WILLIAM III

William III: translation

(1817–1890)

King of the Netherlands. He succeeded his father William II in 1849. William III had married his cousin Sophia of Wurttemberg (1818–1877) in 1839, but she and all three of their sons died before he did. He remarried in 1879, to Emma of Waldeck-Pyrmont (1858–1934). They had one daughter, Wil helmina, who inherited the throne in 1890. William’s autocratic in clination only quickened the process by which Parliamentwon more political influence. After several constitutionalcrises (in 1853, 1857, and 1866) caused by the king’s insistence on a royal prerogative to appoint and dismiss his ministers as he pleased, William was at last forced to recognize that the government had to be based on a majority in Parliament. Since 1868, the Dutch monarchy has been constitutional-parliamentary.