When was the dismissal of bismarck

Bismarck and the Emperor. The North American Review , , Seligmann, M. Germany from Reich to Republic Basingstoke: Macmillan. Reblogged this on cannitohistory. You are commenting using your WordPress. You are commenting using your Google account. You are commenting using your Twitter account.

You are commenting using your Facebook account. Notify me of new comments via email. Notify me of new posts via email. German History since London: Arnold. Joll, J. Europe since London: Penguin. Lerman, K. Bismarck: Profiles in Power. Harlow: Pearson Education. Merriman, J. A History of Modern Europe 3rd Edition ed. Mommsen, W. Imperial Germany Deveson, Trans. Retallack, J. Oxford University Press. Roberts, J. Europe Harlow: Longman. The wording of the document whose perusal the Kaiser insisted upon, literally with his own hands, was undoubtedly extremely displeasing to him, and was intended to be so.

He rose, and offered me his hand--in which he was holding his helmet--more coldly than usual. I accompanied him to the outer steps before the door of the house. He was just about to step into the carriage before the eyes of the servants when he sprang up the steps again and shook my hand vigorously. While already the Kaiser's whole attitude toward me could only produce the impression that he wanted to disgust me with the service and increase my ill humor to the point of seeking to resign, yet I believe that his fully justified irritation concerning the affronts [contained in the reports] Even if the change in the Kaiser's methods, and in his consideration for me, had not been intended, as I had incidentally supposed, to determine how long my nerves would hold out, it was nevertheless quite in the monarchical tradition that the bearer should be the first to suffer for the insult which might be contained in a message for the King.

History ancient and modern contains examples of messengers who were sacrificed to the royal anger on account of the contents of messages of which they were not the authors At the close of the discussion I asked His Majesty whether he insisted upon expressly ordering me to withdraw the order of , on which the position of the prime minister depended.

The answer was a curt "Yes. I was even then convinced that I should not have to assume the initiative, and therewith the responsibility, for my retirement. On the following morning, the 17th of March, [Chief of the Military Cabinet Wilhelm von] Hahnke returned, in order regretfully to inform me that His Majesty insisted on the revocation of the order, and was expecting, from the report which he, Hahnke, had given him of his conversation with me on the previous day, that I should forthwith hand in my resignation.

I was to go to the palace in the afternoon, in order to take it myself. I replied that I was not well enough to do so and would write On the afternoon of the 18th of March I sent in my resignation. My draft of this resignation ran as follows: [14]. Now that I am sure that Your Majesty does not require these, I am able to retire from public life without the fear that my decision will be condemned as untimely by public opinion.

With deep emotion I have perceived, from your request of the 18th, that you are determined to retire from the offices which you have filled for many years with incomparable results. I had hoped that I should not be obliged to consider more closely the idea of parting with you in our lifetime.

If I am none the less compelled, in the full consciousness of the grievous importance of your retirement, to familiarize myself with this idea, I do it indeed with an afflicted heart, but in the confident expectation that the granting of your request will contribute toward sparing and preserving your life-- irreplaceable to the Fatherland--and your energies, as long as possible.

The motives of your resolve which you have put forward convince me that further attempts to persuade you to take back your offer would have no prospect of success. I therefore respond to your wish, in that I herewith grant you the requested discharge from our offices I have regarded it as one of the most merciful dispensations of my life that I had you beside me, as my first adviser, at the time when I succeeded to the government. But even abroad your wise and energetic peace policy, which I, too, am resolved, in future and out of complete conviction, to make the pattern of my own dealings, will always be recollected with glorious approbation.

To reward your service adequately is not within my power. I must in this connection be satisfied with assuring you of my and the Fatherland's imperishable gratitude. As a token of this gratitude I confer upon you the dignity of a Duke of Lauenburg. I will also have my life-size portrait sent to you. God bless you, my dear Prince, and grant you yet many years of an untroubled old age, illumined by the consciousness of duty loyally accomplished.

With these sentiments I remain, in the future also, in loyalty bound, your grateful Kaiser and King, Wilhelm, I. He published his memoirs from exile after reading the long-suppressed third volume of Bismarck's Gedanken und Erinnerungen. One of his clear intentions is to undo some of the damage done by the chancellor's effective attack on his character.

He portrays the old man as hopelessly out of touch with the will of the new Germany, especially in naval and colonial matters, autocratic in his dealings with others, even Wilhelm I, and not nearly as trusted by the high and the mighty as he thought he was.

On the other hand, he, Wilhelm, had been long suffering, loyal, hard-working, and modest in his dealing with the chancellor. Although extremely ill-used, he bore no grudges. Translated by Thomas R. Prince Bismarck's greatness as a statesman and his imperishable services to Prussia and Germany are historical facts of such tremendous significance that there is doubtless no man in existence, whatever his party affiliations, who would dare to place them in question.

For this very reason alone it is stupid to accuse me of not having recognized the greatness of Prince Bismarck. The opposite is the truth. I revered and idolized him. Nor could it be otherwise.

It should be borne in mind with what generation I grew up--the generation of the devotees of Bismarck. He was the creator of the German Empire, the paladin of my grandfather, and all of us considered him the greatest statesman of his day and were proud that he was a German.

Bismarck was the idol of my temple, whom I worshiped. But monarchs also are human beings of flesh and blood, hence they, too, are exposed to the influences emanating from the conduct of others; therefore, looking at the matter from a human point of view, one will understand how Prince Bismarck, by his fight against me, himself destroyed, with heavy blows, the idol of which I have spoken.

But my reverence for Bismarck, the great statesman, remained unaltered. While I was still Prince of Prussia I often thought to myself: "I hope that the great Chancellor will live for many years yet, since I should be safe if I could govern with him.

Even the Congress of Berlin in was, to my way of thinking, a mistake, likewise the "Kulturkampf. Then came the labor-protective legislation. For this reason I could not wage the open warfare against the Social Democrats which the Prince desired.

Nevertheless, this quarrel about political measures cannot lessen my admiration for the greatness of Bismarck as a statesman; he remains the creator of the German Empire, and surely no one man need have done more for his country than that The tragic element for me, in the Bismarck case, lay in the fact that I became the successor of my grandfather--in other words, that I skipped one generation, to a certain extent.

And that is a serious thing. In such a case one is forced to deal constantly with old deserving men, who live more in the past than in the present, and cannot grow into the future. When the grandson succeeds his grandfather and finds a revered but old statesman of the stature of Bismarck, it is not a piece of good luck for him, as one might suppose, and I, in fact, supposed.

Bismarck himself points that out in the third volume of his memoirs p. I feel no grudge against him for the third volume of his reminiscences.

I released this volume after I had sought and obtained my rights. To withhold the volume any longer would have been pointless, since the main contents had become known already through indiscretions; were this not true, there might have been varying opinions as to the advisability in the choice of the time for publication. Bismarck would turn over in his grave if he could know at what time the third volume appeared, and what consequences it had.

I should be honestly grieved if the third volume had damaged the memory of the great Chancellor, because Bismarck is one of the heroic figures whom the German people need for their regeneration. My gratitude and reverence for the great Chancellor cannot be impaired or extinguished by the third volume nor by anything else whatever.

In the first half of the 'eighties I had been summoned to the Foreign Office at the behest of Prince Bismarck I won the confidence of the Prince, who consulted me about many things. For instance, when the Prince brought about the first German colonial acquisitions [in Africa], I informed him, at his wish, concerning the state of mind created in the public and the navy by this move, and described to him the enthusiasm with which the German people had hailed the new road.

The Prince remarked that the matter hardly deserved this. Later on I spoke often with the Prince about the colonial question and always found in him the intention to utilize the colonies as commercial objects, or objects for swapping purposes, other than to make them useful to the fatherland or utilize them as sources of raw materials. As was my duty, I called the Prince's attention to the fact that merchants and capitalists were beginning energetically to develop the colonies and that, therefore--as I had learned from Hanseatic circles--they counted upon protection from a navy.

For this reason, I pointed out that steps must be taken for getting a fleet constructed in time, in order that German assets in foreign lands should not be without protection; that, since the Prince had unfurled the German flag in foreign parts, and the people stood behind it, there must also be a navy behind it.

But the Prince turned a deaf ear to my statements and made use of his pet motto: "If the English should land on our soil, I shall have them arrested. The political interest of the Prince was, in fact, concentrated essentially upon continental Europe; England lay somewhat to one side among the cares that burdened him daily, all the more so since Salisbury stood well with him and had, in the name of England, hailed with satisfaction the Double i.

The Prince worked primarily with Russia, Austria, Italy, and Romania, whose relations toward Germany and one another he constantly watched over. As to the prudence and skill with which he acted, Emperor Wilhelm the Great once made a pointed remark to von Albedyll, his chief of Cabinet.

The General found His Majesty much excited after a talk with Bismarck, to such an extent that he feared for the health of the old Emperor. He remarked, therefore, that His Majesty should avoid similar worry in the future; that, if Bismarck was unwilling to do as His Majesty wished, His Majesty should dismiss him. Whereupon the Emperor replied that, despite his admiration and gratitude toward the great Chancellor, he had already thought of dismissing him since the self-conscious attitude of the Prince became at times too oppressive.

But both he and the country needed Bismarck too badly. Bismarck was the one man who could juggle five balls of which at least two were always in the air. That trick, added the Emperor, was beyond his own powers Despite considerable differences in our opinions, Prince Bismarck remained friendly and kindly disposed to me, and, despite the great difference in our ages, [16] a pleasant relationship grew up between us, since I, in common with all those of my generation, was an ardent admirer of the Prince and had won his trust by my zeal and frankness--nor have I ever betrayed that trust My assignment at the Foreign Office brought a very unpleasant happening in its wake.

My parents were not very friendly toward Prince Bismarck and looked with disfavor upon the fact that their son had entered into the Prince's circle. There was fear of my becoming influenced against my parents, of ultraconservatism, of all sorts of perils, which all sorts of tale bearers from England and "liberal circles," who rallied around my father, imputed against me.

I never bothered my head with all this nonsense, but my position in the house of my parents was rendered much more difficult for me and, at times, painful. Through my work under Prince Bismarck and the confidence reposed in me--often subjected to the severest tests--I have had to suffer much in silence for the sake of the Chancellor; he, however, apparently took this quite as a matter of course Upon my return from Constantinople in I described to the Prince at his request my impressions of Greece, where my sister Sophie was married to the heir-apparent, Crown Prince Constantine, and also my Constantinople impressions.

In doing this, it struck me that Prince Bismarck spoke quite disdainfully of Turkey, of the men in high position there, and of conditions in that land.

I thought I might inspire him in part with essentially more favorable opinions, but my efforts were of little avail. Upon asking the Prince the reason why he held such an unfavorable opinion, he answered that Count Herbert [Bismarck] had reported very disapprovingly on Turkey.

Prince Bismarck and Count Herbert were never favorably inclined toward Turkey and they never agreed with me in my Turkish policy--the old policy of Frederick the Great. During the last period of his tenure of office as Chancellor, Bismarck declared that the maintenance of friendly relations with Russia, whose Tsar [Alexander III] reposed special trust in him, was the most important reason for his remaining at his post. In this connection it was that he gave me the first hints concerning the secret reinsurance treaty with Russia.

When I was Prince Wilhelm, I was placed for a long time under the Chief President of the Province of Brandenburg, [Heinrich] von Achenbach [], in order that I might learn about home administration, get experience in economic questions, and, moreover, take an active part in the work.

Spurred on by the captivating discourses of Achenbach, I derived from this period of my life a special interest in the economic side of the inner development of the country, whereas the purely judicial side of the administration interested me to a lesser degree. Improvements, canal construction, highway building, forestry, improvement in all kinds of transportation facilities, betterment of dwellings, introduction of machines into agriculture and their cooperative development--all of these were matters with which I busied myself later on; this being especially true of hydraulic work and the development of the network of railways, particularly in the badly neglected territory of eastern Germany.

I discussed all these matters with the ministers of state after I had ascended the throne. In order to spur them on, I allowed them free rein in their various domains. But it turned out that this was hardly possible so long as Prince Bismarck remained in office, since he reserved for himself the main deciding voice in everything, thereby impairing the independence of those working with him.

I soon saw that the ministers, being entirely under Bismarck's thumb, could not come out in favor of "innovations" or ideas of the "young master" of which Bismarck disapproved. The ministry, in short, was nothing but a tool in the hands of Bismarck, acting solely in accordance with his wishes. This state of things was, in itself, natural enough, since a premier of such overwhelming importance, who had won for Prussia and Germany such great political victories, naturally dominated his ministers completely and led them despotically.

Nevertheless, I found myself in a difficult position; the typical answer with which my suggestions were met was: "Prince Bismarck does not want that done; we cannot get him to consent to that; Emperor Wilhelm I would not have asked such a thing; that is not in accordance with tradition, etc. Here is an example to show the attitude of the cabinet toward me in those Bismarck days: The question came up of renewing the [Anti-] Socialist Law, a political measure devised by Prince Bismarck for fighting socialism.

A certain paragraph therein was to be toned down, in order to save the law. There were sharp differences of opinion. I summoned a crown council. Bismarck spoke in the antechamber with my adjutant; he declared that His Majesty completely forgot that he was an officer and wore a sword belt; that he must fall back upon the army and lead it against the socialists, in case the socialists should resort to revolutionary measures; that the Emperor should leave him a free hand, which would restore quiet once for all.

At the crown council Bismarck stuck to his opinion. The individual ministers, when asked to express their views, were lukewarm. A vote was taken--the entire ministry voted against me. This vote showed me once more the absolute domination exerted by the Chancellor over his ministers.

Deeply dissatisfied, I talked over the matter with Lucanus looked up some of the gentlemen and took them to task for their attitude, whereupon they made it clear that they were "not in a position" to oppose the Prince, and declared that it was quite impossible for anybody to expect them to vote against the wishes of the Prince.

The great Westphalian coal workers' strike in the spring of took the civil administration by surprise, causing great confusion and bewilderment, especially among members of the Westphalian provincial administration. From all sides came calls for troops; every mine owner wanted, if possible, to have sentries posted outside his room. The commanders of the troops which were summoned immediately made reports on the situation as they had found it.

I decided that in so doing guiding principles and material were to be acquired which would serve the Chancellor and the Prussian government as a basis for working out appropriate projects for new laws. I stuck to my ideas Authors Authors and affiliations A. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves. This is a preview of subscription content, log in to check access.

Meyer, Mitteleuropa in German Thought and Action, — , p. Google Scholar. Langer, p. Dawson, Evolution of Modern Germany , p. Clapham, Economic Development of France and Germany, — , p.

Ritter, p. See also N.