Ludwig Bamberger

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Ludwig Bamberger

Ludwig Bamberger (born July 22, 1823 in Mainz ; died March 14, 1899 in Berlin ) was a German banker and politician . He is considered to be one of the most important representatives of German liberalism at the time the empire was founded. Coming from a Jewish banking family, he was one of the founders of Deutsche Bank in 1870 . In the early 1870s, Bamberger was one of the most important financial politicians. He was involved in the establishment of the Reichsbank and is considered the father of the coin reform and the German mark .

Origin and education

Bamberger's father was a Jewish merchant in Mainz who eventually established himself as a banker without giving up the trading business. The mother came from the Bischoffsheim family , whose banking house had gained international importance in the 1830s. The father was reasonably wealthy, but financially he was not among the top of Mainz society. Bamberger had six siblings. His older brother, Rudolph Bamberger , later took over his father's company.

City view of Mainz around 1840

Bamberger attended high school and also received private lessons in various foreign languages. At the age of fifteen he began to write his own texts. After finishing school, he studied law in 1842, first in Gießen , Heidelberg and later in Göttingen . Bamberger was shaped politically by a liberal environment, memories of the Mainz Republic and influences from contemporary political discourse in France. In addition to his legal studies, he was also interested in contemporary philosophy and economic theories such as Adam Smith's . During his time in Heidelberg he heard from the liberal lawyer CJA Mittermaier . He established close relationships with Friedrich Kapp and Heinrich Bernhard Oppenheim . They shared the orientation towards France on the one hand and the goal of a strong nation-state on the other. With these and others, Bamberger founded a student discussion club in 1843/1844 called Walhalla (later Fraternity Walhalla Heidelberg). He spent the last year of his studies in Göttingen. He passed the faculty examination in Giessen. There he then did his doctorate . However, as a Jew, he was closed to a career as a judge and civil service. Due to the high demand, the profession of notary was just as little an alternative as the position of a lawyer, which was out of the question for him because of his poor health. Bamberger did not have the financial means for the possible goal of a university teacher, so that he initially returned to Mainz.

Democrat during the revolution in Mainz

The news of the outbreak of the February Revolution sparked euphoric enthusiasm among Bamberger. On March 9, 1848, he offered the Mainzer Zeitung his collaboration, which was also accepted. In the following time Bamberger became the formative force of the paper. He rose to become co-editor and editor-in-chief . He made the newspaper an important paper beyond Mainz, the number of which grew rapidly within a few weeks. The income-free lawyer, who was previously dependent on his family, earned a secure income of 800 guilders a year.

His regular editorials were influential. In it, he also described the French Republic as a model for Germany. He traveled to Frankfurt to report directly on the Pre-Parliament and the National Assembly and was soon disappointed by the generally moderate attitude of the MPs. Few like Friedrich Hecker seemed to share Bamberger's more radical goals. Subsequently, as a staunch Republican, he sharply criticized the policies of the March Ministries and the National Assembly. However, he also remained realistic. So he distanced himself from the Hecker move in April 1848, because this approach would only benefit the opponents of the revolution. In addition to journalism, Bamberger tried to influence political developments in Mainz directly. As a result, the Republicans won a majority on the local citizens' committee. Some time later he also took on a leading position in the city's democratic association - at times as chairman. However, he made himself political opponents and under their pressure he lost his position as editor-in-chief, but remained a correspondent for the paper.

As a leading democrat in Mainz, Bamberger took part in both the first and the second all-German democratic congress. At the second meeting in Berlin in October 1848, when he was only 25, he was even elected President of the Assembly. However, he only held this position for a few days after resigning when Congress asked the National Assembly and the provisional central authority to act against the counter-revolution in Vienna. Bamberger considered such an appeal to be ineffective and counterproductive for the democratic movement. But there was also his criticism of socialist utopias, as they were voiced during the congress. When he returned to Mainz in January 1849, he again took over the post of co-editor of the Mainzer Zeitung, now with a salary of 1000 thalers.

Representation of the dissolution of the rump parliament on June 18, 1849 in Stuttgart: Württemberg dragoons drive the demonstration of the locked out MPs apart.

The more the revolution got on the defensive, the more Bamberger and his newspaper criticized the National Assembly. The criticism went so far that Bamberger rejected the National Assembly's catalog of fundamental rights and appealed to the individual states to oppose the Frankfurt unification policy. In addition, he rejected the Central March Association founded by the left of the National Assembly as an amalgamation of democratic associations and continued to speak out in favor of the central committee set up by the last Democratic Congress. During this time, Bamberger was also interested in the ideas of Pierre-Joseph Proudhon . He translated his writing on Volksbanks , which were based on small shares and were supposed to grant interest-free loans, whereupon it was published as a brochure with an introduction. Bamberger criticized the small German solution , the idea of hereditary imperialism and ultimately the constitution passed by the National Assembly. But when the resistance of the governments against the decision became apparent, he supported the imperial constitution campaign . In the Palatinate uprising , the last attempt to save the revolution, he took part as a member of the Rhenish Hessian relief corps. Bamberger reported on this in a book published in Frankfurt in 1849, experiences from the Palatinate uprising in May and June 1849. In addition, he applied to succeed him for a seat in the National Assembly. Bamberger was elected with a large majority, but could no longer take his position in the rump parliament , which had meanwhile moved to Stuttgart, before its dissolution. In the course of the advance of the Prussian army, Bamberger fled to Switzerland. As a result, he was still 1849 in absentia to imprisonment and even sentenced to death. 1852

Exile and banker

In Switzerland, Bamberger first lived in Zurich, later in Geneva and Zurich, and continued to be in close contact with the other political refugees. Bamberger traveled from Switzerland to London at the end of 1849 and worked in the banking house of his uncle Bischoffsheim. There, too, he kept in contact with political exiles. These included Karl Marx , Louis Blanc and Giuseppe Mazzini , among others . In the banking business, Bamberger became a specialist in trading precious metals. In the summer of 1850 he switched to the branch in Antwerp. There he was involved in financing the Reuters news agency . In 1851 he went to Rotterdam and started his own LA Bamberger bank there . During this time Bamberg married Anna Belmont from Alzey . In 1853 he became an authorized representative of the Paris branch. There he also co-founded the Banque de Paris et des Pays-Bas . In Paris, both on business and privately, he met political leaders and leading representatives of intellectual and artistic life in the city's salons, as evidenced by his correspondence with the - also temporarily exiled - writer Moritz Hartmann . From Paris, Bamberger tried to continue to exert political influence on developments in Germany through various publications. A paper from 1859, in which he spoke out against the participation of German states on the Austrian side in the Sardinian War , met with some criticism from the opposition . After negotiations with Bethel Henry Strousberg in Berlin about participation in railway projects, Bamberger stayed in Germany and left the Bischoffsheim bank.

In 1869/1870 Bamberger and Adelbert Delbrück were involved in the preparation for the establishment of Deutsche Bank AG . At that time, this company was primarily intended to finance growing foreign trade and to make the German banking system more independent of the financial center of London. It was also in direct competition with some Hamburg banks that were also heavily involved in foreign trade. From 1870 to 1872 he was a member of the Board of Directors of Deutsche Bank AG.

National liberal supporter of Bismarck

Leading politicians of the National Liberals top row from left to right: Wilhelm Wehrenpfennig , Eduard Lasker , Heinrich von Treitschke , Johannes Miquel , bottom row from left to right: Franz von Roggenbach , Karl Braun , Rudolf Gneist , Ludwig Bamberger

He influenced politics in Germany with his magazine, Demokratische Studien and other journalistic activities. Impressed by Otto Bismarck's politics, Bamberger wrote “ Mr. de Bismarck ” in 1868 , with which he wanted to win over the French public to Bismarck's politics. It stated, among other things, that he “never doubted for a moment that he [Bismarck] was a born revolutionary. Because one is born as a revolutionary as as a legitimist, according to the type of mental disposition, while chance alone decides whether the circumstances of life make the same person a white or a red. ” While other liberals rejected the unification policy and initially the Bamberger hoped to come closer to freedom through unity, who demanded the completion of constitutionalism in Prussia. “Is there unity, not itself a piece of freedom?” This became the slogan of the National Liberal Party that emerged in 1866 and of which Bamberger became a member. As such, he was elected to the German customs parliament for Mainz in 1868 . As a supporter of Bismarck and a monarchist of reason, Bamberger had strayed far from his democratic beginnings and was considered an apostate in the democratic and left-liberal camp of the Customs Parliament.

Bamberg was Otto von Bismarck's personal advisor during the Franco-Prussian War . Bamberger also supported Bismarck's policy with journalism.

In 1868 Bamberger was elected as a member of the constituency of Hesse 9 ( Mainz - Oppenheim ) in the Reichstag of the North German Confederation as a representative of the National Liberal Party, and he also represented this constituency in the first legislative period of the Reichstag from 1871 to 1874. From 1874 to 1890 he was a member of the Reichstag as a member of the constituency of Hesse 8 ( Bingen - Alzey ), which he usually won with certainty.

In the first years after the founding of the Reich, Bamberger was a leading member of the national liberal parliamentary group. His work focused primarily on financial policy. His practical expertise and his passionate commitment succeeded in enforcing a standardization of the coinage, as well as the conversion from silver to gold currency , against the stubborn resistance of the state governments . At the end of 1871 he achieved that new gold coins with a value of 10 and 20 marks could only be minted by the Reich. In addition, the mark was introduced as the sole currency. Another coin law from 1873, coined by Bamberg, determined the transition to the gold currency. The issue of banknotes has also been de facto centralized. With the Banking Act of 1875, in which Bamberger also played a leading role, the states theoretically retained the right to issue banknotes, but only Mark notes were valid throughout Germany. The Prussian Bank , which had already issued most of the banknotes, was converted into the Reichsbank as the de facto German central bank.

Liberal opposition politician

The leaders of the Secessionists (from: Die Gartenlaube 1880), Ludwig Bamberger above

At the beginning of Bamberger's turn away from Bismarck, there was the question of how the state should react to the social democratic movement. In 1876, Bamberger advocated “teaching” the workers and refused to tighten criminal law. The domestic political turning point of 1879 and Bismarck's turn to protective tariff policy and the Socialist Law ultimately led to Bamberger's break with the Reich Chancellor. In 1880 the majority of the National Liberals voted in favor of Bismarck's protective tariff policy, which led to a split in the faction; From then on, Bamberger belonged to the "Secessionists" (later Liberal Association ). Bamberger strictly rejected the protective tariff policy, which at that time was very loudly demanded by many interest groups in the empire, and thus, like Eugen Richter, he became one of the most important opponents of Otto von Bismarck. Bamberger criticized Bismarck not only because of its economic policy - like Franz August Schenk von Stauffenberg, he was also a staunch supporter of parliamentarism and a critic of federalism. He rejected the colonial policy begun by Bismarck. When advising the military budget, Bamberger pleaded that Germany should disarm. For Bamberger, Bismarck's political direction after 1879 meant a fundamental departure from the founding compromise of the old elites with liberalism during the era of the establishment of the Empire. For Bamberger, this was accompanied by a fundamental change in the national movement, which had hitherto been liberal or democratic. “The national banner [is] in the hands of the Prussian ultras and Saxon guilds. [This would be] the caricature of what it once meant, and this caricature came about quite simply in such a way that the conquered opponents appropriated the discarded dress of the victor and turned it around, colored it and trimmed it to make it their own to be able to stalk around laughing heirs of the national movement. "

Bamberger was considered one of the leaders of Manchester liberalism in Parliament. He and Eugen Richter were the spokesmen for the liberals in the fight against all the social policy proposals of the 1880s. He stylized the resistance against social security as a struggle for freedom. When he raised a major speech against old-age and disability insurance in 1889, Bismarck left the plenary chamber with members of the government and masses of MPs, so that Bamberger had to speak to empty benches. The reasons for the strict rejection of social policy were on the one hand ideological. In addition, daily political considerations also played a role. For example, Bamberger saw the plans to create an economic council as a self-governing body for social insurance as a deliberate attempt by Bismarck to weaken parliament.

In 1884, Bamberger played a key role in the unification of the German Progressive Party with the Liberal Association to form the German Freisinnige Party . Bamberger, like many liberals, placed his hopes in a change of the throne. After the death of Wilhelm I , he was also one of Friedrich III's closest advisers . Due to his untimely death, a liberal-oriented government was not formed.

Anti-Semitic attacks and resistance

Because of his religion, Bamberg was repeatedly attacked. Karl Marx once said that the "Gypsy language of the Paris synagogue" could be heard from Ludwig Bamberger. His former parliamentary group colleague in the National Liberal Party Heinrich von Treitschke , who in 1879 caused a sensation with his article Our prospects and with barely concealed sympathy for anti-Semitic ideas ( Berlin anti-Semitism dispute ), Bamberger countered in several pamphlets. For him, Treitschke's attack on the Jews was part of the campaign against liberalism, which was favored by the Jewish origins of some of the most important leaders of the liberal parliamentarians. Even if Treitschke's opponents still dominated, Bamberger saw anti-Semitism as an ongoing threat. "The real organs of life in the nation: the army, school, and the world of scholars are saturated to the brim with it [...], it has become an obsession that never lets go." In connection with this, Bamberger criticized the changes in German nationalism. The hatred against other nations is now dominant. “It is only one step from this hatred of the strange on the other side of the border to the hatred of that which […] can be identified as strange in one's own homeland. […] Where national hatred finds its limits to the outside, the campaign is opened inwards. ”In connection with the Reichstag election in 1884 , Bamberger sharply criticized the fact that the Reich Chancellor was exploiting growing anti-Semitism for his own ends, and accused him of deliberately collaborating with the anti-Semites in front. In the 1890s, Bamberger helped found a pacifist German peace association.

tomb

Bamberger had stipulated in his will that his funeral should take place without a religious ceremony and was buried in 1899 at the Jewish cemetery in Schönhauser Allee in Berlin at the side of Eduard Lasker . The grave inscription reads: "Here rest in death united the common striving for Germany's unity and freedom in life."

family

Bamberger was married to Anna Belmont since 1852. The marriage remained childless.

Works

  • Experiences from the Palatinate survey in May and June 1849. Frankfurt am Main 1849 online at the Frankfurt University Library .
  • Juchhe to Italia! Bern / Geneva 1859 (digitized edition under: urn : nbn: de: s2w-6445 ).
  • Herr von Bismarck . Breslau 1868 (digitized edition at: urn : nbn: de: s2w-7307 ).
  • Confidential letters from the Customs Parliament (1868–1869–1870) . Breslau 1870 (digitized edition at: urn : nbn: de: s2w-6484 ).
  • The worker question from the point of view of the law of associations . Stuttgart 1873 (digitized edition under: urn : nbn: de: s2w-7371 ).
  • The note bank in front of the Reichstag. Attempt at a common understanding . Leipzig 1874 (digitized edition under: urn : nbn: de: s2w-7345 ).
  • Imperial gold. Studies on currency and bills. Leipzig 1876 (digitized edition under: urn : nbn: de: s2w-6431 ).
  • Collected Writings . 5 volumes. Berlin 1894–1898.
    • Volume 1: Studies and meditations from 35 years . Berlin 1898 (digitized edition under: urn : nbn: de: s2w-7408 ).
    • Volume 2: Characteristics . Berlin 1894 (digitized edition under: urn : nbn: de: s2w-7173 ).
    • Volume 3: Political Writings from 1848 to 1868 . Berlin 1895 (digitized edition under: urn : nbn: de: s2w-9489 ).
    • Volume 4: Political Writings from 1868 to 1878 . Berlin 1896 (digitized edition under: urn : nbn: de: s2w-9498 ).
    • Volume 5: Political Writings from 1879 to 1892 . Berlin 1897 (digitized edition under: urn : nbn: de: s2w-9507 ).
  • Memories. Edited by Paul Nathan , Berlin 1899 (digitized edition under: urn : nbn: de: s2w-6598 ).
  • Bismarck posthumous . Berlin 1899 (digitized edition under: urn : nbn: de: s2w-11774 ).
  • Selected speeches and essays on money and banking. Edited by Karl Helfferich , Berlin 1900 (digitized edition under: urn : nbn: de: s2w-6556 ).
  • Bismarck's great game. Ludwig Bamberger's secret diaries. Introduced and ed. by Ernst Feder , Frankfurt am Main 1932.

literature

Web links

Wikisource: Ludwig Bamberger  - Sources and full texts
Commons : Ludwig Bamberger  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Horst Grimm, Leo Besser-Walzel: The corporations. Frankfurt am Main 1986.
  2. ↑ cit. according to Wehler: history of society. Volume 3, p. 267.
  3. ↑ cit. according to Wehler: history of society. Volume 3, p. 339.
  4. ^ Fritz Specht, Paul Schwabe: The Reichstag elections from 1867 to 1903. Statistics of the Reichstag elections together with the programs of the parties and a list of the elected representatives. 2nd Edition. Carl Heymann Verlag, Berlin 1904, p. 266; see. also: Georg Hirth (Ed.): German Parliament Almanach. 9th edition of May 9, 1871. Verlag Franz Duncker, Berlin 1871, p. 155f.
  5. ^ Fritz Specht, Paul Schwabe: The Reichstag elections from 1867 to 1903. Statistics of the Reichstag elections together with the programs of the parties and a list of the elected representatives. 2nd Edition. Verlag Carl Heymann, Berlin 1904, p. 265f.
  6. ↑ see Loth: Kaiserreich. P. 45f.
  7. ↑ cit. according to Wehler: history of society. Volume 3, p. 947.
  8. ^ Nipperdey: Power state before democracy. P. 330, p. 410.
  9. ↑ Quoted from Wehler: History of society. Volume 3, p. 929.
personal data
SURNAME Bamberger, Ludwig
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German banker and politician, MdR
DATE OF BIRTH July 22, 1823
PLACE OF BIRTH Mainz
DATE OF DEATH March 14, 1899
Place of death Berlin