She confessed in a letter to her trusted cousin Frederick Christian of Schleswig-Holstein-Sonderburg-Augustenburg: I have never done a step with more consideration than this, I never decided more cold-bloodedly, because my love was really no magnifying glass in front of [...], my heart that on closer acquaintance overruled my reason.

When mayor Overbeck died in 1817, no suitable new mayor could be found, and the magistrates and citizens decided on 4 January 1818 to ask Pauline ... to take a period the police and financial posts of the government of the city under her immediate direction for a period of six years ....[7] Pauline answered on the same day and, contrary to everyone's expectations, she accepted the invitation.

She managed to improve the financial and social situation by taking some unpopular measures, but always with respect for the parliamentary rules of the city.

[8] She planned to retire to the Lippehof, a baroque palace built in Lemgo in 1734,[8] but she died on 29 December 1820, a few months after she had handed over government business to her son Leopold II on 3 July 1820.

Her contemporary Ferdinand Weerth described her in his sermons as Princely in her whole being, an unusual degree of mental strength, the clear light mind, [...] and her tireless work.

In order to teach them the principles of strict morality she had treated them for too long as children, and had bullied them both to such an extent that the eldest, who was shy and reserved by nature, had become half wild.The Prince and the state government had to agree with the Estates, the nobility as landowners and representatives of the cities, on important political issues.

[11] The publications of Count Rumford inspired Pauline to put into practice her ideas on the state organization of the poor relief.

She believed the cause of poverty and begging in her country was mainly to be found in the Lippe national character with his penchant for laziness and idleness.

From the scientific literature on poor relief available to her, she gathered that real improvement could only be achieved through labor, voluntary or otherwise, and not through financial handouts.

[9] Inspired by this, Pauline continued the policies introduced by her late stepmother-in-law Casimire of Anhalt-Dessau, (1749–1778), in accordance with the socio-political beliefs of their time.

Simon Ernst Moritz Krücke, the inspector of the teacher seminary, was Pauline's closest advisor on social questions.

Nevertheless, problems continued with parents who sent their children to the field in summer, to herd cattle or gather ears of corn, or sent them begging during the Christmas season.

She read in a Paris newspaper of an initiative by Joséphine de Beauharnais, the wife of Napoleon Bonaparte, who was still First Consul of France at that point in time.

A circular from Princess Pauline Detmold ladies with the title German: Vorschlag eine Pariser Mode nach Detmold zu verpflanzen ("Proposal to transplant is a Parisian fashion to Detmold") is viewed as a starting point for the creation of a day care center:[2] Madame Bonaparte and several delicate and elegant ladies in the vast capital of the French Empire chose and built with truly feminine sister feeling and enviable refinement in the various neighborhoods of the big city, rooms where delicate youngsters, whose mothers are employed outside their homes, are being nurtured, fed, and calmed.

In 1801, Pauline purchased a suitable building for the institution: the so-called "Schwalenberg Court" on Süsterstraße (now called Schülerstraße) in Detmold.

In the morning adolescent girls from the orphanage and older pupils from the vocational school would wash the children and put on a clean shirt and woolen jackets.

Pauline was reinforced in her opinion by her correspondence with the highly educated diplomat Karl Friedrich Reinhard, who was in the service of France and was a friend of Goethe.

The Prussian commander, Colonel von der Marwitz, described the incident in a letter to his wife and wrote about Pauline: The Princess-Regent is a rascal, and she has always served Napoleon faithfully [...].

At the beginning of her reign, Lippe was part of a neutral protection zone established by treaty, which all the warring parties respected.

[5][12] That Lippe came out of the political disaster of 1813 intact, was due to the tendency of the rulers in Austria and Russia to restore the status quo ante.

Her words were read from the pulpits and published through posters and printed in the Lippischen Intelligenzblättern: Convinced that serfdom, even if it is as moderate as it has been so far in this country, will always have a negative influence on the morality and the diligence and solvency of the peasants, we find ourselves, as mother of the nation, and in the interest of the wealth of this class of faithful subjects, moved to follow the example of other member states of the Confederation and give up such a relationship, [...]The decree of 27 December 1808 abolished the Weinkauf and Sterbfall rules, which had been applied until then.

The Weinkauf[14] rule stipulated that when a serf sold his Kolonat (his right to use a certain parcel of land), a transfer fee had to be paid to the landlord.

Under the Sterbfall rule, when a serf died, his heirs had to deliver his best set of clothes or his or the most valuable piece of cattle (the so-called Besthaupt to the landlord.

The farmers were more hindered by the numerous banalities and payments in cash and in kind they were required to make, which would only be abolished by law in Lippe in the 1830.

[13] The Estates were made up of representatives of the knighthood and the cities and convened each year at a Landtag in order to discuss the affairs of Lippe and to make decisions.

Pauline had a Constitution for Lippe drafted along the lines of some southern German states; she wrote the final version personally.

[15] The Estates protested against the restriction of their traditional rights and asked the Emperor to counter the Princess's subversive and the democratic spirit of the times.

It condemned her anti-Prussian policy and cited as an excuse: Who is going to require a woman, even if she were an Empress, an independent, correct political view and steady action in matters of war?

Elizabeth Stolle asked in her contribution to Lippischen Mitteilungen aus Geschichte und Landeskunde, 1969 questions about the Pauline's religious stance, in order to obtain a better understanding of her diaconal interests.

[11] In a survey conducted by the Lippische Landeszeitung at the end of 2009, Princess Pauline was elected as the most significant figure in the history of Lippe, with 28 percent of the votes cast.