Hungarian Historical Review 12, no. 4 (2023): 740–744

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Die Protokolle des Cisleithanischen Ministerrates 1867–1918. Vol. 1,
1867. February 19, 1867–December 15, 1867. Edited by Stefan Malfèr.
With an introduction by Thomas Kletečka, Stefan Malfèr, and Anatol
Schmied-Kowarzik. Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie derWissenschaften, 2018; Die Protokolle des Cisleithanischen Ministerrates
1867–1918. Vol. II, 1868–1871. January 1–November 21, 1871.
Edited by Thomas Kletečka and Reichard Lein. Vienna: Verlag derÖsterreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2022; Die Protokolle
des Cisleithanischen Ministerrates 1867–1918. Vol. III, 1871–1879. Part1, November 25, 1871–April 23, 1872. Edited by Klaus Koch. Vienna:
Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 2022.
A few years ago, a project involving the publication of the minutes of theAustrian Council of Ministers between 1848 and 1867 wound to a close. Thiswas a major undertaking which spanned several decades and gave considerable
impetus to research on the history of the Habsburg Monarchy in the two decades
after 1848, both inside and outside the borders of Austria. Stefan Malfèr, whohas been organizing the series for the last few years, and Thomas Kletečka andAnatol Schmied-Kowarzik, the editors of the concluding volumes, have nowembarked with several new colleagues on a new venture which will give them agood opportunity to draw on their experience in publishing and their knowledgeof sources. They have undertaken the publication of the Austrian or, more
precisely, the Cisleithanian Council of Ministers’ minutes from 1867 to 1918,
which will come, according to the original plans, to eleven volumes.
The leaders of the project have adopted the structure of the previous series.
The precise texts of the minutes are supplemented by concise, informativenotes concerning antecedents to any given issue and the ways in which the issue
later played out. Each volume opens with a useful introduction touching on
the main items on the Council of Ministers’ agenda and providing backgroundinformation concerning the various issues. This is followed by a bibliography,
an index of abbreviations, an explanatory list of archaic terms and expressions,and a list of the people who took part in the deliberations of the Council of
Ministers as permanent members or invited deputies or experts. The appendix
contains a list of agendas for the meetings of the Council of Ministers and a
combined index of subjects and persons.
http://www.hunghist.org

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This series poses an unusual challenge to the editors, despite the knowledge
they have garnered over the decades and their experience in the world of source
publications. The minutes are both incomplete and damaged as a consequenceof the July Revolt of 1927, in the course of which the Vienna Palace of Justice
was set aflame. There are other sources on the deliberations of the Councilof Ministers, but for the most part they contain only the agenda items and thedecisions made by the monarch. It is therefore important that these sources beproperly annotated, supplemented with the necessary indexes, and published assoon as possible. Digital versions are being published as well, which will makeit possible to attach additional documents and do searches for specific itemsof content, while the printed versions of the texts will make them more easily
accessible and will ensure their long-term survival.
Three volumes in the series have been published so far. The 1867 minutes
were completely destroyed, so all texts in the first volume have been publishedon the basis of copies made before 1927 by Josef Redlich. The second volumecontains, for the most part, only the agenda items and the imperial decisions,as only 73 of the 618 minutes have survived, but fortunately, the minutes ofmeetings held under the chairmanship of Franz Joseph I at which important
political questions were addressed could be partially replaced with other sources.
With a few exceptions, the minutes from the period between April and August
1869 have survived, as have the minutes of meetings held in the autumn
months of 1871. The latter are particularly important from the perspectiveof the government deliberations led by the conservative Count Karl Sigmund
Hohenwart. The third volume, in contrast, for the most part contains minutesthat have survived in their entirety, even if in a badly damaged state and thus
with some missing passages. In only one case is the proceedings of a sitting
missing entirely.
The first volume provides important information first and foremost on thebackground events in Austria of the Compromise of 1867. The record also shedlight on how the politicians of the Austro-German liberal Constitutional Party
were able to use their otherwise limited room for maneuver to push throughsome of their political demands for the further development of a constitutional
state, which in the preceding years had been effectively hindered by the stubborn
resistance of the ruler and his narrow circle of advisers.
The second volume shows how, within the legal framework created by theso-called December Constitution of 1867, the liberal state institutions of thenew dual state were created by the so-called “Bürgerministerium”, the only

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government in the history of the Monarchy that could call itself the governmentof the parliamentary majority. We also see how the opposing political parties
tried to make the framework of the constitution more precise and also toexpand it. The Austro-German liberal “constitutionalist” group pushed formore centralization, while the federalist camp, which in the center of the empire
was largely conservative-aristocratic but had a much more diverse politicalprofile in the provinces, sought to broaden provincial autonomy. The December
Constitution contained both centralist and federalist elements, which gave both
camps hope for further development. One can see very clearly how this led tofluctuations in the positions adopted by the imperial government. The minutes
also make it possible to trace the history of the efforts to achieve a Bohemiancompromise in the summer and autumn of 1871, which were initiated by andhad the support of Emperor Franz Joseph, but which ultimately foundered.
The arguments made by Austrian politicians, financiers, the Imperial Chancellor
Count Beust, and Hungarian politicians both for and against the BohemianCompromise are discussed in detail.
The third volume marks a return to a policy of centralization after thefailure of this last great experiment in constitutional law. This move to achieve
stabilization proved successful in the short term, but the fundamental politicalfault lines remained unchanged beneath the surface of daily political practice.
In addition to the discussions of the major political breaking points ofthe time, the royal statements found in the minutes are also very important,since they are virtually the only contemporary sources from which we can learn
about Emperor Franz Joseph’s personal political positions. We see, for example,
how he interpreted his role as a constitutional monarch and how he continued
to play a decisive role in crucial political issues. He treated the legislature andthe executive as centers of power that were independent of each other andhad different responsibilities and prerogatives. He also consistently rejected
the notion that the government was a political body subordinate to the will ofparliament. On the contrary, he saw the relationship between the two as quite
the reverse. For instance, when, in early 1872, at the start of the new session of
the Cisleithanian parliament, the Reichsrat, the pro-government majority in thelower house of parliament included questions in its submissions that were notpart of the announced government program, Franz Joseph declared that theReichsrat majority, if it wanted to dictate the direction the government would take,misunderstood entirely what it meant to be a “government party.” The emperor
also expected his ministers to ensure that, on an important political issue (such742

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as the Galician compromise), members of the government could guarantee inadvance the adoption of a government bill in both houses of the Reichsrat.
During the period of the “Bürgerministerium”, however, he saw himself as being
held in the crosshairs by parliament and a government that consisted for themost part of politicians who relied on the parliamentary majority, whereas in hisassessment, the government, as the executive power, should have regarded him
as its primary point of orientation. He was thus compelled to sanction bills withwhich he did not agree, first and foremost legislation concerning the relationshipbetween the Catholic Church and the state. As he stated in January 1872, he
was determined to prevent a repetition of this, and beginning in April 1870, he
consistently appointed a government of bureaucrats and experts who were far
removed from parliamentary party politics. Francis Joseph’s conception of theconstitutional role of the monarch would in the long term be a determining
factor in domestic political processes in Cisleithania.
Franz Joseph also considered the rigid centralism of the Austro-German
liberal camp an obstacle. As the minutes clearly show, in the case of Hungary,
the Compromise of 1867 consolidated political relations for a time, if perhaps
with minor changes, but in the other half of the empire, it took years to achieve
comparable consolidation. Before the summer of 1867, the political forces inAustria had had no opportunity to exert any real influence on the transformationof public law in the empire, so the discussion of political conflicts, now within
the framework of the constitutional compromise reached by the emperor andthe Hungarian political elite, took part in parallel with the enactment of theDecember Constitution. It was a personal matter for Franz Joseph to force theAustro-German liberal camp to compromise, even at the cost of “reconciliation”(Versöhnung) with the Polish nationalist movement in Galicia and the Czech
nationalist movement in Bohemia, which meant extending provincial autonomy.
But he was not willing to repeat the way he had forced the agreement he hadreached with the Hungarian political elite on Austrian politicians. Presumably, hesaw the limits that had been placed on his power as too high a price to pay. The
Czech politicians clearly would have expected this of him, as they overestimatedtheir political weight, unlike the Polish leaders in Galicia, who, by limiting theirdemands, eventually won significant concessions on state rights and language
use and thus contributed significantly to political consolidation that lasted fornearly a decade.
The new series thus makes available indispensable sources on the politicalconditions of the early years of the Dualist Era and, indeed, the entire history743

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BOOK REVIEWSof the Austro-Hungarian Monarchy. Hopefully, it will give a similar boost to
research on the history of the Habsburg Monarchy in the last half century of its
existence as the publication of documents from 1849 to 1867 did for researchon the post-1848 decades a few years ago.
Ágnes Deák
University of Szeged
deakagnes@yahoo.com

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