Imperial Constitution campaign (1849)
제국헌법 운동 (1849)
The risings and agitation of May–July 1849 by which German democrats tried to enforce from below the Frankfurt Constitution that the princes had rejected. Risings broke out in Dresden in Saxony, in Prussia's Rhine Province and Westphalia, in the Bavarian Palatinate and in Baden, in some places reaching the scale of civil war. Suppressed chiefly by Prussian troops, the campaign ended with the fall of Rastatt fortress on 23 July 1849.
In depth
Bakunin, Wagner and Born took part in the Dresden rising (3–9 May); in Elberfeld 15,000 workers built barricades and Engels came as Inspector of Barricades. The Palatinate set up a provisional government on 17 May, and in Baden, after the Rastatt garrison mutinied, the grand duke fled and Brentano's government took office. Engels fought as aide-de-camp in Willich's volunteer corps.
German Wikipedia cites recent research showing that the campaign mobilised the rural population widely, qualifying the older view that the peasants withdrew from the revolution once their demands were met. Engels analysed the risings in "The Campaign for the German Imperial Constitution" and in Revolution and Counter-Revolution in Germany.