When did your country abolish estates or at least different laws for different estates?

24 comments

1. For Russia the answer is straightforward: 25th of November 1917 (Gregorian calendar). That’s when the Decree on the Abolition of Estates and Civil Ranks was published, abolishing all distinctions between the citizens of Russia.

2. 14 August 1919 when the republican Weimar constitution entered into force.

   What confuses many people, is that they were allowed to transform their titles as ordinary part of their names. So there are still people with “Prince” in their name but this is explicitly NOT a nobility title anymore.

3. 1919 in Estonia when government nationalized most of manors and their land, leaving the owners only with main building for them to live in. Land was then handed out to the Independence war veterans. Most of the Balto-Germanic manor owners finally sold their manors in 1939-1940 when as they emigrated out from Estonia after signing of Molotov-Ribbentrop pact between USSR and Germany.

4. 10th of April 1919 is when all privileges of the previous nobility were abolished in Austria. Interestingly, unlike Germany, this also included making it illegal to use a noble title for yourself. The official legal name of the current would-be emperor is just “Karl Habsburg-Lothringen”.

5. With the napoleonic invasion all swiss men became equal citizens. With the founding of the liberal national state in 1848 privileges of aristocracy were abolished. But they kept their money and stayed influential till today.

6. I mean I suppose for the UK… there was no particular point?

   Like the nobility obviously still exists – there are statistics showing that having a originally Norman last name is a solid predictor of wealth (and they arrived here in 1066 for god’s sake)

   But I suppose it was a gradual process of the expansion of the franchise of Parliament to everyone in the country

7. Well they still exist to some small extent. But the transfer of power from the Monarch and the Lords to the Commons has been a long and slow evolution of British society and politics. I don’t think you could give an exact date. There’s Magna Carta, the Reformation, The Civil War, the Glorious Revolution, the Liberal reforms of the 19th century, the Lords reforms of 1911 and 1999 etc

8. Initially the 4-estates Riksdag was abolished in 1866, but there were not a fully democratic representation until 1922, when women were allowed to vote and there were no requirement for income and having fulfilled conscription for men.

   The King lost his political powers with the 1974 constitution change.

   The last symbolical nobility privileges were abolished in 2003(!).

9. “*Privilegios*” still exist. In fact the person of the king is inviolable by law.

   The seizure of church land and privilege (*desamortización*) began (legally) in 1798 and ended in 1924.

   Usually the constitution of 1812 is considered the legal end of privileges in Spain. They were reinstalled and abolished again and again and civil wars were fought.

   The most significant and old privilege is that hold by the Basque country and the (former kingdom) of Navarre, called *fueros*, which allow them to manage their own taxation and pay the central government of Spain whatever is agreed on a given time. All other differences in territorial law were abolished with the formation of Spain (about 1707, *Decreto de Nueva Planta*) which started, you guessed, some civil wars.

   Cities (*ciudades*) and towns (*burgos*) were so called only through Royal privilege, not size, and were allowed to have markets, etc. This is no longer the case but those markets still exist in mostly the same places, as tradition, no longer restricted by law.

   The EU tried to ban the guilds in Spain but through some legal loophole many remained. The one I hate the most, as it affects me, is the Architect’s guilds (*Colegios de arquitectos*). The power these mafias hold is embarrassing.

   The Catholic church, religious orders, etc still hold some privileges.

   Nevertheless, everyone is subjected to the same laws overall, irrespective of being a Grande de España or a bum, …except the King.

10. Abolition of privileges : 4th of August 1789

    Abolition of the nobility : 23rd of June 1790

    Nobility titles wer eventually re-introduced in 1814 during the Restoration but only the “honourary” part, not any rights or privileges. These were eventually abolished again in 1848. Napoléon I also kinda introduced a “Empire nobility” but it only meant titles, nobility didn’t exist properly speaking. Same for Napoléon III.

    The whole abolition of nobility and privileges is a big thing of the French Revolution and I guess it was just unthinkable for anyone after 1789 to re-introduce privileges.

    Former noble families still exist and most rich families today still descend from nobles. They have an association to “protect their culture”, conferences, etc. Standard noble family shit I guess.

    Some also like to use their titles when they have been destroyed decades ago, like the monarchist pretenders for instance.

11. 1st January 1948, when the Constitution of the Italian Republic became effective.

    In truth, the titles weren’t really abolished, with the Constitution merely not recognising their existence and transforming the territorial designations in surnames (example Camillo Benso became “of Cavour” instead of “Count of Cavour”), at lest for those noble families recognized before the March on Rome on 28 October 1922.

12. We still have an aristocracy obviously, to that means we do have the nobility: earls, dukes, barons, and whatnot. And still, the term “upper class” technically only applies to the aristocracy, while “middle class” is the descendents of the mobile burghers or merchant classes; this is why, for example, someone like Jacob Rees-Mogg is “upper middle class” rather than “upper class”.

    What this means practically though is harder to say, beyond many nobles sitting as “hereditary peers” in the House of Lords. Their number was limited back in the 1990’s under Blair, I think, and the Lords became steadily overtaken by the Commons anyway during the mid-late 19th century under Disraeli and the vote was gradually extended to classes who prior to then were disenfranchised.

    Parliament has existed in some form since the 13th century, though back then it was mostly nobles (though with a few burghers), and there have been limits on the powers of kings since 1215. From then onward there was increasing social mobility, with checks put in place to try and limit this; such as laws mandating or restricting certain styles of dress to each class in the 14th century.

    A key event here is the Peasants’ Revolt of 1381, which was a response to increasing social mobility following the Plague, which killed around half of the population. Given the increasing role played by lower estates in government it was much harder in England for rulers to adopt the sort of absolutism favoured in other parts of Europe.

13. In 1814 the creation the Norwegian constitution the creation of new nobles was forbidden, and then in 1821 the noble law abolished a lot of noble titles and privileges, and from there on the nobility gradually dissolved in a few generations (the law allowed some of the nobles to keep their nobility for a generation or two, but this had to be argued for in parliament).The old noble families often kept their noble titles for a longer time due to them holding tiles in Denmark.

14. It didn’t happen at a particular point, as Italy was a patchwork of city states, republics and kingdoms up until unification in 1861.

    Some states, like Venice, didn’t even have a nobility per se (Venetian powerful families like the Foscari or the Corner were mercantile families and held the title of patrician of the Republic) beause they were Republics.

    Most of the differences in estates were wiped out in or in the decades following the Napoleonic wars. The last pre unitary state to abolish feudalism was the Kingdom of Two Sicilies.

    As for the unitary state, the nobility did have a separate status when Italy was a kingdom, but it was mostly connected to ceremonial roles in the court, the country itself was a constitutional monarchy based on census and money, regardless of how it was made.

    The last vestiges of that status were abolished together with the abolition of the monarchy, when we voted in a referendum in 1946 to become a republic

15. Most people in this thread are answering about noble titles and the like.

    But I’m going to guess you were mostly asking about lex mercatoria, canonical law (beyond the Church’s internal matters), “ethnic laws” and so on.

    The answer? For Italy, as a country, they never existed, since the legal science already had went past that, unless you count the first few years that saw Tuscany keep a separate set of criminal laws as a condition to join. As a collection of countries, all of the countries that were under Austrian puppeteering after the Council of Vienna (Lucca, Parma, Modena) did so in 1815, Tuscany did away with lex mercatoria in 1836 IIRC, and neither the Papal State nor Two Sicilies really abolished those ’til their annexation, though in the Papal State’s case you could argue that the Romagnan Law was left unapplied since 1700 or so…

16. I am not sure if there is a specific date. Afaik I know this prices took a while. First most people were farmers. After the Industrial Revolution many poor peasant went to the cities and work in a factory. And after that they slowly get more educated and society getting more equal. One of many important moments was in 1874 when a law was passed which prohibited child labor till the age of 12, forcing kids to be educated till that age. The law itself only prohibited labor in factories. So manual labor on the fields was still allowed. But this law was the first social law which ultimately led to a series of laws improve the lives of the working class.

17. There had been significant reforms in the UK system during the later half of the 19th century, which also would have been applicable in Ireland, but any privilege of aristocracy effectively ended in 1922 upon independence.

    Although technically the British monarch remained ceremonial figure head until the Republic of Ireland Act came into force on 18 April 1949, even though we also had a full presidency doing the same thing and completely ignored the monarch. It was more like there was just some unfinished bureaucratic business that was delayed by WWII and once the paperwork was done that was that.

    We also don’t have any concept of sovereign immunity. It was deemed by the courts to have been extinguished after independence by and doesn’t apply to any modern office holder.

18. On the 10 December 1918, one month and two weeks after the creation of our independent nation. Technically, not my country, since it was the Republic of Czechoslovakia, not the Czech Republic, but since we maintain diplomatic continuity, I think it’s a fair answer.

    If you really want the date for the Czech Republic, then it’s 1 January 1993, the day we split Czechoslovakia with the Slovaks.

19. Most of the special privileges of the estates were stripped during the 1800’s and the estates-general was abolished and replaced by a parliamentary democracy in 1906. Ennoblement was forbidden in 1919 constitution.

20. 1918 provisional constitution made ‘people of any sex, ethnicity, religion and estate equal before the law, there were no estate privileges’.

    The 1920 constitution exlicitly stated that ‘all Lithuanian citizens, regardless of sex, ethnicity or religion are equal before the law; there are no estates or titles.

    ​

    So, it is 1920 for complete abolishment, and 1918 for making them meaningless.

21. Well,

    Between 1795 and 1918 there was no Poland. How situation looked like between 1918-1921 – I don’t know, but “March constitution” from ’21 stands:

    > Every Polish citizen, regardless of gender, has the right to vote if he or she becomes legally valid at the
    full civil rights and resides in the c
    Eight from the day before registration in the Journal of Laws.
    The right to vote can only be a participant.
    active-duty officers have no right

    > Article 96.
    All citizens are equal before the law. Public offices are equally accessible to all on conditions, the former Republic of Poland does not recognize family privileges or those prescribed by law. as well as any coats of arms, family titles, or any other, except scientific, official, and professional.
    the wate of the Commonwealth may not be received without permission
    of pPresident

    .

22. Feudalism in England had informally been in decline since the chaotic 14th century reign of Edward II, who ignored precedent and was eventually usurped by his queen and her new lover Roger Mortimer. A more formal legal ending for feudalism in England happened after the Reformation with the Land Tenancies Abolition Act, of 1660. 17th century popular movements linked with Puritanism and The Levellers hadn’t been entirely satisfied that Lord Protector Oliver Cromwell had delivered on all of his pledges, which was recognised by Parliament when they arranged the restoration of the monarchy.

23. There’s a lot to criticise about the constitution of Cyprus, but it has the Article 28 Paragraphs 3 & 4 which abolish all titles and privileges of nobility. the constitution was adopted in 1960, as Cyprus become independent from the British Empire. One of the rare good things in that constitution.

    Well… that would be cool, but there’s also Article 110 which recognises legal autonomy for both the Orthodox Chruch with its estates and industries and the Evkaf (a Muslim land-holding organisation). So, for the clergy, not abolished yet and it’s often very relevant in politics and the economy.

24. The clergy were influential in the Netherlands, like they were everywhere, but as a calvinist country, they had no formal power after the reformation. Catholics weren’t allowed to practice their faith publicly, so their clergy were even less noticeable.

    Our nobility was relatively small in numbers (we had no king to create new nobility whenever a noble line died out), and they were outnumbered by the burghers in the Estates General as well as the different provincial Estates. Their *Ridderschappen* (literally “knighthoods” or “chivalries”, but more of an upper house kind of system at the provincial level) did not have much formal power as a result. However, we did have a system of estates, just less pronounced than many other countries.

    The first time the system was abolished was with the start of the Batavian Republic, in 1795. The Batavian Republic was basically a vassal state of France and based on the principles of the French revolution. With the *staatsregeling* of 1798, we got our first democratic constitution of sorts, in which the abolition of the estates was further codified.

    William I who would become king of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands reintroduced the *ridderschap* system in 1814. He created many new nobles in the northern Netherlands, as a counterweight to the southern (Belgian) nobility, who were much more numerous. With the 1848 constitution, this system was abolished for the second and, presumably, final time.