The Peace of Westphalia
October 24, 1648
The Peace of Westphalia refers to two treaties ending the Thirty Years’ War. The war was waged mainly within the Holy Roman Empire by the Hapsburgs (Austria and Spain) and their Catholic allies against the Protestant powers, including Sweden, certain Holy Roman principalities, and (Catholic) France. Between 4.5 million and 8 million soldiers and civilians were killed.
The treaties marked the beginning of the exclusion of religious institutions from international politics and diplomacy—the “secularization of international relations.” Papal representatives were present at the negotiations but were largely ignored by both sides. Pope Innocent X declared the settlement to be “null, void, invalid, iniquitous, unjust, damnable, reprobate, inane, and devoid of meaning for all time” because it sacrificed the right of the Catholic Church to properties “stolen” from it at the Reformation. Nevertheless, the representatives of the Catholic states signed the treaties. The papacy’s role as an arbiter of disputes between Christian princes in matters of war and peace was no longer accepted (it had always been contested) even by Catholic states.
Westphalia did not bring about tolerance. Protestants continued to be persecuted in Spain and Portugal; Anabaptists by Catholics and Protestants alike in parts of Germany, if with flagging zeal; and Catholicism remained illegal in the British monarchies and Scandinavia, with Catholic priests (at least native-born) regarded as traitors in England, Scotland, Ireland, and Sweden.
The treaties also marked the rise of raison d’etat (“reason of state”) as the dominant principle of diplomacy, even among “Christian” states. Raison d’etat suggests there can be reasons for a state to act that override all other moral or legal considerations.
William J. Tighe is Professor of History at Muhlenberg College in Allentown, Pennsylvania, and a faculty advisor to the Catholic Campus Ministry. He is a Member of St. Josaphat Ukrainian Catholic Church in Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. He is a senior editor for Touchstone.
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