Arthur von Posadowsky-Wehner

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Arthur von Posadowsky-Wehner. Photography by Nicola Perscheid .

Arthur Adolf Graf von Posadowsky-Wehner Freiherr von Postelwitz (born June 3, 1845 in Groß-Glogau , †  October 23, 1932 in Naumburg (Saale) ) was a German politician .

Life

Early years

Posadowsky-Wehner came from the Silesian nobility. His father was the royal court advisor Adolf Eduard von Posadowsky-Wehner (1799–1848), his mother Amalie von Plötz (1811–1880). In 1864 he passed the Abitur at the Protestant grammar school in Glogau, and then, following his father's tradition, studied law and political science in Berlin , Heidelberg and Breslau . He cherished with particular interest for the state and church law .

After graduating as Dr. jur. In 1867 he completed a two-year legal clerkship at the Wroclaw City Court and completed his training in 1869 with the second state examination. However, he did not return to the civil service and instead acquired an estate that he managed in the following years. In January 1871 he married Elise Emma Adolfine von Moeller, the daughter of an appeals court president in Breslau. With her he had two sons: Hans Adam Nikolaus (1872–1954) and Gustav Adolph (* 1874), who died early, as well as two daughters Helene Elisabeth, called Liska (1872–1945) and Martha Helene, called Litta (* 1875) .

Political rise in Poznan

Since the agricultural work could not satisfy him, Posadowsky-Wehner entered the political stage again in 1871 and received a position in the provincial government of Poznan . Between 1873 and 1882 he worked as a district administrator, first in the Wongrowitz district , then in the Kröben district . Posadowsky-Wehner cleverly used his extensive independence in this position and made moderate efforts to achieve a balance between the Polish majority population and the German residents of the districts, without neglecting the interests of the German Empire .

As a member of the Free Conservative Party , he sat in the Prussian House of Representatives from 1882 to 1885 . He then headed the newly baptized Poznan provincial self-government and focused primarily on improving the infrastructure. In 1885 Posadowsky-Wehner was appointed governor of Posens.

State Secretary in the Reich Treasury

Reich Treasury Secretary Count von Posadowsky, 1894

The up-and-coming Silesian was also noticed in Berlin . On September 1, 1893, Kaiser Wilhelm II appointed him State Secretary of the Reich Treasury , and he also became an authorized representative in the Federal Council. Posadowsky-Wehner's policy strengthened the role of the Reich Treasury against the dominant Prussian Ministry of Finance. He slowed the rise in debt, began to repay it and implemented regulations to protect agriculture.

German Vice Chancellor

After Johannes von Miquel , originally intended for these offices, had refused, Posadowsky-Wehner rose to State Secretary of the Reich Office of the Interior , Vice Chancellor and Prussian Minister of State without portfolio on July 1, 1897 . Under him a paradigm shift took place on the question of how the monarchical state should deal with social democracy.

The so-called prison bill provided the occasion for a reorientation . With this law, which Posadowsky-Wehner introduced to the Reichstag in 1899 at the suggestion of the emperor , persons who prevent a worker from doing his job or induce him to strike could be punished with imprisonment. Against the votes of the conservatives , the Reichstag rejected the proposal on November 20, 1899. The renewed attempt to undermine the SPD by expanding the catalog of repressive measures had failed. Posadowsky-Wehner drew conclusions from the defeat and established a new equalization policy vis-à-vis the social democrats by responding to their demands and continuing the social legislation .

When Posadowsky-Wehner took office as State Secretary for the Interior, he announced a slower pace in social legislation. Nonetheless, at the turn of the century, both pension and accident insurance were comprehensively amended. In 1903 the "Child Protection Act" was created. The further development of the welfare state was supported by the SPD in the Reichstag and increased Posadowsky-Wehner's reputation among the social democrats.

In addition, Posadowsky-Wehner reached a compromise in the Customs Tariff Commission between the demands of the Federation of Farmers , which demanded a drastic increase in grain tariffs from 3.50 Marks to 7.50 Marks per quintal, and the opposing side, who warned against retaliatory tariffs on German products, come here. The new customs law, which was ratified on December 14, 1902 by the votes of the Center, the National Liberals and the moderate conservatives, raised the tariffs from 3.50 marks to 5.00 marks for rye and to 5.50 marks for wheat firmly. The customs tariffs of 1892 were restored.

In the further course of his tenure, Posadowsky-Wehner found himself exposed to increasing domestic political pressure. His sociopolitical zeal and his close cooperation with the center turned the liberals and conservatives against him. When Reich Chancellor Bernhard von Bülow ended his collaboration with the center in 1907 due to differences of opinion in colonial policy , Posadowsky-Wehner's political working basis was withdrawn. Therefore, he resigned on June 24, 1907.

The recognition that Posadowsky-Wehner also enjoyed among workers because of his socio-political reconciliation course is illustrated by an anecdote passed down by Marie von Bunsen :

“In the Rudelsburg , I stood with him in front of a map that had been drawn up, we were looking for a suitable way back. A simple but decently dressed young man stopped there, pointed to the given direction and then asked: “Do I have the honor to speak to Count Posadowsky?” “Yes.” “Then I would like to tell you how exactly we workers are know what we owe you. You have done a lot for us and we will never forget that. "He said hello and left."

Exit of the Empire and Weimar Republic

From then on, Posadowsky-Wehner lived as dean of the Protestant cathedral chapter in Naumburg . However, he remained in politics and sat in the Prussian mansion from 1907 to 1918 and as a non-party member of the Reichstag for the constituency of Bielefeld from 1912 to 1918 . Between 1915 and 1917 he represented his sick son Nikolaus as district administrator of Elbing .

Posadowsky-Wehner deeply regretted the defeat of the German Empire in World War I. He disapproved of the new state order of the Weimar Republic ; the fragmentation of the parties seemed to him to endanger the unity of the German Reich. Nevertheless, he continued his political work after 1918. On February 11, 1919, he ran against Friedrich Ebert in the election of Reich President , but was defeated in the Weimar National Assembly by 49 to 277 out of a total of 379 votes. Until 1920 he was parliamentary group leader of the DNVP . After the Kapp Putsch , which was welcomed by many DNVP members, he distanced himself from the party, which had become too radical for him, and finally left it at the end of 1920.

When inflation peaked in 1923 and 1924, he advocated revaluation and compensation claims from those affected. In 1925 he was elected to the provincial parliament of the province of Saxony , from 1928 to 1932 he sat for the small Reich Party for People's Law and Appreciation in the Prussian state parliament, whose first session of the new legislative period he opened as senior president . He died in Naumburg in 1932 at the age of 87.

Honors and memberships

The Posadowskybai and the Posadowsky Glacier in the East Antarctic Kaiser Wilhelm II Land as well as the Posadowsky Glacier on the South Atlantic Bouvet Island and indirectly also the Posadowsky Canyon in the Davissee are named after Posadowsky-Wehner .

Publications

  • On the old-age pension of workers (1883)
  • History of the Silesian noble family of the Count Posadowsky-Wehner Freiherrn von Postelwitz: together with an appendix containing news about the Breslau patrician family von Wehner (1891) ( digital copy )
  • Luxury and Thrift (1909)
  • The Housing Question as a Cultural Problem (1910)
  • People and Government in the New Reich (1932)

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Arthur von Posadowsky-Wehner: History of the Silesian nobility of the Count Posadowsky-Wehner Freiherrn von Postelwitz: together with an appendix containing news about the Wehner patrician family , printed by Robert Nischkowsky, Breslau, 1891. (digitized version of the university and state library )
  2. ^ Hansjoachim Henning:  Posadowsky-Wehner, Arthur Adolf Graf von, Freiherr von Postelwitz. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 20, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 2001, ISBN 3-428-00201-6 , p. 646 f. ( Digitized version ).
  3. ↑ On Posadowsky's socio-political activities cf. Collection of sources on the history of German social policy from 1867 to 1914 , III. Department: Expansion and Differentiation of Social Policy since the Beginning of the New Course (1890–1904), Vol. 1–7.
  4. ↑ Cf. Bunsen: Contemporaries whom I experienced . Leipzig 1932, p. 91.
  5. ↑ Imperial Statistical Office (Ed.): The Reichstag elections of 1912 . Issue 2. Berlin: Verlag von Puttkammer & Mühlbrecht, 1913, p. 92 (Statistics of the German Reich, Vol. 250)
personal data
SURNAME Posadowsky-Wehner, Arthur von
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Posadowsky-Wehner, Arthur Adolf Graf von
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German politician (DNVP), MdR
DATE OF BIRTH June 3, 1845
PLACE OF BIRTH Groß-Glogau
DATE OF DEATH October 23, 1932
Place of death Naumburg (Saale)