Joseph Baumgartner

This article deals with the former Bavarian Minister of Agriculture, Joseph Baumgartner. But see also Josef Baumgartner

Joseph Baumgartner , also Josef Baumgartner (born November 16, 1904 in Sulzemoos , Upper Bavaria , † January 21, 1964 in Munich ), was a German politician ( BVP , later CSU , Bavaria party ). Joseph Baumgartner campaigned for a free, democratic and independent Bavaria.

Life

Memorial for Joseph Baumgartner in his home town Sulzemoos

After attending Latin school at the Scheyern Benedictine monastery , Baumgartner, one of six children of a small farmer from Sulzemoos near Dachau , attended the humanistic grammar school in Freising . From 1925 to 1929 he studied philosophy , history and economics in Munich. He finished his studies with a degree in economics and a Dr. rer. pole. In 1929 he was a volunteer at the Upper Bavarian Christian Farmers 'Association , from 1929 to 1933 he was Deputy General Secretary of the Bavarian Farmers' Association and a member of the Bavarian People's Party (BVP). In 1933 he became an employee of the Allianz insurance company . Baumgartner kept his distance from the Nazi dictatorship also because of his Christian worldview. Under the National Socialists he was briefly imprisoned by the Gestapo in 1942 for an alleged violation of the treachery law , from which he was released into military service .

From January 1945 Baumgartner was a personnel officer at the Office for Food and Agriculture in Munich. After the war he was one of the founders of the CSU. From October 5, 1945 to December 12, 1947 he was Bavarian Minister of Agriculture .

Baumgartner was a member of the state parliament in Bavaria from 1946 until his death . In 1948 the university professor left the CSU and joined the newly founded Bavarian Party . In the Bavarian Party, Baumgartner joined the party's three-man board of directors. He was chairman of the Bavarian party until 1952, then again from 1953 to 1959.

Since January 1948 he had a teaching position at the Agricultural University in Weihenstephan . In the first electoral term he was elected to the German Bundestag via the state list of the Bavarian Party , but resigned the mandate on January 1, 1951 in order to devote himself to his tasks in Bavaria.

Within the BP, Baumgartner led the group around Ludwig Volkholz , Ludwig Lallinger , Jakob Fischbacher and Ernst Falkner , who were based on opposition to the CSU in principle. In Baumgartner, the Bavarian party found a chairman who was popular among large parts of the Bavarian population. Many of his statements reflected the opinions of parts of the population. B. that denazification must be followed by “debazification” - the repatriation of Prussian refugees.

As chairman of the Bavarian party, Baumgartner also became chairman of the federalist union, an alliance party, in 1957 .

During the coalition of four made up of the Bavarian Party, SPD , FDP and GB / BHE led by Wilhelm Hoegner from 1954 to 1957, he was Deputy Bavarian Prime Minister and again Minister of Agriculture.

In the course of the casino affair , an investigative committee of the Bavarian State Parliament was set up in 1955 to clarify a possible involvement of Baumgartner and Interior Minister August Geislhöringer . The reason for this was rumors that those interested in a casino had paid bribes to obtain a license. Although the allegations could not be confirmed, the reputation of bribery stuck to the Bavarian party, and the governing coalition was morally discredited. This resulted in the resignation of Prime Minister Hoegner samit Kabinett in October 1957. The beneficiary of the affair was the CSU, which now provided the prime minister, while the political decline of the Bavarian party that had already started in the years before intensified.

Due to a voluntary disclosure made by concessionaire Karl Freisehner in secret agreement with the CSU, a court case against Baumgartner and Geislhöringer took place in 1959. In the course of this, several payments totaling DM 2,900 to Baumgartner became known; in addition, contrary to his testimony, he had been friends with Freehner. The Munich District Court I sentenced him to two years in prison for perjury . The Federal Court of Justice overturned the judgment, which had not become final, six months later and ordered a new hearing. Baumgartner was no longer able to negotiate when the process was re-launched.

Baumgartner died of a stroke in 1964 .

literature

• Georg Lohmeier : Joseph Baumgartner. Biography of a Bavarian patriot from Sulzemoos. Süddeutscher Verlag, Munich 1974, ISBN 3-7991-5788-3 .

Web links

Commons : Joseph Baumgartner  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

• Newspaper article about Joseph Baumgartner in the 20th century press kit of the ZBW - Leibniz Information Center for Economics .
• One of the greatest politicians in post-war Bavarian history
• resume
• Joseph Baumgartner in the parliamentary database at the House of Bavarian History
• Acted like the Sicilian Mafia . In: Der Spiegel . No. 33 , 1988, pp. 59–63 ( online - detailed treatment of the casino affair).

Individual evidence

1. ^ Hubensteiner: Bayerische Geschichte , Rosenheimer Verlagshaus, 17th edition 2009, pp. 488–489.
2. ↑ Thomas Schuler : Strauss. A family biography . Verlag Scherz, Second Edition 2006, Frankfurt am Main
3. ↑ A broken man in the end . Mercury. January 20, 2014. Retrieved August 8, 2017.