Question

Discuss the event of frankfurt parliament

Answer 1

Early in 1848 several outbreaks of revolution had caused the French King Louis Phillippe to abdicate (25th February) and Metternich, the chief minister of the Habsburg Monarchy and architect of a system of restored monarchical government in Europe since before the fall of Napoleon (1815), had been driven into exile. 

In these times in the diverse states of Germany several rulers were faced with respectful, yet determined, demands for change and, starting with Baden in early March, moved to award Constitutions or to allow liberalisation of existing Constitutions. On the 16th of March barricades were raised in Berlin, the capital of the Prussian Kingdom. Prussia was then ruled by King Frederick William IV who was anti-liberal and had famously said at the opening of an 'United Diet' of his territories in 1847, the first advisory assembly that any Prussian monarch had been prepared to recognise, that:

After an incident precipitated street fighting the King withdrew his soldiers rather than see even more fatalities amongst his "beloved Berliners" and was subsequently called upon by the populace on the 19th to stand bareheaded whilst the earthly remains of those Berliners killed in the street fighting were paraded with their wounds exposed. The King formalised a change in political direction through the appointment of a new ministry and proclamation issued on the morning of the 21st announced that the King had placed himself at the head of the German nation and would appear that day in his capital wearing "old German" colours. 
These black, red, and gold colours were at one and the same time "revolutionary" in being associated with contemporary German Liberalism and Nationalism having been adopted by "patriotic" Germany in the days of the Wars of Liberation against Napoleon but were also thought of as being associated with the earlier "Holy Roman Empire of the German Nation," (which had been discontinued as a result of a dramatic reorganisation of the Germanies that had been sponsored by Napoleon at thre height of his power). 
During his progess through the streets of Berlin the King was occasionally hailed as Emperor but he felt moved to assert that he intended to rob no German prince of his sovereignty. 
A manifesto was issued towards evening which sought to sum up up the position being adopted:- 
 
In the unsettled and challenging times invitations sent out by a self-appointed group of liberals based in Heidelberg led to the convening, in Frankfurt on the 30th March, of a preparatory parliament ( Vorparlament ) which, at the close of five days in session, recognised a fifty member committee as being responsible for the organisation of processes of election to a German National Assembly which was projected to convene in Frankfurt in May. 
At the time of the Heidelberg meeting although aspirations for various forms of political change were being widely voiced all the traditional states of the German Confederation were still actually in being!!! 

During these times the Federal Diet of the German Confederation was debating processes of election towards reaching decisions about the future of the Germanies but, in the event, it decided that it was not to be the authority behind such decisions and effectively endorsed the elective programme of the Vorparlament on the 7th April thus consigning itself to a position of political obscurity. 

Some time after May 18th when the German National Assembly held its first meetings in the Paulskirche (St. Paul's Church) in Frankfurt-am-Main the Confederal Diet formally dissolved itself. Although the traditional states of the German Confederation continued to exist - with their own local forms of princely or ecclesiatical state government as perhaps recently modified by the recent upsurge in political and constitutional aspiration - at the end of May the Frankfurt Parliament declared that the Constitution it was in the process of framing would be sovereign over all the governments of the former German Confederation. The Frankfurt Parliament further maintained that any legislation passed by princely or ecclesiatical state governments would only be valid if consistent with the new constitution which would be based 'on the will and election of the German people, to found the unity and political liberty of Germany'. 

Like the French in 1789, and indeed the Americans and British in earlier times of crisis and change, the Frankfurt Parliament now also gave a very great deal of its attention to questions of basic law in relation to citizenship endeavouring to frame a "Declaration of the Fundamental Rights of the German People." 

Liberals in Western Europe had long deplored the condition of Poland being maintained principally under the repressive sovereignty of the Tsar but also, in the case of the Grand Duchy of Posen, under the rather more liberal sovereignty of the Prussian King. 

Answer 2

Answer:

The Frankfurt Parliament: It was an all-German National Assembly formed by the middle-class professionals, businessmen and prosperous artisans belonging to the different German regions.

It was convened on 18 May 1848 in the Church of St. Paul, in the city of Frankfurt. This assembly drafted a constitution for the German nation to be headed by a monarchy subject to a parliament.

After long and controversial debates, the assembly produced the so-called Frankfurt Constitution which proclaimed a German Empire based on the principles of parliamentary democracy.

However, it faced opposition from the aristocracy and military. Also, as it was dominated by the middle classes who resisted the demands of workers and artisans and consequently lost their support. In the end, it was forced to disband on 31 May 1849.