"House of Lords" in other countries?

Did anything like the "old" House of Lords (every title holder being
entitled to a seat in a House of Parliament) exist in any other
country? I am specifically interested in finding out if such a
situation existed in Austria, France and Germany. If so, any details

edespalais...

What has happened in the UK happened around 1880. The Table of the
magnates were reformed to a House of m. The lesser wealthy families
were "cleaned" away

would be appreciated.

(Gary Holtzman) garyholtzman...

There was a House of Peers in France during the Restoration, although only peers -
not all nobles - were included.

Don Aitken...

I can think of two examples - restoration France and Meiji Japan. Both
of these Houses of Peers were created in direct imitation of the
British example, rather than arising from native tradition.

mjcar...

Austria indeed had a House of Lords as did Hungary (House of Magnates),
Prussia (Herrenhaus) and others of the larger German States etc - a
web search should bring some up.

Stephen Stillwell / Tom Wilding...

You can also look at resources like Burke's, Ruvigny's, and the Gotha. When
families / houses were mediatized, the head of the house was frequently made
an hereditary member of the Upper House of the state into which their former
territory was incorporated.

Male members of the Royal Family were automatically members of the
Italian Senate under the Savoyard Kingdom.

Brooke
bxzi@yahoo.com

Stephen Stillwell / Tom Wilding...

Actually every title holder was not entitled to a seat in the House of
Lords. It was only every title holder within certain peerages of the
kingdom. There were representative peers from the other peerages.

j.jaroslav...

Since Middle Ages until 1848, every holder of a Bohemian noble title
who was also holder of "inkolat" (i.e. something like cititenship for
privileged classes) could sit in the Bohemian Diet - separately as a
member of the "high nobility estate (pansky stav)", or "knightly estate
(rytirsky stav"). There were two other non-noble estates represented in
the Diet - clergy (only after 1627) and burghers.

I think this would not be any different in most European countries
before the 1848 revolution (or whenever the revolution in a particular
country took place...)...

edespalais...

One supposes that not the burghers but priviledged cities were stav
/St=E4nde. Every city would would delegate competent citizen.

These stav can not be compared to members of a House of Lords. The more
impratant of the pansky stav of Bohemia, Moravia, Silesia however had
usually an hereditarian seat in the later creation House of Lords (in
Vienna); but for example not the very wealthy Clam Gallas

Antonio...

Portugal's unwritten constitutional arrangements pre-1822 (year when
the first, shortlived, written Constitution was promulgated following
the Revolution of 1820), also envisaged a meeting of all Estates of the
Realm (King, clergy, nobility, commons). This institution, formed in
the Middle Ages, was known as "Cortes" (Courts)

The first such assembly of the Orders of the realm was held in Lamego
in 1143, under Portugal's first King, Afonso Henriques. There is some
doubt, however, about the accuracy of the records of that meeting. The
first meeting of the Cortes the records of which are beyond doubt is
that of the Cortes of Coimbra, held by King Afonso II in the year 1211
in the city of Coimbra.

Several other Cortes were held up to the Cortes held by King D. Pedro
II in 1698. After that, no other Cortes were ever again summoned.

The absolutist claimant D. Miguel, younger brother of D. Pedro IV, who
usurped the Throne as D. Miguel I and was later deposed, renouncing his
claim by the Convention of =C9vora Monte (he later, in exile, attempted
to revive his claim, but with no practical consequence), assembled a
traditional meeting of the Cortes in 1828, during his illegitimate
rule. Those Cortes, however, were seen as illegal by subsequent
legitimate Portuguese monarchs, having been summoned by an usurper.

No Cortes were held outside of Lisbon after 1583. In the 14th and 15th
centuries, several Cortes were held, almost regularly. Most Cortes,
however, lasted less then a year and were then dissolved. In the 16th
century we see a pattern of more time elapsing between the dissolution
of one Cortes and the summoning of the next.In the 17th century, only 9
Cortes were held, in 1619, 1641, 1642, 1645-1646, 1653, 1668, 1674,
1679-1680, 1697-1698. No Cortes were held in the 18th century.

After the reorganization of the Portuguese Constitutional arrangements
following the Revolution of 1820, the traditional Cortes ceased to
exist, and new shape was given to the institutions of the Monarchy by
the written Constitutions that were adopted in the 19th century.

During the Revolution, Extraordinary Cortes was the name of the body
elected without summons from the King to draft a written Constituion
for Portugal. Under the shortlived 1822 Constitution, suspended in july
1823, the name Cortes was applied to the unicameral Parliament,
composed of representatives of the people. This Constitution was again
adopted as provisional instrument of Government between the Revolution
of 1836 and the adoption of the Constitution of 1838.

Under the Constitutional Charter granted by King Pedro IV in 1826,
suspended by the Miguelist usurpation in july 1828, then restored in
May, 1834 upon the surrender of the Miguelists and the signing of the
=C9vora-Monte Convention, again suspended by the Revolution of 1836
(that led to the shortlived Constitution of 1838) and once more
restored by the coup d'=E9tat of 1842, remaining into force until the
abolition of the monarchy in 1910, Cortes was the name of the bicameral
Parliament made up of the House of Peers and the House of Deputies.

(note: given that, upon the promulgation of the Constitutional Charter
in 1826 the Constitution of 1822 had been suspended and the traditional
institutions of the ancient monarchy brought back into existance, the
formula of promulgation of the Constitutional Charter of 1826 is
adressed to the "three Orders of the realm".)

Under the shortlived Constitution of 1838, revoked by the coup d`=E9tat
of Costa Cabral, that restored the Constitutional Charter of 1826 in
1842, Cortes was also the name of the bicameral Parliament, made up of
the House of Deputies and of a Senate.

Don Aitken...

Indeed. I think we need to differentiate between medieval-style
Estates and the new kind of House which began to be established in the
19th century. So far, we seem to have France, Portugal, Prussia,
Austria and Japan, for the latter, along with some other German
states. Hungary's House of Magnates is different, in that, although of
the same type, its origins were much older.

edespalais...

The older institution, untill around 1880: Table of Magnates. Many
families then lost their seat(s).

edespalais...

The older institution, untill around 1880: Table of Magnates. Many
families then lost their seat(s).

Francois R. Velde...

France pre-1789 had two institutions that are relvant to the question.
One of the medieval tradition of the Estates mentioned above, which
is indeed very common throughout Western Europe, and whereby nobles
either sat or were represented as one estate, the others being typically
the clergy and the commons. Separately, though, there were the French
peers, numbering 12 in the Middle Ages (6 spiritual and 6 temporal).
The original lay peers were replaced over time with new creations,
after the 16th c. always attached to a title of duke. These lay peers
sat in the Parliament of Paris, which was essentially a judicial
institution (a high court of appeals) but with some political role.
The privilege of peerage (being tried by other peers) was one
similarity with the English peerage.

The medieval Estates ceased to play a regular role after the 14th c.,
being called only a few times every hundred years in crises or
emergencies. The last meeting, in 1789, turned the Estates into
the National Assembly, the forebear of all later French parliaments.

In 1814, when the monarchy was restored, Louis XVIII clearly adopted
some elements of the British constitution, one of which was
bicameralism with an unelected upper house of peers. All surviving
pre-1789 peers were appointed to the new house, but it was much
larger than the pre-1789 peerage and had a clear political role.
It survived until 1848 only. Napoleon III's Senate had life members.

Many German states had their native tradition of Estates
(Landtag), and when the 19th c. constitutions introduced bicameralism,
they retained a flavor of the old Estate: the upper houses of Baden,
Wurttemberg, Bavaria, Hesse-Darmstadt, Hanover, Saxony, Prussia
were a mixture of princes of the ruling dynasty, heads of mediatized
houses, prelates, representatives of the regions in some cases, elected
representatives of the some or all of the local nobility, and life or
term members appointed by the sovereign. In Prussia the king
could create hereditary members, but that seems to have been
the exception rather than the rule for Germany.

Sardinia's (and Italy's after 1860) upper house had only life
members (aside from the princes of the royal family).

Spain' 1837 constitution had a Senate on the US model; the 1845
Senate was made of life members, the 1876 Senate a mixture of
life and elected members. Romania's 1923 Senate has a mixture
of mostly elected members and a few ex-officio members.
Belgium's Senate was from the start elected (with longer
terms than the representatives, on the US model). Bulgaria
was mono-cameral.