On December 4, 1852, the Vienna–Salzburg railway opened. Aside from the newspapers reporting the news, it caused no great stir.
Too many railways had opened in Austria recently. After the initial surprise, the Austrian public had grown accustomed to it.
The railway companies were the ones most affected. After investing so much capital, they were finally seeing returns, directly reflected in the stock market. Booming railway operations drove share prices up once more.
As for this railway's strategic value, hardly anyone paid it much attention. No matter how convenient rail transport was, could it compare to the Danube?
Franz was naturally delighted by this. The idea of German unification had been thoroughly whipped into a fever, and now it was time to launch the next phase of the plan.
Franz joked, "Prime Minister, your visit to the various German states carries a grave responsibility. If you can persuade everyone to rebuild the Holy Roman Empire, we'll have struck gold."
Persuading everyone to agree to rebuild the Holy Roman Empire would require Austria to hold bayonets to their throats. Otherwise, with everyone living comfortably enough, why would they invite a master to rule over them?
Times had changed. Nationalism had already awakened in the German lands. No matter how much freedom the state governments retained, the emergence of a central government would still harm their interests.
Even the loosest empire of this era could not do without a constitution. The governments of the various states would inevitably see their autonomy greatly weakened.
They could forget about independent diplomatic powers. Currency unification was unavoidable, and tariffs would certainly be abolished. Those three measures alone meant the central government would no longer be an empty shell.
With those things in place, Franz could responsibly say that he could use political means to control