Eger Chamber of Commerce and Industry
The Chamber of Commerce and Industry Eger ( Czech : živnostenská komora v Chebu ) was the Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Austria-Hungary and from 1918 in Czechoslovakia in Eger .
Emergence
With the law on the establishment of chambers of commerce and trade of March 18, 1850, chambers of commerce and industry were established in the Austrian Empire , including the Eger Chamber of Commerce and Industry. They had the duties of chambers of commerce .
In addition to the chamber in Eger, the chambers in Reichenberg , Prague , Pilsen and Budweis were established for Bohemia . In Moravia these were the chambers in Brno and Olomouc and in Galicia and Lodomeria the Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Opava .
With the law of June 29, 1868 concerning the organization of the chambers of commerce and trade, the organization of the chambers was basically confirmed and the tasks redefined.
tasks
The chambers should advise the wishes and proposals of the economy and present them to the ministries and authorities independently. They prepared statements on government bills as they related to commercial or commercial interests. The government could also ask the chambers to comment on economic issues.
The chambers kept the electoral registers of those entitled to vote to the Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the trademark and model archives and the business registrations. They collected the data for the trade statistics. The chambers participated in the examination and appointment of the commodity and bill brokers, the exchange councilors and the commercial court assessors. The chambers could be named as arbitration tribunals in commercial contracts.
Each chamber had to submit a comprehensive report to the Ministry of Commerce every year, in which the economic situation in the chamber district was described. The chambers provided trade statistics every five years.
organization
The Chambers of Commerce and Industry were subordinate to the Ministry of Commerce and had to implement its instructions. They were divided internally into a trade and a trade section (mining also belonged to the trade).
The chambers consisted of 16 to 48 actual members. The exact number of members was determined by the Ministry of Commerce depending on the size of the chamber district. The Chamber in Eger had 24 members. In addition, the chamber was able to co-opt other members (without voting rights) as "correspondent members".
The election of the members was made by direct election by the traders and traders or the board members of corporations in the chamber district. The term of office was six years. Half of the Chamber was elected every three years on a revolving basis. There was a census right to vote : wholesalers and industrial companies were only eligible to vote if they paid income taxes of 100 guilders , other companies had lower limits. The choice was made in individual groups. These were determined by the ministry according to the number of voters in locations and trade or business classes.
The chamber elected a president who represented the chamber externally. It was financed through a contribution from companies in the chamber district. The Chamber prepared an annual budget and submitted it to the Ministry for approval. The sum was divided by the income tax revenue in the tax district and the resulting surcharge on the income tax was collected from the companies.
They gained particular importance after the electoral reform of 1873, after which the chambers elected some of the members of the Reichsrat . Until 1906 representatives of the Prague Chamber were represented in the Reichsrat. 15 of the 236 members of the Bohemian Chamber of Commerce and Industry (Prague: 4, Budweis: 2, Reichenberg: 4, Eger: 3, Pilsen: 2) were also elected to the Bohemian Landtag .
The language question
The chambers were free to choose the language of negotiation themselves. According to the language distribution in the chamber district, Reichenberg and Eger chose the German language from 1884 and Prague, Pilsen and Budweis the Czech language.
In the 1890 census, the following language distributions were found in the chamber districts:
| Czech | German | Other | total | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Prague | 1,694,754 | 111,583 | 466 | 1,806,803 |
| Pilsen | 578,524 | 194.716 | 128 | 773.368 |
| Ceske Budejovice | 517.359 | 139,757 | 104 | 657.220 |
| Reichenberg | 801.955 | 1,030,585 | 148 | 1,832,688 |
| Eger | 51,596 | 682.370 | 20th | 733.986 |
By 1884 there was a German majority among the chamber members in all 5 Bohemian chambers. This was due to the selection of the electoral groups by the Ministry of Commerce and the fact that the larger taxpayers were predominantly German.
In the last chamber elections before the First World War in 1911, 48,968 voters were eligible to vote, including 33,953 (69.3%) Germans and 15,015 (30.7%) Czechs. Due to the importance of mining, there were three sections with the following voter numbers:
| German | Czech | total | |
|---|---|---|---|
| trade | 11,098 | 4884 | 15,982 |
| Business | 22,773 | 10.127 | 32,900 |
| Mining | 82 | 4th | 86 |
Trade and commerce were divided into three or size classes. The proportion of Germans increased significantly with the size of the company. The following distribution resulted for trade:
| German | Czech | total | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Size class 1 | 431 | 63 | 494 |
| Size class 2 | 1098 | 283 | 1381 |
| Size class 3 | 9524 | 4583 | 14,107 |
| total | 11,098 | 4884 | 15,982 |
The distribution for trade was as follows:
| German | Czech | total | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Size class 1 | 707 | 203 | 910 |
| Size class 2 | 541 | 149 | 690 |
| Size class 3 | 1706 | 495 | 2201 |
| Size class 4 | 19,819 | 9280 | 29,099 |
| total | 22,773 | 10127 | 32,900 |
Due to the right to vote, the Czech minority was not represented in the Chamber.
In Czechoslovakia
After the First World War Austria-Hungary disintegrated and Bohemia and Moravia became independent as Czechoslovakia . The chambers remained. However, the business language used was uniformly Czech, and the name of the chambers was now živnostenská komora. By Decree No. 32 of January 20, 1919 of the Ministry of Commerce, the chamber elections were suspended and the Ministry of Commerce was given the right to dissolve chambers and fill them again.
There were intensive negotiations between the Chamber and the Ministry about the appointment of Czech Chamber members. Based on the proportion of the Czech population in the Chamber area (which was 8.7%), the Chamber offered to admit four Czechs to the Chamber. The ministry dissolved the chamber on February 19, 1919 on the basis of the decree of January 20 and appointed an administrative committee consisting of the old members of the chamber (the previous chamber president Friedrich Schreb became chairman). Four vacant places were filled with Czechs. The following distribution of the seats resulted:
| Czechs | German | total | |
|---|---|---|---|
| trade | 14th | 1 | 15th |
| Business | 17th | 2 | 19th |
| Montan | 7th | 1 | 8th |
| total | 38 | 4th | 42 |
The tasks of the chambers were similar to those before the war: They were an advisory body, kept trade mark and trade registers, issued certificates and kept statistics. They participated in the election of commercial judges and were arbitration tribunals. Instead of trade and commerce, they were now divided into three sections: trade, commerce and industry.
In 1936/27 the number of members was increased to 49. The composition was now:
| Czechs | German | total | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Industry | 8th | 7th | 15th |
| trade | 18th | 5 | 23 |
| Business | 11 | 0 | 11 |
| total | 37 | 12 | 49 |
On April 20, 1922, the chambers of the country, including the Cheb Chamber, formed an umbrella organization, the československých obchodních a živnostenských.
In 1938, the Eger Chamber covered a chamber area of 7,145 km² with 983,047 inhabitants and 45,142 member companies (4,335 Czech and 40,252 German). It was thus the most strongly German-speaking Bohemian chamber.
According to the Munich Agreement
As a result of the Munich Agreement , Czechoslovakia was broken up in 1938. The predominantly German-speaking areas, the Sudetenland , became part of the German Empire, the predominantly Czech-speaking areas formed the rest of Czechoslovakia. Naturally, this also had an impact on the chamber organization. The chambers in Reichenberg, Eger and Troppau came to Germany and were renamed chambers of industry and commerce . In the years that followed, they shared the history of the German Chamber of Industry and Commerce: conformity and replacement of the self-administration of the economy by the “ leader principle ”. In 1939 the Sudetenland Chamber of Commerce was formed as a joint superordinate organization of the three chambers. In 1942 this became the Sudetenland Gauwirtschaftskammer and the three chambers were fully integrated into it.
After the Second World War
Due to the war situation, the chambers came to a standstill in the course of 1944. The expulsion of the Germans from Czechoslovakia in early 1945 led to the loss of the staff and most of the member companies of the Sudeten German IHKs. Nevertheless, after the end of the war, the reconstruction of the chambers in Czechoslovakia began . The aim of the policy was to restore the status before the Munich Agreement. In May the government appointed Dr. Rudolf Ottis, the former secretary of the Pilsen Chamber, as government representative for the Eger Chamber. On December 23, Miroslava Čermáka, the state administrator of the R. Hubl can factory, was appointed President of the Eger Chamber.
In particular, the communist Komunistická strana Československa (KSČ) was critical of the idea of economic self-government by the chambers. However, it has not yet been able to enforce an abolition. After the February revolution in early 1948, the communists had achieved sole rule. The presidents of the chamber expressed their loyalty to the new regime, but could not prevent the end of the chambers. With Government Decree No. 306 of December 28, 1948, the chambers were repealed and their tasks were assigned to the district offices.
The chamber building
In 1899 the building of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry on the corner of Schulgasse and Opitzstrasse (today: Sládkova 159/1) was built in the Wilhelminian style. The architect was Gustav Wiedermann from Franzensbad, the construction was carried out by the Eger master builder Franz Kraus. The raised corner tower and the inserted gable facade are striking. The exterior painting was done by the Franzensbad artist August Brömse. It shows portraits of Emperor Maximilian, Albrecht Dürer, Peter Vischer and Adam Kraft. The exhibition hall shows symbols for traffic, trade, mining, industry and health resorts, as well as the coats of arms of cities and trades. Today the building is used as a bank building.
Personalities
Chamber presidents
- Dionysius Halbmayer (1868)
- Heinrich von Mattoni 1874- (1884)
- Friedrich Schreb (1919)
- Dr. Rudolf Ottis (1945, government representative)
- Miroslava Čermáka (1945)
Elected to the Reichsrat by the Chamber
The Chamber in Eger elects one member to the Reichsrat:
| Surname | Electoral term | annotation |
|---|---|---|
| Ernst von Plener | V. LP (1873–1879) | |
| Ernst von Plener | VI. LP (1879–1885) | |
| Ernst von Plener | VII. LP (1885-1891) | |
| Josef Kušar | VIII. LP (1891-1897) | |
| Robert Primavesi | IX. LP (1897–1901) | elected on November 7, 1899 in place of Emanuel Proskowetz (Olomouc Chamber of Commerce) |
| Eduard Holstein | X. LP (1901-1907) |
Elected by the Chamber in the Bohemian Landtag
The Chamber elected to the Bohemian Landtag:
| year | MP | MP | MP |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1861 | Ignaz Edler von Plener | Gustav Tetzner | Adolf Tachezy |
| 1867 | Ignaz Edler von Plener | Adolf Tachezy | JD Halbmaier |
| 1870 | Ignaz Edler von Plener | Adolf Tachezy | JD Halbmaier |
| 1872 | Ignaz Edler von Plener | Adolf Tachezy | Dr. Georg Habermann |
| 1878 | Ernst von Plener | Dr. Dionysius Halbmayer | Josef Meindl |
| 1883 | Ernst Edler von Plener | Karl Bernardin | Josef Groeger |
| 1895 | Alexander Richter | Wolfgang Ludwig | Dr. Zdenko Schücker |
| 1898 | Alexander Richter | Wolfgang Ludwig | Dr. Zdenko Schücker |
| 1901 | Dr. Rudolf Knoll | Alexander Richter | Wilhelm Riecken |
| 1908 | Josef Schöffl | Dr. Rudolf Knoll | Wilhelm Keller |
literature
- Bohumír Brom: History obchodních a živnostenských komor na území českých zemí, 2001
- Christoph Boyer: National opponents or partners ?: Studies on the relations between Czechs and Germans in the economy of CSR (1918–1938); Volume 42 of sources and representations for contemporary history, 1999, ISBN 9783486595864 , pp. 207–215, online
- Law on the establishment of Chambers of Commerce and Industry of March 18, 1850, online
- Annex to the law with the list of initially established chambers (also includes the Italian chambers), online
- Law of June 29, 1868 on the organization of the Chambers of Commerce and Industry, Reichsgesetzblatt, p. 249 ff., Online
Individual evidence
- ^ Reichsraths-Wahlordnung, Reichsgesetzblatt, pp. 165 ff., Online
- ^ Jörg Konrad Hoensch: History of Bohemia. From the Slavic conquest to the present . Verlag Beck, Munich 1997, ISBN 3-406-41694-2 , p. 352.
- ↑ Jaroslav Kucera: Minority in the nation state: The language question in Czech-German relations 1918–1938, Volume 43 of sources and representations on contemporary history, 1999, ISBN 9783486596007 , p. 243, online
- ^ Ordinance on the introduction of the organization of the commercial economy in the Sudeten German areas of October 29, 1938; Ordinance sheet on the Sudeten German territories 1938, pp. 147–148
- ^ Building of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry
- ^ Austria: Archives for legislation and statistics in the fields of trade, commerce and shipping, volumes 20–21, 1868, p. 291, online
- ↑ State Handbook 1866
- ↑ Protocol of the Landtag 1867
- ↑ Protocol of the Landtag 1870
- ↑ Protocol of the Landtag 1872
- ↑ Protocol of the Landtag 1878
- ↑ Protocol of the Landtag 1883
- ↑ Protocol of the Landtag 1895
- ↑ State Handbook 1899
- ^ Protocol of the State Parliament 1901
- ↑ Protocol of the Landtag 1908