Casino 1848

Resumé

The present article deals with the events and historiography of the »March Days«
in 1848, when a change of government marked the closest thing to a revolution
ever to happen in Denmark.

Political life during the reign of Christian VIII, 1839-1848, was increasingly characterized by the nationalist conflict between the separatist movement in the Duchies of Schleswig and Holstein, on the one hand, and the national liberal party in the Kingdom of Denmark, on the other. The latter wanted predominantlyDanish-speaking Schleswig to sever its ties from purely German Holstein and to enter into a closer union with Denmark. But the king and his government skillfully exploited the considerable internal dissension in both camps through a policy of delays and concessions to both sides and thus managed to maintain a balance between the nationalities, centered on the person of the absolute monarch. When Christian VIII unexpectedly died in January 1848, that strategy was no longer viable. The government persuaded his incompetent successor, Frederik VII (1848-1863) to relinquish absolutism and to announce on January 28 a proposal for a constitution providing for a legislature composed of an equal number of representatives from the Duchies and the Kingdom. The Danish national liberals, already weak from internal strife, were thus despoiled of their principal rallying point, the abolition of absolute monarchy. Now their only hope of seizing power lay in a rebellion in the Duchies to trigger a mass movement in Copenhagen against the government. They hoped, therefore, that a meeting of politicians from Schleswig and Holstein in Rendsburg (in Holstein), planned for March 18, would result in rebellion, encouraged by the February revolutions that had broken out in Europe. But it failed to happen that way. The moderates carried the day at Rendsburg. It was decided for the time being merely to send a delegation to the King in Copenhagen to demand, among other things, a separate constitution for Schleswig-Holstein. Faced with that situation, the national liberal leader, Orla Lehmann, decided on the morning of March 20 to distort the preliminary messages about the Rendsburg meeting, so that it looked as though a rebellion had broken out. The ploy was possible only because of the peculiar lines of communication between the Duchies and Copenhagen: the detailed minutes of the meeting could not reach Copenhagen until 36 hours after the first news arrived by steamboat. In a series of quick moves the national liberals succeeded in provoking the crucial popular rising in Copenhagen, notably by advancing the date of a meeting at the Casino Theatre, which drew a crowd of three thousand. Aided by the inexperience of a new minister, C. E. Bardenfleth, who was a close personal friend of the new king, they forced the government into resigning on March 21. On the following day a new coalition government was formed with the participation of national liberals — the so-called March Ministry. When the news of the national liberal victory reached the Duchies, the Schleswig-Holsteiners concluded that a negotiated settlement was beyond reach. On March 24 they formed a rebel government and seized the important fortress at Rendsburg. But the new government in Copenhagen, unaware of this event until March 26, had in the meantime been making every effort to implement a policy of reconciliation in order to deter a rebellion. As it actually turned out, these events started the First Schleswig War, 1848-1851, and finally led to Prussia's conquest of the
Duchies in 1864.

Turning to the historigraphy of these events, the author shows how Danish historical writing, with rare exceptions, has followed Orla Lehmann's version: that already at Rendsburg on March 18 the Schleswig-Holstein rebellion »was fully organized and on the verge of outbreak«, thus providing a striking example of how history is written by the victors.

The article closes with considerations on the importance of the role of
personality in history (in casu Orla Lehmann) seen in the perspective of the social
and political framework of the time.