Congress of Laybach

The Congrès of Laybach was a conference of allied sovereigns or their representatives. It was held has Ljubljana, Austria (now Slovenia) of the January 26th to the May 12th 1821. Before the dissolution of the Congress of Troppau, it was decided to defer it in next January, and to invite the king of Naples, having chosen Ljubljana like site. Castlereagh, in the name of the the United Kingdom, had cordially accepted the invitation like implying a negotiation and thus like a withdrawal of the position taken at the time of the Protocole of Troppau. Before leaving Troppau, however, the three autocratic powers, Russia, Austria and Prussia, had published, the December 8th 1820, a circular in which they reiterated the principles of the Protocol, i.e. right and duty of the powers responsible for peace for the Europe to intervene to remove any movement Révolution naire that they could suspecter threaten this peace (Hertslet, No 105). Opposed at this sight, Castlereagh once more protested in a missive of the January 19th 1821, in which it made a clear difference between the contestable general principles advanced by the three powers, and the particular case of the faintness in Italy, which was not a problem for Europe in general, but for Austria and other Italian capacities which could be considered in danger (Hertslet, No 107).

The conference opened the January 26th 1821, and its constitution underlined the divergences revealed in these missives. The emperors of Russia and Austria present, were accompanied in person by the counts Nesselrode and Capo By Istria, Metternich and the Baron Vincent; Prussia and France were represented by the plenipotentiary ones. But the United Kingdom, justifying that it was not directly concerned with the Italian question, was represented only by Lord Stewart (Castlereagh), the ambassador in Vienna, which did not have the full powerss, its mission being only of observing and of checking that nothing is done beyond or in violation of the existing treaties.

Italian princes, Ferdinand of Naples and the duke of Modena came in person; the remainder were represented by plénipotentiaires.
It was quickly clear that a discord between the United Kingdom and the other powers was inevitable. Metternich wanted to obtain an apparent unanimity of the powers to support the Austrian intervention in Naples, and many processes were used to try to trap the British representative and to make him accept a formula which would give the impression that the United Kingdom supported the principles of the others allied. Since these processes failed, it was tempted to exclude Lord Stewart from the conference due to lack to being able, but these attempts failed.

Lord Stewart was finally forced to protest openly, and it forced the writing of its protests on the newspaper. However Capo Of Istria lute a declaration in front of the Italian ministers, who were not at all interdependent of the great values implied by the Austrian intervention, in which like result of the union established by solemn acts between the Européens capacities, the Russian emperor offered to allied the assistance of his weapons, so of new revolutions were to threaten of new dangers; this offer was an attempt to revive the idea of a universal union based on the Sainte Alliance against which the United Kingdom had constantly protested.

The United Kingdom, however, was not opposed as well to the Austrian intervention in Naples as with the scale of the principles as they wanted to use to justify it. The King Ferdinand was invited to Laybach, according to the circular of December 8th, in order to enable him to act like mediator between his wandering populations and the States whose these people threatened peace. The cynical use that it made of its freedom in order to repudiate of the solemnly contracted obligations is described elsewhere (see Naples, Histoire). The result of this action was the declaration of war of Naples and the occupation of Naples by Austria, with the blessing of the congress. This was preceded, on March 10th, by the revolt of the garrison of Alessandria and the military revolution with the Piedmont, which was in its removed turn, following negotiations with Laybach, by the Austrian troops. It was as in Laybach as on March 19th, the emperor Alexandre accepted the news of the invasion by Alexandre Ypsilántis of the principalities of the Danube, which announced the beginning of the Guerre of Greek independence. Since Laybach, Capo of Istria criticized in a letter with Ypsilántis the moment and the way in which the war of independence had started: it was to recognize implicitly that it was justified.

The conference finished the May 12th 1821, date on which Russia, Austria and Prussia published a declaration (Hertslet, No 108) announcing in the world the principles which would enable them to come to assistance of subjected people. This declaration affirmed once again the principles of the Protocole of Troppau. In this the European significance of the conference of Laybach rests, having had primarily discussions in relation to Italy. The publication of the declaration without the signatures of the representatives of the United Kingdom and France proclaimed the disunion of alliance; in which to use the words of Lord Stewart there was triple agreement which bound the parts to advance their own sights in spite of the differences in opinions between them and two large constitutional governments.

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