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152-866: The ideas were only realized to a large extent under the Batavian Republic , when they inspired the Dutch Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen, but they were earlier also influential in the intellectual history of the French Revolution thanks to the French translation the journalist Antoine Marie Cerisier , a collaborator of Mirabeau , published in 1788. According to American and British historians Jeremy D. Popkin and Jonathan Israel this French translation may have influenced

304-776: A constituent assembly that formally abolished the States and founded a new body, the Provisional Representatives of the People of Holland , that took over the functions of the States of Holland as long as the States General continued to exist ). Though the political make-up of the States General changed appreciably because of this change in personnel, it retained a number of defenders of the old particularist interests. The first order of business of

456-525: A bicameral Legislative Corps , to be elected in indirect elections, and a Directory -like Executive of five members. The end result looked much like the French Constitution of 1795 . This was approved by the Assembly on 10 May 1797. The draft-Constitution was to be subjected to a referendum on 8 August 1797, after a very lively campaign in which the French ambassador Noël weighed in with

608-483: A century of being confronted by foreign protectionism ) also was dependent on exports. All these sectors had suffered enormously from the war: the British blockade and French and British privateering had almost brought marine trade to a standstill, whereas a commercial treaty with France (which would have ended French discrimination of Dutch trade in industrial goods) proved an ever-receding fata morgana . True, much of

760-462: A consequence of this electoral change. The "democrats" were mostly replaced by Patriot regents, who had no patience with democracy, and by the old Orangist regents, who did not even have to disguise their allegiance as in early 1801 a convenient amnesty was proclaimed. One surprising example is Egbert Sjuck Gerrold Juckema van Burmania Rengers , the Orangist burgomaster of Leeuwarden before 1795,

912-402: A continuation of the old federal arrangements. As this was totally unacceptable to the unitarists, this draft was subsequently amended into its opposite, by a compromise that finally formed a basis for a new Constitution. The Assembly now began discussing other important matters, such as the separation between church and state, and the emancipation of minorities. The organs of the state were to be

1064-636: A country needed a head of state, and the Stadtholder was it. Instead he was an officeholder, appointed by the provincial States, who also was captain-general and admiral-general of the Union (there was originally no stadtholder on the confederal level). In the Orangist revolution of 1747 this office had been revamped to "Stadhouder-generaal" and made hereditary, and after the Prussian intervention of 1787

1216-433: A few benches for the nobility and members of the vroedschap). Members never needed to be wealthy enough to buy their own weapon, unlike in the schutterijen . Non-attendance earned a fine of a few stuivers . Exercitiegenootschappen had the preference above free corps, being completely independent of the existing schutterij. "Vrijcorpsen" arose mainly in the countryside, because there was no schutterij for their area. After

1368-546: A first government-approved attempt at unification of the Dutch spelling was made; an embryonic Department of Agriculture and Department of Hydraulics were formed, to foreshadow the later government departments; even a Pharmacopeia Batavia started the regulation of drugs; and the School Law of 1806 organized a national system of public elementary education. Most importantly perhaps, the local-government law of July 1805 founded

1520-789: A hand in the original draft. These were the journalist Wybo Fijnje , the Leiden textile manufacturer Pieter Vreede as president, and the Overijssel aristocrat Rutger Jan Schimmelpenninck and François Adriaan van der Kemp , less known are Jacob Blauw and Cornelis van Foreest. On 4 October 1785, after four sessions they edited the final draft that was published as Ontwerp om de Republiek door eene heilzaame Vereeniging van Belangen van Regent en Burger van Binnen Gelukkig en van Buiten Gedugt te maaken, aangenomen bij besluit van de Provinciale Vergadering van de Gewapende Corpsen in Holland (Design to make

1672-653: A matter of fact, since the Spring of 1804 informal talks, mediated by Talleyrand, had been under way with the Batavian envoy in Paris, Rutger Jan Schimmelpenninck , who had a good personal rapport with Napoleon (by now emperor ). Schimmelpenninck was a power in the Batavian Republic by himself. He had played an important role as the leader of the federalist opposition in the "revolutionary" States-General of 1795, and

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1824-656: A new constitution, that he constructed in the Summer of 1804 in consultation with the Staatsbewind . As a matter of fact, a delegation of the Staatsbewind , consisting of Schimmelpenninck, and members of the Regency Van der Goes (the former agent) and Van Haersolte (a former director), presented the case for this draft to Napoleon in November 1804. When the clash about the French customs men therefore took place later in

1976-424: A notorious reactionary. The coup represented a counter-revolution. This became clear in the way the iconography of the 1795 revolution disappeared: the epigraph Vrijheid, Gelijkheid, Broederschap (Liberty, Equality, Fraternity) which had adorned all official publications, was henceforth removed, and the last Liberty Trees were removed from the town squares. Soon the old ways were restored. For example, though

2128-439: A permanent basis urgently. Besides, as the Dutch tax system was heavily skewed toward highly regressive indirect taxes, which inordinately burdened the impoverished population, he wanted to change this to a system that depended more on direct (income and wealth) taxes. Finally, he wanted to do away with the provincial differentiation in the taxation, and construct a nationally standardized system. When he put these reform proposals to

2280-405: A provincial rota and according to national quotas of representatives of each province (much like the old States-General). Except for Holland, the old provinces were reconstituted. The local and provincial administrative organs continued to be elected – no longer by universal manhood suffrage, but by a system of census suffrage . Most important was the change in personnel of these organs, mostly as

2432-401: A rapprochement with conservative and Orangist circles. These were to become his power base. Though Schimmelpenninck was a convinced federalist, he was a pliable character also. When Napoleon indicated that he preferred a centralized organization of the Dutch state (as the re-federalized model of the Staatsbewind had clearly not worked out), he did not hesitate to implement this in his project of

2584-542: A second National Assembly returned one in which the balance of power had shifted to the unitarists in the Fall of 1797. Nevertheless, the federalists managed to retain control of the new constitutional commission by a bare majority. This led to more dawdling and the unitarists in the Assembly now came with their own proposal in the form of the Declaration of 43 on 12 December 1797, containing a nine-point manifesto concerning

2736-419: A separate electoral base. Though the coup of 22 January 1798 did not bode well for a genuinely democratic approval process for the new constitution (and the French would have preferred going the "safe" way of approval by the rump assembly) the plebiscite that started on 17 March (in the usual form of elections in "primary" assemblies of about 100–500 voters) had a reasonably democratic quality. On 23 April 1798,

2888-469: A sleight of hand that unfortunately would also become familiar in the Dutch constitutional politics of the successor states: they counted the 350,000 abstentions as "tacit affirmations". Unlike the coup of June 1798, the Augereau coup did present a sharp break with the recent past. The new constitution reduced the role of the legislative branch (which now did not have the right of initiative), and expanded

3040-509: A supportive appeal. This probably contributed to the resounding defeat of the proposal (108,761 votes to 27,995). The Assembly was back at square one. At this moment foreign events in the form of the 18 Fructidor coup of General Pierre Augereau intervened. This brought the more radical faction to power in France, which proved to be ultimately less patient with the vagaries of the Dutch political process, and more prone to intervene. Elections for

3192-401: A system of national taxation. There was to be a five-man Uitvoerend Bewind as a collective Executive , with eight national Agenten (government ministers) doing the actual Administration , directing Foreign Affairs, Police and Interior, Justice, Finance, War, Navy, National Education, and National Economy. Most importantly, as historian Simon Schama states: "[i]ts central aim was to change

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3344-461: A third edition was necessary. The journalist Gerrit Paape later wrote that a copy of the manifesto was in almost everybody's hand. In the 68 pages of the document first an exposition was given of the main ideas behind the "design" into which the argument issued. That argument may be summarized by giving the headings of the sections of the paper (in translation): The argument resulted in an enumeration of twenty numbered articles: A close reading of

3496-487: A total of about 150 million guilders. The other provinces owed 155 million guilders. The grand total in 1795, at the beginning of the Batavian Republic, came to 760 million guilders; this imposed a debt service of 25 million guilders annually. The indemnity of the Treaty of The Hague immediately added 100 million guilders to this total, and the maintenance of the French army of occupation added about 12 million annually (while

3648-403: A unifier). The conservative federalists were more adept at parliamentary manoeuvering. Rutger Jan Schimmelpenninck proved himself especially adept at this. The frustration this engendered among the democrats led them to appeal to popular opinion and to extra-parliamentary action. Meanwhile, the Assembly installed a constitutional commission that in November 1796 presented a report that amounted to

3800-587: A year after the peace, war resumed. Napoleon was now intent on the destruction of Great Britain by culminating in an ambitious planned invasion . The French expected the Batavian Republic to play a major supporting role in this. As the Franco-Batavian alliance's embodiment, the Staatsbewind was forced to assent to a Convention bringing the total of French and Batavian forces in the Netherlands to 35,000. In addition, 9,000 Batavian troops were slated for

3952-477: A year later), restoring the old confederal order. A similar "solution" seemed appropriate for the Batavian Republic. The Batavian government, and its constitution, were particularly disliked by the Consul (no friend of democracy in any case), because of the snub that Amsterdam bankers gave in 1800 to his request for a big loan at the usual generous rate of interest the French expected as a matter of right. He blamed

4104-504: The Cape of Good Hope , without the Dutch even being consulted. The Dutch ambassador in France, Rutger Jan Schimmelpenninck , who acted as the Dutch plenipotentiary , vainly protested that the Treaty of The Hague had guaranteed the Dutch colonies, and that France had promised not to make a separate peace. After this separate peace had been concluded, the British were left to negotiate with the minor French allies separately. This did not mean that

4256-875: The Design will teach that the editors of the document revered the existing "constitution" of the Dutch Republic (in the sense of a body of foundational charters and treaties, like the Great Privilege , the Pacification of Ghent , the Union of Utrecht , the Twelve Years' Truce , and the Peace of Münster ), but rejected a number of "abuses" that had recently "slipped in" like the so-called Regeringsreglementen (Government Regulations) that had been adopted in

4408-504: The Eems department . The aim was to organize the country into units with equal numbers of primary assemblies (hence the small Amstel department with its large population). The first elections for the administrative organs of these new entities were held in March 1799. But, of course, such a reorganization did not suddenly change the old allegiances of the people living in these areas. In any case,

4560-624: The Fourth Anglo-Dutch War this policy succeeded in bringing down the level of debt, but this war brought a large uptick in the public debt: between 1780 and 1794 the province of Holland alone issued 120 million guilders of new bonds. In 1795, its total debt stood at 455 million guilders. To this should be added the debts of the United East India Company and its sister, the WIC , and the five Dutch Admiralties for

4712-651: The Orangist Grand Pensionary Laurens Pieter van de Spiegel . This de facto status of Anglo-Prussian protectorate was internationally formalized in 1788 by the Act of Guarantee (for which Great Britain and Prussia acted as guarantors) and the Triple Alliance between the Dutch Republic, Prussia, and Great Britain. The Netherlands was little more than a pawn for the major powers. The French Revolution embraced many of

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4864-474: The Peace of Pressburg and was busy dividing up Europe in client-kingdoms apportioned to his relatives. He saw a good candidate for such a position in the Netherlands in his brother Louis Bonaparte . Ver Huell started scheming with his French patrons behind the back of Schimmelpenninck and feeding negative information about the Pensionary that found its way into the French press. Schimmelpenninck's position

5016-545: The Peace of Utrecht in 1713, had become a millstone around its neck. By 1713 the public debt of the County of Holland had reached 310 million guilders; the debt of the Generality was 68 million; and the debts of the smaller provinces, and of the cities came on top of this. The debt service of Holland alone in that year required 14 million guilders, which exceeded its regular tax revenue. Most of this humongous public debt

5168-750: The Rhinegrave of Salm was appointed in Utrecht to organize the city defense; a Commission of Defense was installed in Woerden . Not long after the officers of the Gouda exercitiegenootschap stopped princess Wilhelmina of Prussia , at the Vlist and sent back to Nijmegen. A flying column under Adam Gerard Mappa occupied a number of cities in Holland, and another did the same in Friesland . They tried to take

5320-471: The Staatsregeling voor het Bataafsche Volk was approved with 153,913 votes against 11,587 (i.e., just 641 more people voted for approval in 1798 than had voted for rejection of the previous draft in 1797; about 50% of the electorate had voted.) The new regime therefore seemed well-grounded in the new doctrine of popular sovereignty . The new constitution addressed many of the reformist concerns of

5472-563: The Uitvoerend Bewind (Gerrit Pijman in particular) therefore amended the project in a sense that gave re-federalization even more emphasis. They unilaterally convened the primary assemblies by a proclamation on 14 September 1801, have a referendum on this new draft constitution . The Assembly defiantly ruled this proclamation illegal on 18 September. Then General Augereau (he of the Fructidor-coup), now commander-in-chief of

5624-494: The Uitvoerend Bewind for this, and many other foibles, like undermining the boycott of British goods. To remedy these ills, a new Batavian constitution on the political principles of the Consulate (union, authority, political office for men of ability and social station) was needed. The new French ambassador Charles Louis Huguet, marquis de Sémonville he sent to The Hague in 1799 was just the man for this job. Meanwhile, even

5776-476: The Uitvoerend Bewind . All these disaffections came together with the coup on 12 June 1798, of that recidivist , General Daendels, in which he disturbed a dinner party of Delacroix and three members of the Uitvoerend Bewind , violating the diplomatic immunity of the ambassador by putting pistols to his chest. The members of the Representative Assembly were arrested in session. The fall of

5928-511: The civil list was fixed at the "modest sum" of 1.5 million guilders. The constitution of the Pensionary was actually to be maintained with a few minor alterations (the title of raadpensionaris changed to that of King; and the size of the Staatsraad and the legislative corps nearly doubled). Exercitiegenootschap An exercitiegenootschap ( Dutch pronunciation: [ɛksərˈsitsi.ɣəˌnoːtsxɑp] , exercise company ) or militia

6080-484: The stadtholder to such an extent that the criticisms of his regime gained wide support under the population. His opponents were found in circles of the old anti-Orangist (" States party ") faction among Dutch regents, and among adherents of democratic ideals. These came together as a political movement that called themselves "Patriots". As the stadtholder controlled the armed forces: the Dutch States Army and

6232-542: The American revolutionaries. On the one hand this helped convince Dutch public opinion to support the American Revolution, but on the other hand undermined the autocratic government of stadtholder William V and his Orangist party of Regenten . The public support of the American revolutionaries helped bring about an armed conflict with Great Britain, the Fourth Anglo-Dutch War , which was mishandled by

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6384-580: The Austrian emperor Joseph II about the Scheldt , known as the kettle war - for two hundred years closed off by Holland and Zeeland - led to organization of the provincial armies in January 1785. Court Lambertus of Beyma took the initiative in Friesland , causing a wave of new exercitiegenootschappen and free-corps that spring. The Provincial States reached an understanding in their regulations. In

6536-466: The British. Java , however, remained Dutch until 1811. Another potentially important consequence of the peace might have been that a number of provisions of the Treaty of The Hague, that had been conditional on a peace, like the reduction of the French army of occupation, would now have become operational. However, the First Consul proved reluctant to reduce the numbers of French troops, or return

6688-586: The Dutch Navy, the Patriots started to arm themselves by forming citizen militias, known as exercitiegenootschappen (so-called, because they liked to train themselves by the performance of military drills). These were local militias, overlaid by a federal association that bound them together and made them a national force to be reckoned with. The regime saw this as a threat and tried to discourage their operations where possible. On 23 July 1785 (as one example)

6840-427: The Dutch population looked favorably upon the French incursion, and often considered it a liberation, the French were quickly able to break the resistance of the forces of the Stadtholder and his Austrian and British allies. However, in many cities revolution broke out even before the French arrived and Revolutionary Committees took over the city governments, and (provisionally) the national government as well. William

6992-513: The Dutch republic from a client state of Great Britain and Prussia into a French one; henceforth it would conduct a foreign and military policy dictated by France, where its predecessor had followed British dictates since 1787 (an offensive and defensive alliance of the two republics was part of the treaty). With the treaty, economic policies would in effect also be made subservient to the interests of France, but this did not mean that it lost its independence in all respects. The program of reform that

7144-415: The Dutch revolutionaries attempted to put in place, constrained by the political realities of the French revolution, was mostly driven by Dutch needs and aspirations. The political events in the Netherlands were mainly derived from Dutch initiative, with some notable exceptions. The French were responsible for at least one of the coups d'état, and the French ambassador often acted as a proconsul . At first,

7296-405: The Dutch to maintain a French army of occupation of 25,000 men. To fulfill its responsibilities, Dutch financier Pieter Stadnitski joined a committee at the end of July 1795. To beat hyperinflation it was announced that from 3 August French soldiers in the Batavian Republic would be paid in sound Dutch currency and going forward no one could be obliged to accept French assignats . This changed

7448-530: The Dutch were completely left to their own devices: whenever French interests seemed to be in danger, France decisively intervened on its own behalf, as in the attempt to deduct the value of the Dutch fleet , surrendered in 1799, that the British had purchased from the Stadtholder, from the indemnification of the Prince of Orange. That indemnification was an important sideshow in the negotiations. The consequence of

7600-582: The Emperor. The latter, however, refused to speak with the Commission, and only communicated to them through the intermediary of Ver Huell. Talleyrand had meanwhile drafted a "Treaty" which contained the conditions under which the crown of "Holland" was to be offered to Louis: no union of the crowns; no conscription ; a possible commercial treaty with France; and the basic freedoms of the Netherlands (linguistic, religious, judicial) were to be maintained; while

7752-477: The French Declaration of the Rights of Man and of the Citizen . The American Revolution made a deep impression in the Dutch Republic of the 1770s. Intellectuals like Joan Derk van der Capellen tot den Pol and his friend François Adriaan van der Kemp disseminated the ideas of Thomas Paine , Richard Price , Andrew Fletcher and Joseph Priestley , and generally news about the accomplishments of

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7904-463: The French economic sanctions against Britain. Since the members of the Staatsbewind , and their friends, often profited from this clandestine trade directly, the patience of the French was wearing thin. Matters came to a head when the French commander in the Republic, Auguste de Marmont , ordered in November 1804 that French naval patrols and customs officials were to take over the responsibility for

8056-521: The French forces in the Netherlands, routinely closed the doors of the Assembly (by previous arrangement with Pijman) on 19 September, and arrested the dissident Directors. Despite this military putsch the campaign for the plebiscite took place in an atmosphere of political freedom unthinkable in France. Nevertheless, this did not result in great enthusiasm for the new constitution. When the votes were counted on 1 October, out of 416,619 voters only 16,771 voted in favor and 52,219 against. The Directors then used

8208-506: The French, who supported no fewer than three coups d'état to bring the different political factions to power that France favored at different moments in its own political development. Nevertheless, the process of creating a written Dutch constitution was mainly driven by internal political factors and not by French influence until Napoleon forced the Dutch government to accept his brother, Louis Bonaparte , as monarch. The political, economic, and social reforms that were brought about during

8360-468: The Generality coffers according to a repartition schedule last changed in 1616. Attempts to reform this structure during the 18th century were mainly fruitless. To ameliorate the situation the old Republic maintained a policy of severe austerity during the century, especially economizing on its defense outlays (which in large part explains why its military and political role declined so much). Up to

8512-550: The Patriot regents, who gradually started to drift away from their more radically "democratic" brethren in the Patriot movement. But the wave of democratic reform seemed unstoppable when in the Summer of 1787 the Amsterdam vroedschap was overturned after large street demonstrations of the local Patriot clubs and the Patriot exercitiegenootschap . This went too far for the old-style regents, a number of whom started to move over to

8664-411: The Patriots since 1785, including no hereditary offices; no sinecures ; and accountability of officials. It also came down on the side of economic liberalism , as opposed to mercantilism , in the economic debate then raging in republican circles, and therefore promised to do away with guilds and internal impediments to trade. The old provincial-repartition system of public finance was to be replaced by

8816-616: The People of Holland , and the States-General that for a while became the States General of the Batavian Republic , before it legislated itself out of existence at the end of 1795 to be replaced by the National Assembly of the Batavian Republic . One of the first official acts of the Provisional Representatives was the promulgation of the Dutch Declaration of the Rights of Man and the Citizen, that

8968-561: The Representative Assembly on 30 September 1799, they met with massive resistance. This led to so much delay in its acceptance that by the time it was to be implemented (in 1801) the re-federalisation of the state by the new Staatsbewind regime was already underway. Eventually, Gogel's reforms were only implemented under the successor state of the Kingdom of Holland. These are (important) examples of instances in which

9120-691: The Republic inwardly contented and outwardly feared by a salutary union of interests of Regent and Citizen, Leiden, adopted by resolution of the Provincial Assembly of the Armed Forces in Holland) by the publisher Leendert Herdingh. A new scheme was formulated for attractive and well paid urban and provincial offices. Colonels of the exercitiegenootschappen from Alkmaar and Westzaan were present. The design became so popular that in May 1786

9272-604: The Revolutionary French Republic in 1795 and this time definitively overturned the old Dutch Republic and its institutions. Again, the political method of the Leiden Draft program was used by working ostensibly "within" the old constitution, by taking over the personnel of the old institutions like the States of Holland that was in a "constitutional" way replaced by the Provisional Representatives of

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9424-409: The Rotterdam exercitiegenootschap in 1784 was forbidden, more and more so-called "genootschappen in de wapenhandel" (societies for weapons training) sprang up, as in Bolsward , and they were very progressive for their time and would speak out regularly. In 1787 about 25 new freecorps or "societies in weapon training" were erected, but also the orangists organized themselves better. An incident with

9576-423: The Schimmelpenninck regime actually accomplished more in its short existence than the previous regimes had accomplished in the ten years since 1795. This was, of course, mainly due to the diligent preparatory work that Agents like the ubiquitous Gogel; Johannes Goldberg , for National Economy; and Johannes van der Palm , for National Education; had done. Gogel's General Taxation Plan was finally enacted in June 1805;

9728-405: The States General. However, a grass-roots democratic movement began to form in the Summer of 1795, consisting of popular societies (clubs) and wijkvergaderingen (precinct meetings), demanding popular influence on the government. A kind of parallel government in the form of "general assemblies" sprang up next to the city governments and the provincial States that repeatedly came into conflict with

9880-481: The Vreede-Fijnje Bewind opened the way for the actual implementation of the new constitution. The "Interim Directory" that now came to power (consisting of a few of the dissenting Agenten ) made haste with organizing elections for the Representative Assembly that convened on 31 July. By the middle of August a new Uitvoerend Bewind had been appointed and the Agenten who had been behind the coup, resumed their original positions. This new regime now started to implement

10032-458: The Year VIII in important respects: a bicameral legislature would be appointed by a "National College" (akin to the French Sénat conservateur ) from a list of names produced by a convoluted system of national elections. This met with little enthusiasm by two of the other Directors François Ermerins and Jean Henri van Swinden , and by the Representative Assembly, that rejected the project on 11 June 1801, by fifty votes to twelve. The majority in

10184-462: The abolition of the guilds formally remained, in practice regulation of crafts and trades was reimposed by local ordinances. Against this background the negotiations for the Treaty of Amiens started in October 1801. The minor participants in the negotiations between Great Britain and France (the Batavian Republic and Spain) were immediately presented with faits accomplis: the preliminary agreement ceded Ceylon , and guaranteed free British shipping to

10336-404: The accession of Louis Bonaparte to the Dutch throne . From October 1801 onward, it was known as the Batavian Commonwealth ( Dutch : Bataafs Gemenebest ). Both names refer to the Germanic tribe of the Batavi , representing both the Dutch ancestry and their ancient quest for liberty in their nationalistic lore. In early 1795, intervention by the French Republic led to the downfall of

10488-403: The ambassador's recall. At the same time, Daendels became disaffected with the regime he had helped put into power because of the depredations of the purging commissions. His French colleague General Barthélemy Catherine Joubert was displeased with the radicals because of conflicts about the co-dominion of Flushing . Finally, the newly appointed Agenten were disturbed about the inefficiency of

10640-416: The beginning of August 1786 in Utrecht, the exercitiegenootschappen gathered together to commemorate the Battle of Dogger Bank , with 20,000 men marching through the city. At that meeting, a radical decision was taken: sixteen democratically chosen Patriots were appointed to the council. This was a unique event in Europe. A few weeks later Herman Willem Daendels , captain of the local exercitiegenootschap,

10792-432: The camp of the stadtholder. However, it took military intervention by the king of Prussia, brother of the wife of the stadtholder and hence his brother-in-law, to suppress what had become the Patriot Revolution in the Fall of 1787. After this the personnel changes in the city governments and the States were reversed and the post-1747 system restored, in a more severe form, under the 1788 Act of Guarantee that seemed to cast

10944-627: The center of the Patriot Revolution, and therefore, like many other leading Patriots had to go into exile in France. There he became a close collaborator of Mirabeau , the trailblazer of the French Revolution , who took a keen interest in political developments in the Dutch Republic. Cerisier did not write the Leiden Draft himself as Popkin has it, but excerpted it in French in an article in Analyse des Papiers Anglais in 1788. According to Popkin, who conducted extensive archival research into

11096-463: The city government of Leiden prohibited the activities of the Leiden exercitiegenootschap and fined its drill master. This elicited a reaction by both the local and the provincial militia: they organised a congress of representatives of Holland militias that convened four times between 4 and 8 October 1785 in Leiden in the meeting room of the Society Kunst wordt door Arbeid verkregen (Art is

11248-643: The colonies that had been captured by the British since 1795, except Ceylon , but including the Cape Colony . This now made the attempts in the Asiatic Council, which had replaced the Directorate of the VOC in 1799, to reform the management of the colonies, more urgent. Dirk van Hogendorp was commissioned to write a proposal, that met with considerable enthusiasm from the more progressive elements on

11400-475: The colonies was promulgated, Hogendorp's proposals had been whittled down to insignificance. The vestigial democrats on the Council were now purged in favor of Orangist reactionaries like Hendrik Mollerus , and Hendrik Van Stralen . In any case, the Republic did not enjoy the possession of its colonies for long. After the resumption of hostilities in 1803 the returned colonies in most cases were soon recaptured by

11552-478: The constitution contained an age-requirement for the members of the Uitvoerend Bewind , which favored the election of staid Patriot regents, and discriminated against the more talented appointed Agents , like Jacobus Spoors , Gerrit Jan Pijman and Alexander Gogel . The tenor of the Bewind became more conservative in the ensuing years. The agents went to work energetically, however, and started with an onslaught on

11704-409: The constitution. The influence of this period helped smooth the transition to a more democratic government in 1848 (the constitutional revision by Johan Rudolph Thorbecke , limiting the power of the king). A type of ministerial government was introduced for the first time in Dutch history and many of the current government departments date their history back to this period. Though the Batavian Republic

11856-403: The council, like Samuel Iperusz. Wiselius and J.H.Neethling . He proposed to abolish all perquisites and sinecures ; to permit private trade; to permit native subjects to own private property; to substitute the "land levies" by a regulated land tax; and the abolition of all seigneurial rights in the colonies. This met with overwhelming resistance from vested interests. When a new Charter for

12008-501: The course of the Orangist Revolution of 1747 to give the stadtholder a right of appointment, or at least approval, of city magistrates. The Patriots wanted to roll back these recent reforms and replace them with the right of the citizenry, just below the caste of Regenten , but above the "lower classes," to elect those magistrates, or at least nominate candidates for co-option by the vroedschappen that traditionally had

12160-768: The days before the Battle of Bergen . The Agent for Foreign Affairs, Van der Goes who had been in favor of distancing the Republic from the French, chose this inopportune moment to secretly approach the King of Prussia as a mediator, with a scheme in which the Hereditary Prince was to become a kind of constitutional monarch in a constitution on the model of the American Constitution. The Republic would revert to its traditional neutrality, while Britain would occupy North Holland, and France Zeeland . The overture

12312-491: The dissident members of the Assembly expelled; an "interim Executive Directory" empowered; and the constitutional commission reduced to seven radical members. Though the resulting constitution has sometimes been depicted as a French project, it was actually a result of the constitutional commission's discussions between October 1797 and January 1798. Except for the purge of the electoral rolls of "crypto-Orangists" and other reactionaries, it might therefore have been acceptable for

12464-457: The diverse Patriot factions of all stripes, got in the way of the effort to create an efficient national unitary state, as envisioned by Gogel. The unitary state was not an end in itself, but a means to higher ends. The republic had been in dire financial straits even before the revolution of 1795. The system of public finance that had been the envy of the world in its Golden Age , enabling it to throw far beyond its weight in world politics up to

12616-405: The election of burgomasters and the member of the city counsils into their own hands, shortly before Charles William Ferdinand, Duke of Brunswick the commander of the troops of king of Prussia occupied the Republic, on 13 September. The Orange restoration became established, with its superior force of 20.000 soldiers. Stadholder William V was returned to his position. All the officers of

12768-409: The enemy on 5 July 1803. Later it banned cheese exports and butter. These measures were of little practical effect, since in 1804 the volume of general exports to Britain was nearly equal to that in the last year of peace in 1802. British goods reached Dutch destinations via neutral German ports or disguised as "American cargo". The republic was therefore an important "keyhole into Europe" that undermined

12920-551: The established order. In the Fall of 1795 the States General started to work on a procedure to peacefully replace itself, "by constitutional means", with a National Assembly that would possess full executive, legislative and constituent powers. This project at first met with sharp resistance from the conservatives. In some cases even force was used (as in Friesland and Groningen ) to overcome this opposition. The new National Assembly convened in The Hague on 1 March 1796. Like

13072-510: The exercitiegenootschappen had to be organized firstly at provincial (and later at national) levels. In 1784 a number of nationally organized free-corps ( vrijcorpsen ) signed the Acte van Verbintenis (Act of Agreement), in which they promised to come to the aid of each other as the Patriots saw necessary. This Act especially stimulated the exercitiegenootschappen and vrijcorpsen in the small cities to confidence and action. Gerrit Paape set himself

13224-488: The finances of the Republic and on its economy. Another real burden was the economic warfare that Napoleon launched against the British, which was answered by a British counter-boycott. This foreshadowed the Continental System which was written into law in 1806. However already in 1803 it started to choke off Dutch trade. Ostensibly, the Staatsbewind did its part by prohibiting the import of all goods from

13376-543: The first Assembly. Though an opponent of the radicals, he had politically survived the coups of 1798, and served as ambassador to France, and as plenipotentiary to the Amiens negotiations. Now Napoleon saw him as the person to clean the Augean stables of the Dutch client state. Schimmelpenninck saw himself in the same light. He had long had a woolly vision of a "national conciliation" in the Netherlands, that made him amenable to

13528-426: The first Dutch system of public administration. The French reaction to this flurry of reforms was mixed, however. The very zeal of the program might betoken a renascent nationalism that could work against French interests. The planned invasion of England was cancelled due to a lack of naval superiority, which was only reinforced by the debacle of the Battle of Trafalgar . The Dutch now began to clamor for economies in

13680-514: The form of the return of the Boulogne flotilla, which annoyed Napoleon, because he still had a use for it. The man who had led that flotilla to Boulogne, after repelling a superior British fleet , Carel Hendrik Ver Huell , was now Secretary for the Navy. He had also become a confidant of the emperor, and now engaged in a secret correspondence with Talleyrand and Napoleon. The latter had just concluded

13832-410: The good intentions of the Uitvoerend Bewind and its Agenten met with the political and economic realities of the times. Other necessary reforms (the abolition of the guilds, the reform of the system of poor relief to mention but a few examples) equally came to nothing. These defeats progressively led to disenchantment of the population with the regime, that already was in an awkward position because it

13984-539: The idea from Scotland. He also saw them as necessary due to the serious decline in the existing, Orangist schutterijen . Exercitiegenootschappen were set up after the Scottish, American and Swiss examples of musket-armed citizens. The expenses of a standing army, the attracting of foreign officers into the Dutch States Army and the neglect of the Dutch Admiralties were all loudly criticised and reform

14136-407: The legitimacy of the regime, as moderate Patriots were also disenfranchised. The final blow was that the new regime reneged on its promise to elect an entirely new Representative Assembly. Meanwhile, the 22 Floréal coup in France undermined Delacroix, because it inspired more sympathy by French foreign minister Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord for the Dutch opposition members who demanded

14288-430: The magistracy with the use of more or less "democratic" elections. The Patriots soon started to put this program in execution, beginning in the city of Utrecht where the old government was replaced with a democratically elected one. Soon other city governments in especially Holland, Utrecht province, Overijssel and Friesland went over to the Patriot side, usually, however, by having Orangist regents replaced by adherents of

14440-538: The matter, this excerpt eventually influenced the formulation of the Déclaration des droits de l'homme et du citoyen of 1789, one of the foundational documents of the French Revolution. In a 2007 oration, Jonathan Israel supported this thesis. And so the "path of influence" of the Leiden Draft eventually doubled back to the Netherlands, because the exiled Patriots returned with the triumphant armies of

14592-522: The members of the Second Coalition was mostly against the French Revolution, its ideas and its consequences. By this time Napoleon himself was convinced of their perfidy. Talleyrand and Napoleon therefore saw a possibility of a compromise, in which France would retain its chain of docile client states, but with the "revolutionary" sting removed, to appease the Allies. That unrevolutionary docility

14744-469: The minds of reformers like Gogel had become receptive to the need for change. The frustrations of the stalemate between unitarist reformers and democratically elected federalist obstructionists had caused a certain disillusionment with democratic politics in the former (the latter were already convinced). An alliance was therefore forming between the would-be reformers, who would like to finally push their reforms through, by "Bonapartist" means, if necessary, and

14896-554: The minimum conditions to which the new constitution should conform. Now the course of events started to speed up. The new French ambassador Charles-François Delacroix took the side of the radicals. His behavior sufficiently intimidated the opponents of the radical proposals to actually fall in line. The coup that was to follow was therefore in reality superfluous. Nevertheless, the radicals, led by Wybo Fijnje and Willem Ockerse , in collaboration with Pierre Auguste Brahain Ducange ,

15048-478: The miserable present becoming clear to everyone. The first exercitiegenootschappen were set up in the beginning of 1783 in Deventer , Dordrecht ,and Utrecht . Further in Leiden, Edam, Woerden, Enkhuizen, Gouda, Hoogkarspel, Amsterdam, Weesp, Rotterdam, Schiedam, Heusden, Westzaan. Quint Ondaatje was the leader of the exercitiegenootschap in Utrecht, and he soon spoke in deeds as well as words. He knew that

15200-447: The moderates, obviating the need for the January coup. In any case, the "suggestions" of Delacroix were rejected and the constitutional commission insisted on the following three essential points: universal manhood suffrage , without fiscal qualifications. the right of revision of the constitution at quinquennial intervals by the voters; and finally the rejection of the principle of a bicameral legislature , in which each House would have

15352-410: The month, Napoleon came to a speedy decision and soon thereafter the Batavian Republic had a new constitution and government. On 10 May 1805, Schimmelpenninck was therefore inaugurated as Raadpensionaris (Grand Pensionary) of the Batavian Republic. This venerable title (clearly chosen for sentimental reasons) had little connection with the former office of the States of Holland ; as a matter of fact,

15504-404: The nature of the Dutch state and to bind its new institutions into the framework of an electoral democracy." As such it had an importance that outlasted the Batavian Republic and set up an ideal to emulate for its successor states. Giddy with their success, the radicals now pushed further. Their legitimacy was already tenuous, because of the way they had seized power. Now they also lost support in

15656-469: The new local and departmental administrations, though elected, were supposed to execute the policies as centrally laid down by the national government. As the elections often put people in power who represented the old order (like Joan Arend de Vos van Steenwijk in Ouden Yssel) this was exceedingly unlikely. To put it differently, the political effort to attain "national unity" through reconciliation of

15808-470: The new office more resembled that of Stadtholder, though even William V, after 1787, had not possessed the powers Schimmelpenninck was to wield. His was a one-man Executive that would in no way be encumbered by the 19 man Legislative Corps, that had no powers apart from the Pensionary. The Pensionary conducted his business assisted by a Staatsraad , that resembled the French Conseil d'État more than

15960-530: The old Raad van State , and by Secretaries of State, who resembled the Agenten of the Uitvoerend Bewind . Of course, such an important change in the constitution had to receive the imprimatur of the popular will. A plebiscite was duly organized which elicited 14,903 Yes-votes (against 136 Noes) from an electorate of 353,322. The abstentions were counted as "tacit affirmatives" in the now well-established tradition. Despite such unpromisingly reactionary trappings

16112-545: The old Dutch Republic. The new republic enjoyed widespread support from the Dutch populace and was the product of a genuine popular revolution. However, it was founded with the armed support of the French Revolutionary Army . The Batavian Republic became a client state , the first of the " sister-republics ", and later part of the French Empire of Napoleon . Its politics were deeply influenced by

16264-505: The old States party, whose families had been driven out in 1747, but had taken up the explicit invitation in the Leiden Draft to cast their lot with the democrats. Sometimes, however, even those old-style regents were replaced by representatives of the middle-class citizenry (like in Utrecht, Leiden, Delft and Rotterdam), breaching the traditional monopoly of political office of the Regent class. This "attack" on their position started to disturb

16416-451: The old administrative organization of the country, in a deliberate attempt to liquidate the very identity of the old federal structure. The once mighty province of Holland was carved into three pieces: Amstel (Amsterdam and immediate vicinity), Texel (the northern peninsula) and Delf (the southern part); and the other provinces were often merged in larger entities, like Overijssel and Drente into Ouden Yssel , and Frisia and Groningen into

16568-461: The old revolutionary States-General, the new National Assembly contained radically opposed parties: the unitary democrats, led by Pieter Vreede , Johan Valckenaer and Pieter Paulus , and the federalists, such as Jacob Abraham de Mist and Gerard Willem van Marle . But there was a broad continuum of opinion between these poles. In this force-field the federalists held the upper hand after the sudden demise of Paulus (who might otherwise have acted as

16720-523: The other funding requirements of the republic added another 20 million annually). To fulfill its engagements to the French Republic, Pieter Stadnitski joined a committee at the end of July 1795. On August 3 it was announced that from that date French soldiers would be paid in sound Dutch currency and no one could be obliged to accept French assignats anymore. In 1814 the public debt stood at 1.7 billion guilders. The average ordinary revenue of

16872-414: The peace treaty specifically exempted the Dutch from paying anything. Instead, an arrangement between the French, British and Prussians (the former stadtholder's champions ) in the matter was reached that in return for dropping any and all claims William was to be compensated with the abbatial domains of Fulda and Corvey Abbey (see also Principality of Nassau-Orange-Fulda ). The Treaty restored most of

17024-479: The peace treaty was that the Batavian Republic now received international recognition, even by the British, and that the old Dutch Republic was now irreversibly dead. This put an end to all pretensions of the Stadtholder and his heirs, such as they were. It may be important to note that these pretensions were dubious to begin with. The Stadtholder was never the sovereign power in the Netherlands, despite understandable misconceptions by foreigners, who may have thought that

17176-527: The people who wished to restore the old federal order, in the hands of the old regent class. Director Besier in particular was amenable to a project that would extend executive power (and curtail that of the Assembly), and revert the constitution to federal devolution. With the help of Sémonville he now started to push a project of constitutional reform that followed the French Constitution of

17328-410: The policies that their radical predecessors had written into the constitution. The coup of June therefore was not a reactionary revolution, but only brought about a change in personnel. Soon most of the people that were arrested at both the January and June coups were released in the spirit of reconciliation that the new regime advocated. The make-up of the Representative Assembly closely resembled that of

17480-570: The political ideas that the Patriots had espoused in their own revolt. The Patriots enthusiastically supported the Revolution, and when the French revolutionary armies started to spread the revolution, the Patriots joined in, hoping to liberate their own country from its authoritarian yoke. The Stadtholder joined the ill-fated First Coalition of countries in their attempt to subdue the suddenly anti-Austrian French First Republic . The Patriots sought French revolutionary aid in their struggle against

17632-400: The port of Flushing, for the good of the Dutch as he pointed out, as they needed many of their own troops in their restored colonies, so the "protection" of the French troops was considered necessary. On the other hand, the departure of the French troops was an indispensable point for the British as they could not allow the Netherlands to be dominated by a hostile power, and the Batavian Republic

17784-475: The powers of the Executive, which now became known as the Staatsbewind (Regency of State). The elective principle was reduced to a formality: the Staatsbewind , originally consisting of the three directors taking part in the coup, expanded its membership by co-optation to twelve. This executive then appointed the first 35 members of the legislature. As vacancies arose, these were filled, as far as possible, on

17936-423: The powers of the Stadtholder had become dictatorial. But formally the States General had been sovereign since 1588, and the Stadtholder was merely their "first servant". The British may have entertained certain fantasies about his formal status, but never seriously considered it. An example of this would the British acceptance of the surrender of the Batavian fleet in the name of the Stadtholder in 1799, as though he

18088-412: The proposed overseas expedition. Even more importantly, the Dutch were to supply five ships-of-the-line, five frigates, 100 gunboats, and 250 flat-bottomed transport craft, capable of holding 60–80 men by December 1803. In total the Dutch were meant to provide transport for 25,000 men and 2,500 horses, the major part of Napoleon's invasion armada, and all at Dutch expense. Napoleon's imposed real burdens on

18240-406: The regulations of the exercitiegenootschappen, their underlying aim of bringing the people republican principles and petitioning for and demanding their participation in choosing the composition of the city administration had never been taken up. Initial support, however, turned into a discouraging administration in the summer of 1785, with the aristocrats moving more and more towards the prince. At

18392-440: The relatively short duration of the Batavian Republic have had a lasting impact. The confederal structure of the old Dutch Republic was permanently replaced by a unitary state. For the first time in Dutch history, the constitution that was adopted in 1798 had a genuinely democratic character. For a time, the Republic was governed democratically, although a coup d'état in 1801 put an authoritarian regime in power after another change to

18544-437: The republic at this time amounted to between 28 and 35 million guilders. However, since the outbreak of the war in 1793 the expenditure had been running at between 40 and 55 millions. For the year 1800 the republic had to find 78 million guilders for its expenditures. In other words, the new Agent of Finance, Gogel, was faced with a financial emergency. He needed to generate about 50 million guilders annually in ordinary revenue on

18696-526: The result of Labour), one of the Patriot clubs in Leiden At this congress a draft of a manifesto was adopted that became known as the Leiden Ontwerp (which is often translated into English as "Leiden Draft"). Who exactly wrote this draft was not entirely clear. However it is likely that the members of the commission that was charged by the congress with the writing of a final document, also had had

18848-486: The revolutionaries therefore was to strive for the reform of the confederal state, with its discrimination of the Generality Lands , and of particular minorities (Catholics, Jews), in the direction of a unitary state , in which the minorities would be emancipated , and the old entrenched interests superseded by a more democratic political order. As a first step the representatives of Brabant were admitted to

19000-419: The revolutionaries used the constitutional machinery of the old confederal republic. They resumed where they had left off after the purge in 1787 of Patriot regents , taking over the offices of the Orangist regents that were now purged in their turn. (For instance, the States of Holland and West Friesland were replaced by having the 18 cities that formally were represented in those States send representatives to

19152-473: The right to elect them. In other words, they implicitly accepted the existing "constitution", with its special political rights for the Regenten , but put a new reading on it, "clawing back" so to speak the "ancient" rights of the guilds and schutterijen to influence local government, and through its intermediary, regional and national government. To justify this they proclaimed a popular sovereignty that

19304-500: The rump-Assembly because of their partisanship. Not wishing to repeat the mistakes of the French Jacobins they moved against the popular political clubs that formed their political base, thereby alienating their most enthusiastic supporters. On the other hand, at the behest of Delacroix they also moved against "counter-revolutionaries" by having purging commissions removing these men from the electoral rolls, further undermining

19456-424: The second National Assembly of 1797. The new regime was soon to discover that changes do not easily come about by legislative fiat. The part of the constitution that worked adequately was the experiment with indirect democracy. During the period in which the constitution was in force, the system of primary assemblies that elected delegates who voted for the respective organs of government worked efficiently, and kept

19608-434: The secretary of the French ambassador, now started to plot the coup d'état of 21–22 January 1798, which, with the assistance of General Herman Willem Daendels , put the radicals in power. A rump assembly of about fifty radicals declared itself a Constituante , which in one fell swoop enacted the entire radical program, while the other members of the Assembly were forcibly detained. All provincial sovereignties were repealed;

19760-405: The stadholder into exile. The French Revolutionary War proceeded disastrously for the forces of the Stadtholder. In the severe winter of 1794/95 a French army under General Charles Pichegru , with a Dutch contingent under General Herman Willem Daendels , crossed the great frozen rivers that traditionally protected the Netherlands from invasion. Aided by the fact that a substantial proportion of

19912-500: The stadholder, but did not want to be considered territory conquered by France, but rather a "sister republic". There was open warfare, with the Patriots' cause dependent on its success on the battlefield. With the defeat of allies of the stadholder at Battle of Fleurus , Austria abandoned its interest in the southern Netherlands. French revolutionary forces were able to take advantage of the freezing of rivers in December 1794 and forced

20064-426: The stadtholderate in stone. The Patriot Revolution therefore seemed to be stopped in its tracks, and rolled back, but that did not imply that the influence of the Leiden Draft also had forever dissipated. The 1770s and 1780s were a time of intensive contact and exchange of ideas across European frontiers by like-minded intellectuals. Among those involved were the French journalist Antoine-Marie Cerisier, who had been in

20216-403: The surveillance of cargoes in Dutch ports, with powers of confiscation without reference to Dutch authorities. The Staatsbewind forbade any Batavian official to take orders from the French on 23 November 1804. This act of defiance sealed the fate of yet another of the Batavian regimes. Napoleon had long been dissatisfied with what he viewed as the foot-dragging and inefficiency of the Dutch. As

20368-425: The task of being a historian of these local societies. Many people wanted to become a member, with Catholics and Mennonites no longer excluded. Not only many shopkeepers, but also ministers, such as François Adriaans van der Kemp , reported for duty. They exercised at least once a week, mostly on Sundays after the religious service or, in bad weather, actually inside the church. (There were almost no chairs, but

20520-701: The territory was annexed into the French Empire. Due to the disastrous Fourth Anglo-Dutch War , the Patriot party revolted against the authoritarian regime of Stadtholder William V but were quickly struck down through the intervention of William's brother-in-law Frederick William II of Prussia in September 1787. Most Patriots went into exile in France , while The Netherlands' own " ancien régime " strengthened its grip on Dutch government chiefly through

20672-458: The trade had shifted to flags of convenience (especially that of the US and European neutrals like Prussia), but the peace made the resurgence of the Dutch carrying trade fully practicable. Nevertheless, some changes proved irreversible, like the shift of trade patterns to German ports, and the decline of the fisheries. The peace turned out to be of short duration. On 18 May 1803, slightly more than

20824-400: The voters engaged. However, exactly because the Republic was a genuine democracy, other goals of the regime were less easy to attain. The elections often put people into office that were very much opposed to the unitary state that was now enshrined in the constitution, and to other innovations that it entailed, or in any case were of a conservative inclination. This already applied at the top:

20976-526: Was a client state of France, its successive governments tried to maintain a degree of independence and to serve Dutch interests even where they clashed with the interests of the French. This clash of interests led to the eventual demise of the Republic when the short-lived experiment with the regime of " Grand Pensionary " Rutger Jan Schimmelpenninck proved unsatisfactory to Napoleon. The subsequent king Louis Bonaparte also refused to follow French dictates, which ultimately led in turn to his downfall in 1810 when

21128-403: Was a military organisation in the 18th century Netherlands, in the form of an armed private organization with a democratically chosen administration, aiming to train the citizens and the lower bourgeoisie in use of muskets. Exercitiegenootschappen were propagated by Joan van der Capellen tot den Pol , who translated an old book (1732) by Andrew Fletcher on arming a nation's citizens and so got

21280-505: Was a sovereign prince. But this was all make-believe, and it ended with the peace of 1802 (though it was revived in 1813). The Prince had reason to feel aggrieved by this. He did have large patrimonial estates in the Netherlands that now were forfeit. Besides, the loss of his hereditary offices entailed a loss of income. According to his own calculations the arrears in all these incomes since 1795 amounted to 4 million guilders. The Staatsbewind refused to pay this, or any sum, point blank, and

21432-443: Was also brushed with the tar of the depredations of the French "sister republic" that mainly viewed the Batavian Republic as a milk cow , both collectively (in its demands for loans at very low interest rates ) and individually (in the demands of French officials for bribes and other extortions). The sagging popularity of the Republic did not escape the attention of the British intelligence services. However, because this intelligence

21584-457: Was called for. The leaders of the Patriots tried to seek a solution during the Fourth Anglo-Dutch War , at the cheapest possible cost. Immediately the war (which had begun badly) developed disastrously, a wave of deprivation spreading through the country, and this result of the attempted reform was widely felt as a matter of national shame, with the harrowing contrast between the famous past and

21736-537: Was drawn up by a commission, chaired by Pieter Paulus , which certainly took the Leiden Draft into account as one of its inspirations. Batavian Republic The Batavian Republic ( Dutch : Bataafse Republiek ; French : République Batave ) was the successor state to the Republic of the Seven United Netherlands . It was proclaimed on 19 January 1795 and ended on 5 June 1806, with

21888-463: Was filtered through the eyes of Orangist agents in the Republic and émigrés in England, it was erroneously interpreted as possible support for an Orangist restoration. This caused the miscalculation that led to the ill-fated Anglo-Russian invasion of Holland in the peninsula of North Holland in 1799. Though the expedition ended in failure the members of the Uitvoerend Bewind became very nervous in

22040-470: Was forced to flee to England on a fishing boat on 18 January 1795. The French presented themselves as liberators. But there were acrimonious negotiations between the representatives of the new Batavian Republic and those of the French Republic , and a harsh Treaty of The Hague was concluded on 16 May 1795. In addition to imposing territorial concessions and a huge indemnity, the treaty obligated

22192-404: Was held by Dutch private citizens, so in a sense it merely engendered an internal money circuit in the Dutch economy. However, it was mostly concentrated in the hands of the rentier class, while the debt was serviced by mainly regressive taxes that weighed on the working population. Most importantly, these were taxes levied by the individual provinces, who serviced their own debt, and paid into

22344-451: Was incapable of defending its own neutrality. This was to be an insoluble dilemma in the coming years. Real advantages of the peace came in the economic field. As an open economy , the Republic needed unhindered trade. It was heavily dependent on exports of agricultural products to the British markets, and on its services sector (especially its large merchant fleet, and the banking sector), whereas its industry (whatever remained of it after

22496-699: Was inspired to take action in Hattem , upon which all exercitiegenootschappen meetings and mutual support were banned in Friesland and Gelderland. Freedom of assembly had reached its limits. Moreover, it was a war in propaganda. In May 1787, the professors and students in Franeker were forbidden from joining the local exercitiegenootschappen or militia. Near Zeist , east of Utrecht, the Dutch States Army camped; there were several shootings Vreeswijk and Soestdijk , but not very many people were hurt. In June 1787,

22648-634: Was rejected, and it caused a lot of embarrassment in the relations with the French Directory. At this time Napoleon Bonaparte performed his coup of 18 Brumaire , establishing the French Consulate . The Franco-Batavian relations now entered a whole new era. Though Napoleon had a warlike reputation, his policies in his first years as First Consul were aimed at restoring peace in Europe, albeit at terms favorable to France. The animus of

22800-630: Was to be assured by constitutions designed to eliminate not only domestic conflict (as was the new French political order), but also any flashes of impertinent nationalism. France therefore embarked on a program of constitutional reform in the dependent republics, first in the Helvetic Republic , where Napoleon as Mediator imposed the Constitution of Malmaison in 1801 (followed by the Second Helvetic Constitution

22952-411: Was to replace the sovereignty claimed by the provincial States and the States-General (another of those "abuses", as the sovereignty of the States was always supposed to be derived from "the People"). The Leiden Draft therefore was not only a declaration of principles, but also a political program of overturning, not the political structure of the Republic, but the composition of the personnel occupying

23104-462: Was weakened by the fact that he was slowly going blind. The Dutch Secretaries of State and the Staatsraad did not have much choice: their only options were a complete extinguishing of the national identity in the form of annexation to the Empire, or the lesser evil of a new kingdom under one of Napoleon's relatives. A Groot Besogne (Grand Commission) was formed to conduct the unequal negotiations with

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