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 THE EUROPEAN POWERS FROM 1815 TO 1871 379 king's eldest son, Pedro, who could not hold the Crowns in con- junction. When King John died, Pedro claimed the Portuguese succession for his daughter Maria, who was opposed Spain and by his brother Miguel. Ultimately, by the active Portugal, assistance of Britain and with French support, the Crown was secured to Maria, who married Ferdinand of Saxe-Coburg, brother of the King of the Belgians. Miguel, successful at the outset, had ruled with brutal despotism, and Maria's cause and her victory were made the cause and the victory of constitu- tional principles. In Spain the death of Ferdinand in 1833 led to a struggle for the succession between his brother Don Carlos and his widow Christina, representing their infant daughter Isabella. Here also the cause of the female succession was identified with that of constitutionalism and was ultimately successful ; though in the long-run constitutionalism did not profit by it. Once more, the revolutionary movement was to be roused by France. The ' Orleanist ' rule of Louis Philippe was a very different thing from that of Charles x., but it was by 3 The Year no means satisfactory to the bulk of the French ofRevolu- nation. Wealth had become the real source of tlons# political power; the conflict between capital and labour was growing more acute, and the labouring classes looked to political power as the means to their victory in that conflict. The sheer feebleness of the government led to its easy over- throw in February 1848: the royal family retired into exile, and for the second time a French Republic was pro- claimed. The new Republican government did not realise the hopes of the Socialists — the name now being applied to those who held that the sources and the control of production should be in the hands not of private persons, but of the state or com- munity j but the revolution set an example to Europe which was soon plunged in a general ferment. This year, 1848, is known as the Year of Revolutions. In every German state there arose a clamour for constitutional reform so sudden and so unanimous that the princes in general were compelled to give way to it, and everywhere new constitutions were promulgated before March was over. Even at Vienna and in the four kingdoms of Prussia,