602 Ch. 1 5 • Liberal Challenges To Restoration Europe
Intellectuals demanded that national boundaries correspond to linguistic
frontiers.
The Revolt in Poland
The Congress of Vienna had left about 20 percent of pre-Partition Poland as
'‘Congress Poland” with its own army, but within the Russian Empire. The
tsar was king of Poland. Tsar Alexander I granted the Poles the Constitu
tional Charter of 1815, which provided for a parliament of two houses—a
Senate of appointed members drawn from noble families and Catholic bish
ops, and a lower house (the Sejm) elected by people of means. Neither assem
bly, however, possessed real authority. In 1820, Alexander forbade the Sejm
from meeting for five years as punishment for opposing Russian policies,
which included imposing disadvantageous customs barriers on Polish grain.
Some Poles hoped that France, in the wake of the July Revolution, would
send forces to help them expel the Russians. However, the issue of Polish in
dependence interested only French republicans, not the liberal monarchists
who had brought Louis-Philippe to power. However, Polish military cadets
rose up in Warsaw in November 1830. Russian troops withdrew in the hope