How would you explain the lack of success of German nationalism between 1815-60?

In the year 1835 the zollverein included twenty-five out of the thirty-eight German states and this brought economies closer under Prussia but Austria was not included at all.

There were religious divisions between the north and the south as the majority of people from the north were protestant and the majority of people from the south were catholic which meant that there was some tension between them.

The king called a diet and told them that he wanted to raise taxes so that he could build a railway but the ember of the diet demanded sweeping reforms, which involved a parliament for the whole of Germany and a written constitution. The King then dissolved the diet.

King Frederick hated violence and so because of the demonstrations in Berlin and the troops being called in he became afraid and so gave in to the demands of a written constitution, an elected assembly, a united Prussia and Germany and almost anything else that the protestors asked for. Frederick dissolved the national assembly before it and the Junkers became properly established.

The Frankfurt assembly’s problem was that it could not enforce any of its laws and when it tried to incorporate the help of the Prussian army they remained loyal to their king. In 1815 the bund was given a place in the diet when one of the delegates became ill and when he was in he spoke up strongly for the king. It looked like there was going to be a confrontation and Prussia looked to the bund to restore order but for the bund to do this would cause great embarrassment for Prussia and the erfurt union but they did not want a war. In November 1850 the Erfurt union was dissolved and the bund sorted out the problems of the state leading to the re-establishment of Austrian power in Germany and causing great embarrassment for Prussia. The Prussian government made Bismarck the Prussian delegate to the bund because they admired his politics so much. He became resentful towards the power that Austria had over Germany and tried to challenge them at every turn for example when he prevented Austria from becoming involved in the conflict in southeast Europe. Bismarck was sent to St Petersburg in 1859 as Prussian ambassador because the king and the Prussians were not happy with his proposal to attack Austria.

The nationalist movement was not at all a great success for many reasons such as the fact that there was a lot of opposition and there was great difficulty in deciding what should be included in the united Germany. The power that Austria had over Germany was also a great hold back as was the fact that King Frederick dissolved the National assembly before they had been given a chance.