Category: History - European
The first inhabitants of Switzerland, according to tradition, were fugitives from Italy, who had been driven by the Gauls from the country where now flourish the cities of Genoa and Florence, and who, 600 B.C., found an asylum in the recesses and wilderness of the valleys abov...
The first inhabitants of Switzerland, according to tradition, were fugitives from Italy, who had been driven by the Gauls from the country where now flourish the cities of Genoa...
3. CHAPTER II.“On the main-land only two little spots at the two extremities of the old Teutonic world came out of the mediæval crucible with their self-government substantially intact. At th...
4. CHAPTER I.The Cantons are sovereign so far as their sovereignty is not limited by the Federal Constitution, and as such they exercise all the rights which are not delegated to the Federal...
5. CHAPTER II.It is provided that the duties of Secretary to the Federal Assembly and Federal Council shall be performed by a Federal Chancellery under the direction of a Chancellor of the Co...
6. CHAPTER III.3. If one branch of the Federal Assembly passes a resolution for amendment of the Federal Constitution and the other does not approve; or upon the demand of fifty thousand quali...
7. CHAPTER III.“A legislative, and an executive, and a judicial power comprehend the whole of what is meant by government.”[30] We find in Switzerland this general division of powers, with man...
8. CHAPTER IV.The three main forms of executive embrace the hereditary and irresponsible king, with or without a responsible ministry; the single responsible president; and the executive coun...
9. CHAPTER V.The Swiss Federal Tribunal, in its present form, dating from 1874, was originally set up in 1848. It is, however, the product of an historical development extending over nearly...
10. CHAPTER VI.Prior to the year 1798, the condition of a Swiss Canton was that of a great feudal lord, with an aggregate of many separate seigniorial properties; acquired partly by conquest,...
11. CHAPTER VII.In the republics of the ancient world, where representative assemblies were unknown, legislative power vested with the citizens, the sovereign power being exercised by the whole...
12. CHAPTER VIII.The student of politics may always look with advantage to Switzerland for the latest forms and results of democratic experiments. Federal laws, decrees, and resolutions require...
13. CHAPTER IX.The lowest unit in the political system is that which still exists under various names, as the Mark, the Gemeinde, the Commune, or the Parish, the analogue of the precinct or to...
14. CHAPTER X.In the old days of the Swiss Confederation, the days of the _Staatenbund_, when no part of the internal sovereignty had been given over to any central power, the citizen of any...
15. CHAPTER XI.There can be no better security for the stability of the institutions of a country than by enlisting a large number of the people in their support, by giving them a stake in the...
16. CHAPTER XII.Attached alike to liberty and to arms, the Swiss are no less famous for their undaunted intrepidity than their simple and pure democracy. From early times the hardy mountaineers...
17. CHAPTER XIII.No inquiry can be more important than that which proposes to discover the legitimate purpose and the best course of general education. All men, how much soever they may be disti...
18. CHAPTER XIV.A French writer has compared a well-arranged plan of public instruction “to a railway system, with its main line, stations, junctions, and branch lines. Just as passengers on a...
19. CHAPTER XV.It is a popular mistake that Switzerland, industrially, occupies a stagnant condition in the scale of nations, and exists for picturesqueness alone. It is equally a mistake to t...
20. CHAPTER XVI.“Mid the murmurings of his fountains, And the echoes of his mountains, Where the lordly eagle soars, Where the headlong torrent roars, He is, as he was meant to be, Poor and vir...
21. CHAPTER XVII.“A wilderness of sweets: for nature here Wanton’d as in her prime, and play’d at will, Her virgin fancies pouring forth more sweet, While above rule of art, enormous bliss.”
22. CHAPTER XVIII.Trite and worn out as the subject may appear, it is impossible by any amount of familiarity to divest the historical legend of William Tell of its undying charm; and he who has...
23. CHAPTER XIX.From the end of the thirteenth century Bern was the great, influential, and growing town of Switzerland; rich, enterprising, and self-asserting. For the sake of securing their f...
24. CHAPTER XX.It is not a little surprising--when we consider the great and rapid advance that has been made during the last century in diplomacy, jurisprudence, statesmanship, and political...
25. CHAPTER XXI.Switzerland has no small influence on the affairs of Europe, as well by its situation as by its warlike genius. There is much of history, but still more political anomaly, writt...