The Lawful Revolution

The most well organized independence movement was in Hungary, which had historically been an independent kingdom but which in 1848 was merely a province of the Habsburg Empire. When Emperor Ferdinand was forced out of Vienna in March, the leading nobles, known as magnates, held a Diet, or Estates-General, of Hungary, to discuss whether they could re-establish an independent country.

Led by a lawyer, Louis Kossuth, the Diet declared itself independent of the Hapsburg Empire. The Diet then proposed a constitution for a Hungarian republic, which would assure the right to vote and freedom of speech to all and which would promote economic development towards greater commerce and industry. It also proposed a guarantee of support for the poor of the cities. These "March Laws" amounted to a complete Revolution in Hungary, without any bloodshed. Kossuth and other Hungarian nationalists were justifiably proud of their achievement. However, like the French Second Republic, this Hungarian Republic had to deal with an uprising of workers and peasants who were dissatisfied with the changes that had been made. Kossuth, now leader of the Republic, had to break with his own principles of legality and use his army against his own citizens, to suppress them by force.