From school he passed into the Politische Institut (a seminary of law and political science) in his native town, and proceeding thence to the universities of Berlin and Bonn, took the degree of doctor juris in the latter in 1829.

[2] Fascinated by the metaphysical views of the philosopher Friedrich Rohmer (1814–1856), a man who attracted little other attention, he endeavoured in Psychologische Studien über Staat und Kirche (1844) to apply them to political science generally, and in particular as a panacea for the constitutional troubles of Switzerland.

He resigned his seat, and on the overthrow of the Sonderbund in 1847, perceiving that all hope of power for his party was lost, took leave of Switzerland with the pamphlet Stimme eines Schweizers über die Bundesreform (1847), and settled at Munich, where he became professor of constitutional law in 1848[2] at the Ludwig Maximilian University.

[7] At Munich he devoted himself with energy to the special work of his chair, and published Allgemeines Staatsrecht (1851–1852); Lehre vom modernen Staat (1875–1876); and, in conjunction with Karl Ludwig Theodor Brater (1819–1869), Deutsches Staatswörterbuch (11 vols, 1857–1870; abridged by Edgar Loening in 3 vols., 1869–1875).

He was a Freemason and was Master of Lodge Ruprecht zu den fünf Rosen[8] and in 1865 published a public letter against Pope Pius IX's apostolic exhortation Multiplices inter.