The Diet consisted of 383 deputies from the German-speaking and Slavic crown lands of Habsburg Austria, that is, without representatives from the Kingdom of Hungary.
Following the popular trend in Europe during the Revolutions of 1848, in October 1848 workers rioted in Vienna for a constitutional monarchy and blockaded the troop transports headed for Hungary.
It featured many liberal and progressive reforms including forming a constitutional monarchy, creating a parliament that would share power with the Emperor, abolishing the privileged status and all titles of the Catholic Church within the Empire, deriving the Emperor's power from the people rather than the "Grace of God",[2] and finally, making all languages and nationalities equal in the eyes of the Monarchy.
[4] Could anyone have honestly thought a Habsburg Emperor with central authority vested in him would have been an ideological proponent of and see himself as an extension of a Rousseauan "will of the people"?
[2] As one can see, the progressive movement of the Kremsier Parliament created a devastating backlash against the growing national identities of the Empire.
After the adoption of the February Patent in 1861, another attempt was made to elect a general representative body for the people, mainly from Prime Minister Anton von Schmerling.
This Parliament was named the Reichsrat ("Imperial Council"), because Emperor Francis Joseph I wanted it to serve in only a consultative role.