Anton Reissner

Anton Reissner

Anton Reissner , called Toni, (born December 30, 1890 in Munich , † around May 15, 1940 in Amsterdam ) was a German politician (SPD).

Live and act

Youth and Education (1890 to 1914)

Reissner was the son of a coppersmith . After elementary school he worked as a trade assistant ("Ausgeher"), from 1909 as a bookstore assistant. He became a member of the “Central Association of Trade, Transport and Traffic Workers in Germany” and the SPD . On March 20, 1908, he was elected chairman of the Munich youth department at a youth meeting.

In 1909, Reissner was elected district manager of Munich District 16 (Lehel-Bogenhausen) within the local administration I of the " German Transport Workers Association ", in whose district board he was accepted in the same year. On January 1, 1912, he became a full-time functionary in the Munich local government, and he was elected 1st secretary on March 3, 1912. On February 16, 1913 he was elected the second cashier of the local administration. Reissner kept the chairmanship in the Lehel-Bogenhausen district until 1914 and as an assessor in the Gau board. From June 7th to 13th, 1914 he was a delegate at the Association Day in the “Volkshaus” in Cologne.

From August 11, 1914, Reissner was in the First World War . He fought with an infantry regiment on the western front . In March 1915 he was wounded and taken to a hospital in Colmar . In July 1916 he was wounded again as a member of a hunter regiment. He spent the following time in hospitals in Trier and Munich . From September 1918 to February 1920 he was a French prisoner of war .

Political careers in the Weimar Republic (1919 to 1933)

After his return to Germany, Reißner became a full-time employee on the board of the German Transport Workers' Association in Berlin. In 1921 he was trained at the Academy of Labor in Frankfurt am Main. In the main administration he was responsible for civil servants' issues, among other things. On October 12, 1923, he became a trade employee representative. At around the same time, Reissner became a member of the " Provisional Reich Economic Council ".

From January 12 to 14, 1925, Reissner took part in the 1st Federal Congress of the General German Association of Civil Servants in Berlin. At the founding meeting of the “General Association of Workers in Public Enterprises and the Movement of People and Goods” from October 7th to 10th, 1929 in Berlin, he was elected Secretary of the Board. At the 1st Reich Conference of Road, Private, Harbor and Works Railroaders in the general association on December 11, 1929 in Berlin, Reissner, as substitute for the sick union chairman Oswald Schumann, gave the report on the merger of the transport workers ' association with the "Association of Community and State Workers "And the" Association of gardeners and horticultural workers ".

From September 15 to 21, 1926, Reissner was a delegate at the congress of the International Transport Workers' Federation (ITF) in Paris and from August 7 to 13, 1932 at the ITF conference in Prague. After that he was a regular delegate at the meetings of the international trade secretariat until 1932.

As Gerhard Förster's successor, Reissner became head of the department for education and advertising on April 25, 1930. As such, he was responsible for the federal school in Bernau and for the educational institutions of the district and local administrations. His aim in this function was to make the organization clearer by reducing the number of sub-divisions.

At the 13th Bundestag of the trade unions, Reissner was elected as a new member of the extended trade union board.

After his first candidacy for the Reichstag failed in 1928, Reissner was a member of the Reichstag for the SPD from 1930 to 1933 . In the 6th electoral period (1932) he was elected to the 14th committee (official affairs), in addition he was appointed by the Reichstag as a deputy member of the administrative board of the German Reichspost . On April 13, 1932, Reissner was a delegate to the 5th Bundestag of the General German Trade Union Confederation in Berlin, where the free trade unions presented their economic program to combat the economic crisis.

In the late phase of the Weimar Republic , Reissner publicly opposed social cuts and the transfer of power in the state to the National Socialists ("because the education in fanaticism, which is deliberately cultivated in the Nazi movement, kills all independent and critical thinking"). In addition, he was one of the sharpest opponents of communist trade union politics within the free trade union movement, but at the same time remained a staunch anti-capitalist (“We must eliminate the capitalist system that bears the heavy blame for the economic, social and political conditions of our time”).

Period of National Socialism and Emigration (1933 to 1940)

In March 1933, Reissner voted as one of 94 deputies against the National Socialist Enabling Act . As a result, he was briefly arrested on April 3, 1933 during a trade union meeting. On May 2, 1933, Reissner was arrested again during the occupation of the union building by the SA . He was first brought to the Anti-War Museum in Parochialstrasse and later transferred to the Plötzensee prison, where he was held as a “protective prisoner” for the next few months .

After his release from prison, Reissner fled to the Netherlands with his family .

In exile , Reissner was closely connected to the leadership of the Sopade . Since its foundation, Reissner was a member of the exile organization of the General German Trade Unions. From January 1937 to 1938 he was editor of the trade union newspaper of the exile organ of the foreign representation of the German trade unions (ADG). From May 1939 he was Ernst Schumacher's successor as the correspondent of the " Deutschland -berichte " for north-west Germany. From 1939 to 1940 he was editor of the new trade union newspaper. In Amsterdam , Reissner was also an employee of the "Free Press".

From July 8 to 11, 1936, Reissner was a participant in the Congress of the International Trade Union Confederation (IGB) in London and in August 1938 at the ADG conference in Mühlhausen.

In 1939, Reissner's efforts at the IGB to establish an ADG headquarters in London for increased activities against the Nazi regime in the event of war failed. Almost unanimously, the AGB lines abroad had spoken out in favor of Reissner for this office.

As a supporter of Fritz Tarnow , Reissner wanted to restore the old union structures after the National Socialist collapse. He refused to cooperate with communists and the International Transport Workers 'Federation ("In no case do I allow these people any influence in the reconstruction of the German workers' and trade union movement.").

In February 1940, Reissner was expatriated from Germany . After the German invasion of the Netherlands , in May 1940, together with his wife Anna, née Wörle, (1890–1940) and their son Erwin (1916–1940), Reisser committed suicide through gas poisoning. The daughter Gisela (* 1920) survived.

literature

• Rudolf Vierhaus: German Biographical Encyclopedia, p. 310.
• Socialist Communications No. 29 of September 1, 1941, p. 22.
• Archive of the Social Democracy
• Martin Schumacher (Hrsg.): MdR The Reichstag members of the Weimar Republic in the time of National Socialism. Political persecution, emigration and expatriation, 1933–1945. A biographical documentation . 3rd, considerably expanded and revised edition. Droste, Düsseldorf 1994, ISBN 3-7700-5183-1 .

Web links

• Literature by and about Anton Reissner in the catalog of the German National Library
• Anton Reissner in the database of members of the Reichstag