In early modern studies, it is something of a cliche to describe the HRE as a peculiar institution, but the description is somewhat apt, especially prior to its dissolution in 1806. The Reich was not, and never really was, a unitary state, but rather something approaching a confederation of multiple polities ranging from free cities to principates and bishroprics. All of these multiple polities within the HRE enjoyed their own degree of sovereignty, but were also subordinate to a variety of imperial institutions and responsibilities. During the eighteenth century, the three main HRE institutions that were most salient in the lives of Central Europeans were the Reichstag (imperial diet), the imperial Kreise (circles), and the various forms of imperial law.

The Reichstag met permanently in the city of Regensberg from 20 January 1663 to the dissolution of the HRE. The Reichstag itself covered a bewildering array of functions, ranging from legislation of laws, the approval of levying imperial taxes, or maintaining contact between the emperor and his many subjects. The last function was actually quite critical because the Reichstag was not so much a conventional diet that represented the common people of the HRE, but instead was a institution meant to represent the various rulers and polities of the HRE. The Reichstag existed as a conduit between imperial power and its various components. The perpetual Reichstag allowed for some degree of collective action and coordination for such a polyglot territory. Various factions and alliances within the institution emerged that made it easier for smaller polities to air their grievances and desires. Although the system was very incoherent and as a parliamentary body, the Reichstag was comparatively weak, it was not a toothless echo chamber. For example, when the French Revolutionary governments abolished feudalism in Alsace in 1789, the Reichstag declared the action illegal in 1791, but left it up to the emperor to either negotiate with the French or declare war.

While the Reichstag was a conduit between the emperor and its components, the imperial Kreise were geographic divisions of the empire intended to provide a collective defense of the HRE. The Kreise encouraged regional economic development and the Reichstag delegated control over the currency issue to the Kreise. This system of collective defense worked moderately well in the late seventeenth century, especially in wars against the Ottomans, but was increasingly difficult to manage as military establishments increased in size and cost during the eighteenth century. Larger states like Bavaria began to dominate their respective circles and the advent of Prussia destabilized this dynamic even further. But in theory, the Reichstag had the potential to raise a Central European Reichsarmee , and existence of the Kreise would make such a military formation a more tenable proposition. many of the small and middling HRE states saw the Kreise as a vital component for their security as its existence precluded them from being swallowed up by their larger neighbors.

The most potent and active symbol of the Reich's governmental organizations prior to dissolution was its legal system. The HRE maintained two imperial supreme courts, the Reichshofrat (RHR) and the Reichskammergericht (RKG), and a network of lower-level territorial courts, Hofgerichte. This web of imperial laws coexisted with local legal establishments and imperial law often served as a mechanism for appealing decisions reached in the local courts. In an age of absolutism, HRE territorial rulers had to walk a fine line in trying muzzle or control local courts as the imperial appeal mechanism remained intact. Although a number of the larger principalities had sidelined the imperial court system by the late eighteenth century, they often did so not by ignoring the imperial courts, but by streamlining and rationalizing local courts so they were a more attractive venue to settle legal disputes. The imperial court system also provided a venue for smaller polities to have a voice beyond the Kreise or Reichstag. The potential of the imperial courts system was illustrated in 1802 when Württemberg, Bavaria, and Kassel used the disorder created by the French wars to occupy land controlled by the Imperial Knights. A flurry of appeals to the RHR led the emperor to order the return of all occupied territories in 1804 as part of a wider defense of the imperial constitution.

The HRE was neither a nominal union, nor a unitary state, but it existed somewhere in between these two poles. The Reich's various institutions were quite dysfunctional, but this systematic dysfunction was often by design rather than accident. Entities like the RKG and the Kreise were about striking a precarious balance between the independence of the component parts of the empire and maintaining enough imperial strength to prevent the HRE's occupation by a foreign power. The capability of the HRE's larger states like Prussia to act with a degree of autonomy destabilized the system, but it could not destroy it completely. Prior to 1806, there were very few partisans in the HRE actively calling for the dissolution of the empire, but rather its reform. Napoleon's actions which forced the dissolution actually came to a shock for many Central Europeans who expected the French emperor to push for a reform. Napoleon's German replacement for the HRE, the Rheinbund offered a deal for the middling German states to expand their territory at the expense of smaller territories with the cost being that the Rheinbund was subordinate to French foreign policy. In many respects this was the antithesis of the HRE which provided some nominal protection for smaller states and protected the independence of the various polities of the HRE by providing some voice in matters of war and taxation.

Sources

Coy, Jason Philip, Benjamin Marschke, and David Warren Sabean. The Holy Roman Empire, Reconsidered. New York: Berghahn Books, 2010.

Forrest, Alan I., and Peter H. Wilson. The Bee and the Eagle: Napoleonic France and the End of the Holy Roman Empire, 1806. Basingstoke [England]: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009.

Whaley, Joachim. Germany and the Holy Roman Empire, Volume II . Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2012.