In 1893 Georg Mollat published a manuscript by Hegel which dealt with political conditions in Germany. The original manuscript had no title, but following a remark by Hegel's disciple and first biographer, Karl Rosenkranz, Mollat entitled it Kritik der Verfassung Deutschlands. Later editors of the essay shortened the title to Die Verfassung Deutschlands, and the Knox-Pelczynski English edition of Hegel's political writings follows this usage, calling it The German Constitution.

It is now firmly established that Hegel composed the final draft of the essay in 1802 at Jena, though an earlier version of the introduction dates back to 1799, when he was still in Frankfurt. Rosenkranz, however, mistakenly attributed it to 1806–8, the period immediately following the French victory over the Prussians at Jena, and tried to see in it a patriotic reaction by Hegel to German humiliation and political impotence, similar to Fichet's Addresses to the German Nation of 1808. Rosenkranz later accepted that the essay was written in 1801–2 and thus couid not be attributed to the traumatic impact of the Battle of Jena; but the circumstances of Mollat's publication of the essay, as well as his introduction to it, helped to sustain the image that the pamphlet expressed Hegel's concern for the unification of Germany. It was as such that it was interpreted in numerous discussions of Hegel's politics around 1870, when only partial quotes, based on Rosenkranz's biography, were known; and the coincidence of the centenary of Hegel's birth with the high tide of German nationalism helped to sustain this image.