Arnold Seematter

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Arnold Seematter (born November 21, 1890 in Saxeten ; † October 27, 1954 in Bern ) was a Swiss politician ( FDP ).

Teacher

Arnold Seematter grew up in the Bernese Oberland mountain village of Saxeten and attended the Hofwil teacher training college . From 1910 he worked as a teacher, first in Gsteigwiler , then in 1911/12 as a private tutor in England. After his return he trained as a secondary teacher in the linguistic and historical direction at the University of Bern . In 1919 he took up a job at the school in Büren an der Aare , where he also became head of the school in 1919.

Town hall Büren an der Aare

Politician

Arnold Seematter was also politically active in Büren an der Aare. He took on a leading role as community and council president. The Liberal Democratic Party of the Canton of Bern elected him in 1930 as central secretary in the newly created secretariat. For a short time he worked in the parliaments of the city and canton of Bern.

Bern City Hall

Arnold Seematter was elected to the Bern cantonal government as successor to Leo Merz as early as 1934 . The first four years he was responsible for the poor management. In 1938 he took over the police department, which he headed until his resignation in 1954. He was President of the Government twice. On September 17, 1946, he was able to greet the English war premier Winston Churchill from the terrace of the Bern City Hall in front of an enthusiastic audience. During his twenty-year tenure as a member of the government, he experienced the workers' leader Robert Grimm and the later federal councilors Markus Feldmann and Rudolf Gnägi as prominent colleagues . The forced assignment of departments to the Bern-Jurassic government colleague Georges Moeckli led in 1947 to an accentuation of the Jurassic conflict .

In 1941, Police Director Seematter had a speech by the renowned theologian Karl Barth forbidden because it was to be expected that it would be too political and not in the interests of Switzerland. Barth had previously called for resistance against National Socialist Germany and sharply criticized the Swiss authorities.

On the question of the cost sharing in the refugee policy in the Second World War, the Bergierkommission called the view of the Bernese government councilor Arnold Seematter symptomatic. In February 1943 he spoke out against the generous use of federal funds: "The Swiss people should bear the consequences of their generosity themselves." The dominant opinion was that refugee aid was a private matter.

Bundeshaus

Arnold Seematter was a member of the Swiss National Council from 1939 until his death in 1954 . He participated in 43 commissions, six of them permanent. He presided over seven commissions. He only belonged to the influential Powers of Attorney Commission after the end of the war from 1951 to 1952.

In terms of content, Arnold Seematter was particularly involved in the field of transport policy in its facets of road, rail and air transport. In 1953 he worked in a traffic education film for the Swiss Advice Center for Accident Prevention (bfu).

Arnold Seematter rose to become vice president of the liberal party in Switzerland. He was also President of the Upper Austrian Chamber of Commerce, President of the Board of Directors of the Simmentalbahn (Spiez-Zweisimmen) and member of the board of the Bernese Alpine Railway Company Bern-Lötschberg-Simplon (BLS). He also presided over the Pro Aero Foundation , which promoted national aviation.

Seematter organized the Federal Singing Festival in Bern, connected with the centenary of the founding of the federal state in 1948. He was also an active singer and honorary member of the Bern men's choir. The music brought him in connection with copyright protection. He was President of the Swiss Society for Mechanical Copyright and a member of the Board of Directors of the European Society for the Protection of Reproduction Rights (BIEM) based in Paris.

The Berner Tagblatt described Seematter as "a tall man with a penchant for stiff collars and the thoughtful, almost hesitant manner of speaking" as the embodiment of "a good piece of the Bernese people's state." As a police director, he was not an agitator. The popularity of Seematter can be seen from his good election results.

swell

  • Der Bund , April 28, 1934, April 10, 1954, February 15, 1954, October 28, 1954 and November 1, 1954
  • Obituary in the National Council, December 6, 1954 (in French) pdf

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Oberländisches Volksblatt, November 20, 1950
  2. ↑ Report on the state administration of the canton 1946, p. 5 doi : 10.5169 / seals-417339
  3. ↑ Radio report from September 17, 1946 ( proof )
  4. ↑ Weekly film show from October 4, 1946 (without mentioning Seematter)
  5. ^ Daniel Ficker Stähelin: Karl Barth and Markus Feldmann in the Bern church dispute 1949-1951 , Theological Publishing House Zurich, 2006, p. 43f (Google Books: Link )
  6. ^ Eberhard Busch: The Karl Barth Files, Censorship and Surveillance in the Name of Swiss Neutrality 1938-1945 , Theologischer Verlag Zurich 2008, in particular p. 370f (partly available from Google Books: Link )
  7. ^ Final report of the Independent Expert Commission Switzerland - Second World War, Zurich 2002, p. 154 pdf
  8. ↑ August Kern: "5 minutes to 12"; Prevention of accidents. Advice center for accident prevention bfu, December 11, 1953, accessed on March 17, 2020 .
  9. ↑ Berner Tagblatt, April 15, 1954
personal data
SURNAME Seematter, Arnold
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss politician
DATE OF BIRTH November 21, 1890
PLACE OF BIRTH Saxeten
DATE OF DEATH October 27, 1954
Place of death Bern