Day of dissolution of the union with Sweden (07/06)

The Dissolution of union with Sweden (Unionsoppløsningen) is celebrated in Norway annually on June 7, on which day the national flag is raised in the country.

Swedish-Norwegian Union 1814-1905 — state legal association of Sweden and Norway based on a real union. The union was imposed on Norway by Sweden by force of arms, as a result of the Swedish-Norwegian War of 1814, and became a compromise between the Norwegian desire for independence, on the one hand, and Sweden's desire to compensate for the loss of Finland as a result of the war with Russia and Pomerania, on the other. Came into force on November 4, 1814 with the election of King Charles XIII of Sweden as King of Norway.

Relations between the parties in the union were regulated by the «State Act» (Riksakt) of August 6, 1815, adopted by the parliaments of both states. Sweden and Norway had a common diplomatic department, each country retained its own laws, administration, courts, and church. The Norwegian army (the — officers were Norwegian only) was under the command of the king, but its use outside Norway required the sanction of the Norwegian Storting (the decree adopted by the three convocations of the Storting came into force despite the king's twofold suspensive veto).

The king's appointment of members of the Norwegian government was carried out on the recommendation of the Storting, which also retained the right to manage the country's finances and grant Norwegian citizenship. The Storting became the center of the Norwegians' struggle against the union; its dissolution was also facilitated by the favorable position of Russia and Great Britain towards Norway.

On June 7, 1905, the Storting passed a resolution to dissolve the union. During the plebiscite in Norway, which took place on August 13, 1905, about 369 thousand votes were cast for breaking the union (184 votes for its preservation). The dissolution of the union was formalized by the peaceful Swedish-Norwegian Karlstad Agreements of 1905, and after that Norway gained complete independence and its own king — Haakon VII.

In honor of this event, which became an important date in the history of Norway, today's holiday — is the so-called flag day, when the national flag is raised at government institutions and in other places provided for by law.

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