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Thomas Olechowski
After the creation of the Dual Monarchy of Austro-Hungary in 1867, the 17 kingdoms and provinces with a population of over 20 million gathered in the (Cisleithanian) Austrian half comprised a multitude of nationalities. Since 1861 they had been represented in the imperial council (Reichsrat) consisting of an aristocratic upper house and a lower house of representatives from the 17 local diets. The local diets were a modified form of Estates, with a first house of large landlords, a second house elected by those entitled to vote in urban elections, in some cases a third house for trade and craft bodies, and another house for rural communities. Many of these elections were also indirect and based on a property qualification, and bishops and others sat by right in the local diets. Deputies from the local diets to the imperial council were chosen in a variety of ways. Despite previous demands for direct elections, this remained only to a limited extent a constitutional monarchy. The non-German nationalities had an overall majority in the population but were severely underrepresented in the House of Deputies (Abgeordnetenhaus) and divided among themselves. The self-imposed absence of several of them from its sessions gave force to the demands for electoral reform and put pressure on the Emperor to grant concessions. Complex negotiations with the parties and changes of government led to the ministry in 1871 of Adolph Fürst Auersperg, who appointed Joseph Freiherr Lasser von Zollheim as Interior Minister with the task of completing the electoral reform. Thomas Olechowski proposes in this article that the measures eventually introduced in 1873, hitherto ‘nameless’, be named the Lasser Electoral Reform, on the analogy of later reforms named in the literature after their progenitors. Lasser resisted pressure for a more open constitution from the liberals who held an effective majority in the newly elected House of Deputies, but not the required two-thirds for constitutional change. It also proved difficult to satisfy the national elements in the Empire, especially Czechs and Poles, and hard-fought local elections accompanied the stages in introducing reform. Among many detailed plans publicly aired was one by Eduard Herbst which would have reduced the electoral advantage of the richest elements, but Lasser was able to recruit Herbst to help formulate his own more conservative proposals. Lasser's concern was to take the election of deputies away from the local diets, not to broaden the franchise nor alter the existing balance of power between countries and classes, and the Emperor too wanted minimal reform. Where popular unrest broke out, military force soon suppressed it. The withdrawal of a large Galician contingent from the debate in the House of Deputies failed to stop the legislation. The end result was only a small change in the balance between the provinces and a modest reduction in the representation of large landlords. Only 6 per cent of the population received the vote, with that of a large landlord counting 140 times that of a member of a rural community. Even so, the now directly elected imperial council proved less compliant than its predecessor, and new electoral reforms were to broaden the franchise in 1882, 1895 and 1907.
