Erhard Auer

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Erhard Auer as Bavarian Minister of the Interior. Postcard from 1919
Memorial plaque for Erhard Auer in Giengen an der Brenz, Obertorstraße 9

Erhard Auer (born December 22, 1874 in Dommelstadl, Neuburg am Inn near Passau ; † March 20, 1945 in Giengen an der Brenz , Württemberg ) was a German social democratic politician , member of the Bavarian state parliament , first interior minister of the Free State of Bavaria and the SPD - Party chairman in Bavaria.

Life and work

Auer was born the illegitimate son of a seamstress from an already social democratic family. The fact that he was already working as a farm laborer at the age of twelve speaks for their social need. At the age of 15 Auer was one of the founders of an agricultural workers' movement that was immediately banned again. After his military service he achieved remarkable social advancement. In 1896 he joined a Munich trading company as a messenger and, in the course of time, achieved a managerial position through intensive training. In 1900 he joined the local health insurance fund in Munich. He gave up this position in 1908 due to his numerous political commitments. In the First World War was Auer soldier.

Party and parliamentary mandates

From 1892 Auer was a member of the SPD. From 1900 to 1921 he was head of the newly established state secretariat of the Bavarian SPD and was thus a close associate of chairman Georg von Vollmar . From 1907 Auer was a member of the Bavarian Chamber of Deputies and from 1919 until the end of the Republic he was Vice President of the Bavarian State Parliament . In 1919/20 he was a member of the constituent national assembly.

Except during the revolution of 1918/19

Regarding Auer's role during the strike at Krupp in January 1918, Ernst Toller writes in Eine Jugend in Deutschland that the “leader of the right-wing socialists” Auer had appeased the workers: “The strike lasted for days until the right-wing socialist parliamentarians seize the leadership, they have it Minister of War promised to stifle the strike. The strike collapses. A delegation is elected beforehand and is supposed to convey the demands of the strikers to the minister "with all seriousness and all emphasis". The leader of the right-wing socialists, Auer, appeased the dissatisfied workers, he vouched for the fulfillment of their demands, he would lead the delegation to the minister, no one who took part in the strike would be fired, no one would be punished. In the morning the strikers gather for a final rally on Theresienwiese, the train pulls into the city and dissolves at Karlsplatz. ”Shortly afterwards, the strike leaders, including Ernst Toller, were arrested.

After Georg von Vollmar's resignation , Auer was elected as his successor. On November 8, 1918, the provisional National Council of Bavaria elected a revolutionary government made up of the MSPD and USPD with Kurt Eisner as Prime Minister and Erhard Auer as Minister of the Interior.

Auer, who also belonged to the Weimar National Assembly , like most of the Bavarian MSPD leadership, endeavored to form a coalition with the Bavarian People's Party and the Liberals as quickly as possible , as was also to be done at the Reich level with the Weimar coalition .

In the state elections of January 12, 1919, the USPD suffered a crushing defeat and Eisner wanted to resign as Prime Minister at the constituent session of the state parliament on February 21, 1919, but was shot by Count Anton von Arco-Valley on the way to the state parliament building . This led to riots in the state parliament, in which Erhard Auer was shot down with a pistol by the left-wing butcher Alois Lindner from the stands of the state parliament meeting room and the major and center member Paul Ritter von Jahreiß (advisor at the Bavarian War Ministry ) was killed. Conservative MP Heinrich Osel also died of a gunshot wound, but the culprit in this case remained unclear.

Weimar Republic and National Socialism

After his recovery, he was operated on - like Arco before - by Ferdinand Sauerbruch , Auer took over the chairmanship of the SPD parliamentary group. From 1919 to 1933 he was a city councilor in Munich, from October 1922 to 1933 an editor at the Munich Post . In the mid-1920s, Auer advocated a reformist orientation of the new SPD basic program (“ Heidelberg Program ”) (1925). He was one of those Social Democrats who tried to self-confidently oppose National Socialism. On March 17, 1922, at a meeting called by Bavaria's Interior Minister Franz Xaver Schweyer , he was the only party chairman in the state parliament to speak out against the deportation of Adolf Hitler to Austria. As a reaction to the Hitler putsch of 1923, Auer initiated the formation of social democratic self-protection groups, the so-called Auer-Garden , which were later transferred to the " Reichsbanner Schwarz-Rot-Gold ".

After the " seizure of power " by the NSDAP , Auer initially went into hiding and fled to Innsbruck. A short time later, however, he returned to Munich. On May 9, 1933, he was severely mistreated by the National Socialists in the Munich city council and imprisoned in Stadelheim prison. After his release, Auer was banned from staying in Munich and was subsequently forced to change his whereabouts and employment several times. In connection with the assassination attempt of July 20, 1944 , Auer, meanwhile seriously ill, was arrested again, imprisoned in the Dachau concentration camp and, probably because of the advancing Allied troops, transferred to Giengen by ambulance, where he died on March 20, 1945.

Honors

literature

  • Erhard Auer . In: Franz Osterroth : Biographical Lexicon of Socialism. Deceased personalities . Vol. 1. JHW Dietz Nachf., Hannover 1960, pp. 348-349.
  • Markus Schmalzl: Erhard Auer - pioneer of parliamentary democracy in Bavaria. Laßleben, Kallmünz 2013, ISBN 978-3-7847-3020-2 (= Munich historical studies, Bavarian history department, vol. 20).
  • Georg Lohmeier : “Anyone who is a servant should remain a servant!” The “Royal Bavarian Social Democrats” Erhard Auer, Ignaz Auer and Georg von Vollmar . Langen Müller, Munich 2000, ISBN 3-7844-2794-4 .
  • Michael Lotterschmid and Hartmut Mehringer: Erhard Auer - a Bavarian social democrat . In: Hartmut Mehringer in collaboration with Marita Krauss ... and the historical working group of the Bavarian SPD (ed.): From the class movement to the people's party. Landmarks of the Bavarian Social Democracy 1892 - 1992 (=  series of publications by the Georg von Vollmar Academy ). tape 5 . Saur, Munich / London / New York / Paris 1992, ISBN 3-598-22024-3 , pp. 138-150 .
  • Reichs Handbuch der Deutschen Gesellschaft - The handbook of personalities in words and pictures. First volume, Deutscher Wirtschaftsverlag, Berlin 1930, p. 40, ISBN 3-598-30664-4 .
  • Board of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (ed.): Committed to freedom. Memorial book of the German social democracy in the 20th century . Schüren, Marburg 2000, ISBN 3-89472-173-1 , p. 26th f .
  • Martin Schumacher (Hrsg.): MdR The Reichstag members of the Weimar Republic in the time of National Socialism. Political persecution, emigration and expatriation, 1933–1945. A biographical documentation . 3rd, considerably expanded and revised edition. Droste, Düsseldorf 1994, ISBN 3-7700-5183-1 .
  • Walter Goetz :  Auer, Erhard. In: New German Biography (NDB). Volume 1, Duncker & Humblot, Berlin 1953, ISBN 3-428-00182-6 , p. 429 f. ( Digitized version ).
  • Wilhelm Zils (Hrsg.): Intellectual and artistic Munich in autobiographies. Munich 1913 (quoted in Josef Hofmiller : Revolution Tagebuch 1918/19 . Munich 1934, p. 37 ).

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Ferdinand Sauerbruch, Hans Rudolf Berndorff: That was my life. Kindler & Schiermeyer, Bad Wörishofen 1951; cited: Licensed edition for Bertelsmann Lesering, Gütersloh 1956, pp. 242-252.
  2. ↑ The SPD prevented Hitler from being expelled in good time. In: THE WORLD. Retrieved March 26, 2016 .
personal data
SURNAME Auer, Erhard
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Bavarian politician, first Minister of the Interior of the Free State of Bavaria and SPD party chairman in Bavaria
DATE OF BIRTH December 22, 1874
PLACE OF BIRTH Dommelstadl, community of Neuburg am Inn near Passau
DATE OF DEATH March 20, 1945
Place of death Giengen an der Brenz , Württemberg