Failure of the Frankfurt Parliament of 1948

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The Frankfurt Parliament was established in 1848 as a response to the widespread revolutions of the same year throughout the German Confederation. The Parliament's mission was to create a German constitution that would satisfy the whole of Germany and institute a central Government for the whole of Germany. However, by June 1849 the Frankfurt Parliament had failed, its power was no longer recognized. Despite some achievements the parliament was unable to fully establish neither its authority nor its constitution. The failure of the Frankfurt parliament was precipitated by a number of factors, from its inability to make quick, vital decisions to the division between its members. The responsibility of founding a national constitution was left to an unrepresentative portion of society that made up the Frankfurt Parliament. Eighty percent of its members had university degrees and the rest was comprised of a few land owners, four craftsmen and one peasant .Of the 596 members, the vast majority were middle-class which meant that overall the parliament was moderately liberal in politics. However, the minority of extremist members of the Parliament, as well as the differing aims of its liberal and radical affiliates, proved fatal for the Frankfurt Parliament. Differences could not easily be resolved between these groups and so a majority decision was seldom reached. The Parliament also struggled to determine the territorial extent of Germany. The debate of whether to be independent of Austria as a Kleindeutschland' or include Austria as a Grossdeutschland' plagued the parliament, as did the issue of whether to use the German Confederation boundaries as a model for the new Germany, despite the fact that it did not conform to a logical definition of Germany, with its Czech, Polish and French populations. For these reasons the Parliament was unable to take decisive action
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