Royal Successions. A Special Law for the Inheritance of Power?

Abstract

Since the 18th century, the German tradition of a ‘Private law (of succession) for Princes’ (‘Privatfürstenrecht’) has suggested that German families of the high nobility had their own law for each family. Certainly, the multitude of princely families in the late Empire and the political independence in many cases allowed for a general assumption of autonomy. The ‘iurisprudentia heroica’ was an early denomination for the new subject. Unlike other European States, the new subject played a significant role in Germany even until 1919. There are, however, some common European traditions which deal with the particularities of a succession in power. The legal dispute on princely succession, therefore, is much older. A first discussion of the subject can be found in the Canon law literature, which defended the advantages of elections. The famous authors of the Natural law tradition from Grotius to Vattel continued this debate about the advantages of hereditary power. Particular cases since the 13th century fuelled the discussion, from which the German authors derived their works.