BISMARCK, OTTO VON,

born April 1, 1815, Schnhausen, Altmark, Prussia died July 30, 1898, Friedrichsruh, near Hamburg in full Otto Eduard Leopold, Prince (Frst) Von Bismarck, Count (Graf) Von Bismarck-schnhausen, Duke (Herzog) Von Lauenburg prime minister of Prussia (186273, 187390) and founder and first chancellor (187190) of the German Empire. A conservative and a temporizer in domestic affairs, he was at his greatest and most imaginative in foreign policy. After 1871 he built a system of important alliances and arranged a series of diplomatic actions to secure both the position of Germany and the peace of Europe. After studying law, Bismarck entered Prussian service and became a judicial administrator at Aachen. In 1847 he became a member of the Prussian United Diet. Bismarck gained prominence in 1851 when he was chosen to represent Prussia in the Federal Diet in Frankfurt am Main. In 1859 he was sent as ambassador to Russia, from which he was recalled in March 1862 to become ambassador to France. Finally, on Sept. 22, 1862, Bismarck returned to Berlin as Prussia's prime minister under King William I, and he devoted himself to the task of uniting the German states under Prussian leadership. In the war of 1866 he succeeded in defeating Austria and gaining Prussian control over the German states north of the Main River. When the French emperor Napoleon III, provoked by the Ems telegram, declared war on Prussia on July 19, 1870, the southern German states joined the north in the Franco-German War. German victory in 1871 led to political unification and the creation of the German Empire. Bismarck was appointed imperial chancellor and created Prince von Bismarck (March 21, 1871). He initiated administrative reforms, developing a common currency, a central bank, and a single code of civil and criminal law for Germany. In foreign affairs, he presided over the Congress of Berlin (1878), and this seemed to symbolize his paramount position as mediator between the great powers. An alliance (1879) with Austria-Hungary marked a new period of conservatism in Bismarck's foreign policy, soon reflected at home in antisocialist policies. But in order to defeat the Social Democrats, Bismarck also became the first statesman in Europe to devise a comprehensive scheme of social security, offering workers insurance against accident, sickness, and old age. But by 1890, his policies had begun to come under attack. On March 18, 1890, two years after William II's accession, Bismarck was forced to resign. His last years were devoted to composing his memoirs.