Leopold Becker

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Hans Leopold Becker ( September 23, 1904 in Koblenz - May 1977 ) was a German politician of the Eastern CDU . He was a member of the state parliament, state minister and state chairman of his party in Saxony-Anhalt and a member of the GDR - People's Chamber .

Leopold Becker was the first-born son of the Chief Postal Inspector August Becker and, according to Spiegel, was of "petty bourgeois" origin. After graduating from a grammar school in 1924, he studied law in Bonn, Cologne and Marburg. Becker began his professional career with a year-long administrative service with the Lord Mayor of Koblenz. He then worked as an administrative clerk in industry, first at Düsseldorfer Stahlunion-Export GmbH, the foreign trade of the United Steelworks , and from 1936 at Ringsdorff-Werke in Mehlem ( Bad Godesberg ). In 1939 he was transferred to Central Germany.

Politically, he joined the Windthorstbund , the youth association of the Center Party , and was a member of it until its dissolution in 1933. According to his own statements, in April 1945, after the end of the Nazi regime, he co-founded a “democratic club” in Koethen . There he became city ​​councilor and social affairs officer in the post-war period . From its establishment in 1946 until its dissolution in 1952 , it belonged to the state parliament of Saxony-Anhalt and was a member of the East German parliament from 1948, first of the first and second People's Council of the Soviet Zone and from 1949 of the provisional and then the first regular People's Chamber . As chairman of the CDU parliamentary group from 1949, he ensured loyalty to the line, for example when, at the beginning of 1950, an increasing number of members of the CDU and the LDP left the respective parliamentary groups and joined the newly founded center group. Becker campaigned in the council of elders of the state parliament to remove the faction status from her as politically “unreliable”, while he characterized the CDU as “progressive” “in the spirit of the bloc party ”. In 1950, together with Erich Fascher and Otto Nuschke , he prevented open protests by CDU members against the irregular extension of the state parliament's legislative period.

The removal and arrest of the previous CDU state minister, Leo Herwegen, in preparation for a “Stalinist show trial ” in October 1949 gave Becker the opportunity to advance further. He voted - probably out of personal animosity - for his dismissal. On October 28, 1949, he succeeded Herway's State Minister for Labor, Social Welfare and Health in the Bruschke I cabinet . From the forced resignation of Erich Fascher on February 10 to the handover to Josef Wujciak on June 4, 1950, Becker was also acting chairman of the CDU in Saxony-Anhalt , after having been second chairman for a long time. He kept his office as minister until the new state government was formed in November 1950. After the districts were formed in the GDR in 1952, Becker was managing director of the Chamber of Commerce and Industry in Wernigerode until he retired in 1969 . Becker was a member of the Magdeburg district assembly from 1958 to 1976 . He spent his retirement in Wernigerode and died at the age of 72.

The historian Christina Trittel judges that Becker was “strictly Catholic, but progressive enough in SED German ” to use his opportunities for advancement in GDR politics. Becker was awarded the Patriotic Order of Merit in bronze in 1959 and in silver in 1970.

literature

  • Kurt Schwarze (Ed.): Handbook of the Landtag Saxony-Anhalt. Mitteldeutsche Verlags-Gesellschaft, Halle 1947, p. 227 (short biography).
  • Michael Richter : The Eastern CDU 1948–1952. Between resistance and synchronization (= research and sources on contemporary history. Volume 19). Droste, Düsseldorf 1990, ISBN 3-7700-0899-5 (dissertation, University of Bonn, 1988/89), pp. 200 f., 234, 255, 399, 401, 407.
  • Christina Trittel: The parliamentary groups in Saxony-Anhalt from 1946 to 1950: Analysis of state political action and the scope for action of collective actors in the emerging GDR. Deutscher Universitäts-Verlag, Wiesbaden 2006, ISBN 3-8350-6037-6 (also dissertation, University of Halle-Wittenberg, 2005), pp. 63, 248, 252.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c Prosit, Fernande. In: Der Spiegel , November 24, 1949.
  2. ↑ See also Alfred Reckendrees : The “Steel Trust” project. The foundation of the Vereinigte Stahlwerke AG and its corporate development 1926–1933 / 34 (= series of publications for the journal for corporate history . Volume 5). CH Beck, Munich 2000, ISBN 3-406-45819-X (also dissertation, Bielefeld University, 1999), p. 221, note 250.
  3. ↑ See next to the manual of the Landtag Sachsen-Anhalt the Landesarchiv Sachsen-Anhalt : K 12 Bezirksverwaltung Dessau, 0.5 municipal supervision, 0.7 city and community affairs, No. 637 Stadtkreis Köthen, 1945–1947 with the personnel files of Becker as city councilor 1946 (not viewed) .
  4. ↑ a b Christina Trittel: The parliamentary groups in Saxony-Anhalt from 1946 to 1950: Analysis of state political action and the scope for action of collective actors in the emerging GDR. P. 252.
  5. ↑ Michael Richter : Die Ost-CDU 1948–1952. Between resistance and synchronization. P. 200 f.
  6. ^ A b c Christina Trittel: The parliamentary groups in Saxony-Anhalt from 1946 to 1950: Analysis of state political action and the scope for action of collective actors in the emerging GDR. P. 63.
  7. ↑ On the date of Fascher's resignation Günter Wirth : Kurmärkischezeichen der Zeit 1945–1951. The journalistic reflection of the church development in the area of ​​tension of socio-political life in Potsdam. In: Yearbook for Berlin-Brandenburg Church History . Volume 65, 2005, pp. 156-213, here pp. 203 f., And Chronicle February 1950. In: Universität Magdeburg. University archive.
  8. ↑ Leopold Becker. Brief portrait. In: New Time . June 19, 1970, p. 3.
  9. ^ Union friend Hans-Leopold Becker †. Obituary. In: New Time . May 28, 1977, p. 2.
  10. ↑ Documents of the CDU. Volume 3. Union, Berlin 1960, p. 190.
personal data
SURNAME Becker, Leopold
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Becker, Hans Leopold (full name)
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German politician (CDU), Member of the Bundestag and Minister in Saxony-Anhalt
DATE OF BIRTH September 23, 1904
PLACE OF BIRTH Koblenz
DATE OF DEATH May 1977