German Fatherland Party

from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The German Fatherland Party (DVLP) was a right-wing German party that was active in the final phase of the First World War . The party took up elements of conservative , nationalist , anti-Semitic and völkisch ideologies; In terms of organizational history, it is regarded as the hinge between the Wilhelmine right and the new right-wing radicalism of the post-war period.

classification

Launched at the beginning of September 1917 on the occasion of the peace resolution rejected by the DVLP protagonists , the party gave the openly anti-democratic movement of radical nationalism for the first time the party-political mass base that the Pan-German Association , which was involved in the founding of the party, had striven for since the 1890s. Domestically, the Fatherland Party terminated the " truce " from the right. She pleaded for a repressive course against the labor movement and also violently attacked bourgeois politicians who - like Matthias Erzberger - spoke out in favor of a reform of the political system including the SPD . The party leadership pursued the plan to initiate an authoritarian state restructuring with the help of a “strong man” and thereby to eliminate the Reichstag and the left-wing parties. In the most extreme case, the "too soft" Wilhelm II should be declared incapable of governing when the opportunity arises and the Crown Prince, who is far to the right, should be appointed regent. In terms of foreign policy, the Fatherland Party advocated a German “victory peace” and a comprehensive program of direct and indirect expansion. With its campaigns against a peace of understanding known as “waiver peace” or “Jewish peace” and against “sluggishness” and “betrayal” on the “home front”, the DVLP laid the foundation for the post-war discourse on the “ November criminals ” and the “ stab in the back ”.

The Fatherland Party was led by Alfred von Tirpitz (1st chairman) and Wolfgang Kapp (2nd chairman). The party's honorary chairman was Duke Johann Albrecht zu Mecklenburg . Many leading industrialists, large landowners and business association officials belonged to the party - often in at least regionally prominent positions - including Max Roetger , Wilhelm von Siemens , Carl Duisberg , Carl Ziese , Ernst von Borsig , Hugo Stinnes , Emil Kirdorf , Jakob Wilhelm Reichert , Alfred Hugenberg , Ernst Schweckendieck , Conrad Freiherr von Wangenheim , Johann Christian Eberle and Hermann Röchling , but also humanities scholars such as Eduard Meyer and Dietrich Schäfer .

background

The impetus for the creation of the DVLP came primarily from three - ideologically related, but institutionally clearly distinguishable - groups of influence. In the vicinity of the Admiral's staff , the Commander-in-Chief of the East , the Supreme Army Command and various civil authorities, more or less concrete plans for an authoritarian state restructuring had been developed since 1915, which were to be implemented by a “strong man” - supported by the military. Among others, Crown Prince Wilhelm, Hindenburg , Grand Admiral Tirpitz, who was dismissed in March 1916, and - increasingly since 1917 - Erich Ludendorff were discussed as a "strong man" . Partly in this context, partly in continuation of its own past activities, the Pan-German Association endeavored since 1915 to launch a party of the " national opposition ", among other things loosely linked to the cartel of the creative classes of 1913 and the various war target committees. Relatively independent of the military dictatorship considerations and the organizational efforts of Pan-German-Völkisch circles, however, it was primarily the crisis of Prussian-German conservatism, which had been smoldering for years, that ultimately led to the founding of the DVLP - as an essential stage in the “deformation of the political style of the conservatives” led.

In 1916 and even more so in 1917, the two conservative parties fell politically on the defensive. A visible sign of this was the Easter message of Wilhelm II, in which the Prussian electoral reform, perceived by the conservative side as an existential threat, was promised. The climax of this development was the so-called peace resolution of July 19, 1917, with which a majority in the Reichstag was constituted from the FVP , the Center and the SPD (see Intergroup Committee ). The fact that Georg Michaelis , his successor Bethmann Hollweg, at least formally committed to the content of the peace resolution, made the increasing isolation of the advocates of an internally reactionary and externally imperialist maximum program public. Some of the conservative party leaders close to the Pan-German-ethnic groups blamed the one-sided trust in the obviously dwindling institutional-informal influence and the complete lack of an organized mass base for this marginalization; they were now beginning to think seriously about the creation of a conservative “People's Party”. Other voices initially only advocated the organizational merging of German and free conservatives . However, these “new conservatives” were thwarted by the old conservative leadership group represented by Ernst von Heydebrand and the Lasa , which continued to adhere rigidly to the traditional elitist-clientelist political and organizational model. Some of the critics of the traditional line were in any case not convinced of the chances of success of a "counter-attack" launched by the widely discredited and paralyzed conservative organizations and groups. So the idea arose to create a new "non-partisan" organization alongside and independently of the conservative parties, which would attract not only conservative but also national liberal and right-wing Catholic forces, but above all the much-discussed "party of the non-party" - a "Bismarck League". , a “Bismarck Party”, a “United Right”, a “Hindenburg Party” or a “German Unity Party”. The main controversial issue was whether the new organization should be set up as a federation, association or explicitly as a party.

Wolfgang Kapp, who became known beyond East Prussia in "national" circles since the spring of 1916, was also involved in these discussions, in which the party supporters finally prevailed . Kapp was in contact with Alfred von Tirpitz and the Supreme Army Command through Ulrich von Hassell . In the summer of 1917 he negotiated in Berlin , Hamburg and Bremen with influential personalities - including Friedrich Bendixen , Richard Krogmann and Ludwig Roselius - about the establishment of a new organization for the "national opposition". Initially, it was planned that the founding movement should come from the Hanseatic cities so that the project would not immediately be suspected of being controlled by " East Elbe " controls. However, since Kapp was known, at least among informed circles, as a shop steward and trustee of East Prussian landowners (his name is said to have often "looked like a red cloth" to Hanseatic dignitaries who were initially interested in the project), these steps fizzled out. The circle around Kapp (mostly members of a political club, the East Prussian Society in 1914 ), who finally took charge of founding the Fatherland Party, - like many other conservatives and national liberals - basically assumed that the internal and external politics of the Reich leadership was to be rejected from the “national” point of view. Unlike the Heydebrand faction, for example, he was ready to break new ground in order to give the necessary emphasis to the conservative Pan-German agenda through an extra-parliamentary mass movement directed against the Reichstag and, in case of doubt, also against the Reich government . A pronounced economic liberal motive also played a not entirely unimportant role - in his May memorandum of 1916, Kapp denounced widespread " state socialism " and the abolition of the maximum price policy , the orientation of politics to the "legitimate interests" of producers and generally the suppression of "social aspects" is called for.

Two parallel initiatives - one came from the former diplomat Franz von Reichenau , the other from Munich Pan-Germans around Ernst Müller-Jürgens - Kapp came only shortly beforehand and was finally able to integrate them into the start-up he was running. Above all, these circles expressed a break with the previous practice of the “patriotic” parties to emphasize their own closeness to the state, to the government and to the “state authority” and to cultivate it as a characteristic of identity. As a result - modified and shaped by the specific situation of the war period - the anti-governmentalism , which was already latent in the last decades of the 19th century among parts of the German conservatives, fully achieved a breakthrough. Many protagonists of the Fatherland Party had already made this “change of sides” subjectively and assumed their “opposition role” with considerable aggressiveness. The historian Max Lenz , who was planned for some time as chairman of the new party and, above all through his Bismarck biography published in 1902 in the educated bourgeoisie, wrote in a private letter in the summer of 1917:

“It is possible that afterwards a choir with such a strong response will form to impress the dullness and the dull heart of our quasi-Reich representatives and to silence the Flaumacher in Berlin above and below. The best would be (...) to blow off the gas in Wilhelmstrasse , unfortunately such sharp measures are only common at the front. "

development

founding

Until recently still planned under the name "Hindenburg Party", the preparations for the re-establishment in mid-July 1917 entered the final phase. In a draft resolution that emerged from this, it was postulated that the German people “longed for a strong leader who would take the political leadership in hand with indomitable determination and not leave it to a weak-hearted Reichstag, which the party interests over the welfare of the fatherland represents. "All" nationally "minded MPs, individuals and organizations should be called upon to unite in a" Hindenburg cartel ". On August 23, 1917 in joined Konigsberg , a circle of East Prussian dignitaries' almost conspiratorial "to a final preparatory meeting together, the later as" constituent assembly "was called. The actual (and initially also kept secret) constituent meeting of the organization called the Fatherland Party - probably because of a wave from the OHL not to associate Hindenburg too strongly with the project - took place on September 2 in the Yorck Hall of the East Prussian General Landscape Directorate . Tirpitz, Kapp and Herzog Johann Albrecht were given the chairmanship or honorary chairmanship by acclamation. Bernhard von Bülow , who was also in discussion shortly before as chairman, had withdrawn at the last minute. The assembly approved a “big” and a “small appeal” as well as the party statute. In addition, a so-called Select Committee was formed, made up of Professors Dietrich Schäfer and Georg von Below , the Lord Mayors of Königsberg and Halle / Saale Siegfried Körte and Richard Robert Rive , the winery owner and Bavarian Councilor Franz von Buhl and Conrad von Wangenheim from the Federation of Farmers duration. On September 24th, Heinrich Claß from the Pan-German Association and Heinrich Tramm , the city director of Hanover , were elected. On September 2, the Kaiser, the OHL and the Chancellor were informed by telegrams that the party was being founded.

On September 9, the DVLP made its existence public in newspaper advertisements. The "Little Appeal" was proclaimed two days later. It was supposed to create the impression that the two signatories - Tirpitz and the Duke - only made themselves available to the DVLP under the impression of the “national wave” triggered by the founding of the party. In the “Great Appeal”, which in fact took on the role of the party program, it was postulated, among other things, that the Reichstag was no longer the “representation of the German will of the people” and that the majority of the Reichstag even “promoted our enemies”. The sharp attacks against the Reich government that were still contained in the preparatory documents were postponed for the time being, and they were given a "predicament". In addition, one turned against "disunity" and "party division", the Fatherland Party, it was said, did not see itself as competition between the established parties, but as a "unification party". The domestic political agenda of the party leadership was only indicated by the phrase that the DVLP regards itself as the future support (“powerful tool”) of a “powerful Reich government” that has yet to be created. On September 24th, the DVLP hosted its first two major events in Berlin - in the Philharmonie and in the Weinhaus Rheingold . The speakers included Tirpitz, Wangenheim, Gottfried Traub , Duke Johann Albrecht and Ludwig Thoma . The event in the Philharmonie was considered the first party conference of the DVLP.

The established bourgeois parties reacted inconsistently to the founding of the Fatherland Party. The two conservative parties expressly welcomed them. The board of the National Liberal Party also offered to cooperate and left the party members free to join the new party. The left-liberal Progressive People's Party, which lost a noticeable number of members to the DVLP, expressly refused to work with it. The center's Reich Committee asked party members on October 12, 1917 not to join the DVLP.

The DVLP worked openly and very closely with the numerous “patriotic” clubs, associations and committees, in particular with aid and cover organizations of the Pan-German Association, namely with the Independent Committee for a German Peace . The procedure of the Pan-German Association, which has been common for years, of covertly setting up and managing “branch organizations”, was also used by the DVLP. In this context, the Bund der Kaisertreuen and the German Workers' and Employees' Party (DAAP), whose Bavarian branch - the Workers' Committee for a Good Peace - was headed by Anton Drexler , later founder of the NSDAP's predecessor DAP, deserve special mention .

The foreign policy line of the Fatherland Party

The main official purpose of the Fatherland Party was the victorious end to the war and the securing of a “German peace”. The spokesmen and publicists of the party devoted themselves to its painting. On September 24, 1917, Tirpitz had demanded a “correct solution to the Belgian question”, “securing” the “open borders”, “physical compensation” and - quite generally - the well-known “ place in the sun ”. In the months that followed, the following ideas gradually emerged:

This program diverged dramatically from competing ideas in many ways. In clear contrast to the Central Europe concept advocated by Naumann , Bethmann Hollweg and Rathenau , among others - which was similarly ambitious, but almost exclusively relied on a sophisticated system of indirect rule - it postulated an extreme claim to direct rule and control, which demonstratively no longer coincides the old academic debate as to whether the claimed areas were actually "old German land" (although the DVLP publicists also published extensively on the "tribal affinity" of the Flemings ). Basically, the DVLP always put the naked power interest in the foreground without any major ideological trimmings. From this point of view, she repeatedly complained about the “betrayal” of the responsible authorities, including during the peace negotiations in Brest-Litovsk . The fact that the Reich leadership had formally recognized the “ right of peoples to self-determination ” for tactical reasons - in order to break Russia down into as many individual parts as possible and take the lead from Wilson's 14-point program - was condemned as “folly” by the DVLP ; instead, it simply demanded that the "right to victory" be exercised without further consideration.

The war aims of the DVLP were concerted at every possible opportunity in "countless [n] meetings (...) and a flood of declarations, appeals, writings, demands and telegrams to the Kaiser, the government, the Reichstag, the Supreme Army Command and to the public ”made known and popularized. Above all, this should give the impression of a "primitive popular movement".

A by no means unique, but nevertheless striking feature of the DVLP propaganda, which was not directly reflected in the war target program, was the sharp point against and fixation on Great Britain . The “perfidious Albion ” was the main culprit in the world war, Germany, it was said again and again, was basically waging a war of independence on the European continent against England. In this “struggle for freedom” not only the “small nations”, but also France and Russia tended to be incorporated. The Fatherland Party waged a similar hateful and intense campaign as against Great Britain, neither against Russia nor against France.

The domestic political line of the Fatherland Party

Especially in the first few months of its existence, the DVLP repeatedly emphasized its “national”, anti-“external enemy” character and an alleged domestic neutrality associated with it. The call to members and supporters, which was still little veiled in the “Great Appeal”, to stand up against a Prussian electoral reform and the parliamentarization of Reich policy and for a commitment of the government to the DVLP line, was deleted on September 24, 1917 without comment. The party assured that it would not put up its own candidates for Reichstag elections and that the "internal dispute" would rest until the end of the war. This demonstration of disinterest, however, was merely a tactical tool that arose from the DVLP's political concept. The main domestic political goal of the party leadership was clearly to force the dissolution of the Reichstag by means of extra-parliamentary pressure. Externally, this was justified with the pseudo-democratic argument that parliament no longer reflects the “will of the people”. A DVLP speaker protested on November 24, 1917 in Neustettin against:

“The politics of the Reichstag, which during the war developed more and more into an afterthought for the German people, in which the red, gold and black Internationals have fraternized and work into the hands of the English. We can ask the Reich Government to send this Workers 'and Soldiers' Council, as the Reichstag majority can be called, (...) home and offer the German people the opportunity to express their political wishes and views in new elections! "

However, the DVLP leadership did not actually seek such a new election for a moment. On the one hand, she was aware that a majority mandate was completely out of the question for the "national" parties; on the other hand, she saw the phase after the dissolution of the Reichstag as a suitable moment to bring the "strong man" to the helm. Its “ Caesarist techniques of domination” should then replace parliamentary procedures and help crush the labor movement and the political left . Not least because of this, Kapp had tried so hard to win Tirpitz - who had already played an essential role in Konstantin von Gebsattel's and Heinrich Claß's dictatorship considerations before the war - for the party. Tirpitz was also the one in whose environment the deposition of the emperor and a regency had been discussed as early as 1915 . The reactionary agenda of the DVLP - although at no point officially discussed by the party - by no means remained hidden from political observers. The Berliner Tageblatt saw the party as a "disguised electoral association of the [Reichstag] minority". Max Weber expressed the opinion that the resistance to parliamentarization and electoral reform is nothing less than the main purpose of the DVLP. Individual prominent members of the Fatherland Party sometimes actually referred to this objective as the "only purpose" of the organization, for example Lieutenant General Max von Kluge at an event in Kolberg in November 1917 . In the wider journalistic environment of the party, this debate was conducted even more openly and demanded, among other things, that “patriotic sentiments” lead to the automatic loss of parliamentary mandate and that the Reichstag's budget rights must be withdrawn.

Initially, the party leadership tried to prevent such requests to speak. In the end, however, the DVLP was unmistakably "on the way to becoming a completely 'normal' party with a program encompassing the entire political spectrum." This transformation of the DVLP into a fully developed right-wing radical mass party, which was interrupted by the end of the war and the revolution, also included the fact that the Party broke the principle of not sending party members into election campaigns at the earliest opportunity. In the case of a necessary by-election in the constituency of Bautzen - Kamenz - Bischofswerda , for which even Tirpitz originally wanted to run himself, the DVLP member nominated by the Conservatives was narrowly defeated by the Social Democratic candidate in the runoff election in January 1918. Kapp himself was elected to the Reichstag on February 2, 1918 in the constituency of Gumbinnen 2 ( Ragnit - Pillkallen ), which is firmly controlled by the farmers' union ; here too the nomination was made by the German Conservatives.

As the main domestic enemy, the DVLP spokespersons increasingly explicitly identified the “left-wing independent socialists and their appendages, whom I will call the German Bolsheviks without further ado.” In the final analysis, the entire internal dispute is tending towards two poles: “Fatherland Party and German Bolsheviks”. DVLP supporters in Berlin, Munich and Leipzig took violent action against the USPD's January strike with regular " rolling commands ".

The end of the war and the dissolution of the party

In September and October 1918 an acute political crisis developed out of and alongside the crisis of the German warfare. In March and April, in the slipstream of the German spring offensive , the party had made triumphalistic statements. In June, however, the mood changed drastically and finally. From then on, in view of the widely articulated rejection of their positions, the DVLP leadership no longer dared to launch larger events or new campaigns (but the euphoric war propaganda was maintained until the last day of the war). Most of the major newspapers refused to cooperate with the DVLP press service. A large rally planned for the first anniversary of the founding of the party was canceled. The party apparatus was partially paralyzed or resigned.

A minority of the leadership group nevertheless took an active part in the discussion about further modifying and making the conservative tactics more flexible. In August Kapp emphasized in a letter to Wangenheim that the “current political and economic system (...) was no longer tenable”. At that time, the DVLP leadership still believed an authoritarian way out was possible. On September 1, 1918, at a board meeting, Kapp again called for the dictatorial elimination of the Reichstag. In the following weeks, however, the realization began to break out that the involvement of the SPD and forced parliamentarization were essential to stabilize the system of rule. This was due to the fact that Ludendorff, who was being treated as a “lifeline” by Pan-Germans and members of the Fatherland, also expressly rejected an open dictatorship at this point in time. In mid-October, the DVLP board presented the concept of a “national defense” or “national survey”, in which - a completely new feature - the SPD had been expressly included. On October 17, Tirpitz sent a relevant letter to Max von Baden , Hindenburg and Scheidemann . At the same time, however, he also campaigned for a chancellor dictatorship in the last weeks of the war in the imperial environment, for which he recommended Max von Gallwitz or Hugo Stinnes. Probably also because of this inflexibility - but above all because of the total discrediting of the party's staff - the leadership of the DVLP was initially not included in the conservative reorganization efforts that began with the German conservatives in October 1918, primarily with the Free Conservative Party, the Christian Social Party Party and the Deutschvölkische Party aimed and ultimately led to the establishment of the German National People's Party (DNVP).

The November Revolution effectively ended the DVLP's existence. It was not until November 28 that the board met again and agreed to stop all “public activity”. The members were asked to agitate for the early convocation of a national assembly , to ensure that the “national forces” were gathered together and, for the time being, to support the council of people's representatives in “maintaining order”. On December 10, the Reich Committee of the DVLP, which was only attended by about 20 people, decided to dissolve the party. On this occasion, a three-member liquidation committee was set up, which initiated the transfer of the party's assets to the DNVP and ceased its activities on February 1, 1919.

Organization, members, funding and press

The Fatherland Party held two party congresses (on September 24, 1917 and April 19, 1918 in Berlin). A delegation procedure was not provided for in the statute; every party member could take part in the party congresses, which were purely forums for acclamation. A party congress was called “as required” by the Select Committee. In addition, there was a Reich Committee, which was composed of the Executive Board, the Select Committee and 50 individuals to be appointed by the party congress, but only met three times. In addition to Tirpitz, Johann Albrecht and Kapp, the DVLP board of directors consisted of the following people: Gottfried Traub , August Rumpf , Heinrich Beythien , Carl Pfeiffer (an "economically peaceful" worker in the Weser AG ), Lambert Brockmann , Wilhelm von Siemens , Dietrich Schäfer , Franz von Reichenau , Ernst Schweckendieck, Otto Hoffmann , Ulrich von Hassell and Stephan von Nieber (since June 1918). The party executive committee of the DVLP had a very strong, almost independent position - it could not be changed from within the party and chose new members itself if necessary. Decisions were made in small groups; according to the statute, the committee had a quorum when two (from April 1918 three) members were present. The select committee, which was abolished in April 1918, later included Robert Einhauser and Clemens Freiherr von Loë-Bergerhausen as well as the eight people appointed in September 1917 .

Head of the noticeably large head office of the party, which last had nine departments and up to 137 employees, were (one after the other) Kapp's close confidante Georg Wilhelm Schiele , Franz Ferdinand Eiffe and Konrad Scherer . For the maintenance and activities of the DVLP party apparatus, enormous sums were incurred that were completely unusual for other contemporary parties. In addition, the party gave the bulk of its literature and other propaganda material completely free of charge. This effort could not possibly be covered by membership fees and occasional donations alone. In the spring of 1918, the monthly average of the initially uncovered expenses alone amounted to 142,000 marks. The party leadership continuously complained internally about insufficient financial resources. A three-person committee made up exclusively of industrialists (Wilhelm von Siemens, Max Roetger and Max Fuchs ) was responsible for their procurement . The obvious question of which financiers enabled the party's continuous work was already discussed intensively by contemporaries, but has not yet been fully clarified historiographically due to a lack of meaningful sources. It is known that on September 24, 1917 - parallel to the two major DVLP events - a group of members of the Association of German Iron and Steel Industries met in the Berlin Hotel Adlon and declared their readiness to support the party. On March 9, 1918, in view of the rumors circulating, the DVLP party executive proposed "electing the [finance] committee [not] only from industry because of the accusation that heavy industry was behind the party."

According to its own information, the DVLP had 450,000 members in March 1918, 1,250,000 in July and 800,000 in September. However, these numbers are considered highly exaggerated. At least, very likely, but more than half of the members belonged to "patriotic" clubs and associations that had affiliated with the Fatherland Party. It is also known that several senior officials - including Prussian government presidents - forced the staff of the departments and authorities they headed to join the party. In July 1918 there were 32 regional, 237 district and 2,536 local associations. The majority of the “real” individual members were recruited from the upper class Protestant property and educated middle class. Craftsmen and small merchants were hardly represented, workers almost not represented at all. The party tried harder to attract workers, especially after the January strike. A guideline for party speakers had previously stated that the worker “must gain the understanding that he is serving himself by joining our party; because our party especially serves the welfare of the workers by advocating a peace that secures our economic future. "Officially, the party claimed in January 1918 to have over 290,000" registered workers "in its ranks. This pretentious phantasy figure underscores how important the DVLP leadership considered an intrusion into the labor movement.

The Fatherland Party published a newsletter and correspondence sheet for its members and supporters; it did not have its own daily newspaper. The headquarters published brochures and leaflets in quick succession. Numerous regionally and nationally influential conservative or pan-German newspapers represented the line of the DVLP, among them the German daily newspaper , Die Post , the daily Rundschau and the German newspaper . The Cologne People's Newspaper , which is influential in the Rhineland and close to the center's right wing , also openly sympathized with the Fatherland Party.

literature

Monographs

  • Geoff Eley : Reshaping the German Right. Radical Nationalism and Political Change after Bismarck , Yale University Press, London-New Haven 1980, ISBN 0-300-02386-3 .
  • Heinz Hagenlücke: German Fatherland Party. The national right at the end of the Empire , Droste, Düsseldorf 1997, ISBN 3-7700-5197-1 .
  • Rainer Hering : Constructed Nation. The Pan-German Association 1890 to 1939 , Christians, Hamburg 2003, ISBN 3-7672-1429-6 .
  • Abraham J. Peck: Radicals and Reactionaries. The Crisis of Conservatism in Wilhelmine Germany , University Press of America, Washington, DC 1978, ISBN 0-8191-0601-1 .
  • James N. Retallack : Notables of the Right. The Conservative Party and Political Mobilization in Germany 1876-1918 , Unwin Hyman, Boston 1988 ISBN 0-0490-0038-1 .
  • James N. Retallack: The German Right 1860-1920. Political Limits of the Authoritarian Imagination , University of Toronto Press, Toronto-Buffalo-London 2006, ISBN 0-8020-9419-8 .
  • Dirk Stegmann : The heirs of Bismarck. Parties and associations in the late phase of Wilhelmine Germany. Collection policy 1897–1918 , Kiepenheuer u. Witsch, Cologne-Berlin 1970.
  • Robert Ullrich: The German Fatherland Party 1917/1918. On the emergence, role and function of an extremely reactionary party of German imperialism and its place in the bourgeois party system , Phil. Diss. (Ms.), Jena 1971.
  • Karl Wortmann: History of the German Fatherland Party 1917–1918 , Hendel, Halle 1926.

Essays and Miscellings

  • Helmut Lensing, Against War of Age and Longing for Peace - The German Fatherland Party in the Grafschaft Bentheim 1917/18, in: Eugen Kotte / Helmut Lensing (ed.), The Grafschaft Bentheim in the First World War - "Home Front" on the German-Dutch border. Edited by the Heimatverein der Grafschaft Bentheim eV in collaboration with the Grafschaft Bentheim district by Eugen Kotte and Helmut Lensing (Das Bentheimer Land, 222), Nordhorn 2018, pp. 334–349.
  • Dirk Stegmann: Between Repression and Manipulation: Conservative Power Elites and Workers 'and Employees' Movement 1910–1918. A contribution to the history of the DAP / NSDAP , in: Archiv für Sozialgeschichte , Vol. 12 (1972), pp. 351-432.
  • Dirk Stegmann: From Neoconservatism to Proto-Fascism. Conservative party, clubs and associations 1893–1920 , in: ders., Bernd-Jürgen Wendt , Peter-Christian Witt (eds.): German conservatism in the 19th and 20th centuries. Festschrift for Fritz Fischer on his 75th birthday and on the 50th anniversary of his doctorate , Neue Gesellschaft, Bonn 1983, ISBN 3-87831-369-1 , pp. 199-230.
  • Robert Ullrich: German Fatherland Party , in: Dieter Fricke (Ed.): The bourgeois parties in Germany. Handbook of the history of the bourgeois parties and other bourgeois interest organizations from Vormärz to 1945 , Volume 1, Das Europäische Buch, Leipzig 1968, pp. 620–628.
  • Manfred Weißbecker : German Fatherland Party , in: Dieter Fricke u. a .: Lexicon on party history. The bourgeois and petty bourgeois parties and associations in Germany (1789–1945) . Volume 2, Bibliographisches Institut, Leipzig 1984, pp. 391-403.
  • Manfred Weißbecker: On the development of extremely anti-communist organizations and the "anti-Bolshevik" propaganda in Germany during the first years after the Great October Socialist Revolution , in: Scientific journal of the Friedrich Schiller University Jena , vol. 16 (1967), pp. 491-500 .
  • Manfred Weißbecker: Conservative Politics and Ideology in the Counterrevolution 1918/19 , in: Zeitschrift für Geschichtswwissenschaft , Vol. 27 (1979), pp. 703–720.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Representative: Abraham J. Peck: Radicals and Reactionaries. The Crisis of Conservatism in Wilhelmine Germany , Washington, DC 1978, pp. 203-221; Dirk Stegmann: From Neo-Conservatism to Proto-Fascism: Conservative Party, Associations and Associations 1893-1920 , in: ders., Bernd-Jürgen Wendt, Peter-Christian Witt (Ed.): German Conservatism in the 19th and 20th Centuries. Festschrift for Fritz Fischer on his 75th birthday and on the 50th anniversary of his doctorate , Bonn 1983, pp. 199–230; ders .: The heirs of Bismarck. Parties and associations in the late phase of Wilhelmine Germany. Collection policy 1897–1918 , Cologne / Berlin 1970, p. 497 ff .; ders .: Between repression and manipulation: Conservative power elites and workers 'and salaried employees' movement 1910–1918. A contribution to the history of the DAP / NSDAP , in: Archiv für Sozialgeschichte , Vol. 12 (1972), pp. 351-432; Manfred Weißbecker: German Fatherland Party , in: Dieter Fricke u. a .: Lexicon on party history. The bourgeois and petty bourgeois parties and associations in Germany (1789–1945). Volume 2, Leipzig 1984, pp. 391-403. Heinz Hagenlücke has a relativization of the transformative potential of the DVLP, which has been worked out many times: German Fatherland Party. The national right at the end of the Kaiserreich , Düsseldorf 1997, pp. 18, 402 ff. Tried, but has been criticized by reviewers with sometimes harsh words. Also Hans-Ulrich Wehler : German history of society. Volume 4: From the beginning of the First World War to the founding of the two German states 1914–1949 , Munich 2003, p. 108 describes the DVLP as the “first right-wing radical proto-fascist mass party”.
  2. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, pp. 90 ff.
  3. ↑ Stegmann, Protofaschismus, p. 219.
  4. ↑ See Peck, Radicals and Reactionaries, pp. 204 ff.
  5. ↑ On the conceptions of the “old” and “new” conservatives see above all James N. Retallack: Notables of the Right. The Conservative Party and Political Mobilization in Germany 1876-1918 , Boston 1988, pp. 210 ff. And passim.
  6. ↑ See Weißbecker, Vaterlandspartei, p. 392, Stegmann, Protofaschismus, p. 217 and Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 145.
  7. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 142.
  8. ↑ Quoted from Weißbecker, Vaterlandspartei, p. 392.
  9. ↑ See Stegmann, Protofaschismus, p. 215.
  10. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 155 ff.
  11. ↑ Quoted from Weißbecker, Vaterlandspartei, p. 392.
  12. ↑ Quoted in Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 146.
  13. ↑ Weißbecker, Vaterlandspartei, p. 393.
  14. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 155.
  15. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 162.
  16. ↑ Quoted from Weißbecker, Vaterlandspartei, p. 393.
  17. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 161.
  18. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, pp. 290 ff. And Robert Ullrich: Deutsche Vaterlandspartei , in: Dieter Fricke (Ed.): The bourgeois parties in Germany. Handbook of the history of the bourgeois parties and other bourgeois interest organizations from Vormärz to 1945 , Leipzig 1968, Volume 1, pp. 620–628, here p. 625.
  19. ↑ See Stegmann, Protofaschismus, p. 220.
  20. ↑ See Weißbecker, Vaterlandspartei, p. 394 and in detail Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, pp. 192–215.
  21. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 204 f.
  22. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 205.
  23. ↑ Weißbecker, Vaterlandspartei, p. 397.
  24. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 193 f.
  25. ↑ See Weißbecker, Vaterlandspartei, p. 394.
  26. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 216 ff.
  27. ↑ Quoted in Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 216 f.
  28. ↑ Stegmann, Protofaschismus, p. 219. See also ders., Repression und Manipulation, p. 385 ff. And Peck, Radicals and Reactionaries, p. 208 ff.
  29. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 217.
  30. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 218 f. Georg Alexander von Müller provides information on this: Did the Kaiser rule? Diaries, Records, and Letters of the Chief of the Navy Cabinet , ed. by Walter Görlitz, Göttingen 1959.
  31. ↑ Quoted from Weißbecker, Vaterlandspartei, p. 392.
  32. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 220.
  33. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 221.
  34. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 225.
  35. ↑ Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 223.
  36. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 225.
  37. ↑ Quoted from Weißbecker, Vaterlandspartei, p. 398.
  38. ↑ Quoted from Weißbecker, Vaterlandspartei, p. 398.
  39. ↑ Ullrich, Vaterlandspartei, p. 627.
  40. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 332.
  41. ↑ See Weißbecker, Vaterlandspartei, p. 399.
  42. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 378.
  43. ↑ See Weißbecker, Vaterlandspartei, p. 399.
  44. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, pp. 374 f., 377.
  45. ↑ Quoted in Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 376.
  46. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 376.
  47. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 383.
  48. ↑ See Weißbecker, Vaterlandspartei, p. 400.
  49. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 381 f.
  50. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 391.
  51. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 385 and Weißbecker, Vaterlandspartei, p. 400.
  52. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, pp. 164ff. and Weißbecker, Vaterlandspartei, p. 396.
  53. ↑ See Hagenlücke, Vaterlandspartei, p. 189.
  54. ↑ Quoted from Weißbecker, Vaterlandspartei, p. 396.
  55. ↑ See Weißbecker, Vaterlandspartei, p. 397.
  56. ↑ See Stefan Breuer : Basic positions of the German right (1871-1945) , Tübingen 1999, p. 92.
  57. ↑ Quoted from Weißbecker, Vaterlandspartei, p. 398.
  58. ↑ See Stegmann, Manipulation und Repression, p. 385.