1800 Bridel, rare work on Revolution in Switzerland & new Constitution

[Jean-Louis-Philippe Bridel] “Attribué à J.-L. Bridel par la Bibliothèque Nationale de Berne”. 

Réflexions sur la Révolution de la Suisse, sur le principe de l'unité et de l'indivisibilité, et sur la nécessité d'en revenir au systême fédératif, suivies du plan d'une nouvelle Constitution

[éditeur non identifié], [Lausanne], 1800.

8vo, 80 pages, string bound in quirks. Some light staining and a few leaves dog-eared. Title stained.

OCLC list no examples held by libraries outside Switzerland! A second edition was issued in 1801. At the end of page 80, there is a note: "Fin de la première partie". This is all published.

Prior to 1798, the Swiss Confederacy was a confederation of independent states, not a federal state; as such it was based on treaties rather than a constitution. The Helvetic Republic of 1798–1803 had a constitution largely drawn up by Peter Ochs, in 1803 replaced by the Act of Mediation, which was in turn replaced by the Federal Treaty of 1815, which restored the Confederacy, while the individual cantons drew up cantonal constitutions, in most respects based on the Ancien Régime of the 18th century, but with notable liberal innovations in the constitutions of the new cantons of St. Gallen, Aargau, Thurgau, Ticino, Vaud and Geneva. The new cantonal constitutions in many cases served as precedents for the later federal constitution.