Art. 5. Whereas, according to Art. 59 of the Vienna Final Act, in those cases where the constitution permits the deliberations of the provincial estates to be made public, the limits of free expression cannot (either during the deliberations themselves, or by their publication in print) be exceeded in a manner that endangers the peace of an individual Confederal state or that of Germany as a whole, and this is provided by the rules of procedure; therefore, too, shall all Confederal governments, as they are obligated to their Confederal relations, offer each other – for the prevention of attacks on the Confederation in the assemblies of estates and for the guidance of the same, each in accordance with its domestic provincial constitution – to enact and apply the appropriate orders.
Art. 6. Whereas the Confederal Assembly is already called upon, according to Art. 17 of the Final Act, to uphold the true meaning of the Confederal Act and the provisions contained therein whenever there should be doubt about their interpretation in accordance with an explanation of the Confederal purpose, therefore it is self-evident that only and exclusively the German Confederation is entitled to an interpretation of the Confederal and the Final Act that has legal effect, which [Confederation] exercises this right through its constitutional organ, the Confederal Assembly.
Source: Source: Protokolle der Bundesversammlung 1832, 22. Sitzung [Minutes of the Confederal Assembly 1832, 22th session].
Original German text also reprinted in Ernst Rudolf Huber, ed., Deutsche Verfassungsdokumente 1803-1850 [German Constitutional Documents 1803-1850], vol. 1, Dokumente zur deutschen Verfassungsgeschichte [Documents on German Constitutional History], 3rd ed., rev. and enl. Stuttgart: W. Kohlhammer, 1978, pp. 132-33.
Translation: Jeremiah Riemer
II. The Ten Articles from July 5, 1832
In consideration of circumstances at the current time and for the duration of the same, the Confederal Assembly, in accordance with the obligations incumbent on it to confer about common disciplinary rules for the maintenance of public peace and legal order, after listening to expert opinion from a commission selected from among themselves, has resolved as follows:
Art. 1. No newspaper or other published writing of less than twenty sheets containing political content, written in German, and published in a state not belonging to the German Confederation may be permitted or distributed in a Confederal state without prior approval of the government of the same; there will be proceedings against violators of this prohibition as well as against the distributors of prohibited published writings.
Art. 2. All associations that have political purposes or are used under another name for political purposes are to be prohibited in all Confederal states, and proceedings shall be undertaken against their authors and the participants in the same with appropriate punishment.
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