Heinrich Theodor von Schön (20 January 1773 – 23 July 1856) was a

Prussia Prussia (; ; Old Prussian: ''Prūsija'') was a Germans, German state centred on the North European Plain that originated from the 1525 secularization of the Prussia (region), Prussian part of the State of the Teutonic Order. For centuries, ...

n statesman who assisted in the liberal reforms in Prussia during the

Napoleonic Wars {{Infobox military conflict , conflict = Napoleonic Wars , partof = the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars , image = Napoleonic Wars (revision).jpg , caption = Left to right, top to bottom:Battl ...

Biography

Schön was born in Schreitlauken, Tilsit district,

East Prussia East Prussia was a Provinces of Prussia, province of the Kingdom of Prussia from 1772 to 1829 and again from 1878 (with the Kingdom itself being part of the German Empire from 1871); following World War I it formed part of the Weimar Republic's ...

(now Šereitlaukis,

Pagėgiai Municipality Pagėgiai (, ) is a town in south-western Lithuania. It is located in the medieval region of Scalovia in the historic region of Lithuania Minor. It is the capital of Pagėgiai municipality, and as such it is part of Tauragė County. Name The name ...

Lithuania Lithuania, officially the Republic of Lithuania, is a country in the Baltic region of Europe. It is one of three Baltic states and lies on the eastern shore of the Baltic Sea, bordered by Latvia to the north, Belarus to the east and south, P ...

). He studied law and political science at the

University of Königsberg The University of Königsberg () was the university of Königsberg in Duchy of Prussia, which was a fief of Poland. It was founded in 1544 as the world's second Protestant Reformation, Protestant academy (after the University of Marburg) by Duke A ...

. In 1793, he entered the Prussian government service and was rapidly promoted, serving as governor. After the Peace of Tilsit, he rendered assistance in carrying out the reforms of Baron vom Stein and Karl August von Hardenberg, and to him is attributed the authorship of the ''Politisches Testament'', which Stein issued upon his retirement from office. In addition, Schön's memorandum on the abolition of serfdom was the basis of the law of emancipation. In 1816, Schön was appointed governor of West Prussia, and eight years afterwards of the whole Province of Prussia. Under his administration many reforms were made. He was an ardent liberal, and it was partly through his efforts that upon the accession of the new King in 1840 a demand was made for a

constitution A constitution is the aggregate of fundamental principles or established precedents that constitute the legal basis of a polity, organization or other type of entity, and commonly determines how that entity is to be governed. When these pri ...

. Schön was made Minister of State, but his ideas were too advanced for Frederick William IV, and he found it expedient in 1842 to retire from political life. He was buried next to the Arnau Church in East Prussia. Schön's memoirs and correspondence were published by his son under the title of ''Aus den Papieren des Ministers und Burggrafen von Marienburg Theodor von Schön'' (1875–83). The share claimed by him in Stein's reforms has been the subject of some controversy.

Notes

References

* This work in turn cites: **

John Robert Seeley Sir John Robert Seeley, Order of St. Michael and St. George, KCMG (10 September 1834 – 13 January 1895) was an English Liberal Party (UK), Liberal historian and political essayist. A founder of British imperial history, he was a prominent adv ...

, ''Life and Times of Stein'' (Cambridge, 1878) * {{DEFAULTSORT:Schon, Theodor von 1773 births 1856 deaths People from Pagėgiai Municipality People from East Prussia German untitled nobility Government ministers of Prussia Members of the Prussian National Assembly German politicians of the Napoleonic Wars University of Königsberg alumni