In his later years, a nuncio at Cologne took responsibilities for the financial administration of the archdiocese, and Ernst's nephew, Ferdinand of Bavaria, was elected to the Cathedral Chapter, the Wittelsbach heir-apparent. When Ernst died in 1612, the Cathedral Chapter duly elected his nephew to the position and Wittelsbachs held the Electorate until 1761. Ernst's victory, both in winning the election in 1583, and in convincing the assembly of other electors to accept him in 1585, confirmed him as the new archbishop of Cologne and gave the Wittelsbach family a foothold on the northern Rhine. Ernst's rule, and that of his four Wittelsbach successors, strengthened the position of his family in Imperial politics. The victory of the Catholic party further consolidated the Counter-Reformation in the northwest territories of the Holy Roman Empire, especially in the bishoprics of Münster, Paderborn, Osnabrück and Minden, which were bordered by Protestant territories. Once Ernst's brother or such allies as the Duke of Parma regained control, Jesuits efficiently identified any recalcitrant Protestants and converted them to Catholicism. The Counter-Reformation was thoroughly applied in the lower Rhineland, with the goal that every Protestant, whether Lutheran or Calvinist, would be brought to the Catholic fold. For their efforts, the Spanish acquired important bridgeheads on the Rhine River, securing a land route to the rebellious northern provinces, which helped to extend an already long war of secession well into the next century. The German tradition of local and regional autonomy differed structurally and culturally from the increasingly centralized authority of such other European states as France, England, and Spain. This difference made them vulnerable to the unabashed intervention of Spanish, French, Italian, Dutch, English and Scots mercenaries and the influence of papal gold and changed the dynamic of internal German confessional and dynastic disputes. The great "players" of the Early Modern European political stage realized that they could enhance their own positions "vis-a-vis" one another by assisting, promoting, or undermining local and regional competition among the German princes, as they did in the localized feud between Gebhard and Ernst. Conversely, German princes, dukes, and counts realized that they could gain an edge over their competitors by promoting the interests of powerful neighbors. The scale of the engagement of such external mercenary armies as Spain's Army of Flanders set a precedent to internationalize contests of local autonomy and religious issues in the German states, a problem not settled until the Peace of Westphalia in 1648.