Johann Leicht

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Johann Leicht

Johann Leicht (born December 19, 1868 in Bischberg , † August 14, 1940 in Bamberg ) was a German politician ( center , BVP ).

Live and act

Leicht was born as the son of a brewery and estate owner. He attends elementary school and high school in Bamberg . After graduating from high school, Leicht embarked on a spiritual career: after studying theology for three years at Bamberg University, he was ordained a priest in 1893. He then took on the duties of chaplain in Ebermannstadt for two years (1893–1895) and the duties of chaplain in Erlangen for four years (1895–1899) . From 1899 to 1915, Leicht was cathedral preacher , then cathedral chapter at Bamberg Cathedral . In addition to his theological work, Leicht was also involved in the Volksverein for Catholic Germany and was diocesan president of the Association of Catholic Workers' Associations in the Diocese of Bamberg .

From April 1913 to the November Revolution of 1918 Leicht was a member of the Catholic Center Party in the Reichstag of the Empire , in which he represented constituency 5 (Bamberg).

During the First World War - for which he was sin, i.e. H. blamed the “envy of England”, the “hatred of the French” and the “racial hatred of the Slavs” (sic!) - Leicht published the war pamphlet St. Michael . After the collapse of the monarchy in autumn 1918, Leicht became a member of the Bavarian People's Party (BVP), a split from the old Center Party. In January 1919 he entered the constituent Weimar National Assembly for the BVP, where he represented constituency 26 (Upper, Middle Lower Franconia).

In the first Reichstag election of the Weimar Republic in June 1920, Leicht was elected as his party's candidate for constituency 29 (Franconia) in the Reichstag , to which he subsequently belonged without interruption until July 1933 as a member of his party's parliamentary group and chairman. Overall, he was elected seven times in the following thirteen years as a member of constituency 29 or (after renumbering the constituencies) 26 (francs). There were frequent disputes between the center and the BVP. Leicht, who was assigned to the left wing of the party, understood as the leader of the faction to mostly settle these disputes, especially since he was with many of the center's politicians, e. B. was friends with the temporary Chancellor Wilhelm Marx . In addition, Leicht was the second chairman of the entire board of the Volksverein for Catholic Germany from 1921, in which leading central politicians were active. In 1933, Leicht, like all MPs from the BVP and the Center, voted for the passing of the Enabling Act , which formed the legal basis for the establishment of the Nazi dictatorship.

Leicht felt closely connected to the KV . As early as 1895 he became an honorary member of the Rhenania KV association as town chaplain in Erlangen, and in 1920 he became an honorary member of the K.St.V. Ottonia Munich. During the twenties he frequented the Berlin KV and was fascinated by the Berlin city pastor Carl Sonnenschein . In 1928 he - together with Sonnenschein - became an honorary member of the KV-Association Askania (now K.St.V. Askania-Burgundia ), of which many politicians from the center were also members.

Since 1931 Leicht held the rank of cathedral dean of Bamberg and papal house dean. He also exercised public influence through the Bamberger Volksblatt , which was considered his mouthpiece.

Soon after the National Socialist " seizure of power ", Leicht expressed fear of a new version of the Kulturkampf of the Bismarck era. After he was briefly arrested once in 1933, he remained largely unmolested until his death in 1940. In 1935 he became provost of the cathedral in Bamberg and did a great job securing the works of art and the further design of the cathedral.

A comprehensive scientific biography of Leichts, whose legacy no longer exists, was first presented in 1990.

Fonts

  • The Lamentations of the Prophet Jeremiah Lent Sermons 1905
  • The Lord's Prayer of War (1914)
  • Saint Michael. A book from the iron war time as a reminder, edification and consolation for the Catholics of the German tongue. With an introduction by Paul Wilhelm von Keppler , Würzburg 1917.
  • The Necessity of Organizing Germany's Catholics in Defense of Christian Schools and Education , 1918.

literature

  • Christian Maga: Prelate Johann Leicht (1868-1940). Conservative democrat in the crisis of the interwar period. A political biography of the chairman of the Reichstag parliamentary group of the Bavarian People's Party , Würzburg 1990.
  • Bernhard Pfändtner in Siegfried Koß, Wolfgang Löhr (Ed.): Biographical Lexicon of the KV. 2nd part (= Revocatio historiae. Volume 3). SH-Verlag, Schernfeld 1993, ISBN 3-923621-98-1 , p. 76 ff.

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Thomas Breuer: Ordered Change? , P. 25.
  2. ↑ Falk Wiesemann: The history of the National Socialist takeover of power in Bavaria 1932/1933 , 1975, p. 188.
  3. ^ Society for Franconian History / Bavarian Academy of Sciences Commission for Bavarian State History: Journal for Bavarian State History Vol. 59 Issue 1, 1996, p. 290.

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Easy, Johann
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German politician (center, BVP), MdR
DATE OF BIRTH December 19, 1868
PLACE OF BIRTH Bischberg
DATE OF DEATH August 14, 1940
Place of death Bamberg