BAUMGARTNER, GALLUS JAKOB

BAUMGARTNER, GALLUS JAKOB. - Swiss politician, b. at Altstätten on 15 Oct. 1797, d. at S. Gallo on 12 July 1869. After the July Revolution in France, he carried out active propaganda for the revision of the cantonal constitution, and the new constitution of S. Gallo of 1831 was largely his work. A Radical, at the conference of Baden (Jan. 1834), which was joined by seven Cantons, he took the initiative of subjecting the Church to the authority of the State, a measure condemned by Gregory XVI in the encyclical of 17 May 1835. The secularization of the convents of Argovia in 1841 was disapproved of by B. Two years later, he was at the head of the Catholic party. In 1861 he declared himself in favor of the Jesuits. In 1842 he founded the Schweizer Zeitung, the first Swiss Catholic daily newspaper.