Carl Cohn

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Carl Cohn (born November 19, 1857 in Neustrelitz ; † May 7, 1931 in Hamburg ; full name: Carl Johann Cohn ) was a German overseas merchant , politician of the German Democratic Party (DDP) and senator .

Life

Senator Cohn's tomb (by Rudolf Lodders , 1931), Ohlsdorf cemetery

Carl Cohn, who was of Jewish faith, came from Neustrelitz and, like his brother Emil Cohn , attended the Carolinum grammar school there until he joined the Hamburg company David Lippert & Co as an apprentice in 1877 . David Lippert was a Hamburg wool merchant who had married a cousin of Cohn's mother. The company was mainly active in trading with South Africa and was at times involved in the diamond trade. After stays in England and Scotland , Cohn also went to South Africa on behalf of D. Lippert & Co. After Lippert & Co became insolvent in 1882, Cohn founded the company Arndt & Cohn in 1883 , which was also primarily active in trade with southern Africa. It had offices in Durban , Port Elizabeth , Johannesburg and Cape Town . It is said to have been one of the largest and most respected import and export trading houses in Hamburg. The company was Aryanized in 1938 . In addition to his commercial work, Cohn also worked as an honorary commercial judge. He was also a member of the supervisory boards of the Hamburg waterworks and the Hamburgische Electrizitätswerke .

Senator (Carl) Cohn's grave is located at grid square S 6 (near Chapel 1) in Hamburg's Ohlsdorf cemetery .

MP and party

Cohn was a member of the Hamburg Parliament from 1913 to 1929 . Only in the faction of the United Liberals and from 1919 in the Weimar Republic in the left - wing liberal DDP, which he co - founded in 1918 .

Former Hamburg mayor Carl Wilhelm Petersen was a role model, mentor and companion of Cohn . In a letter to him on September 27, 1918, Cohn wrote:

“You gave my life a new dimension when you made me take care of politics. I followed you because I couldn't do anything else; the magic of your personality did it to me. "

Public offices

From March 23, 1921 to June 20, 1929, Cohn held the office of Hamburg Senator.

After Arnold Diestel's death in 1924, Cohn held the most influential office of the Hamburg Senate after the first mayor , that of Finance Senator . The economy of Hamburg and the port were severely affected by the consequences of the First World War and the Versailles Treaty . Nevertheless, thanks to his good connections, Cohn managed to get a cheap long-term international loan in 1926 , which improved the city's financial situation over the long term. Cheap short-term bonds were also used to build schools. Cohn's warnings about the problems with this funding went unheeded. The generally solid financial policy of Cohn and his function as the “right hand” of State Councilor Leo Lippmann were highly valued in Hamburg politics by the faction of all non-extreme parties.

The reason for Cohn's resignation was a dispute over the downsizing of the Senate. In order to demonstrate its willingness to save, the coalition agreed to downsize the Senate and, as before the First World War, to introduce semi-official senators.Therefore, two SPD senators and one senator each from the DDP and the DVP should only fill their office unpaid, i.e. on an honorary basis. To do this, they should resign and then be re-elected as semi-official senators. In the case of Cohn, however, the resulting savings would have been nullified by the pension payments that were due immediately . So he didn't want to resign. The coalition partners were also prepared to make an exception in his case. Above all, however, his own faction pushed for his resignation. Cohn had already had a different opinion than Carl Wilhelm Petersen and Walter Matthaei on important issues such as the amount of port dues in the Senate . Petersen and Matthaei, who was to succeed him in the office of finance senator, then also dismissed Cohn. In his place, Curt Platen was elected to the Senate from the left wing of the DDP.

In 1929, almost simultaneously with Cohn, the only other Jewish senator, the SPD politician Max Mendel , left; Health reasons were given for his resignation, but it is assumed that the motivation for this step was partly the increasingly open anti-Semitism .

The publicist Erich Lüth states that one of the reasons for leaving is that Mendel and Cohn were no longer trusted to “get the city's economic problems under control”. In addition, Cohn was rooted in the “old days” and not open to new ideas been. He only hoped for an improvement in the financial situation, but did nothing to help. At that time, Lüth was himself a member of the DDP parliamentary group in the citizenry and helped remove Cohn.

Honors

literature

  • Ursula Büttner : Hamburg in the state and economic crisis: 1928–1931 . Hamburg 1982, ISBN 3767207745
  • Erich Lüth: There were a lot of stones on the way. A crosshead reports . Hamburg 1966.
  • Erich Lüth: Hamburg's fate was in your hands. History of citizenship . Hamburg 1966.
  • Erich Lüth: Mayor Carl Petersen. 1968-1933 . Hamburg 1971.
  • Institute for the history of the German Jews (ed.): The Jewish Hamburg. A historical reference work . Göttingen 2006, ISBN 3835300040

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Leo Lippmann: My life ... , p. 298
  2. ^ Frank Bajohr: Aryanization in Hamburg, 1998 p. 348
  3. ^ Lüth: Mayor, p. 49.
  4. ^ Rainer Fuhrmann: Distribution of offices in the Senate 1860-1945 . Typescript, Hamburg State Archives.
  5. ^ A b Büttner: Hamburg in the state and economic crisis, p. 177.
  6. ^ Büttner: Hamburg in the state and economic crisis , p. 176.
  7. ^ Büttner: Hamburg in the state and economic crisis, p. 178
  8. ↑ Ulrich Bauche a lecture at the Institute for Folklore ( Memento of the original from June 13, 2007 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.uni-hamburg.de
  9. ↑ Lüth: Much Stones, p. 76.
  10. ^ Lüth: Hamburgs Schicksal, pp. 125–126.
  11. ↑ List of the Mayor Stolten medals


personal data
SURNAME Cohn, Carl
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Cohn, Carl Johann (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German businessman, politician (DDP), Member of the Bundestag and Hamburg Senator
DATE OF BIRTH November 19, 1857
PLACE OF BIRTH Neustrelitz
DATE OF DEATH May 7, 1931
Place of death Hamburg