A Very Civil War: The Swiss Sonderbund War of 1847 By Joachim Remak (review)

BOOK REVIEWS 453 there were houses with substantial endowed wealth, but relatively few religious living in them. Spiritual and intellectual formationwas weak, and ministry was sometimes non-existent. Cases of outright immorality were quite rare (greatly outnumbered by examples of exemplary holiness), but the religious were generally perceived as useless and parasitical. Beginning about 1 770, officials in Modena set out to reduce the number of convents, give local bishops jurisdiction over the religious, and seize property seen as excessive. Within twenty-five years, the number ofwomen in religious communities dropped from 1601 to 864, and the men from 878 to 305. In the same period, the total population of Modena grew almost 20% . As the religious grew fewer and older, die State essentially subjugated the Church to itself. In 1805, die bishops urged the surviving nuns to convince the authorities of their social usefulness by taking charge of a school or a hospital, instead of merely following the monastic life. Napoleon's decree of 1810 secularized all orders which were not engaged in care of children, die poor, or the sick. During die Restoration period, convents were either strictly cloistered and contemplative, or dedicated to doing charitable work. Fabriani's congregation was one of the many groups founded for such a ministry. It is significant that Fabriani struggled for many years to get his Daughters of Providence accepted by both secular and ecclesiastical authorities. The old anticlericalism was not dead, and the vigor of the restored Church required strict standards of formation. But die excellence of the Daughters' ministry finally convinced die skeptics, despite die turmoil of the time. Their work continues today as a memorial to Fabriani and his vision. Leopold Glueckert, O.Carm. Loyola Marymount University A Very Civil War. The Swiss Sonderbund War of 1841. By Joachim Remak. (Boulder, Colorado: Westview Press. 1993. Pp. xvii, 221. Î24.95.) Joachim Remak has written an elegant, charming book about an important event which, until now, has received little or no attention from Englishlanguage historians. The "Sonderbund War" or, "War of the Special League," was an almost bloodless showdown between seven of Switzerland's conservative Catholic cantons (die Sonderbund') and the federal Diet which lasted only diree and one-half weeks in November, 1847. Remak believes diat the Swiss civil war was the catalyst for the revolutions of 1848 because the victory of die liberal and radical factions served as a great morale booster for their fellow travelers north and south of die Alps. James McPherson, die distinguished autíior of Battle Cry ofFreedom, contributed die foreword to diis book. He thinks Üiat die events in Switzerland prefigured die American Civil 454 BOOK REVIEWS War in so far as they pitted the advocates of "state rights" (die Sonderbund') against the more progressive advocates of a stronger federal union. The eventual result of the latter's quick victory was a series of constitutional revisions which rendered Switzerland a stronger, more stable country. Another historical analogy comes to mind, namely, the Kulturkampf, the state-church conflict which raged in Prussia in the 1870's. This, too, was a constitutional struggle which started with sectarian overtones. The issues which triggered the conflict in Switzerland were religious: the secularization of monasteries in a Protestant canton; an invitation to the radical Protestant biblical exegete, David Strauss, to teach in Zurich; and, in response, an invitation to the Jesuits to find a new home in Lucerne, which was the heart of the Sonderbund. Remak notes that in those days the Jesuits did not conjure up visions of civil rights, hospitals, and universities and then adds (in something of a non sequitur ) that "Father Hesburg and Notre Dame's Fighting Irish were a century and a continent away." Remak views the program ofthe Protestant cantons as the march ofprogress and the key to future Swiss happiness and national unity. But this is not the point of his book. The Swiss demonstrated that the great issues of the midnineteenth century could be worked out in a spirit of moderation, mutual respect, and generosity. General William Henry Dufour conducted military strategy in such a fashion that actual fighting was almost irrelevant. The upshot was that the Swiss civil...