Käthe Leu

Käthe Leu (* 1881 ; † 1933 in Danzig ) was a German politician and one of two female delegates at the first Reich Council Congress from December 16 to 21, 1918.

Life

She was married to the Gdansk Social Democratic party secretary Georg Leu . She was a housewife and also active in politics and trade unions in Gdansk. She belonged to the SPD and switched to the USPD in 1918 .

She was elected in Danzig as one of two women in the first Imperial Council Congress. How this election came about is not known. She was the only woman to speak during the December 20, 1918 Congress. At this point there was great unrest in the hall. She made a motion to the effect that it was the special task of the revolution to actively support the previously neglected interests of women. The fact that she was able to speak at the congress as a woman was seen as proof of the dawn of a new era. She campaigned to familiarize the mostly politically uneducated women with socialism . She spoke out against a split in the revolutionary movement. Their motion was accepted although few delegates understood what it was about because of the noise.

In 1919 she ran for the USPD for the Weimar National Assembly . Since 1930 she was paralyzed. After her husband was arrested in early May 1933 in the office of the Central Employees' Association , she suffered a shock and died of it.

Web links

• Riots in the Imperial Council Congress - Comrade Leu ensures calm

literature

• Sabine Roß: Political Participation and National Council Parliamentarism. Determinants of the political action of the delegates to the Reichsrätekongressen 1918/1919 . In: HSR Trans 15 (2004) pp. 209f.
• Ralf Hoffrogge / Dieter Braeg: General Congress of Workers 'and Soldiers' Councils in Germany. 16. – 20. December 1918 Berlin - Stenographic Reports, Berlin 2018 p. 13