Herman Greulich

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Portrait around 1914
Half relief on Greulich's house in Zurich-Hirslanden
Herman Greulich (center) with his colleagues in the Swiss Workers' Secretariat, around 1889
Herman Greulich surrounded by the six National Councilors of the Social Democratic Party of Switzerland 1908–1911. The bourgeois politicians referred to the group as "Chapel Greulich".

Herman Greulich (born April 9, 1842 in Breslau , † November 8, 1925 in Zurich ) was a Swiss politician . He founded the first Social Democratic Party in Switzerland and was a pioneer for Swiss women's suffrage .

Life

Herman Greulich came from Silesia . His father Johann Gottlieb Greulich was a coachman, his mother Rosina Greulich, née Franske, was a nanny. From 1848 to 1856 he attended a school for the poor in Breslau. For health reasons, he had to prematurely end an apprenticeship as a glove maker. He then completed an apprenticeship as a bookbinder in Breslau from 1857 to 1862 . He was self-taught and at times a member of the free religious community and the liberal labor movement of Hermann Schulze-Delitzsch . In 1865 he immigrated to Switzerland. Here he married Johanna Kauffmann in 1867, the daughter of the architect Heinrich Fürchtegott Kaufmann. Together they had seven children, u. a. the daughter Gertrud Medici-Greulich, who tried to continue the work of the father. Greulich saw Switzerland as the epitome of a liberal state, but here too he found abuses such as child labor and sixteen-hour factory working days.

Greulich first worked as a bookbinder, then as an assistant in a photography studio (1866–1869), then became editor of the Tagwacht (1869–1880) and coffee roaster at the consumer association in Zurich (1880–1884). From 1884 he worked at the Statistical Office of the Canton of Zurich , of which he was head from 1885 to 1887. In 1887 Greulich took up his position as the first full-time workers secretary in Switzerland.

Greulich's political activity almost became doomed when he wanted to be naturalized in his municipality of Hirslanden in 1877 : only exactly half of the voters in the decisive municipal assembly were in favor of including the “socialist chief” in Swiss citizenship. The casting vote of the liberal mayor finally tipped the balance in favor of Greulich.

Greulich lived from 1875 until his death in 1925 at Klusstrasse 28 in the middle-class district of Zurich-Hirslanden, which was incorporated in 1893, his grave is in the Rehalp cemetery . The Herman-Greulich-Strasse, named after him, is in Zurich- Aussersihl , a district shaped by the workforce. In 1933 in Vienna- Donaustadt (22nd district) the Hermann-Greulich-Platz was named after him. His great-grandson is the former Zurich trade union politician Marco Medici (* 1945), current president of the AVIVO association. His daughter, Greulich's great-great-granddaughter, is Gabriela Medici; the lawyer has held the office of central secretary at the SGB in Bern since 2018 .

Political activity

He first sought a connection to the liberal German workers' education association Eintracht . However, under the influence of the Zurich socialist Karl Bürkli , Greulich soon became involved in the socialist workers' movement . He founded the first trade unions , the Zurich section of the International Workers 'Association (IAA) and the workers' newspaper Tagwacht . Friedrich Albert Lange later played an important role in Greulich's political commitment. His first two attempts to form a social democratic party around 1870 failed not least because of the resistance of the Grütliverein ; only the third attempt by Albert Steck in 1888 was successful.

As a result, Herman Greulich held various parliamentary offices: He was Zurich Cantonal Councilor ( 1890–1893, 1896–1899 and 1901–1925) and Zurich City Councilor (today's municipal council; 1892–1925). In the parliamentary elections in 1902 he was elected to the National Council, but lost his seat three years later. In 1905 he co-founded a predecessor organization of the VPOD with the Association of Community and State Workers . In 1908 he succeeded in rejoining the National Council, to which he belonged until his death and of which he was age president in 1919 and 1922. Thanks to his pragmatic politics and his closeness to bourgeois culture (he was a singer in the mixed choir of the city of Zurich and cultivated his education in the field of history and languages) he became a real father figure, which earned him the nickname "Papa Greulich". Greulich was also directed against anarchists and revolutionary goals in the party; his approach was predominantly social reform .

Greulich was criticized on various occasions by the more radical forces within his party, for example because of his approval of the military budget or his reluctance to answer the question of the general strike in 1918. At that time he stood out as an internal party opponent of the Olten Action Committee (OAK) and criticized Robert Grimm , the president of the OAK, several times because of its views on the general strike question.

photos

Works

  • The state from the social democratic point of view. An argument with the "anarchists" . Volksbuchhandlung, Zurich 1877
  • Karl Fourier . A much misunderstood one. Attempt to present his ideas in the light of modern socialism . Bookstore of the Swiss Grütlivereins, Zurich 1881 (2nd full edition 1919)
  • The materialistic conception of history. Presented easily . Vorwärts, Berlin 1897 2nd edition 1907 vDigitalisat
  • Promotion of trade unionism. Presentation to the Swiss Workers' Day on April 5, 1899 in Lucerne . "Volkstrecht" printing press, Zurich 1899 digitized version (PDF; 1.5 MB)
  • Where do we want to go? A serious warning to all trade unionists in Switzerland . Union printing house, Bern 1903
  • War and International . Cooperative printing company, Zurich 1915 digitized
  • The way to socialism. A factual argument with the new communists about physical and moral violence . W. Trösch, Olten 1921
  • The green shell. Memories . Edited by Gertrud Medici-Greulich. Cooperative printing company, Zurich 1942

literature

  • Herman Greulich. Commemorative pamphlet on the occasion of the death of the pioneer of the Swiss workforce - published by the Social Democratic Party of the Canton of Zurich. Cooperative printing company, Zurich 1925
  • Karl Renner : Greulich, Hermann . In: International Concise Dictionary of Trade Unions . Edited by Ludwig Heyde 1 (1931), pp. 731–732 digitized
  • Franz Schmidt: Hermann Greulich. A little picture of life . Swiss Federation of Trade Unions, Berlin 1934
  • Ernst Nobs: Hermann Greulich 1842-1925 . Europa-Verlag, Zurich 1942
  • Eduard Weckerle: Herman Greulich. A son of the people . Gutenberg Book Guild, Zurich 1947.
  • Werner Kuhn: The importance of Charles Fourier for Herman Greulich's world of thought. A contribution to 19th century Swiss history . Juris-Verlag, Zurich 1949 (Zurich, Phil. Diss. Of 1949)

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. a b c d e f g h i j k l m n o Daniel Foppa: Famous and forgotten dead in Zurich's cemeteries . Zurich, Limmat Verlag, 2000. pp. 52 f., 184. ISBN 3-85791-324-X .
  2. a b c d e f g h i j k l m n Markus Bürgi: Herman Greulich. In: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland. January 19, 2006, accessed December 26, 2019 .
  3. http://www.textverzeichnis.ch/Textverzeichnis.aspx?SearchExpression=Gertrud%20Greulich&SearchField=Pers&NumOfPages=25&SearchResult=True
  4. ^ Robert Savary: Herman Greulich. In: Find a Grave . November 22, 2016, accessed December 26, 2019 .
  5. https://www.woz.ch/-778d , WoZ 6/17 of February 9, 2017, accessed on May 26, 2020
  6. https://www.avivo-zuerich.ch/avivo-info/ , accessed on May 26, 2020
  7. https://www.sgb.ch/themen/gewerkschaftspektiven/detail/gabriela-medici-neue-sgb-zentralsekretaerin-fuer-sozialversicherungen
  8. ^ Sigmund Widmer: Zurich. A cultural story . Zurich, Artemis-Verlag, 1983. P. 99 ff.