|
( Reichstag (institution))
The Reichstag (German for "Imperial Diet") was the parliament of the Holy Roman Empire, the North German Confederation, and of Germany until 1945. The main chamber of the German parliament is now called Bundestag ("Federal Diet"), but the building in which it meets is still called "Reichstag" (see Reichstag (building)). The term "Reichstag" (listen&_160;(help·info)) ['?a?çsta?k] is a compound of German Reich ("Empire") and Tag ("assembly"; does not mean "day" here, but is derived from the verb tagen "to assemble"). The Latin term, a direct translation, was curia imperialis. (Still today, the parliaments on the various federal levels in Germany are called Bundestag, Landtag etc., and the parliament in Sweden is called Riksdag.) While the Holy Roman Empire lasted (formally until 1806), the Reichstag never was a parliament in today's sense; instead, it was the assembly of the various estates of which the Empire was composed. More precisely, it was the convention of the Reichsstände ("imperial states"), those legal entities that, according to feudal law, had no authority above them besides the king himself (see Holy Roman Empire for details). The precise role and function changed over the centuries, as did the Empire itself, as the states gained more and more control at the expense of the imperial power. Initially, there was neither a fixed time nor location for the Reichstag. It started as a convention of the dukes of the old Germanic tribes that formed the Frankish kingdom when important decisions had to be made, probably based on the old Germanic law that each leader relied on the support of his leading men. For example, already under Charles the Great (Charlemagne), the Reichstag in Aachen in 802/803 officially declared the laws of the Saxons and other tribes. The Reichstag of 919 in Fritzlar elected the first king of the Germans who was a Saxon, Henry the Fowler, thus overcoming the longstanding rivalry between Franks and Saxons and laying the foundation for the German Empire. In 1158, the Diet of Roncaglia finalized four laws that would significantly alter the (never formally written) constitution of the Empire, marking the beginning of the steady decline of the central power in favour of the local dukes. In 1356, the Golden Bull cemented the concept of Landesherrschaft ("territorial rule"), the largely independent rule of the dukes over their respective territories.
|
Reichstag (institution) Subcategories
Reichstag (institution) Articles
|
|
