The Sun.
London, England, 1863-09-30 00:00:00

of Germany into any war with Russia on account
of Poland, into which he has been from the first
resolved not to be himself dragged either. He there-
fore provides, in the first place, that if he is to tak"
any part in Federal Reform, it will be solely on the)
understanding that he is to have the power of clog-
ging the wheels of the Diet in any attempt which
they may _make to go to war with his brotbe
despot. This is the first of King William's condi-
tions, and the second is like unto it. It is that
Austria and Prussia are to hold a position of equal
dignity in the Diet, both as regards their relative
power and their nominal presidency over its sit-
tings. Here, however, we see a plausible -position
taken up. It is quite true that the King of Prussia
is not so powerful a Sovereign as the Emperor of
Austria, taking all their respective territories into
account. But, on the other hand, Prussia has an
actually greater humber of inhabitants within the
limits of the Confederation than Austria has. The
disproportion, to be sure, is not great, but it is
somewhat on the side of Prussia. Austria, how-
ever, has made from time to time very considerable
arrogations, on the ground of her traditionary
tenure of the imperial sceptre of Germany ; and
perhaps, when we consider that that dignity was,
after all, merely an elective one, though the House
of Hapsburg contrived to keep it for many gene-
rations in their own hands, the pretension was not
equal to the foundation for it, as applying to a
Germanic Confederation in which these imperial
distinctions of authority have now long ceased to
exist. But we do not apprehend that there is, on
the present occasion, any serious intention on the
part of Austria to claim a superior place in the Diet
to that which would be assigned to Prussia. The
Emperor of Austria, indeed, was offered the presi-
dency in the recent deliberation of the German
Princes, partly because the King of Prussia refused
to take part in them. Probably, if the Diet should
ever bo re-established on a new basis with the con-
currence of Prussia, the Austrian and Prussian
monarchs would divide the presidency between them
in alternate years. But the third condition made
by the King of Prussia of his acceptance of a Fede-
ral Reform comes with very indifferent grace from
such a quarter. The Austrian Emperor had pro-
posed that the Federal Chamber of Deputies should
be composed of delegates from the chambers of
each component State of the Federation. They
would, therefore, be indirectly elected by the Ger-
man people. One advantage of this scheme—and
it was no slight one—was that its adoption would
in a manner compel all the German Princes to adopt
representative government in their own States. For
it would be only through the existence of a Cham-
ber of Deputies in each State that that State could
become represented in the Third Estate of the Fede-
ration. But the King of Prussia requires that the
deputies, in place of being chosen thus, should be
directly elected by the German constituencies, and
should bear no relation whatever to the Chambers
of Deputies in each State of the Confederation.
This is no doubt, on the face of it, a much more
liberal proposition ; and it would be inconceivable
that it could represent the realopinions of the King
of Prussia as they are to be gathered from his
domestic policy. Such a body would at once as-
sume that the whole and direct popular authority
of Germany, and, the King of Prussia's life would
be spent in dissolving them. We have long enter-
tained a repugnance to indirect election as applied
to the House of Representatives in a simple State.
But in a Federal Government direct election is
nearly equivalent to a setting aside of the Lower
Chambers of the component States; and we believe
that such a principle could lead to little short of a
revival of the " Frankfort Parliament" of 1848,
and of all the antagonism between Kings and Com-
mons that ended in its destruction.