Liberal Association

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The leaders of the Secessionists (from: Die Gartenlaube 1880), above: Ludwig Bamberger , left: Franz August Schenk von Stauffenberg , right: Heinrich Rickert , below: Max von Forckenbeck

The Liberal Association (sometimes referred to as the Secession ) was a liberal party during the German Empire , which emerged from a split of the left wing of the National Liberal Party in 1880 and merged with the German Progressive Party to form the German Freedom Party in 1884 . Later, the Liberal Association, founded in 1893, continued its tradition.

Break away from the National Liberals

The national liberal parliamentary group in the Reichstag was characterized by a diverse range of opinions and interests of its members. It formed a pool for liberals from the Prussian provinces and the southern German states and united both “ Manchester liberals ” and “ protective customs officers ”. As early as 1875, Friedrich Kapp - member of the Central Election Committee of the National Liberal Party - noted critically that "the National Liberal Party [...] is such a conglomeration of all possible, sometimes incompatible aspirations, views and goals that it has to get out of the glue". Against this background, there was a gradual alienation process within the national liberal parliamentary group between the comparatively well-networked left wing around Eduard Lasker , Max von Forckenbeck and Ludwig Bamberger on the one hand and the growing right wing, which did not have a central leader.

The supporters of the left wing became more and more convinced that the party leadership around Rudolf von Bennigsen and Johannes Miquel had tied the National Liberals too closely to the policies of Reich Chancellor Otto von Bismarck . The first differences of opinion within the National Liberal Party had already become clear in 1878 during the deliberations on the Socialist Law . The differences within the party deepened when the left wing wanted to restrict the laws of the Kulturkampf against the Catholic Church and approve the military budget for only one legislative period and not, as in the form of the septnate, for seven years. These issues ultimately led to the split in the National Liberal Party and the founding of the Liberal Association because the more right-wing party leadership supported the protective tariff policy. The newly founded party was mainly joined by the left-wing liberal wing.

The decisive factor behind the fall of the Liberal Association , also known as “secession”, was the conviction that if Bismarck continued to support the conservative policies pursued by the National Liberals since 1878, fundamental liberal principles would be violated or even completely sacrificed. The secessionists therefore demanded a return to free trade . In domestic politics, contrary to Bismarck's intentions, the attempt was made to gradually parliamentarize the constitutional system in the sense of a consistent separation of powers , and advocated the preservation of state sovereignty over the church. With these demands, the secessionists rebelled against the " conservative turn " carried out by the National Liberals in 1878/79 in the course of the "victory [it] won by Bismarck with the help of the Junkers, priests and ultramontanes, in short all enemies of the Reich" again for a short time, but in vain in the long term.

Organization of the secessionists

The Liberal Association was a classic party of dignitaries and was therefore badly organizationally prepared for the beginning age of mass politicization. The party essentially consisted of the members of the Reichstag parliamentary group , some notables from the capital and personal stewards in the constituencies . The number of secessionist local associations remained relatively small; it is estimated that in 1884 there were 50 throughout the entire Reich. They existed mainly in the large trading and sea cities of northern and eastern Germany. From a sociological point of view, the secessionists were consistently bourgeois to upper class. Its main classes included free trade economic and liberal educational groups in particular , while their importance in the petty bourgeoisie and the working class was rather minor, because these groups generally supported protective tariffs. Since large parts of the upper-class bourgeoisie who supported the party were unwilling to organize, the secessionists remained "officers without NCOs and therefore often without men," said Nipperdey. Nevertheless, the new party initially seemed to be successful, after all, after the Reichstag elections in 1881, it had 46 members of the Reichstag, as many as the National Liberals from which it had split off.

In the short period of its existence, the Liberal Association has only developed approaches from central institutions. Initially, a five-person executive committee was set up, which included the MPs Heinrich Rickert and Gustav Lipke and the non-parliamentarians Friedrich Kapp, Albert Gröning and Theodor Wilhelm Lesse . Among other things, this committee set up an office for electoral affairs, initiated the publication of a correspondence , and collected the necessary money. Soon afterwards, in addition to parliamentary representation, a “Liberal Electoral Association” was founded as an organization for supporters in the country. The connection between the leading MPs and Berlin notables with the members, some of whom were organized in the electoral association, was maintained through party congresses to which the most important people in the constituencies were invited. According to Nipperdey, the party congress had less of the character of an institution than a meeting with “friends in the country”. In essence, he only legitimized the decisions of the factional leadership, for example adopted a programmatic declaration en bloc in 1882, and set up an executive committee to push the party's organizational structure forward.

The organization of the central bodies was not clearly defined. In practice, the leading MPs, the members of the executive committee and the parliamentary group leadership formed the party leadership, to which other people were called in on a case-by-case basis. For example, an election appeal drafted by Heinrich Rickert and Eduard Lasker in 1881 was signed by Ludwig Bamberger, Max von Forckenbeck, Franz von Stauffenberg and Friedrich Kapp. Other leading figures in the party included Karl Baumbach , Georg von Bunsen , Theodor Mommsen , Karl Schrader , Georg von Siemens , Friedrich Witte and the young Theodor Barth . In the Reichstag parliamentary group, each other was given a lot of freedom, for example Eduard Lasker almost alone advocated the health insurance law passed in 1883 , which, however, did not endanger the unity.

Joining forces with the progressive

In the longer term, the secessionists strove to found a new liberal rallying party, which, following the example of the British Liberal Party , was to form a government in the future, possibly after Crown Prince Friedrich came to power . The desire for the unification of all liberals was already expressed in the written declaration of resignation of the secessionist Reichstag members from the faction of the National Liberals. Careful not to slam the door for a return to the National Liberals, the secessionists called for "the liberal party to unite on essential issues and the end of confusing and grueling struggles between various liberal factions". The plans for an all-liberal party finally failed when the National Liberals unequivocally supported Bismarck's policies with their “Heidelberg Declaration” of 1884. In addition, the economic and political standpoint of the secessionists ruled out a union with the National Liberals. The constitutional idea of ​​total liberalism had also increasingly lost weight.

Instead, the leaders of the Liberal Association gradually became friends with the idea of ​​merging with the Progressive Party. While Ludwig Bamberger and Max von Forckenbeck were initially reserved about plans in this regard because they feared they would lose the middle position of the secessionists in German liberalism and also shied away from the autocratic leadership style of the progressive party leader Eugen Richter , Heinrich Rickert and Georg von Bunsen vigorously advocated Go together a. In a meeting of the parliamentary group's executive committee, they finally succeeded in winning over those who were hesitant for a merger. Franz von Stauffenberg and Eugen Richter had already started the merger negotiations in January 1884, in March of the same year both parties formed a parliamentary group in the Reichstag comprising a total of 100 members, and soon afterwards the merger was formally completed before the Reichstag elections in October 1884 .

In the election, the new German Liberal Party lost a third of its seats and returned to the Reichstag with only 64 members. The liberalists now recognized that total liberalism in Germany could only be imagined as a decisive political factor if it also included the national liberals. This solution, however desirable it might seem, failed because of the political orientation of the different factions at the time, because the remaining faction of the National Liberal Party was far to the right and the members of the Liberal Party from the Progressive Party were far to the left. It was impossible for all Liberal MPs to come together under one roof.

Bismarck had thus not only succeeded in winning the National Liberals for his conservative government, but also decisively and lastingly weakening the liberal movement as a whole in the Reichstag. He thus made a decisive contribution to preventing a liberal government in the German Reich and at the same time decisively weakening the liberal opposition in the Reichstag.

literature

  • Hans Fenske : German party history. From the beginning to the present. Schöningh, Paderborn 1994, ISBN 3-506-99464-6 , pp. 113, 120.
  • Wolther von Kieseritzky : Liberalism and the welfare state. Liberal politics in Germany between the power state and the labor movement (1878-1893) , Böhlau Verlag, Cologne / Vienna 2002 (= Industrial World , Vol. 62), ISBN 3-412-07601-5 .
  • Heinz Edgar Matthes: The split in the National Liberal Party and the development of left-wing liberalism up to the dissolution of the German Liberal Party (1878-1893). A contribution to the history of the crisis in German political liberalism. Diss. Phil., Kiel 1953 (Ms.).
  • Thomas Nipperdey : German History 1866-1918. Vol. 2: Power state before democracy. Beck, Munich 1998, ISBN 3-406-44038-X , pp. 327, 412.
  • Thomas Nipperdey: The organization of the German parties before 1918. Droste, Düsseldorf 1961, p. 182 f., 204 ff.
  • Walter Tormin : History of the German parties since 1848. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart 1967, p. 89.
  • Hans-Peter Ullmann : The German Empire 1871-1918. Suhrkamp, ​​Frankfurt 1995, p. 75.
  • Hans-Ulrich Wehler : German history of society. Vol. 3: From the German double revolution to the end of the First World War. Beck, Munich 1995, ISBN 3-406-32263-8 , pp. 872 f.

Web links

Commons : Liberal Association  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Quotation from Wehler 1995, p. 869.
  2. ^ Ansgar Lauterbach: Between reform and opposition On the political self-image of national and progress liberals in the Bismarck era. In: Yearbook on Liberalism Research . Volume 19, 2007, pp. 9-30, here: pp. 14 f.
  3. ↑ Wehler 1995, p. 872.
  4. ↑ Matthes 1953, p. 182.
  5. ↑ Nipperdey 1961, p. 183.
  6. ↑ Nipperdey 1961, p. 205.
  7. ↑ Quoted from Tormin 1967, p. 89.