imminent, though a submissively worded petition to the authorities, in which the executive board asked for conferment of corporate rights and recognition of its statues, indicated that members of the association expected difficulties from the bureaucracy.

56. See Treitschke, Deutsche Geschichte, 4:545–50; 5:589–91.Google Scholar In 1848 Flottwell himself became a member of the Centralverein.

57. See von Delbrück, Rudolf, Lebenserinnerungen, 2 vols. (Leipzig, 1905) 1:131–32Google Scholar, who recounted his dinners at the house of another high officical, Generalsteuerdirektor von Kühne, where, among many others, Patow, Pommer-Esche, and Bornemann were frequent guests, while Flottwell was well-known to everyone. Like other officials involved in the association, its chairman Bornemann also had a reputation for “his decidedly liberal views” (Treitschke, Deutsche Geschichte, 1:204)Google Scholar.

58. See Varnhagen, Tagebücher 2:255.Google Scholar Arnim also knew several officials who were involved in the association, such as Johann Christian Karl Quentin (1810–1862), Councillor at the Düsseldorf Regierung, who had published a treatise on coalitions among workers and had dedicated a copy to Arnim. In the 1830s, Quentin served as Junior Councillor (Referendar) under Regierungspräsident von Arnim in Aachen. Robert von Patow (1804–1890), who held a high position in the Interior Ministry in 1844–45, also knew Arnim.

59. After the revocation of the Edict of Nantes (1685) by Louis XIV, the Great Elector granted asylum to thousands of Huguenots. Many of their descendants later came to occupy prominent positions in Prussian society. One known offspring of a Huguenot family is of course Theodor Fontane.

60. Treitschke, , Deutsche Geschichte, 4:598; 5:511.Google Scholar For Mathis's Frankfurt activities (1835–1838), Treitschke finds words of praise which in itself is telling.

61. In addition to several members of the former Wochenblatt group, such as Leopold and Ernst-Ludwig von Gerlach, the Kamarilla included the conservatives Hans von Kleist-Retzow, Ernst von Senfft-Pilsach, and Edwin von Manteuffel. During the 1848 revolution and after, this circle of advisers brought decisive influence to bear on the King.

62. See Epstein, Klaus, The Genesis of German Conservatism (Princeton, 1966), 3–29.Google Scholar

63. Ibid., 9.

64. See Vogel, “Beamtenkonservatismus”.

65. Mathis either shared his minister's idée fixe about intellectuals or adroitly played up to them. In the preparation of reports which Arnim later signed, the Minister seemed to have given him free hand. Mathis's acolyte in composing acid memoranda was an official named Wenzel, a former Councillor at the Regierung at Frankfurt/Oder, who had only recently come to work for the Interior Ministry, Wenzel's political preferences seemed to have been congruent with those of his master.

66. See Zentrales Staatsarchiv II, Merseburg, “Die Bildung von Vereinen”, 64–76 verso. After perfunctory introductory phrases, Mathis is quick to point out that “in our time conditions of the lowest classes are often discussed with emotion and glaring exaggeration…to spread the opinion that their misery is due to the injustice of others.”

67. Ibid., 66–66 verso. Arnim explained that the statutes lacked guarantees to frustrate the possibility “that hostile and malicious forces could, sooner or later, seize such a dangerous weapon as the association may prove to be”. The potential benefits the association offered were hardly mentioned.

68. Ibid., 67 verso. See also, “Entwurf eines Statuts des Central–Vereins in Preussen für das Wohl der arbeitenden Klassen”, ibid., 36–39. “Article 8: Entry into the association and continuation of membership is contingent on an annual fee of at least four Reichstaler.” This provision automatically excluded a broad section of the population from membership, notably the working classes. In the 1840s, four Reichstaler bought two pigs.

69. Ibid., 71–72.

70. Ibid., 75–76.

71. Ibid. In his recent Rhineland Radicals (Princeton, NJ, 1991), 119, Jonathan Sperber also mentioned the predominance of radical tendencies at local association meetings in Cologne, where “leftist forces outvoted moderates on several occasions, leading them to leave the organization”. But then, radicals in Cologne intended to drop the official designation “Association for the Welfare of the Working Classes” and rename their association “Gegenseitiger Hülfs–und Bildungsverein,” 120.

72. On 20 November 1844, for example, the Mannheimer Abendzeitung reported that the Cologne association had spoken out for the equality of man and creation of better working conditions. As if to confirm Arnim's report, Friedrich Engels in Barmen had written to his friend Marx in Paris on 19 November 1844: “Wir haben jetzt überall öffentliche Versammlungen, um Vereine zur Hebung der Arbeiter zu stiften; das bringt Bewegung unter die Germanen und lenkt die Aufmerksamkeit des Philisteriums auf soziale Fragen…In KöIn haben wir die Hälfte des Komitees zur Statutenentwerfung mit Unsrigen besetzt, in Elberfeld war wenigstens einer drin, und mit Hülfe der Rationalisten brachten wir in zwei Versammlungen den Frommen eine famose Schlappe bei; mit ungeheurer Majorität wurde alles christliche aus den Statuten verbannt”. See Marx, and Engels, , Briefwechsel, 1:5.Google Scholar

73. Reulecke, Sozialer Frieden, 92.

74. On the role of the bureaucracy during the Reform Era, see Rosenberg, Bureaucracy, 202–28; Koselleck, Preussen, 163–217; Vogel, ed., Preussische Reformen; Nipperdey, Deutsche Geschichte 1800–1866, 3–69; Gray, Marion W., Prussia in Transition: Society and Politics under the Stein Reform Ministry of 1808 (Philadelphia, 1986);Google ScholarWehler, , Deutsche Gesellschaftsgeschichte, 1:397–486.Google Scholar

75. According to Otto Hintze, disinterestedness together with integrity, a selfless work ethic, and an uncompromising sense of justice had been the salient features of the Prussian bureaucracy. See Hintze, Otto “Der Beamtenstand”, in idem, Soziologie und Geschichte. Gesammelte Abhandlungen, 2 vols. (Göttingen, 1967), 2:66–126, esp. 77.Google Scholar

76. Zentrales Staatsarchiv II, Merseburg, Rep. 120D, XXII, I, no. 1, vol. 1, 126. See also Stiebel, Der Zentralverein, 165; Reulecke, Sozialer Frieden, 96. Firmness of purpose was not one of Friedrich Wilhelm's salient characteristics, so that the king's quick change of heart came as a surprise to no one. As if to substantiate Arnim's charges further, Friedrich Wilhelm had received an urgent report by Count von Mirbach, Councillor in the Düsseldorf Regierung, in which Mirbach complained about local associations' alarming radicalism and the inability of authorities to intervene which, the count charged, was partly due to royal protection. See Reulecke, Sozialer Frieden, 106; Stiebel, Der Zentralverein, 165.

77. There were also a number of publications by radical members, such as Meyen's, Eduard, “Der Berliner Local-Verein für das Wohl der arbeitenden Classen”, in Püttmann, , ed., Rheinische Jahrbücher zur gesellschaftlichen Reform, 1 (1845): 198–214.Google Scholar In the autumn and winter 1844–45 numerous local branch associations in Prussia's western provinces had been founded.

78. Zentrales Staatsarchiv II, Merseburg, Rep. 120 D, XXII, I, no. 1, vol. I, 85–88 verso. The meticulous eight-page report stresses the fact that the radical party was internally divided. Some of its members, Rutenberg and Nauwerck in the present case, supported mutually exclusive motions. The overall impression one gets of the meetings was one of chaos, whereby it was mostly members of the radical faction who were at each other's throats.

79. Zentrales Staatsarchiv II, Merseburg, Rep. 120D, XXII, I, no. 1, 90–92; 109–12. The Centralverein's leading officals, notably Bornemann and von Patow, anticipating insurmountable difficulties with the Interior Ministry, made every conceivable effort to allay fears and appease the minister. Patow, himself a high officials in the Interior Ministry, was familiar with official correspondence and made several futile efforts to get Arnim on his side or at least predispose him more favorably toward the Centralverein.

80. 16 March 1844 at Zentrales Staatsarchiv II, Merseburg, Rep. 120D, XXII, I, no. 1, 97–107 verso. The following quotations are taken from Arnim's directives to the Oberpräsidenten. Together with his instructions the minister enclosed copies of Bornemann's open letter which he had received from the Centralverein, reassuring the provincial governors that he was acting in accord with the association's leadership.

81. In exceptional cases, namely in smaller localities, different treatment might be warranted. In these instances, the minister wanted to be consulted for his personal permission (ibid., 105). Of a total of thirty-five branch associations only three were ultimately granted permission of their statutes. See Reulecke, Sozialer Frieden, 108.

82. The Interior Minister did not fail to mention that “purpose and goals” of the Centralverein and those of the bureaucracy were essentially identical. Conflicts between the two were thus virtually foreordained and could only be avoided if associations were administered jointly “by authorities of state and communes” as well as by men of excellent public reputation “familiar with wants and conditions of the working classesd”. Ibid., 100.

83. 2 April 1845 at Zentrales Staatsarchiv II, Merseburg, Rep. 120 D, XXII, I, no. 1, vol. I, 121–24.

84. Meetings of the executive board could not be held in public, nor could access to them be open to all members of the association, for “both could only have an unfavorable effect on discipline and level-headedness of deliberations and resolutions and can thus not be permitted…” (Ibid., 123 verso).

85. These very harsh policy guidelines were bound to put an end to any independent initiative of local associations. They can be comprehended only in the context of conservative officials' growing fear of radical conspiracies which had recently come to the fore. In Cleves, a town in Prussia's farthest west, an alleged communist circle had been discoverd which had attempted to gain a foothold in the local branch of the association and Arnim feared that other local associations could be affected as well. And the minister had good reason for concern, since at Cleves even state officials had been heard advocating radical opinions. See Zentrales Staatsarchiv II, Merseburg, Rep. 120 D, XXII, I, no. 1, vol. I, 116/116 verso; and Reulecke, Sozialer Frieden, 106–8. On political radicalism in the Rhineland see also Jonathan Sperber's thorough study, Rhineland Radicals.

86. See above, notes 76 and 77.

87. See Mayer, Gustav, “Die Junghegelianer und der preussische Staat”, Historische Zeitschrift, 123 (1920): 413–40.Google Scholar

88. Ibid., 433.

89. Further examples are the Rhenish politicians Mevissen and von Beckerath. Stiebel, Zentralverein, 178, equally made the point that the suppression of the association strengthened opposition movements.

90. There were eleven members of the Centralverein in different factions of the Frankfurt national assembly and numerous other Frankfurt deputies had previously been active in lolcal branch associations. Of the association members, Quentin, Wesendonck, and Groneweg, all of them civil servants, later emigrated to America.

91. Statutes were submitted on 27 October 1844. For the response see 4 April 1845 at Zentrales Staatsarchiv II, Merseburg, Rep. 120 D, XXII, I, no. 1, vol. I, 135–45 verso.

92. Zentrales Staatsarchiv II, Merseburg, Rep. 120 D, XXII, I, no. 1, vol. I, 208/208 verso, and the long article on the meeting in the Vossische Zeitung of 19 December 1845.

93. See Westfälisches Dampfboot, 3 (1847): 178.

94. See Zentrales Staatsarchiv II, Merseburg, Rep. 120 D, XXII, I, no. 1, vol. I, 386–87 verso. Mathis's notes on the margin of nearly every page clearly show that he had been the decisive obstacle all along. His comment to reproaches that “prospects for practical activity, intended with the society's establishment, have dwindled due to long procrastination in the approval of the association's statutes” was that this was largely “to be blamed on the association itself”. Ibid., 386. According to Mathis, the Centralverein had pressed its ideas “with little practical sense”.

95. In regard to conservative officials in the Interior Ministry, Varnhagen wrote in his diary on 25 December 1847: “In matters of police supervision they do whatever they want. The minister lends them his reputation and whoever is in charge of the policing post in the ministry is a pasha who has such powers as if he were not in Prussia, but in Turkey”. See Varnhagen, Tagebücher, 3:488.Google Scholar

96. Koselleck, Preussen, 217–84. Koselleck spoke of a “Behördenausbau von 1815 bis 1825 als verfassungspolitische Vorleistung.”

97. See especially, Nathan, Helene, Preussens Verfassung und Verwaltung im Urteil rheinischer Achtundvierziger (Bonn, 1912),Google Scholar and Heinzen, Die Preussische Bürokratie.

98. In this context O'Boyle, Leonore, “The Middle Class in Western Europe, 1815–1848”, American Historical Review, 72 (1966): 826–45CrossRefGoogle Scholar, contended that “an argument might be made that the bureaucracy remained the core of the ruling class in Germany up to 1917.” Ibid., 842.