Enquiry Frame and Chronology

The official Edexcel row asks you to connect four strands:

• Prussia's role in Germany in 1866-67, including the Treaty of Prague, annexations, the North German Confederation, relations with the south German states, the Zollparlament, and Bismarck's relationship with the National Liberals.
• Prussia's relations with France in 1866-70, especially Napoleon III, Bismarck, the Luxemburg Crisis, the Hohenzollern candidature, the Ems Telegram, the outbreak of war, and the international situation in 1870.
• The significance of the Franco-Prussian War, including nationalism, Bismarck's position, the creation of the German Empire, and the Treaty of Frankfurt.
• The reasons for Prussia's success: Bismarck, military strength, economic factors, German nationalism, and international circumstances.

The main argument is that Prussia succeeded because it combined state power, national language, military readiness, economic leverage, and diplomatic timing. None of these factors worked alone. Nationalism gave Bismarck useful language, but Prussian armies and institutions made it practical. Military victories changed what was possible, but Bismarck's diplomacy shaped the settlement. Economic ties pulled German states together, but they did not by themselves overcome south German particularism.

For a Paper 2 essay, avoid a simple story of "Bismarck planned everything and won". A stronger answer asks how far each crisis widened Prussia's control, how far Germany remained federal and particularist, and why France's defeat solved problems that the 1866 settlement had left unresolved.

The 1866-67 Settlement

The Treaty of Prague, signed on 23 August 1866, ended the Austro-Prussian War. It mattered because it removed the old political framework. The German Confederation, created in 1815 and traditionally influenced by Austria, was dissolved. Austria accepted that Prussia could reorganise Germany north of the River Main. This was the foundation of the Kleindeutschland solution: Austria was not destroyed, but it was pushed outside the new German political structure.

Bismarck's restraint towards Austria was important. Some Prussian military figures wanted a harsher settlement, but Bismarck preferred to avoid turning Austria into a permanent enemy. Austria lost influence in Germany, not its existence as a great power. That made future Austrian revenge less likely and helped keep other powers from treating Prussia as a revolutionary threat to the whole European order.

Prussia was much less restrained towards several north German opponents. It annexed Hanover, Electoral Hesse (Hesse-Kassel), Nassau, Frankfurt, Schleswig and Holstein. These annexations did three things:

• They joined Prussia's eastern and western territories more effectively, strengthening its strategic position between the Rhineland and the old Prussian core.
• They punished states that had backed Austria or resisted Prussia.
• They increased Prussia's population, resources and representation inside any new German institutions.

The North German Confederation then gave legal form to Prussian power. It began as a military alliance in 1866 and became a federal state in 1867. Its constitution was adopted by the North German Constituent Reichstag on 16 April 1867 and came into force on 1 July. It contained twenty-two states north of the Main, but Prussia dominated it. The king of Prussia held the federal presidency. Bismarck was both Prussian minister-president and federal chancellor. The Bundesrat represented state governments, and Prussia held 17 of 43 votes, enough to block constitutional change even without an outright majority.

At the same time, the Confederation was not simply Prussia with new flags. It had a Reichstag elected by universal male suffrage for men aged 25 and above. This gave national politics a mass electoral dimension and allowed liberals to argue that unification was not just dynastic conquest. Yet the executive was not made responsible to parliament. Bismarck's design balanced popular nationalism and federal forms with Prussian monarchical control.

South Germany remained the obvious problem. Bavaria, Wurttemberg, Baden and the southern part of Hesse-Darmstadt did not enter the North German Confederation. The Treaty of Prague allowed them to form a separate south German union, and many southern rulers and Catholics feared Prussian militarism, Protestant dominance and higher taxes. However, a south German bloc did not become effective. Bavaria, Wurttemberg, Baden and Hesse-Darmstadt had their own rivalries, and several preferred a cautious relationship with Prussia to dependence on Bavaria or isolation in Europe.

Bismarck used that opening. He concluded secret defensive alliances with the south German states in 1866. In a defensive war, their armies would serve under Prussian command. This was not full unification, but it meant that France could not easily attack Prussia without turning the conflict into a wider German war.

Liberals, Economics and the Zollparlament

The settlement after 1866 depended on more than treaties and soldiers. Bismarck also needed political cooperation inside the new order. The key group was the National Liberals, formed in 1867 by liberals who were willing to work with Bismarck because he seemed to be achieving national unity. Many had been uneasy about his earlier defiance of the Prussian parliament during the army conflict, but after victory over Austria they chose compromise. Their calculation was that a Prussian-led national state might later be made more liberal from within.

The bargain suited Bismarck. The National Liberals gave parliamentary support and national respectability to a constitution that still preserved monarchical executive power. They helped pass laws that integrated the new federation, while Bismarck accepted enough parliamentary participation to keep liberal nationalists inside the system. This was a partnership, not a liberal triumph. Bismarck used nationalism and elections, but he did not concede responsible government.

Economic integration also mattered. The Zollverein had long linked many German states through customs policy under Prussian leadership. After 1866 it had to be reorganised because the old political framework had collapsed. In July 1867 the customs union was reformed with a Zollbundesrat and a Zollparlament. The Zollparlament brought together the North German Reichstag and 85 deputies from the south German states. It opened in 1868 and eventually had 382 deputies.

The Zollparlament was significant because it crossed the Main line without formally annexing the south. Through customs, trade law, weights and measures, and economic regulation, it made north and south Germany work together in practical ways. It strengthened the Kleindeutsch route because it accustomed the south to institutions linked to Prussian-led Germany.

Its limits are just as important. The south German elections to the Zollparlament did not produce simple enthusiasm for Bismarck. Many southern representatives were particularist, Catholic or anti-Prussian. The Zollparlament could bind economies together, but it could not make Bavaria or Wurttemberg emotionally ready to surrender sovereignty. Economic factors were therefore enabling conditions: they made unity easier and more useful, but they did not complete it. The war against France did what customs politics alone could not do.

For source evaluation, a National Liberal programme is useful evidence for the hopes of moderate liberal nationalists: unity, law, freedom and a stronger Reichstag. Its limitation is that it does not show the fears of southern Catholics, conservatives or democrats who saw the new Germany as Prussian and militarised. A source from Bismarck or Prussian government circles is useful for state strategy, but it may underplay how much negotiation and resistance remained.

France and the Road to War

Prussia's relations with France between 1866 and 1870 were shaped by the fact that Napoleon III had gained little from Prussia's victory over Austria. France had stayed neutral in 1866, but Prussia's reward was enormous: Austria was excluded from Germany, Prussia annexed territory, and the North German Confederation changed the European balance of power. Napoleon III now looked as if he had allowed a stronger neighbour to appear on the Rhine without securing compensation.

The Luxemburg Crisis of 1867 showed this tension. Napoleon III tried to acquire Luxemburg from William III of the Netherlands. Luxemburg had a German-speaking population, a strategic fortress, and a Prussian garrison. When the issue became public, German opinion reacted angrily and Bismarck could present France as grasping and threatening. The crisis was settled by the Treaty of London in May 1867: Luxemburg was neutralised, its fortress was to be dismantled, and the Prussian garrison withdrew. France had not gained Luxemburg, and Prussia had not had to fight. The deeper significance was that public nationalism now made Franco-Prussian bargaining more explosive.

The crisis also revealed Bismarck's timing. In 1867, Prussia had not yet fully consolidated the north and might have faced a wider European reaction if it rushed into war. Bismarck did not need war immediately. He needed a situation in which France would look aggressive, the south German states would honour their defensive treaties, and other European powers would remain neutral.

That situation emerged in 1870 through the Spanish succession crisis. After revolution in Spain, Prince Leopold of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen became a candidate for the Spanish throne. France feared a Hohenzollern on its southern frontier as well as Prussian power on its eastern frontier. Leopold withdrew on 12 July 1870, which could have ended the crisis. French ministers then demanded a further guarantee from King William I that no Hohenzollern candidate would ever be supported again. The French ambassador, Count Benedetti, approached William at Ems on 13 July.

William refused the further demand politely, but Bismarck edited and published the report of the meeting in a sharper form: the Ems Telegram or Ems Dispatch. The edited version made both sides appear insulted. In Paris it strengthened those who wanted war; in Germany it made France appear arrogant. France declared war on Prussia on 19 July 1870.

That sequence mattered because it shaped the international situation. France had declared war, so Bismarck could frame the conflict as defensive. The south German alliances now operated in Prussia's favour. Britain cared above all about Belgian neutrality and was suspicious of French ambitions after earlier talk of compensation. Russia did not support France and had reasons to welcome a crisis that distracted Europe from the Black Sea restrictions imposed after the Crimean War. Austria-Hungary disliked Prussia's rise but was not ready to risk a new war, especially without reliable French success or Russian support. Italy stayed neutral and was absorbed by the Roman Question. France therefore entered the war with weak alliances, while Prussia entered it with a German coalition.

War, Nationalism and Empire

The Franco-Prussian War transformed the political meaning of the 1866 settlement. Before the war, the North German Confederation was powerful but incomplete. During the war, soldiers from Bavaria, Wurttemberg, Baden and Hesse fought alongside the North German forces under Prussian command. This mattered because it made the Kleindeutschland solution visible as a shared German military effort against France.

Prussian and German military strength rested on preparation. The Prussian system used short-service conscription followed by large reserves and Landwehr forces. Helmuth von Moltke's General Staff planned mobilisation and railway movement carefully. The German armies could concentrate quickly and coordinate separate army groups. France still had brave soldiers and the effective Chassepot rifle, but its mobilisation and command system were slower and more confused. The difference was not simply courage; it was organisation, reserves, staff work, railways and artillery.

The campaign moved quickly. German forces defeated French armies at Wissembourg and Woerth on 4 and 6 August 1870. Bazaine's army was pushed back into Metz after Mars-la-Tour and Gravelotte on 16 and 18 August. MacMahon's army tried to relieve Metz but was trapped at Sedan. On 1-2 September 1870, Napoleon III surrendered with a large French army. The Second Empire collapsed on 4 September and a republic was proclaimed in Paris.

The war did not end at Sedan. The new French Government of National Defence refused to surrender territory. Strasbourg fell on 28 September, Metz on 27 October, and Paris endured a winter siege before the armistice of 28 January 1871. This longer phase matters because it allowed Bismarck to negotiate German unity while victory still generated nationalist pressure.

War increased support for German nationalism because it made unity seem defensive and practical. In 1848-49, liberals had failed to create Germany through parliamentary revolution. In 1870-71, victory made a Prussian-led Germany look like the answer to French threat and German weakness. Southern rulers could now join without appearing simply to surrender to Prussia: they could claim to be defending Germany.

Bismarck's position was strengthened in several ways. He could negotiate from military success. He could use nationalist enthusiasm to pressure hesitant southern rulers. He could also offer concessions where needed. Bavaria and Wurttemberg retained some special rights, including peacetime military arrangements and, in Bavaria's case, important postal, telegraph and taxation privileges. These concessions show that unification was not pure centralisation. The Empire was a federal monarchy under Prussian dominance.

On 18 January 1871, William I was proclaimed German Emperor in the Hall of Mirrors at Versailles. The location was deliberately symbolic: German unity was being announced in defeated France. The new imperial constitution, passed in April 1871 and in force from May, was largely based on the North German Confederation constitution of 1867. That continuity is vital for judgement. The Empire was not invented from nothing in 1871; it expanded the Prussian-led federal system created after 1866.

The Treaty of Frankfurt, signed on 10 May 1871, formally ended the war. France ceded Alsace and part of Lorraine, including Metz, paid an indemnity of five billion francs, and accepted German occupation of parts of France until payment was complete. The treaty confirmed Germany as the new central power in Europe, but it also created a lasting French grievance. For a judgement on significance, the treaty was both a triumph and a risk: it secured victory, but it made reconciliation with France much harder.

Why Prussia Succeeded

Prussia's success came from the interaction of several causes. The best essays rank them, but also show how they depended on each other.

One strong judgement is that military victory was the necessary immediate cause of the Empire's creation. Without the defeat of France, the south German states would probably have remained outside the North German Confederation for longer. Sedan and the siege of Paris gave Bismarck leverage and gave German nationalism emotional force.

However, a better overall judgement gives Bismarck and Prussian state power the greatest explanatory range. Bismarck did not create German nationalism, the Zollverein or Prussian military reform by himself. Yet he connected them. He accepted a limited settlement in 1866, built a constitution that preserved Prussian dominance, worked with the National Liberals without surrendering parliamentary government, kept the south tied by customs and defensive alliances, and used the 1870 crisis to make France appear the aggressor. His importance lies less in a perfect masterplan than in converting opportunities into institutions.

The most important limitation is that the new Germany was not the liberal national state imagined by many in 1848. It excluded Austria, preserved the power of princes, gave Prussia enormous weight, and left the chancellor responsible to the emperor rather than to the Reichstag. It also began with Alsace-Lorraine as a conquered territory, making France a resentful neighbour. Prussia's success was therefore supreme but incomplete: it solved the German question in Prussia's favour, while creating new tensions inside Germany and across Europe.

For AO2 source work, remember that different sources reveal different parts of the explanation. A Bismarck speech may show strategy and political language, but it will usually justify his choices. A National Liberal document shows why liberals cooperated, but not why radicals or Catholics objected. A French diplomatic source may show fear of encirclement and wounded prestige, but may underplay French miscalculation. A military observer can explain mobilisation and command, but may not explain why victory became empire.