2 Gulden Imperial election of Frederick William IV

Frankfurt struck this 2 Gulden to commemorate the election of Frederick William IV as German Emperor by the Frankfurt Parliament in March 1849 — an offer he famously refused, dismissing the crown as one "picked up from the gutter." The liberal parliament had spent nearly a year drafting the Paulskirchenverfassung, a constitution that would have unified Germany under a constitutional monarchy, only to have the Prussian king reject both the crown and the document outright.

The collapse of the Frankfurt Parliament effectively ended the revolution of 1848–49 in Germany. This coin thus commemorates a political failure as much as an election.