Emil Keller (politician)

Emil Keller (born March 2, 1878 in Zofingen , † March 12, 1965 in Aarau ; resident in Hottwil ) was a Swiss politician ( FDP ). From 1909 to 1945 he was a member of the government of the Canton of Aargau , from 1912 to 1922 and from 1925 to 1943 he was also a member of the National Council . He was the younger brother of the politician Gottfried Keller and the lawyer Johann Alfred Keller .

biography

The son of the teacher Emanuel Gottlieb Keller graduated from the canton school in Aarau . He then studied law at the universities of Munich , Berlin and Bern . After completing his studies, he was admitted to the bar in 1902 and initially worked for three years as the deputy state clerk before he took over this post himself in 1905. He served in the military with the rank of major .

In 1909, Keller was elected to the cantonal government without having previously held a political office. As a government councilor, he initially headed the building and agriculture department, and from 1923 the finance department. He is considered the initiator of the targeted use of hydropower ; During his tenure, numerous new power plants were built in Aargau. In order to achieve his goals in electricity policy, he suggested the establishment of the Northeast Swiss Power Plants (NOK) in 1914 . Two years later he was a co-founder of Aargauische Elektrizitätswerke and was their chairman .

Keller was also politically active at the national level. In 1912 he was elected to the National Council, to which he belonged until 1922 and again from 1924. He was a member of several standing commissions, including the Federal Railway Commission, the Finance Commission and the Business Audit Commission. Of the more than 60 non-permanent commissions to which he belonged, he presided over 15 of them. In the National Council, too, he paid particular attention to finance and energy policy. From 1941 to 1943 he was President of the FDP parliamentary group , and from 1942/43 President of the National Council . He presided over the Aargau FDP from 1930 to 1942.

In 1943, Keller decided not to run for another member of the National Council and wanted to succeed his brother Gottfried in the Council of States . However, he was defeated in the Council of States elections to Karl Killer , the SP candidate . He resigned as a member of the government in 1945 and then became a member of the board of directors of the Aargauer Tagblatt ( Chairman of the Board of Directors from 1956 to 1964); He had been Chairman of the Board of Directors of NOK since 1942. In 1963 he received an honorary doctorate from the University of Zurich .

Web links

• Sarah Brian Scherer: Emil Keller. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland .