DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.47347#0056
40
HISTORICAL ESSAY ON
point of view the mutual claims of Austria and France, the
negociators merely found occasion to connect with them the
great political question which the congress of Utrecht was
charged to resolve, while securing the interests of all. We
therein see that the great powers required of Philip V.,
before they would acknowledge his legitimacy and his right
of succession to the crown, nothing more than that he should
renounce his eventual rights to the throne of France; that
is to say, fulfil the condition previously insisted upon in the
will of Charles II., and which he had not yet complied with.
It is, therefore, without any foundation that the advocates
of Don Carlos pretend that the congress of Utrecht imposed
on Philip V. the obligation to modify the cognatic order of
succession, and to substitute the agnatic order of succession
(Lex salicaj in its stead. No such condition was ever made
with king Philip by the congress of Utrecht; nay, it would
have been decidedly adverse to the principal aim of the
treaty of peace, which was to prevent the union of France
and Spain. The cognatic succession, which calls to the
throne the daughters of the king, in default of sons, in pre-
ference to agnates, whereas in France agnates take prece-
dence of daughters : this succession was precisely an addi-
tional pledge for preventing the union of the two crowns by
inheritance, and obviating grave political complications, in
case of the extinction of either of the principal branches of
the house of Bourbon. It is evident that the congress of
Utrecht could not wish to destroy a pledge so satisfactory
for the future equilibrium of Europe. In fact, we no where
find the slightest evidence that the great powers had any
intention of interfering in the internal affairs of Spain, or of
changing in the smallest degree her fundamental laws con-
cerning the order of cognatic succession.
If, then, Philip V. subsequently abolished the cognatic
succession by an act of his will, that act is in no way con-
HISTORICAL ESSAY ON
point of view the mutual claims of Austria and France, the
negociators merely found occasion to connect with them the
great political question which the congress of Utrecht was
charged to resolve, while securing the interests of all. We
therein see that the great powers required of Philip V.,
before they would acknowledge his legitimacy and his right
of succession to the crown, nothing more than that he should
renounce his eventual rights to the throne of France; that
is to say, fulfil the condition previously insisted upon in the
will of Charles II., and which he had not yet complied with.
It is, therefore, without any foundation that the advocates
of Don Carlos pretend that the congress of Utrecht imposed
on Philip V. the obligation to modify the cognatic order of
succession, and to substitute the agnatic order of succession
(Lex salicaj in its stead. No such condition was ever made
with king Philip by the congress of Utrecht; nay, it would
have been decidedly adverse to the principal aim of the
treaty of peace, which was to prevent the union of France
and Spain. The cognatic succession, which calls to the
throne the daughters of the king, in default of sons, in pre-
ference to agnates, whereas in France agnates take prece-
dence of daughters : this succession was precisely an addi-
tional pledge for preventing the union of the two crowns by
inheritance, and obviating grave political complications, in
case of the extinction of either of the principal branches of
the house of Bourbon. It is evident that the congress of
Utrecht could not wish to destroy a pledge so satisfactory
for the future equilibrium of Europe. In fact, we no where
find the slightest evidence that the great powers had any
intention of interfering in the internal affairs of Spain, or of
changing in the smallest degree her fundamental laws con-
cerning the order of cognatic succession.
If, then, Philip V. subsequently abolished the cognatic
succession by an act of his will, that act is in no way con-