While Schönerer and Pan-Germanism appealed to the educated classes, Karl Lueger transformed the Socialism" class="md-crosslink">Christian Socialism of Karl, Freiherr (baron) von Voegelsang, into a political organization that appealed to small shopkeepers, artisans, tradesmen, and lower bourgeois circles of Vienna and the surrounding countryside. The workers’ movement, formerly a concern of welfare and adult-education societies, also transformed itself into a political party. Although workers’ movements had been weakened in Austria by personal rivalries and government persecution, in 1889 at a conference in Hainfeld, Victor Adler managed to unite the competing Marxist groups into the Social Democratic Party (see Marxism).
Taaffe continued to seek compromises between nationalities that were becoming increasingly radical in their demands. The Slav orientation of the Taaffe cabinet did not satisfy the Czechs, for example, but rather encouraged a mood of belligerence; because the moderate Old Czechs failed to live up to radical demands, the nationalistic Young Czechs were able to gain support from the electorate. In 1890 Taaffe tried to negotiate an agreement between the Old Czechs and the German liberals, whereby Bohemia would be divided for administrative and judicial purposes along lines of nationality, but he was balked by the more chauvinistic Young Czechs and German nationalists, and his efforts led to riots in Prague in 1893.
When Emil Steinbach joined Taaffe’s cabinet as minister of finance in 1891, he encouraged Taaffe and the emperor to try electoral reform as an instrument of breaking nationalist opposition. It was hoped that, by extending the franchise, nationalistic antagonism could be allayed and the growing unrest among urban workers could be placated. On October 10, 1893, the government introduced a suffrage bill that would have given the vote to virtually every literate adult male (while preserving the traditional system of voting in curiae). Conservative groups of all nationalities joined forces against this bill, and, under pressure from the Hungarian government, Taaffe had to resign on November 11, 1893.
Though failing in political matters, the cabinet had introduced some economic reforms. Between 1888 and 1892 a system of cooperative banks for farmers was organized, the taxation system was revised, Austrian currency was stabilized by a return to the gold standard, and the florin was replaced by the crown, which remained the Austrian currency until 1924. The Taaffe government is also remembered for social-reform legislation; the laws of 1884 fixed the maximum working day at 11 hours, outlawed the employment of children under 12, required a Sunday rest day for workers, and set up compulsory insurance against accidents and sickness. Political turmoil
The franchise question continued to dominate Austrian domestic affairs and became closely welded to the nationality conflicts. The next Austrian prime minister, Alfred, Fürst (prince) zu Windischgrätz (grandson of the Windischgrätz who seized Prague in 1848), sought to win the support of parliament by forming a cabinet in which the clerical conservatives, the Poles, and the German liberals were represented. They were united, however, only in opposition to universal suffrage. Each minister defended his national cause, and the ministry was torn by ceaseless conflict. The end came in June 1895, when the government fulfilled an old promise and introduced Slovene classes into the grammar school at Cilli (now Celje, Slovenia) in Steiermark. Because the school had been exclusively German, this was regarded as a grave blow to the German cause, and the German liberals resigned, forcing Windischgrätz himself to resign.
Embittered by the conduct of the German liberals, Franz Joseph on October 2 entrusted the task of solving Austria’s problems to a Polish aristocrat, Kasimir Felix, Graf (count) von Badeni, known as a “strong man” for the high-handed way in which he had acted as governor of Galicia. Little noticed at the time, the appointment of Badeni as Austrian prime minister symbolized the breakdown of German control over the Habsburg monarchy. For the first time in Habsburg history, Germans controlled none of the key positions of government. Not only the prime minister but also the finance minister (Leo, Ritter [knight] von Biliński) and the foreign minister (Agenor, Graf Gołuchowski, who had succeeded Gusztáv Siegmund, Graf Kálnoky von Köröspatak, in May 1895) came from the Polish part of the empire.
Badeni managed to induce parliament to accept a compromise franchise bill that introduced qualified universal male suffrage but preserved the system of class voting (a fifth curia was even added). The shortcomings of the new system enraged the parties representing the masses of the population. By 1897, however, elections held on the basis of the new suffrage had strengthened the radical elements in the Reichsrat; the Young Czechs, for instance, had completely overwhelmed the conservative Old Czechs.
In the 1870s and ’80s, decisive economic changes with far-reaching social consequences had occurred in the Habsburg lands. Though remaining primarily agrarian, they had undergone an industrialization that had resulted in an unprecedented growth of urban centres. Vienna, which had about 430,000 inhabitants in 1851, had become a metropolis of 1,800,000 by the turn of the 20th century, and that phenomenon was paralleled in other areas, especially in Bohemia, which had become the industrial centre of the western part of the Habsburg lands. Those socioeconomic developments naturally began to affect politics. From 1890 on, the advance of the Social Democrats and the Christian Socialists caused considerable tension in Vienna. In October 1894 the Social Democrats held their first impressive orderly mass demonstration in the capital, and the communal elections of 1895 made the Christian Socialists the strongest party in Vienna, ending the long liberal rule. When the emperor refused to confirm Karl Lueger, the popular leader of the Christian Socialists, as mayor of Vienna, there were demonstrations and protests. Not until Lueger was elected mayor for the fifth time did Franz Joseph agree to confirm him, in April 1897.
Counting on support from the Slav and conservative parties in parliament, Badeni dared to take up the Bohemian-language question again. In April 1897 he issued a famous language ordinance that introduced Czech as a language equal to German even in the “inner service”—i.e., for communications within government departments. This decision meant that civil servants in Bohemia and Moravia would have to be able to speak and write Czech as well as German. Since many Germans refused to learn Czech, the ordinance put them at a definite disadvantage in Bohemia’s administration. The publication of the ordinance provoked violent German reactions: university professors signed resolutions of protest, mass meetings incited the public, and German deputies in the Reichsrat began to obstruct all legislative activities. The protest reached its climax in November 1897, when parliamentary sessions turned into bedlam, and popular protests against Badeni led to street demonstrations. The mass protest was not restricted to Vienna. It was even worse in some German towns in Bohemia; in Graz, clashes between soldiers and the masses ended in the death of one demonstrator.