30 November 1786 – The Grand Duchy of Tuscany, under Pietro Leopoldo I, becomes the first modern state to abolish the death penalty.
30 November 1786 – The Grand Duchy of Tuscany, under Pietro Leopoldo I, becomes the first modern state to abolish the death penalty.
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Leopold II (1747 – 1792) was Holy Roman Emperor, King of Hungary and Bohemia, and Archduke of Austria from 1790 to 1792, and Grand Duke of Tuscany from 1765 to 1790.
An enlightened monarch, the son of Empress Maria Theresa and her husband, Emperor Francis I, and the brother of Marie Antoinette, Queen of France, he is highly regarded as a sensible and progressive ruler, despite his brief reign.
On 30 November 1786, after having de facto blocked capital executions (the last was in 1769), Leopold promulgated the reform of the penal code that abolished the death penalty and ordered the destruction of all the instruments for capital execution in his land. Torture was also banned.
Unsurprisingly, to this day, the USA are still a mere 235 years behind the progressive state of Tuscany.
Enlightenment was one of the best things happened in Europe.
Joseph II, brotherof Leopold II, abolished it for the whole monarchy the next year. And he died of overwork. During his times the works on the ABGB (civil code) began and it’s still valid, we came back to the majority of it several years ago with a communist intermission. That’s a pity that the rest of the world knows just Marie Antoinette and not her brothers. Joseph implemented many needed modern reforms in both civil and criminal law and the bureaucracy.
This, alongside the 1978 law that abolished asylums as a first in the world, is one of the (unfortunately few) things I’m proud of my country on penal matters!
Really gives a new meaning to the term “ahead of his times”.
Meanwhile, over in France….
Underrated dude.
I have to ask the obvious question here that is on everyone’s mind:
Is his distorted face the result of artistic freedom or incest?