Today (23 January) marks the 293rd anniversary of the creation of the Principality in 1719, when Charles VI united the counties of Schellenberg and Vaduz and awarded the newly-created principality to Anton Florian of Liechtenstein, the first prince.
That seems like more of a birthday than anything. I wonder why Himayura set in in July?
There is actually historical precedent, in that it was on 12 July, 1806 that Liechtenstein gained full sovereignty as a member state of the Confederation of the Rhine.
Entertainingly, the prince at the time, Johann I, was not consulted, and did not sign the Confederation treaty. However, Article VII thereof allowed for him to abdicate in favor of his third son, whom he was able to control indirectly while maintaining his position in the Austrian court. When Napoleon fell, so did the Confederation of the Rhine, and Johann I retook the throne.
Thus, according to Raton, “Liechtenstein is the only part of the Napoleonic territorial system, which has survived unchanged until the present time” (25).
From Pierre Raton’s Liechtenstein: History and Institutions of the Principality.
As regards international organizations, the system allows for a variety of methods. For example, an exchange of notes between Liechtenstein and the Secretariat of the United Nations goes via the Office of the Swiss Observer to the UNO despite the loss of time this involves. The Secretariat passes the note to the Observer who forwards it to the Federal Political Department; the latter hands it on to the Liechtenstein Legation at Berne, which either settles the matter itself or refers it to the Government in Vaduz. The reply comes in reverse by the same cumbersome procedure. In certain cases where the reply is urgent, the UN Secretariat finds itself considerably handicapped. It would be preferable for the correspondence to go directly to the Liechtenstein Government with copies, when necessary, to the Office of the Swiss Observer and to the Political Department in Berne. For Liechtenstein’s representationat international conferences, three different methods are used: one, which might be called the most extreme, consists of Liechtenstein being represented directly by Switzerland. In this case only the Swiss representative takes part in the negotiations and Liechtenstein has no vote. The Swiss plenipotentiaries sign the final Protocol of the conference on behalf of Liechtenstein. This procedure has little to recommend it since it implies the absorption of Liechtenstein by Switzerland and smacks too much of colonial status. The second system is better since it involves only moderate costs and yet gives Liechtenstein complete representation, i.e., a seat and a vote. It consists in charging a Swiss diplomat with representing the Principality’s interests. The diplomat has full powers signed by the Reigning Prince and represents the latter only on the specific matter with which he is charged.
This system was used at conferences in New York under the auspices of the United Nations and also at the election of the judges of the International Court of Justice. The third method is obviously the best one and is used whenever the costs involved are relatively low: direct representation of the Principality by a Liechtenstein delegation. This has in fact been the procedure at various European conferences, and Switzerland has never raised any objections. The relations here have been more of a political than of a juridical nature and on the whole, the system has worked to the satisfaction of both partners.
Note that this was published in 1970; I would be curious to know how Liechtenstein’s accession to the United Nations in 1990 affected this process, given that Switzerland did not join until 2002.
From Pierre Raton’s Liechtenstein: History and Institutions of the Principality.
As early as 1862 a strong segment of popular opinion began to favour a Customs Union with Switzerland, but when the treaty with Austria was renewed in 1864, this trend was halted for the time being. Many ties already existed with Switzerland. Ever since the Middle Ages Liechtenstein had belonged to the Bishopric of Chur. In the 19th century a number of treaties were agreed upon, such as the Treaty of Establishment in 1874 which is still valid today. In 1886 came the agreement allowing doctors living in border ares to practice in the neighbouring country.
However, it was only after the rise of the Volkspartei in 1913 and the fall of the Austrian Empire in 1918 that the vague wish of many Liechtensteiners for a close partnership with Switzerland began to take substance. During World War I Switzerland had sent food to Liechtenstein and by 1919 Liechtenstein’s debts for this had come to nearly 450,000 Swiss francs. Prince Johann II sold off some of the crown jewels for 550,000 and granted his country this sum as an interest-free loan. Three years later he cancelled the debt.
From now on, Liechtenstein gradually relinguished [sic] its ties with Austria and broadened those with Switzerland. The first step in this direction was to request Switzerland to take over the Principality’s diplomatic relations abroad since Austria, as a former belligerent, was no longer able to do so. Then Liechtenstein confided its postal administration to Switzerland and, finally, in 1923, the Customs Union was agreed upon and completed by a border police agreement. Thus in the course of four years, the foundations were laid for Liechtenstein’s present international position and economic progress.
From Pierre Raton’s Liechtenstein: History and Institutions of the Principality (1970).
For Austria, the Liechtenstein question became a vital issue, because of its influence on that of the border province of Vorarlberg, whose population was demanding annexation to Switzerland on the basis of the right of self-determination.
Vorarlberg representatives were already in Berne and were planning to go on to Paris. Liechtenstein’s step threatened to set a dangerous precedent and could precipitate developments to the disadvantage of the Austrian Republic which feared that already the loyalty of several rich border provinces was in considerable doubt. The leaders of the new Austrian state were obviously nervous, but quite unexpectedly, on August 30, the Cabinet accepted the denunciation of the [Customs] Treaty and immediately the border guards were ordered to their posts and food deliveries from Vorarlberg were held up. From September 1 on, Liechtenstein was, for the Austrian customs officials, a foreign country. The Austrian customs officials on duty at the border between Liechtenstein and Switzerland withdrew without turning over the customs houses in proper order. The [Liechtenstein] Legation in Vienna protested many times and was successful at least to the extent that the duty on Liechtenstein’s exports to Austria was lifted and the customs offices eventually handed over in an orderly manner. At the end of November the Austrian Government declared its readiness to negotiate a new Customs Treaty.
It occurs to me to wonder how, if at all, later history might have been different had Vorarlberg successfully arranged to join Switzerland. Would Liechtenstein have followed suit, or would it have become an enclave as San Marino? Would Burgenland and Klagenfurt have followed suit in leaving Austria? What of the impact of Austria’s altered borders on Nazi politics and/or Nazi-Swiss relations?
The Liechtensteiners also feared that their country might again become a battleground as it had so often in the course of history. They wished to remain neutral like Switzerland, but Switzerland too had so far not applied for membership in the League although it had been invited to do so.
From Pierre Raton’s Liechtenstein: History and Institutions of the Principality.
From the psychological point of view, matters were still more complicated and bore in them the seed of that decisive turning point which was to affect so deeply the Principality’s domestic and foreign policy. The House of Liechtenstein, one of the richest and most famous families of the Austro-Hungarian monarchy, had over the years played a leading role in the Austrian administration and army, and still did. Prince Eduard, for example, author of the Memorandum, was Chairman of the Youth Service in the Austrian Ministry of the Interior as late as 1917. The two reigning families were closely related and the Liechtensteins had enormous properties in Bohemia and Moravia, all of which made the family strong supporters of the Austrian regime and state. No wonder that the Liechtenstein family were on the side of the Central Powers from the beginning of the war. This only began to change with the increasing military successes of the Allies.
The Head of Government, the Austrian Baron von Imhof, also seems not to have been at all sympathetic to the Entente Powers. As regards the population, their atttitude deserves a closer look.
For the ordinary Liechtensteiner, the French were the escendants of Masséna’s and Jourdan’s men who had devastated the country during the Napoleonic wars a hundred years before. The Russians were regarded as no better; so were the italians, who had been enemies only fifty years before (1866); and as for the English, they were known only as tourists.
Therefore the people, too, favoured the German-speaking neighbours, all the more so, as this did not seem to bring any inconveniences; but as soon as the blockade began to be felt, and hunger and misery set in—particularly in contrast to the well-being of the Swiss in St. Gallen, across the Rhine—they began to recall ever increasingly that their country was independent of Austria, that its neutrality had officially been made known to the Allies, and that it would be only right to be fed by them. All negotiations to this end failed, however, and unrest and dissatisfaction grew. At the same time the People’s Party, founded in 1913 by Wilhelm Beck, grew too. Prince Johann, a true benefactor of his country, enjoyed too great a respect for anyone to attack him directly. The dissatisfaction was directed instead against the Head of Government, Baron von Imhof, who was accused of being too friednly toward Austria. On November 7, 1918, he was forced to resign. Prince Eduard who, since May 1918, had exercised the functions of a foreign minister for the Principality, was subjected to frequent attacks by the Oberrheinische Nachrichten, the organ of the People’s Party. He was accused of sabotaging the negotiations with the Swiss Government at Berne.
From Pierre Raton’s Liechtenstein: History and Institutions of the Principality.
Nicolas Politis describes neutrality as “the attitude of a state which, during a war betweent wo or more states, does not participate in the fighting and strives to maintain insofar as possible the same relations with all participants as it had had before the outbreak of the conflict.”
Did Liechtenstein behave according to this lengthy definition? The lack of troops since 1868 made it impossible for Liechtenstein to have participated in any military actions. However, individual Liechtensteiners had joined the armies of the Central Powers. Prince Heinrich of Liechtenstein fell in 1915 at the head of troops commanded by him, but as an Austrian Major.
On September 25, 1914, Liechtenstein requested the Emb assy of the United States of America to inform the Powers that the country had declared itself neutral. This declaration was a voluntary act of a sovereign state; and it is entirely within the competence of a state to issue such a declaration. Naturally, a neutral follows the customary and conventional patterns of neutrality. According to Prince Eduard’s “Memorandum”, Liechtenstein seems to have observed these patterns very exactly: French and British nuns, who were living in Liechtenstein, were granted asylum, as were other nationals of the Entente powers; escaped prisoners of war were permitted to transit the country; and the Government refused to hand over to the Austrians deserters and conscientious objectors living on Liechtenstein territory. These facts were gneerally acknowledged by the warring powers.
However, the war was not limited to the battle-field. As it went on, it became more and more a moral, economic, and financial one. And here Liechtenstein was not able to preserve such a strict neutrality. After all, it was connected with Austria by the Customs, Currency and Economic Union and thus was involuntarily drawn into the Austrian war effort. As a result, in 1916 the French GOvernment, through its Ambassador at Berne, let Liechtenstein know that it did not recognize Liechtenstein’s neutrality in economic matters. In fact, Vaduz had gone to considerable effort to demonstrate its backing up those declarations. The Government banned the export of cotton stored in the country to Vorarlberg where it was to be used in a factory; and a weaving mill was not permitted to export to Austria some of its machinery of British origin.
