Act of Mediation

The 1803 settlement imposed by Napoleon Bonaparte that ended the Helvetic Republic, restored cantonal governments, and reorganized Switzerland as a Confederation of nineteen cantons.

Confederation of Switzerland: The Swiss political union established in 1803, comprising nineteen cantons under the Act of Mediation. This was the federal arrangement the settlement established.
Helvetic Republic: A centralized Swiss republic established under French influence in 1798 and dissolved in 1803. Its unstable centralization was the political order the settlement replaced.
Swiss Confederation: A federal state in Central Europe composed of twenty-six cantons. The modern Confederation developed from the federal form restored in 1803.
Old Swiss Confederacy: The loose alliance of Swiss states that existed before the French invasion of 1798. The settlement revived confederal government but changed the old alliance’s membership and institutions.
Tagsatzung: The Swiss confederal assembly in which cantons sent delegates to deliberate and coordinate common affairs. The settlement restored this assembly as the Confederation’s central institution.
French invasion of Switzerland: The 1798 French military intervention that ended the Old Swiss Confederacy and initiated the Helvetic Republic. It began the period of French intervention that culminated in Napoleon’s settlement.
Swiss Federal Constitution of 1848: The constitution that transformed Switzerland into a federal state in 1848. It replaced the loose confederation established by the Act of Mediation.
Swiss Confederacy (1798–1803): The centralized Swiss state established in 1798 and governed as the Helvetic Republic. The settlement reversed this republic’s centralized constitutional model.
Swiss cantons: The member states of Switzerland, each with its own government and constitution. The settlement restored cantonal governments and enlarged the federation to nineteen cantons.
Stecklikrieg: The 1802 Swiss civil conflict that helped bring down the Helvetic Republic. Its violence prompted Napoleon to intervene and convene Swiss representatives.

Linked from 9 pages