Frederick William’s IV coming to the throne was cheered by the population at large. It was to be a new era, of which they had great expectations. And Frederick William’s first actions seemed to bear out these expectations. Ernst Moritz Arndt was restored to his chair at the University of Bonn, the police supervision of Jahn was lifted, the Brothers Grimm were called to be members of the Prussian Academy of Sciences and Alexander von Humboldt appointed state councilor.
Frederick William IV completely reversed Frederick William III’s Polish policy, that is to say that policy inaugurated after the Polish rising in 1831. Flottwell, the Oberprasident in Posen for the past 10 years, was transferred in 1841 to Saxony; the policy of Germanizaiton ceased. In 1841 Frederick William IV declared in Posen that he loved all his subjects equally, irrespective of whether they spoke German, Walloon, Lithuanian or Polish. They were all children of Prussia, and under his rule no nationality should suffer any disadvantage. All civil suits in the courts had now to be conducted in the language of the plaintiff, all official decrees had to be accompanied by a Polish translation. The Catholic archbishop of Gnesen, a true Polish patriot, appeared to be the political leader and the ultimate arbiter rather than the representative of the Prussian civil service. But instead of winning the loyalty of his Polish subjects by these measures, in an age of national awareness Frederick William found that the Poles interpreted the concessions as no more than signs of weakness at the centre of the Prussian state.
The King could no longer resist political and economic pressure and on 3 February 1847 published a decree which called into being a Prussian diet, the United Diet, while still maintaining the United Committees as well as a permanent Delegation for the State Debts responsible, naturally enough, for the state debts. The United Diet was to meet as often as the requirements of the state called for it, such as when there was a need for new loans, the introduction of new taxes or the increase of existing taxation. The United Committees were, in the absence of the United Diet, to meet every four years. Both diets and committees had the right to agree to or to refuse loans and taxation as well at to participate in the legislative process, but only as inasmuch as did the provincial diets already. This of course meant that as far as legislation was concerned their function was still restricted to a purely advisory and consultative role. While the United Diet was to represent the three estates, the higher nobility such as princes were to deliberate separately as a kind of upper house, the Herrenhaus.
Frederick William’s IV’s proclamation of 18 March coincided with the diet of the German Confederation recommending to its member states the liberty of the press and the adoption of the colors of black, red, and gold as German national colors.
When on the morning of 19 March 1948, news arrived that several barricades had been cleared, the King ordered that troops should be withdrawn wherever the barricades had been removed. Confusion ensued, resulting in a total withdrawal of the troops that left the King alone in the palace without any military protection. The masses followed close on the heels of the withdrawing troops into the city, and the military party, as a rejoiner to the King’s refusal to take its advice, decided to let him stew in his own juice.
As by the autumn of 1848 the revolutionary fervor had begun to evaporate and it became apparent that he discussions about a Prussian constitution had brought forth little that was of any practical use, Prussia’s conservatives began to reassemble and form the Conservative Political Party. On 5 December 1848, Frederick William imposed his constitution upon Prussia. The method again rejected the principle of popular sovereignty; again it was a reform from above, a reform which included many features which liberals had been demanding for decades. General and representative elections were planned and two chambers were to convene to discuss the final version of the constitution. But the full executive powers of the crown were retained, though within a framework of constitutional limitations. A vital feature omitted from the constitution was that the armed forces should be sworn in on it; a clause was included which stipulated that civil servants should swear loyalty and obedience to the King. The German revolution came to end on 17 May 1848 after Frederick William declined the title of emperor from the Frankfurt parliament.
After Frederick William IV dissolved the Prussian diet in 1849, conservative voices in Prussia could be heard calling for the complete abolition of the constitution, but Frederick William wisely decided to retain it and, with a newly elected diet, to revise it. The revision was carried out with liberal support, and replaced universal franchise, the achievement of 1848, with the three class franchise. For the time being this ensured a conservative majority in the diet. This return to conservative domination had been inaugurated the year before by a publicly little-noticed measure affecting the judiciary in Prussia.
On 31 January 1850 Frederick William IV had accepted the revised constitution and sworn an oath to it. executive power, appointment of ministers, supreme command of the armed forces and the conduct of foreign policy remained in his hands. The three-class franchise was converted into a system of equal representations for all three classes, which meant that the small group of rich tax payers had the same number of representatives as the bulk of the people in the third class. For instance in 1852 the Conservatives, representing the land-owners, had 196 deputies, while the opposition, representing the bulk of Prussia’s population, had 152 deputies. The Conservatives, however, did not represent a homogeneous group and those from Prussia’s Rhenish provinces in particular, under the leadership of the Bonn jurist August von Bethmann Hollweg, shared many of the views of the liberals, especially the desire for German unification. Prussia’s neutrality during the Crimean War prevented it from becoming a global war. Frederich Julius Stahl defended Prussia’s policy of neutrality in the Prussian diet:
‘I and my friends wish for Prussia’s non-participation in the present conflict and desire that out old relationship with Russia is preserved without hostility towards the western powers. I must reject outright the so-called European standpoint in judging this question, because in the final analysis this standpoint is that of England and France or of Russia. I vindicate our right to judge solely and alone from a Prussian, from the German standpoint. We do not want to serve Russian interests – but neither do we wish to support the rivalries of the western powers and their view of the condition of Europe. We are not very anxious for a European concert in which England and France lead the orchestra while the Germans are the musicians. It is not in Prussia’s interest that Russia enlarges her power, but it is the self-evident interest of Prussia and Germany that Russia’s present position of power remains, along with her existing relationship with Prussia. Frederick William IV died in 1861.