Heinrich Kurtscheid

Heinrich Kurtscheid (born September 24, 1872 in Rheinbrohl ; † November 6, 1961 ) was a German trade unionist. From 1903 he was chairman of the central association of Christian woodworkers and from 1920 deputy chairman of the general association of Christian trade unions .

Life

The father was a worker in a factory and Heinrich Kurtscheid grew up in poor conditions. After elementary school, he completed an apprenticeship as a carpenter. Then he went on a journeyman hike . He joined the Catholic Journeyman's Association . The hike takes him to Saxony and Bavaria. He did his military service between 1892 and 1894.

Then he went to Düsseldorf and worked in the profession he had learned. In addition, he is involved in the Catholic labor movement. He was active in the carpenter's department of the journeyman's association and in the Catholic workers' association . In 1898 he joined the newly founded Christian construction workers' association. As a Düsseldorf delegate, he took part in the 1st Congress of Christian Trade Unions in Mainz in 1899 . In addition to Adam Stegerwald, he played a key role in preparing the establishment of the Christian woodworkers' association. The union was soon called the Central Association of Christian Woodworkers.

Kurtscheid initially took over the management of the trade union in the Rhineland and Westphalia on a voluntary basis. From 1901 he headed the association secretariat full-time in Cologne. Before that he had attended an economics course organized by the Volksverein for Catholic Germany .

As a successor to Stegerwald, he became chairman of the Central Association of Christian Woodworkers based in Cologne in 1903. At the same time he was editor of the association gazette. He also played an important role in the general association of Christian trade unions. He was a member of the board and finally, from 1920, deputy chairman. In 1920 he also became secretary of the Christian International Woodworkers Association.

During the trade union dispute , he advocated the interdenominationalism of Christian trade unions. The larger free trade union woodworkers' association and employers often reached agreement without involving the Christian unions. Krautscheid tried to change this in a confrontation in 1905, which, however, deepened the rifts between free and Christian trade unions.

He did not play a significant political role in the Center Party. He was only a city ​​councilor in Cologne.

During the Weimar Republic he was a member of the Provisional Reich Economic Council . In 1923 he led the passive resistance against the occupation of the Ruhr in Cologne.

After the beginning of the National Socialist rule , he lost his trade union functions. After 1945 he was initially skeptical about the establishment of the DGB as a unified union , but eventually changed this position and joined the wood and plastics union .

literature

• Michael Schneider: Heinrich Kurtscheid. In: The wood worker book. The history of the woodworkers and their unions. Cologne, 1993 pp. 150–152 online version (PDF; 563 kB)

Web links

• Short biography