Sonderband 3. „wir aber aus unsern vorhero sehr erschöpfften camergeföllen nicht hernemben khönnen…” – Beiträge zur österreichischen Wirtschafts- und Finanzgeschichte vom 17. bis zum 20. Jahrhundert (1997)

Ronald E. Coons - Carey Goodman: An Audacious Proposal. A Memorandum Attributed to Finance Minister Karl Ludwig Freiherr von Bruck

Ronald E. Coons Carey Goodman

cision followed nine days later38. It is therefore reasonable to conclude that the memorandum dates from the second half of July 1855, when Bruck is known to have been considering a variety of measures that might enable him to bring the budget into balance and stabilize the monarchy’s currency39.

Finally, the question must be asked whether the younger Bruck was correct in maintaining that his father had opposed bureaucratic centralism to the point of favoring a „radical“ administrative reorganization of the Habsburg Monarchy. Writing as he did early in 1866, when the Belcredi ministry was promoting a federalist solution to the monarchy’s ongoing organizational dilemma, it is understandable that Bruck’s son sought to rehabilitate his father by emphasizing those elements in the 1855 memorandum which condemned the evils of a centralism then in official disfavor. Over a century later, however, an analysis unencumbered by sentiments of filial piety would do well to begin with Harm-Hinrich Brandt’s terse judgment „daß man bei Bruck kaum von verfassungs- und verwaltungsrechtlicher Klarsicht sprechen kann“40. At best the minister’s 1855 memorandum was overly optimistic in assuming that merely by simplifying its administrative structure the monarchy could solve its perpetual budgetary problems41. At worst, on the other hand, the document failed to give sufficient attention to the Kingdom of Hungary, to which its author apparently wished to give a resurrected Hungarian Hofkanzlei. So anachronistic a measure, linked as it was to an affirmation of monarchical sovereignty, conspicuously ignored the April Laws of 1848 and could hardly have served as the basis for a lasting accommodation with leading elements in the monarchy’s eastern half. A similar observation is in order for the non-Hungarian territories. Bruck spoke generously of provincial sensibilities, which he sought to appease through the creation of separate Hofkanzleien in Vienna, but he said nothing to indicate he was willing to pacify local élites by offering them institutions in their provincial capitals that would give them an effective voice in imperial affairs. And finally, although Bruck called for the creation of „eine munizipale Organisation aller Städte und Landgemeinen [sic!]“, he begged such important practical questions as how these local institutions were to be organized, precisely what functions they would perform, who would be eligible to serve, and what consequences adminis38 Bach’s Vortrag of 6 June was discussed in the Minister Conference on 9 June 1855; see ÖMR Abt. 3, Bd. 4, pp. 79-80 and Reichsgesetzblatt [RGBl.] Nr. 130 ex 1855. Announcement of the Emperor’s decision appeared in the Wiener Zeitung on 24 July 1855, the same day the patent was published; brief articles on the central congregations appeared in the issues of 21 July and 24 July 1855. On these institutions in Lombardy, e. g., see Raponi,Nicola: Politica e amministrazione in Lombardi agli esordi dell’unità. Il programma dei moderati. Milano 1967, pp. 27-29.

39 See Bruck’s lengthy Vortrag of 16 July 1855 Finanzarchiv Wien [hereafter cited as FA Wien] 78/GP ex 1855 [Sonderfaszikel 15]; the contents and failure of the minister’s proposals are discussed in Brandt: Der österreichische Neoabsolutismus, pp. 715-721.

40 Brandt: Der österreichische N eoabsolutismus, p. 837.

41 As Brandt: Der österreichische Neoabsolutismus, p. 601 observes: „Davon, daß die Länder von einer auswuchemden Struktur riesiger Verwaltungsapparate und einem Massenheer von Beamten überzogen wurden, deren konsumtiver Finanzbedarf den materiellen Fortschritt belastet habe oder für das chronische Haushaltsdefizit wesentlich mitverantwortlich sei, kann nicht gesprochen werden“.

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