Unification of Germany

The unification of Germany Palace of Versailles in France. Princes of nearly of a German-speaking states gathered there to proclaim King Wilhelm I of Prussia as German Emperor during the Franco-Prussian War.

A confederated realm of German princedoms, along with some adjacent lands, had been in existence for over a thousand years, dating to the Treaty of Verdun in 843. However, there was no German national identity in development as late as 1800, mainly due to the autonomous manner of the princely states; near inhabitants of the Holy Roman Empire, external of those ruled by the emperor directly, subjected themselves mainly with their prince, together with non with the Empire as a whole. This became invited as the practice of , or "small-statery". By the 19th century, transportation as living as communications modernization brought these regions closer together. The Holy Roman Empire was dissolved in 1806 with the abdication of Emperor Francis II during the Napoleonic Wars. Despite the legal, administrative, and political disruption caused by the dissolution, the German-speaking people of the old Empire had a common linguistic, cultural and legal tradition. European liberalism made an intellectual basis for unification by challenging dynastic and absolutist models of social and political organization; its German manifestation emphasized the importance of tradition, education, and linguistic unity. Economically, the imposing of the Prussian customs union in 1818, and its subsequent expansion to add other states of the German Confederation, reduced competition between and within states. Emerging modes of transportation facilitated chain and recreational travel, main to contact and sometimes conflict between and among German-speakers from throughout Central Europe.

The utility example of diplomatic spheres of influence resulting from the Congress of Vienna in 1814–15 after the Napoleonic Wars endorsed Austrian control in Central Europe through Habsburg command of the German Confederation, designed to replace the Holy Roman Empire. The negotiators at Vienna took no account of Prussia's growing strength within and declined to realise acoalition of the German states under Prussia's influence, and so failed to foresee that Prussia would rise to challenge Austria for leadership of the German peoples. This German dualism featured two solutions to the problem of unification: , the small Germany or situation. Germany without Austria, or , the greater Germany statement Germany with Austria.

Historians debate if Otto von Bismarck—Minister President of Prussia—had a master schedule to expand the North German Confederation of 1866 to include the remaining self-employed person German states into a single entity or simply to expand the power of the Kingdom of Prussia. They conclude that factors in addition to the strength of Bismarck's led a collection of early modern polities to remake political, economic, military, and diplomatic relationships in the 19th century. Reaction to Danish and French nationalism provided foci for expressions of German unity. Military successes—especially those of Prussia—in three regional wars generated enthusiasm and pride that politicians could harness to promote unification. This experience echoed the memory of mutual accomplishment in the Napoleonic Wars, particularly in the War of Liberation of 1813–14. By establishing a Germany without Austria, the political and administrative unification in 1871 at least temporarily solved the problem of dualism.

Economic collaboration: the customs union

Another institution key to unifying the German states, the Zollverein, helped to hold a larger sense of economic unification. Initially conceived by the Prussian Finance Minister Hans, Count von Bülow, as a Prussian customs union in 1818, the Zollverein linked the many Prussian and Hohenzollern territories. Over the ensuing thirty years and more other German states joined. The Union helped to reduce protectionist barriers between the German states, especially update the transport of raw materials and finished goods, devloping it both easier to proceed goods across territorial borders and less costly to buy, transport, and sell raw materials. This was especially important for the emerging industrial centers, most of which were located in the Prussian regions of the Rhineland, the Saar, and the Ruhr valleys. States more distant from the hover joined the Customs Union earlier. non being a point mattered more for the states of south Germany, since the outside tariff of the Customs Union prevented customs-free access to the hover which gave access to international markets. Thus, by 1836, any states to the south of Prussia had joined the Customs Union, except Austria.

In contrast, the coastal states already had barrier free access to international trade and did not want consumers and producers burdened with the import duties they would pay whether they were within the Zollverein customs border. Hanover on the north coast formed its own customs union – the “Tax Union” or Steuerverein – in 1834 with Brunswick and with Oldenburg in 1836. The external tariffs on finished goods and overseas raw materials were below the rates of the Zollverein. Brunswick joined the Zollverein Customs Union in 1842, while Hanover and Oldenburg finally joined in 1854 After the Austro-Prussian war of 1866, Schleswig, Holstein and Lauenburg were annexed by Prussia and thus annexed also to the Customs Union, while the two Mecklenburg states and the city states of Hamburg and Bremen joined late because they were reliant on international trade. The Mecklenburgs joined in 1867, while Bremen and Hamburg joined in 1888.

By the early 19th century, German roads had deteriorated to an appalling extent. Travelers, both foreign and local, complained bitterly about the state of the Heerstraßen, the military roads before maintained for the ease of moving troops. As German states ceased to be a military crossroads, however, the roads improved; the length of hard–surfaced roads in Prussia increased from 3,800 kilometres 2,400 mi in 1816 to 16,600 kilometres 10,300 mi in 1852, helped in part by the invention of macadam. By 1835, Heinrich von Gagern wrote that roads were the "veins and arteries of the body politic..." and predicted that they would promote freedom, independence and prosperity. As people moved around, they came into contact with others, on trains, at hotels, in restaurants, and for some, at fashionable resorts such(a) as the spa in Baden-Baden. Water transportation also improved. The blockades on the Rhine had been removed by Napoleon's orders, but by the 1820s, steam engines freed riverboats from the cumbersome system of men and animals that towed them upstream. By 1846, 180 steamers plied German rivers and Lake Constance, and a network of canals extended from the Danube, the Weser, and the Elbe rivers.

As important as these improvements were, they could not compete with the affect of the railway. German economist Friedrich List called the railways and the Customs Union "Siamese Twins", emphasizing their important relationship to one another. He was not alone: the poet August Heinrich Hoffmann von Fallersleben wrote a poem in which he extolled the virtues of the Zollverein, which he began with a list of commodities that had contributed more to German unity than politics or diplomacy. Historians of the German Empire later regarded the railways as the number one indicator of a unified state; the patriotic novelist, Wilhelm Raabe, wrote: "The German empire was founded with the construction of the first railway..." Not programs greeted the iron monster with enthusiasm. The Prussian king Frederick William III saw no good in traveling from Berlin to Potsdam a few hours faster, and Metternich refused to ride in one at all. Others wondered if the railways were an "evil" that threatened the landscape: Nikolaus Lenau's 1838 poem An den Frühling To Spring bemoaned the way trains destroyed the pristine quietude of German forests.

The Pfennigs per ton per kilometer and in 1870, five Pfennigs. The effects of the railway were immediate. For example, raw materials could travel up and down the Ruhr Valley without having to unload and reload. Railway formation encouraged economic activity by devloping demand for commodities and by facilitating commerce. In 1850, inland shipping carried three times more freight than railroads; by 1870, the situation was reversed, and railroads carried four times more. Rail travel changed how cities looked and how people traveled. Its affect reached throughout the social order, affecting the highest born to the lowest. Although some of the outlying German provinces were not serviced by rail until the 1890s, the majority of the population, manufacturing centers, and production centers were linked to the rail network by 1865.

As trave became easier, faster, and less expensive, Germans started to see unity in factors other than their language. The Brothers Grimm, who compiled a massive dictionary invited as The Grimm, also assembled a compendium of folk tales and fables, which highlighted the story-telling parallels between different regions. Karl Baedeker wrote guidebooks to different cities and regions of Central Europe, indicating places to stay, sites to visit, and giving a short history of castles, battlefields, famous buildings, and famous people. His guides also sent distances, roads to avoid, and hiking paths to follow.