In the Low Countries, a stadtholder ( ) was a steward, first appointed as a medieval official and ultimately functioning as a national leader. The stadtholder was the replacement of the duke or count of a province during the Burgundian and Habsburg period (1384 – 1581/1795).
The title was used for the highest executive official of each province performing several duties, such as appointing lower administrators and maintaining peace and order, in the early Dutch Republic. As multiple provinces appointed the same stadtholder, the stadtholder of the powerful province of Holland at times functioned as the de facto head of state of the Dutch Republic as a whole during the 16th to 18th centuries, in an effectively hereditary role. For the last half century of its existence, it became an officially hereditary title under Prince William IV of Orange. His son, Prince William V, was the last stadtholder of all provinces of the Republic, until fleeing French revolutionary troops in 1795. His son, William I of the Netherlands, in 1815 became the first sovereign king of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands.
The title stadtholder is roughly comparable to the historical titles of Lord Protector in England, Statthalter in the Holy Roman Empire and Governor-general of Norway.
In the 15th century the Dukes of Burgundy acquired most of the Low Countries, and the constituent parts (duchies, counties, lordships) of these Burgundian Netherlands mostly each had their own stadtholder, appointed by the Duke in his capacity of duke, count or lord.
In the 16th century, the Habsburg Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, also King of Spain, who had inherited the Burgundian Netherlands, completed this process by becoming the sole feudal overlord: Lord of the Netherlands. Only the Prince-Bishopric of Liège and two smaller territories (the Imperial Abbey of Stavelot-Malmedy and the Duchy of Bouillon) remained outside his domains. Stadtholders continued to be appointed to represent Charles and King Philip II, his son and successor in Spain and the Low Countries (the electoral Imperial title would be held by his brother Ferdinand I, Holy Roman Emperor and his heirs in the separate Austrian branch of Habsburgs). Due to the centralist and absolutist policies of Philip, the actual power of the stadtholders strongly diminished, compared to the landvoogd (es) or governor-general.
On the Republic's central 'confederal' level, the stadtholder of the provinces of Holland and Zeeland was normally also appointed Captain-General of the Dutch States Army and Admiral-General of the confederate fleet, though no stadtholder ever actually commanded a fleet in battle. In the army, he could appoint officers by himself; in the navy only affirm appointments of the five admiralty councils. Legal powers of the stadtholder were thus rather limited, and by law he was a mere official. His real powers, however, were sometimes greater, especially given the martial law atmosphere of the 'permanent' Eighty Years War. Maurice of Orange after 1618 ruled as a military dictator, and William II of Orange attempted the same.
The leader of the Dutch Revolt was William the Silent (William I of Orange); he had been appointed stadtholder in 1572 by the States of the first province to rebel, Holland, as a replacement of the royal stadtholder (He had previously held the post as an appointee of Philip II.). His personal influence and reputation was subsequently associated with the office and transferred to members of his house. After his assassination, however, there was a short-lived move to install Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester as governor-general of Elizabeth I before Maurice in 1590 became stadtholder of five provinces, a position he would hold until his death (his cousin William Louis, Count of Nassau-Dillenburg held the post in the remaining two provinces, Friesland and Groningen).
Tensions nonetheless persisted between Orangists and republicans in the United Provinces, sometimes exploding into direct conflict. Maurice in 1618 and William III from 1672 replaced entire city councils with their partisans to increase their power: the so-called "Changings of the Legislative" ( Wetsverzettingen). By intimidation, the stadtholders tried to extend their right of affirmation, while they also attempted to add the remaining stadholderships like Friesland and Groningen to their other holdings. In reaction, the regents in Holland, Zeeland, Utrecht, Guelders, and Overijssel, after the death of William II in 1650, appointed no stadtholder, and banned his son William from the stadtholdership by an Act of Seclusion, something overcome by popular feeling during the catastrophic events of 1672, the Dutch Year of Disaster ( Rampjaar), when the future William III of England was swept to power. After the death of William III in 1702 they again abstained from appointing a stadtholder. These periods are known as the First Stadtholderless Period and the Second Stadtholderless Period.
After the French invasion of 1747, the regents were forced by a popular movement to accept William IV, Prince of Orange, stadtholder of Friesland and Groningen, as stadtholder in the other provinces. On 22 November 1747, the office of stadtholder was made hereditary ( erfstadhouder) everywhere (previously only in Friesland). As William (for the first time in the history of the Republic) was stadtholder in all provinces, his function accordingly was restyled Stadhouder-Generaal.
After William IV's death in 1751, his infant son was duly appointed stadtholder under the regency of his mother. The misgovernment of this regency caused much resentment, which issued in 1780 in the Patriot movement, seeking to permanently limit the powers of the stadholderate. The Patriots first took over many city councils, then the States of the province of Holland, and ultimately raised civil militias to defend their position against Orangist partisans, bringing the country to the Patriottentijd. Through Prussian military intervention in 1787, Prince William V of Orange was able to suppress this opposition, and many leaders of the Patriot movement went into exile in France. The stadtholderate was strengthened with the Act of Guarantee (1788).
Soon after the French army withdrew from the Netherlands, William Frederick, the son of William V, was invited by the Triumvirate of 1813 to become the first 'Sovereign Prince'. William had been living in exile in London during the French occupation. On 13 November 1813 he returned to the Netherlands to accept the invitation. On 16 March 1815 he assumed the title of King of the United Kingdom of the Netherlands.
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