The study is a partial contribution to understanding the development of university education in Cisleithania in the 1860s and 1870s. Despite the qualitative changes that universities underwent in the 1860s, including the increase in the number of students, there was no increase in the number of university institutions, but, on the contrary, their number decreased in the Cisleithanian part of the monarchy. The first part of the study deals with the efforts of some crown lands and cities to establish a new German university, which culminated at the end of this decennium in connection with the polonization of Lviv University. The second part focuses on the discussions centred on the application for the establishment of a new university held in the House of Deputies of the Imperial Council between 1872 and 1874. It outlines the views and arguments of national parliamentarians on the issue of the establishment of a new university and its future location, as well as the final justification of the government’s decision to establish it in Chernivtsi, Bukovina.