The
Republic of Mainz was the first
democratic state on the current
German territoryThe shortlived republic is often ignored in identifying the "first German democracy", in favour of the
Weimar Republic; e.g. "the failure of the first German democracy after the First World War (the Weimar Republic)..." (Peter J. Burnell,
Democracy Assistance: international co-operation for democratization 2000:131), or Ch. 3. 'The First Attempt at Democracy, 1918-1933', in Michael Balfour,
West Germany: a contemporary history, 1982:60 and was centered in
Mainz. A product of the
French Revolutionary Wars, it lasted from March to July 1793.
Context
During the
First Coalition against
France, the
Prussian and
Austrian troops that had invaded
France retreated after the
Battle of Valmy, allowing the French revolutionary army to counterattack. The troops of
General Custine entered the
Palatinate in late September, and occupied Mainz on 21 October 1792. The ruler of Mainz,
Elector and
Archbishop Friedrich Karl Joseph von Erthal, had fled the city.
Jacobin club
On the next day, 20 citizens of Mainz founded a
Jacobin club, the
Gesellschaft der Freunde der Freiheit und Gleichheit (Society of the Friends of Liberty and Equality). Together with their filial clubs founded later in
Speyer and
Worms, they promoted the
Enlightenment and the French revolutionary ideals of
liberté,
egalité,
fraternité in Germany, aiming for a German republic to be established...
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