 The Austrian Republic was preceded by a constitutional monarchy, whose legislative body was elected by, as "The New York Times" put it, "quasi-universal (male) suffrage" for the first time in 1897.Austria's first attempt at republican governance after the fall of the monarchy in 1918 was severely hampered by the crippling economic burden of war reparations required by the victorious Allies.Austria's First Republic (1918–1938) made some pioneering reforms in the 1920s, particularly in Vienna, that served as models for the social-welfare states of post-World War I Europe.