Heinrich Scherrer (politician)

Heinrich Scherrer ( December 12, 1847 in Nesslau ; † November 25, 1919 in St. Gallen ) was a Swiss lawyer and politician .

Life

Scherrer, the son of the farmer Wendelin and Susanne geb. Kuratle, attended high schools in Schiers and Basel . After studying law and economics in Basel, Berlin and Zurich , he worked as a lawyer in St. Gallen from 1875 to 1902 . During his studies he dealt with Marxism , but rejected revolutionary upheavals. He saw the solution of the social question under the influence of the scientific ideas of Rudolf Virchow in the social reform . In 1869 he participated in the Congress of the 1st Internationalin Basel. He was one of the leading Grütlians and presided over the Swiss Grütliverein from 1882 to 1890 . With Caspar Decurtins and Theodor Curti , he founded the so-called New Swiss Workers' Union in 1887. In the canton of St. Gallen, Scherrer was one of the founders of the Demokrat in 1888. and the Labor Party and the co-initiators of the revision movement from 1888 to 1890, which enforced more state rights of intervention.

He was considered to be one of the bearers of the democratic-conservative alliance against free-thinking supremacy. From 1889 to 1902 he was an Education Councilor, from 1891 to 1902 a Grand Councilor, from 1902 to 1919 a Government Councilor (head of the Economics and Education Department) and from 1902 to 1911 a National Councilor. In 1905 he joined the SP St. Gallen, with which he always had a tense relationship. From 1911 to 1919 he was the first Social Democratic Council of States. Scherrer campaigned for health and accident insurance as well as worker protection (1897 international conference in Zurich, 1900 president of the International Labor Office in Basel), sat on the board of directors of the Swiss Accident Insurance Institute (Suva) from 1912 to 1919 and in 1906 submitted a motion for the creation by arbitration tribunals to settle collective disputes. As a major in the Swiss Army, he turned against the anti-militarist-internationalist wing of the SP, in 1907 affirmed the new military organization and in 1916 defended the army as a necessary instrument for maintaining independence.

Web links

• Max Lemmenmeier : Heinrich Scherrer. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland . July 25, 2011 .

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