Otto notices

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Otto Merkt, drawn by the Kempten architect and painter Andor Ákos

Otto Merkt (born July 26, 1877 in Kempten (Allgäu) , † March 23, 1951 ibid) was a German local politician and local researcher . For 23 years, from 1919 to 1942, he was mayor of Kempten and for 25 years President of the Schwaben and Neuburg District Council and the Swabian District Association. The establishment of the home curator goes back to him .

Life

Merkt was born on July 26th, 1877 in Kempten. His parents were the district veterinarian Ferdinand Merkt and his wife Emma. Ferdinand Merkt was a staunch member of the Old Catholic Church and a supporter of the traditionally strong national liberalism in the Allgäu . Merkt has repeatedly acknowledged this origins, it has strongly influenced him.

Education, first activities in local politics and other interests

Title page of Otto Merkt's doctoral thesis (reprint from 1904)

Merkt attended the Humanist Gymnasium in Kempten (today: Carl-von-Linde-Gymnasium Kempten ), went to the military as a one-year volunteer after graduating from high school and then began studying law at the University of Munich in 1897 . After two semesters at the Berlin University and the University of Erlangen , he passed his first examination for the higher judicial and administrative service in 1900 and received his doctorate in Erlangen in 1903 on local self-government . In 1904 the so-called state bankruptcy followed, the second state examination in law. He completed his training with two semesters of social and commercial sciences in Frankfurt am Main .

In 1906, Merkt began his career in local politics in Mallersdorf , where he was a district assessor and public prosecutor . In 1909 he was elected by the parliamentary groups of the liberals and the center as a legal councilor to the magistrate of the city of Munich. In this function, he reported to the German Association of Cities in 1911 on the reallocation of the Reichstag constituencies . In May 1914 he was elected second mayor of Munich; he also received the votes of the social democratic group . Although he remained in his Munich mayor's office until 1917, he could hardly exercise it because he served as captain on the Western Front from August 1914 to early 1918 during the First World War . He was wounded several times there. After a stay in the hospital, he was an officer in the border guard in Scheidegg for a few months and then prepared for his return to Kempten.

After graduating from high school noted 1896 was a member of the first three years earlier founded Ferialverbindung Algovia become an association of coming from Kempten academics who the Latinized name of the Allgäu leads as a label. During his studies he also joined the Apollo Munich fraternity in 1896 , and then in 1898 the Arminia-Rhenania fraternity in Munich , which also had its historical roots in the Allgäu. While nothing more is known about his activities in the fraternity, the Algovia membership played a major role in Merkt's further life. After the first state examination in 1901, he became Philistine Secretary of the Association, and thus headed the organization of the members who were no longer actively studying, and remained so until his death. Under Merkt's leadership, Algovia developed into an important reservoir for filling municipal political offices and posts in Kempten and remained so not only in the Weimar Republic, but also during the time of National Socialism and in the Federal Republic of Germany. Numerous letters from "Algoven" to their Philistine secretary, who in connection led the Bierspitz Ekkehard , have survived ; There is an empirical study of such letters to Merkt from the Second World War.

In addition, Merkt got involved in the home movement early on . He belonged to the circle around the Kaufbeurer pioneer of this movement, curate Christian Frank , and since 1903 began to collect all available literature about the Allgäu. In the series Neuere Allgäuer Literatur published by him , which appeared in numerous episodes from 1911 to 1949, he bibliographed and discussed all of the writings he found on the subject of Allgäu. Among other things, he tried to authoritatively determine the northern border of the Allgäu in the series published in 1914, following Franz Ludwig von Baumann's History of the Allgäu . This demarcation is still considered a reference point for the spatial construction of the Allgäu region today.

Finally, Merkt was very active in the Old Catholic Church, especially in the so-called “young teams”, which were particularly encouraged by the Old Catholic pastor in Kempten and later Bishop Erwin Kreuzer . Later he also became a member of the synod and synodal judge of this church.

Mayor and district council president: Weimar Republic

Conflicts with the workers 'and soldiers' council

Otto Merkt as a speaker at the opening of the Stadtbad (1932)

On December 2, 1918, Merkt was unanimously elected First Mayor of Kempten by the 36-strong, nationally liberal-dominated, but also five Social Democratic representatives, college of municipal representatives. He took office on February 6, 1919. By electing the administrative specialist Merkt, the community college tried to create a center of power against the influence of the Kempten workers 'and soldiers' council that had been formed four weeks earlier . It was a success: in the first meeting under Merkt's leadership, the magistrate decided not to invite any more representatives of the workers 'and soldiers' council to the magistrate's meetings and thus to deviate from the practice previously practiced.

On April 7, 1919, however, the workers 'and soldiers' council under the leadership of Wilhelm Deffner ( MSPD ) and Adolf Schmidt ( USPD , later KPD ) proclaimed the short-lived Kempten council republic based on the Munich model and asked Merkt and the city administration to comply with the orders of the revolutionary government to add. Merkt remained in office and recommended that the administration follow the instructions insofar as they were compatible with the oath of service. Merkt was arrested three days later but escaped immediately. The Soviet republic was repealed on April 14th; the following day, Merkt asked the Hoffmann government in Bamberg to send troops to “restore order”. On 12./13. On May 25th, the Swabian Freikorps arrived in Kempten and immediately arrested seven representatives of the Workers 'and Soldiers' Council.

Election for mayor and district council chairman

The first direct election of the mayor of Kempten took place in June 1919. Here the United Citizens' Association, a newly created collection of conservative-liberal parties including the DDP and the BVP , called for the election of Merkt. The MSPD found out about the early election too late to put forward its own candidate; so she decided to support Merkt as well. This received an overwhelming majority for a ten-year term. Since the direct election of the mayor was abolished in 1924 for communities with more than 3,000 inhabitants, re-election was not necessary. Merkt had held the title of Lord Mayor since 1928, and in 1929 the Kempten City Council unanimously made use of the opportunity to appoint him mayor for life.

When he was elected to the Schwaben and Neuburg district council in 1919, Merkt was a candidate on the DDP list. The Kempten city council had made it important that the mayor was represented in the new Swabian-Bavarian committee (like Merkt's predecessor Adolf Horchler in the earlier "Landrath"). Notices, who saw his mayor's office as non-partisan and therefore kept his distance from the parties, needed a party list. Therefore he did not join the local association, but only the district association of the DDP as an individual member and was thus able to avoid appearing as a party member in Kempten. Although the DDP only got three out of 30 seats on the committee, Merkt was elected district council chairman - probably because of his reputation as an apolitical administrative specialist, as Albert Thurner says. He held this post until the end of World War II, although the name, functions and composition of the body changed significantly during this time.

In 1927 Merkt resigned from the DDP, whose left-liberal politics had never had much connection with him. For the district council election, he accepted the offer of the Bavarian Farmers and Medium-Sized Business Association (BBB), which had assured him that he could remain independent.

Economic and cultural policy

Mark operated a targeted urban development policy. As he later wrote himself, it seemed to him that a “peasant policy” was necessary above all; he tried to make Kempten the center of the Allgäu, which was characterized by agriculture and, above all, the dairy industry , the "center ... in the theoretical area, with regard to organization, production and sales". Immediately after the forced management was lifted after the First World War, in 1921, he wrote a memorandum on the establishment of an Allgäu butter and cheese exchange , was one of its founders and took over the honorary chairmanship himself. This institution, which has resided in the Kemptener Kornhaus since 1923 , was supposed to create market transparency through statistical recording of business processes and later also noted price corridors on this basis, so it had a market-regulating effect. As mayor of the city, Merkt also exerted influence in the Allgäu dairy industry association and was involved in the founding of other dairy industry institutions, such as the Bavarian Trademark Association for Butter and Cheese and the Süddeutsche Markenbutter -tons GmbH in 1929. He also tried to strengthen the second mainstay of Allgäu agriculture, cattle breeding , by building an animal breeding hall at the train station in Kempten in 1928.

Another economic and political activity was the founding of the Allgäu overland plant for power supply as early as 1919 , together with co-"Algoven" Karl Böhm. Furthermore, Merkt was heavily involved in housing construction policy and took over the chairmanship of the supervisory board of the non-profit building cooperative GmbH, which was established in 1919. In this context, there was also his commitment to the incorporation of the neighboring communities of Sankt Mang and St. Lorenz , which have been independent since 1818 . He was unsuccessful with this, the incorporation only happened with the regional reform in Bavaria in the 1970s, but was at least able to expand the area of ​​the city of Kempten during the Weimar Republic.

During this time, Merkt's homeland ideology also had significant cultural-political consequences for the city and especially for the Swabian and Neuburg districts. Since 1920, Merkt has chaired the Historisches Verein Allgäu, and he played a key role in the expansion and realignment of the Kempten local history museum. In 1924 he was the driving force behind the founding of the Swabian Museum Association , an association of Swabian local museums. Above all, however, after tough negotiations, he succeeded in institutionalizing homeland care: In 1930, the district of Schwaben and Neuburg approved a part-time position for a district homeworker for the first time, which was filled with an acquaintance from the homeland security movement, the Obergünzburg clergyman Bartholomäus Eberl .

Both the economic and cultural-political activities of Merkt at the same time reflected his sympathy for the idea of ​​a state of Greater Swabia , which should include at least the entire Allgäu including its part of Württemberg , the Württemberg Upper Swabia , the districts of Landsberg am Lech and Schongau as well as Vorarlberg , which are part of Upper Bavaria . The area of ​​the Allgäu butter and cheese exchange also included all of Upper Swabia, and the museum association also accepted members from Württemberg; Merkt was also involved in founding a Swabian-Vorarlberg trade association. However, there was initially no territorial expansion.

Mayor and District Council President: Time of National Socialism

Initial struggles over Merkt: SA versus NSDAP

After the Reichstag election in March 1933 , Merkt got into a violent dispute between the SA , in particular its special representative for Swabians Hermann Ritter von Schöpf , and the party organization of the NSDAP, especially the Gauleiter Karl Wahl , from which Merkt and Wahl emerged victorious after a few weeks. The dispute began immediately after the NSDAP came to power in Bavaria on March 9, 1933. It was related to the Bavaria-wide conflict between Ernst Röhm , the NSDAP party organization and the government agencies also occupied by the NSDAP over the powers of the SA special commissioners .

On March 9th, SA units in Kempten, like in Munich and many other cities, hoisted the swastika flag at the Kempten town hall . Noticing this was a violation of the law, as a party flag was attached to a state building. He wanted to turn on the police first and then the Reichswehr , with whose Kempten commander Eduard Dietl he maintained good relations. However, both refused to intervene. The following day the police took at the direction of the Acting Interior Minister Adolf Wagner , all leaders in Bavaria of Reichsbanner black, red and gold in " protective custody ", including the Kempten SPD Councilor Albert Weir . However, the district office chairman Paul Jäger released Wehr again, since nothing suspicious had been found during a house search and Wehr was a "quite decent man". The fact that Merkt had allowed this was initially recorded by a reprimand from the Ministry of the Interior, to which he responded with a letter of complaint to the new Bavarian governor Franz Ritter von Epp ; In it he appealed to the former Lord Mayor of Lindau , Ludwig Siebert , a member of the NSDAP since 1931 and meanwhile State Commissioner for the Bavarian Ministry of Finance, and to Oskar Esser, the "leader" of the NSDAP faction in the Kempten city council, as witnesses of his national sentiments. On March 11, however, SA men put the mayor under house arrest in his apartment . Merkt was on leave by order of Wagner. Now an old friend of Merkts stepped in, namely Hermann Esser , Oskar Esser's son, NSDAP member since 1919 and founding member of the NSDAP local group in Kempten, who had meanwhile become President of the Bavarian state parliament. Upon his intervention, Merkt was reinstated in his office a few hours later.

With the support of powerful friends from the NSDAP, Merkt initially seemed to have prevailed against the attacks by Schöpf and the SA. Oskar Esser publicly condemned the actions of the SA and apologized to Merkt on behalf of the NSDAP. In the local party organization and in the SA, however, it continued to rumble. Different holders of party and SA offices were replaced. On the day in Potsdam he publicly acknowledged the “national revolution” and absolute loyalty to the NSDAP and Hitler. On April 3, he informed Epp by letter of his wish to join the NSDAP. The following day he wrote a letter to the Kempten city council and informed them of this request; he also met with the local NSDAP and SS leadership. Of course, it quickly became apparent that Schöpf had not yet given up his campaign against Merkt.

On April 5, Merkt was confronted with the accusation of having personally enriched himself in business with the Städtische Sparkasse and was given another leave of absence by order of Schöpf. On this day the last meeting of the district council took place, which was dissolved according to the provisional law for the alignment of the states with the Reich . As President of the District Council, Mark went to Augsburg and announced the dissolution; later he was arrested there and sent to prison. On April 10th he succeeded in sending a letter to various high officials, including Ludwig Siebert. The mediation of the old Catholic clergyman Erwin Kreuzer may have played a role; In any case, he stated in 1953 that he had "been able to draw the attention of authoritative people to this mistake [...]". Eduard Dietl also seems to have stood up for Merkt. In any case, Siebert and Hermann Esser promptly arranged for his release on April 11th. Immediately afterwards Schöpf signed Merkt's application to join the NSDAP, as did Siebert the next day, who was about to be appointed Bavarian Prime Minister. This made Merkt a member of the NSDAP. Siebert explained to the Minister of the Interior, the Gauleiter and the SA Special Representative that Merkt was absolutely trustworthy and demanded that he be put on the NSDAP's new list of candidates for the coordinated district council. He then ordered the reinstatement of Merkt as mayor, which was carried out in a solemn act on April 15.

Merkt was added to the list of the NSDAP for the new district assembly and unanimously re-elected district assembly president on May 12th. He headed the district assembly, renamed the district association in 1938, without interruption until 1944. At the end of April, Merkt also applied to the Kempten city council to make Hermann Esser an honorary citizen of Kempten. At the ceremony for the award of honorary citizenship on May 27th, Merkt appeared in SA uniform and paid tribute to Esser as a pioneer of the National Socialist movement in the Allgäu.

But that did not end the conflict. At the end of June 1933, Schöpf tried to organize a public demonstration by SA men against Merkt in Kempten. However, he now had not only the NSDAP city council and the Gauleiter against him, but also the NSDAP district leader in Kempten-Stadt, Anton Brändle , who had intrigued against Merkt in April. This banned the demonstration and criticized Schöpf in a circular letter to the heads of the state administration, the NSDAP and the SA in the harshest terms: "Anyone who stages a revolution against this state is a rebel and is treated as such." Notices himself also turned personally on the same matter to Siebert, the Gauleiter Wahl demanded that Schöpf be recalled, and the district council followed suit under Merkt's chairmanship. As a result, the conflict even preoccupied the Bavarian State Council of Ministers: Epp and Siebert took the Merkt case as an opportunity to accuse the SA of “severely disrupting state authority” and “shaking law and order”.

The result of the whole "monkey theater", as an anonymous NSDAP member called it in a letter to Siebert, was a temporary compromise: Schöpf remained in office until February 1934, but had lost power. Brändle was excluded from the SA (and only accepted again after the Röhm putsch ), but remained district leader of the NSDAP. The position of Merkt and Wahl was significantly strengthened and remained unchallenged for the next few years. In particular, it was shown that Merkt could rely on the commitment of high officials. Brändle was ailing and subsequently gave Merkt a lot of leeway in local politics. Merkt thanked him for his support by proposing Brändle as a candidate for the Reichstag for the NSDAP.

Politics in National Socialism

After the battles of 1933, a relationship of trust developed between the mayor and district council chairman Merkt and the Gauleiter and (from 1934) district president of Swabia Karl Wahl, which was maintained for several years. One policy area in which both cooperated closely was housing policy, for which Merkt was also considered an expert by the National Socialists and which the NSDAP was close to the heart for ideological reasons. Merkt made it possible to continue the construction of a small settlement in Kempten by first approving the construction of a Karl-Wahl-Siedlung and later a Ludwig-Siebert-Siedlung. In March 1936, Wahl and Merkt jointly founded a “district aid for housing construction in Gau Schwaben GmbH” based in Augsburg, whose supervisory board chairman was elected, while Merkt, as deputy chairman, took on the actual management.

Above all, noted found and choice in conflicts around the independence and importance Bavarian-Swabia and Gaus Schwaben on the same side again. The Bavarian Minister of the Interior and Gauleiter of Munich-Upper Bavaria, Adolf Wagner, intended to annex Swabia to the Gau Munich-Upper Bavaria. This alerted the Great Swabian supporter Merkt and the Gauleiter Wahl. In 1934/1935, Merkt wrote a memorandum for the district council, in close consultation with Wahl, which was never published, but which became fairly well known under the names "black book" and "black memorandum". The memorandum called for the creation of a new “Reichsgau Swabia”, which should encompass no less than the Lake Constance area, Württemberg to the ridge of the Swabian Alb, the Danube valley, the entire Ries, Schongau, Landsberg and the Ammersee. In addition to the economic interdependence, the most important argument was the original unit, i.e. a tribalistic criterion. Merkt and Wahl could not prevail with their wishes, but they managed to prevent Upper Bavarian expansion plans. Later attempts to recapture Vorarlberg for Swabia after the annexation of Austria in 1938 also failed; only the Kleinwalsertal was incorporated into the Gau.

In addition, Merkt largely succeeded in maintaining and further strengthening Kempten's central role as a “farming town” in the Allgäu. So he was able to keep the synchronized successor of the Allgäu butter and cheese exchange and the trademark association, the Milch- und Fettwirtschaftsverband Allgäu , in Kempten and prevent a centralization of the dairy industry in Munich. In doing so, he was able to rely on cultural-political initiatives such as the “First Allgäu Farming Thing” in November 1934, during which he hosted a highly acclaimed speech on the “alliance of town and farmers”, which was “truly in the spirit of the Führer”.

While the appeal to the ideology of the homeland and the “fundamental National Socialist conception” of blood and soil was only able to achieve limited success in attempts at territorial reorganization, these Merkt arguments largely prevailed in the cultural policy of the district or district association. The National Socialist district council converted the position of home nurse in 1934 into a full-time position and also appointed an additional assistant in 1935, who was appointed second district nurse in 1937: Alfred Weitnauer . In 1940 a third position was added: Ludwig Ohlenroth was supposed to deal with Swabian prehistory and early history.

Notices dismissed in 1942

The time of the somewhat fruitful cooperation between Merkt as Lord Mayor and District Council President and the party organizations of the NSDAP lasted until the beginning of the war, i.e. until 1939. After that, Merkt became increasingly disillusioned with the realities of the Third Reich, and also with Wahl, the most powerful man in the NSDAP side, no longer attached great importance to working with Merkt. A debate about the incorporation of the independent municipality of Sankt Mang into Kempten was decisive for the break . Merkt had already made several attempts in this direction, but had encountered fierce resistance from the district farmer leader Georg Schädler . In addition, he had bought land for the city of Kempten from a so-called hereditary farm that he wanted to use for residential construction . Schädler therefore accused him of violating the Reichserbhofgesetz , which Merkt already saw as a hindrance to the expansion of the city. It got so far that Merkt Schädler sued the NSDAP Gaugericht in Augsburg for “defamatory accusations”. Wahl, who was not only Gauleiter of the NSDAP, but from 1934 also President of the Government of Swabia, finally sided with Schädler in this dispute. He dismissed Merkt on his 65th birthday, July 26, 1942, after 23 years in office "with all honors" and with a personal thank you telegram from the mayor's office and justified this with reaching the age limit. Merkt was replaced by Anton Brändle , district leader of the NSDAP in Kempten-Stadt since 1933 . Merkt retained his office as president of the district association until the end of the war.

After the Second World War

The American military government installed Merkt on May 24, 1945 as acting Lord Mayor of Kempten. She followed a suggestion from three local dignitaries ( Heinrich Zölch , Alfred Weitnauer , Karl Hoefelmayr ), but not without reservations because of his membership in the NSDAP. Presumably, it played a role that the office of district administrator had already been transferred to Merkt's old opponent Adolf Schmidt and Merkt was intended as a counterweight to Schmidt.

Merkt tried to keep the "experienced administrative staff he knew" in office, but met with resistance from the Americans. So he put together an "advisory board" as a provisional city council, which collapsed at the first meeting due to the exclusion of all NSDAP members. On July 21, the military government released Merkt, placed him under arrest and then temporarily took him to the Garmisch-Partenkirchen internment camp . In the years 1946 to 1948, Merkt went through an award chamber procedure at the tribunal chamber of Kempten-Stadt, from which he emerged as exonerated.

After the end of the denazification process, Merkt no longer took over a local political office. But he was one of the most important supporters of the “non-partisan list”, also known as the “town hall party”, which achieved a surprise success in the city council elections in 1948 and became the strongest faction before the CSU . The non-partisan list mainly included people who viewed themselves as apolitical experts and who had often already been active in the Weimar Republic or under National Socialism. In addition, in 1949 he was again appointed chairman of the supervisory board of the re-established non-profit building cooperative GmbH Kempten.

Merkt died on Good Friday , March 23, 1951, in his hometown and was buried at his request in the woods in Hölzlers Tobel near the Burgus Ahegg near Buchenberg .

Act

Home care

Throughout his life, Merkt was not only a local politician, but also volunteered to take care of the homeland. He was one of the most prominent representatives of the homeland security movement in Bavarian Swabia. The Allgäu and Kempten's central position in this region were particularly important to him. As early as 1903, Merkt had been collecting all available literature on the Allgäu and published his collection results from 1911 to 1949, often with reviews from his own hand, in the New Allgäu literature series . Since 1920 he has been chairman of the Historisches Verein Allgäu, which today bears the name Heimatverein Kempten .

In fifty years of work he anchored the landscape name Allgäu in the consciousness of the population. Among other things, he made sure that his hometown got the official suffix "(Allgäu)".

For the first time in Germany, Merkt invented the office of home guardian . A district home nurse for the district of Swabia and Neuburg should have the task of "taking care of the soul of the Swabian people so that they become and remain Swabian". It should “come from the people, from the ancestors, from the peasants, to the people, from the ancestors, to the people, to the town and country to show Schwabenart [...] We are not fighting against Munich, but we want our Bavarian country Old Bavarian and Franconian, Palatinate and Swabian tribal peculiarities eighth ”. “The rural population has a lot of understanding for the cultivation of the homeland idea [...] The mental hardship is almost even greater for the urban worker because he is uprooted and his labor is the object of capitalist purchase. Even if the worker hardly has time for such things, they shouldn't be withheld from him. With him the longing for home and connection with home is greatest ”. In October 1929, at Merkt's repeated insistence, the district council finally approved a position for a part-time district home nurse, which was filled by the Catholic clergyman Bartholomäus Eberl from January 1, 1930 . The National Socialist district council converted this position into a full-time position in 1934 and also appointed an additional assistant in 1935, who was appointed second district administrator in 1937: Alfred Weitnauer . In 1940 a third position was added: Ludwig Ohlenroth was supposed to deal with Swabian prehistory and early history.

Notably, he researched the historical sites of the Allgäu. He had around 1,300 memorial plaques on buildings and around 800 memorial stones at historical sites throughout the Allgäu, for the most part privately made and erected. Critics believe, however, that Merkt is also responsible for numerous demolitions of monumental buildings. In particular, he campaigned for the partial overbuilding of the site of the Roman settlement of Cambodunum - against violent protests from local curators, many curators and the State Office for the Preservation of Monuments . The character of Merkt is described as angry and thick-headed, Merkt could not do anything with existing buildings. So he was in favor of the demolition of the oldest chapel in the city, the Keckkapelle , in order to be able to better introduce an urban infrastructure. In the case of the Keck Chapel, it was a question of widening what is now Bundesstraße 19 . The subsequent attachment of commemorative plaques therefore often only had an alibi function. Despite his homeland research, Mark has hardly visited a church to look at the art monuments in it. He dealt in particular with the history of the castles , castle stables , entrenchments , Letzen and similar historical sites in the Allgäu. Therefore, Mark's interest was in researching no longer recognizable, old building fabric.

From his private assets, Merkt established several foundations that are still active today. Markt Buchenberg administers a small foundation run by Otto Merkt, from which 9th grade secondary school students can receive a prize for special achievements. In today's city archives Kempten, formerly old customs office , is the collection noted that documents containing noted.

Local politics

Dr.-Merkt-Wohnhof in Kempten, seen from Merktstrasse

Merkt's urban development concept continues to be effective today . Determined he developed Kempten into the "capital of the Allgäu". Otto Merkt achieved it in 1935 that Kempten was raised to the status of an independent city ("Stadtkreis"), which the city is to this day. The Allgäu overland plant , the Allgäuhalle ( animal breeding hall ), the Allgäu butter and cheese exchange , other dairy facilities, the outdoor swimming pool in Kempten , the regotisation of the old town hall , the settlement of schools and authorities and the planning of the Mittlerer Ring are some of his services. For several decades after the Second World War, Merkt's political will was an integral part of urban planning, infrastructural and cultural decision-making.

Elections and party views

After the NSDAP came to power, Merkt tried by all means to remain mayor of his native city. Until he joined the NSDAP, he is said to have not been very sympathetic to it. In his Arbitration Chamber proceedings in 1946/1947, he described himself as an "old democrat" and stated that before 1933 he had elected democratic parties. During the Nazi era he did not vote for Hitler, except in the referendum after the reintegration of the Saarland and immediately after the occupation of the Rhineland . In other elections and votes, he had applied for a voting slip for a neighboring community on the pretext of going on a Sunday excursion so that his refusal would not be discovered. In a letter to the Mayor of Lindau, Ludwig Siebert , in 1933, he wrote that he had previously advocated that a city leader should be independent in order to be above the parties. Now, however, every “national man” must join the only remaining party. "But I am and have been national as long as I live."

In the court proceedings, Otto Merkt also stated that he had only worn the party badge in the presence of “party authorities”, did not approve the installation of a striker's box on the town hall, did not hand newly married couples, as intended by the party, Mein Kampf , a designation of Kemptener streets after Ludwig Siebert and Karl Wahl refused and went to the Old Catholic Church in public every Sunday.

Alfred Weitnauer says in a biography of Merkt that he tried to keep his mayor's office with " lip service ".

Persecution of the Jews

Because of his environment, Merkt did not share the imposed views of the National Socialists regarding the persecution of the Jews . He maintained a close relationship with the Jewish banker Sigmund Ullmann, an important person in today's Allgäuer Volksbank Kempten-Sonthofen . Merkt made Ullmann a city councilor in Kempten until 1929, and during the Nazi era, Merkt regularly visited him in his apartment.

Mark agreed with the Kempten Israelite community to take over the Jewish cemetery in Kempten and had a thick hedge planted so that the tombstones, some of which were inscribed in Hebrew, could no longer be seen. After the November pogroms , Merkt received the cult objects from the prayer room of the Jews and hid them in the town hall. When Ullmann's apartment was searched, other sacred items were found that were handed over to a lending agency for auction. The Lord Mayor removed the ritual items and handed them over to the museum caretaker for safekeeping.

In 1942 the 88-year-old Ullmann received the news that he would soon be deported to a concentration camp. Later stated that he had phoned the Gestapo in Augsburg and asked that the old man be spared. According to the town hall's war diary from 1939 to 1943 , he was present at the long-distance train station in Hegge (district of Waltenhofen ) during the deportation. It was a "human drama" that he unfortunately could not prevent.

The Jewish citizen of Kempten and survivor of Theresienstadt , Bruno Kohn, appeared as an exonerating witness in the arbitration chamber proceedings . According to his daughter's memory, her mother once saw how Merkt's housekeeper Marie threw a "quite substantial" amount of money into Kohn's mailbox. Bruno Kohn wrote: “[...] At a time when the Jews of Kempten were helpless and without rights, he left no stone unturned to ease their lot within the limited possibilities available to him at the time [...] as one of the few I feel obliged to the surviving Jews of Kempten to express my deepest thanks for his noble and humane attitude. Without wanting to anticipate the decision of the Chamber, I express the sincere wish that [...] Mark may come to justice in his efforts to rehabilitate. "

Eugenics

The district of Neuburg and Swabia bore the costs of maintenance and care for the sanatoriums and nursing homes in Irsee , Kaufbeuren and Günzburg through the state welfare association . In order to compensate for the critical financial situation of the district, Merkt, as district council president, came up with the idea of calling for the sterilization of so-called "hereditary diseases" who suffered from mental illnesses. As early as December 2, 1930, he brought this to a district council meeting. He said then:

“We all know that habitual and incorrigible criminals, that the mentally ill, that the physically ill in particular syphilitics and tuberculosis [sic] produce, produce children who are burdened like them, like them, have to fall victim to the general public. Wouldn't it be right to see to it that such people are not born, that is, that those who are like that are rendered harmless by making them sterile? "

At the same time, Merkt asked Valentin Faltlhauser , the new director of the Kaufbeuren sanatorium, for an expert opinion. He agreed with Merkt that it had to be about the "elimination of bad genetic material as possible", although he rejected financial reasons for such measures. At the same time, he referred to practical problems, which should not, however, prevent “energetic pursuit of the problem”.

In the district council, Merkt initially received a divided response with this advance. While some members were very reserved about such eugenic demands, others agreed to Merkt, such as SPD MPs Karl Wernthaler and Otto Berger and BVP MP and Füssen Mayor Michael Samer . Merkt further promoted his idea, both in the district assembly and beyond: He even tried to get the Bavarian District Assembly to support eugenic measures by giving a detailed lecture there in November 1932 on public welfare and sterility . However, he was dissatisfied with the political result: Unfortunately, the result was just a “lukewarm resolution to the state and imperial government”. Through these activities, Merkt had gained a certain prominence in circles of the "racial hygienists" and was even elected to the main committee of the Munich Society for Racial Hygiene in January 1933 , but rejected the office because of its time demands in Kempten.

With Hitler's rise to power, Merkt and Faltlhauser saw new opportunities for their project to sterilize “hereditary patients”. Merkt justified his plan to become a member of the NSDAP, among other things, with the fact that he agreed with the party's program “especially in questions of racial hygiene ” and “with regard to the sterilization of the hopeless genetic material”. Even before May 1933 he seems to have advocated this with the new Reich Interior Minister Wilhelm Frick ; At the first meeting of the new district assembly, dominated by the NSDAP, on May 10, 1933, he already reported on an exchange of letters with "Berlin", which promised a legal regulation in the near future. In his statement of accounts at this district council meeting, he again promoted the “means of sterilization” against the “diseased genetic material”. With the law for the prevention of genetically ill offspring , Faltlhauser was finally given a free hand for his forced sterilization projects , which the district council continued to support, including an additional doctor's position for “hereditary biological activities”.

From 1939 on, Faltlhauser became one of the actors in Aktion T4 , the scheduled murder of the mentally ill and disabled. After Action T4 was broken off in the summer of 1941, numerous other patients were murdered in the decentralized “euthanasia”, Aktion Brandt , in the Kaufbeurer clinic led by Faltlhauser until the end of the war . According to the unanimous opinion of researchers, what Merkt knew and thought of it cannot be inferred. On July 13, 1945, he himself wrote in what he called a “reservation”, evidently motivated by a report on the Kaufbeurer euthanasia practice in the Munich newspaper :

"In any case, I know for sure that these things were kept secret from me."

Albert Thurner comments that the district association and its chairman, Merkt, “must have been aware of the large number of deaths in the sanatorium and nursing home”, especially at the last meeting of the district association on July 25, 1944, the one in the institution's ballroom took place, at Faltlhauser's request the construction of a crematorium was approved. He writes: "If, as Merkt put it, the district association actually knew nothing about the National Socialist extermination measures, it was because it did not want to know anything about it."

Gernot Römer believes that Merkt did not handle the subject lightly. In speeches he quoted medical professionals, Catholic moral theologians and lawyers. Mark also took up discussions that had been held between scientists in the 1920s.

Research situation and debate

There is an extensive source of sources on Otto Merkt's life and actions, consisting on the one hand of his very large written estate and, on the other hand, of numerous files in municipal, district and state archives. So far, however, there is only one biography of Alfred Weitnauer , which is a "life picture [...] from personal memory". Merkt's estate in the Kempten city archive consists of 118 archive boxes.

The historian Oded Heilbronner sees Merkt as a radical liberal in a region that stretches from the Allgäu to southern Baden. For these anti-clerical and anti- ultramontane radical liberals, “self-administration to preserve the freedom of the individual and the community vis-à-vis the state and central authority” was a very popular idea. In the empire still part of the national liberals, not a few of the radical liberals would have joined the NSDAP in the final phase of the Weimar Republic. Notes is a typical example of this continuity, said Heilbronner. The activities of Merkt as a local and district politician were researched by Herbert Müller (on the position of mayor) and Albert Thurner (on the position as district council president). The work of Otto Merkt as an exemplary representative of the homeland security movement was documented and analyzed in the contributions by Martina Steber. Gernöt Römer drew a comparison between the opponents Merkt and Brändle.

A review in the Allgäu history friend of the Heimatverein Kempten (part of Merkt's homeland security movement) regarded Stebers work as "formulated very compellingly" and politicizing. Stebers elaborations reveal a “slightly negative attitude towards Merkt”, Steber also reduced any local museum to a “folk institution”, which creates a negative aftertaste. Local museums arose as early as the 1920s. Because of the comparison between two regional personalities, Römer's writings were criticized as a dubious black-and-white contrast, with Merkt as the good and Anton Brändle as the bad.

In general, the problem with the difficult personality is the lack of a comprehensive biography, which is also due to the amount of various estates.

Works

  • The concept of communal self-government with special consideration of Bavarian law. Dissertation. Kempten 1904.
  • Newer Allgäu literature, 1st to 35th episode. Kempten 1911-1949.
  • Reallocation of the Reichstag constituencies. Report to the 3rd German Association of Cities in Posen on September 12, 1911. Lindauer, Munich 1911 (= communications from the Statistical Office of the City of Munich, Volume 23, Issue 4)
  • Letzen in the Allgäu. In: Allgäu history friend. 1950, p. 1 ff.
  • Castles, jumps and gallows in the Allgäu: the Little Allgäu Burgenbuch . Kösel-Verlag, Kempten (Allgäu) 1951; also reprinted in Allgäuer Geschichtsfreund 1951 (together with the article Letzen im Allgäu republished under the title Burgen, Schanzen, Letzen und Galgen im Allgäu: the Kleine Allgäuer Burgenbuch in Verlag für Heimatpflege im Heimatbund Allgäu, Kempten (Allgäu) 1985)

literature

  • Herbert Müller: Party or administrative supremacy? The municipal politics of the city of Kempten (Allgäu) between 1929 and 1953. (= Writings of the Philosophical Faculties of the University of Augsburg, No. 35, historical-social science series; also Diss. Augsburg 1986) Verlag Ernst Vögel, Munich 1988, ISBN 3-925355- 04-9 .
  • Herbert Müller: Kempten during the Weimar Republic . In: Volker Dotter Weich et al. (Ed.): History of the city of Kempten . Verlag Tobias Dannheimer, Kempten 1989, ISBN 3-88881-011-6 , pp. 407-435.
  • Herbert Müller: Kempten in the Third Reich . In: Volker Dotter Weich et al. (Ed.): History of the city of Kempten . Verlag Tobias Dannheimer, Kempten 1989, ISBN 3-88881-011-6 , pp. 435-448.
  • Herbert Müller: The time after 1945 . In: Volker Dotter Weich et al. (Ed.): History of the city of Kempten . Verlag Tobias Dannheimer, Kempten 1989, ISBN 3-88881-011-6 , pp. 449-467.
  • Martina Steber: Politics for a “different modernity”. Kempten, Otto Merkt and “Home Care in the City” . In: Detlef Schmiechen-Ackermann , Steffi Kaltenborn (ed.): City history in the Nazi era. Case studies from Saxony-Anhalt and comparative perspectives . Lit, Münster u. a. 2005, ISBN 3-8258-8822-3 , pp. 92-108.
  • Martina Steber: Ethnic certainties. The order of the regional in Bavarian Swabia from the German Empire to the Nazi regime . Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht, Göttingen 2010, ISBN 978-3-525-36847-3 .
  • Albert Thurner: The Schwaben District Assembly and its predecessors from 1933 to 1962 . Wißner, Augsburg 1999, ISBN 3-89639-196-8 .
  • Alfred Weitnauer : Mayor Merkt. Life and achievement. Publishing house for home care in the Heimatbund Allgäu , Kempten (Allgäu) 1967.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ^ A b c Alfred Weitnauer: Mayor Merkt , pp. 7-10.
  2. ↑ a b Martina Steber: Ethnic certainties , p. 227f.
  3. ^ A b Alfred Weitnauer: Mayor Merkt , p. 56f.
  4. ^ Presentation of "Ekkehard" = Otto Merkt on the Algovia site
  5. ^ Helge Dvorak: Biographical Lexicon of the German Burschenschaft. Volume I: Politicians. Sub-Volume 4: M-Q. Winter, Heidelberg 2000, ISBN 3-8253-1118-X , p. 88.
  6. ^ Herbert Müller: Party or administrative supremacy? Pp. 49f., 252-254.
  7. ↑ Clemens Mennicken: "... but it's not an Allgäu". Home construction and home experience of Kempten soldiers in World War II . In: Andreas Wirsching (Ed.): National Socialism in Bavarian Swabia. Ostfildern 2004, pp. 31–55.
  8. ↑ Martina Steber: Politics for a “different modernity”. P. 96; see also Walter Jahn's map on the Allgäu Heimatbund website , which still shows the Merkt boundaries today.
  9. ^ EK Zelenka (= Erwin Kreuzer): Men as we need them. P. 44.
  10. ^ Herbert Müller: Kempten during the Weimar Republic. Pp. 409f., 427.
  11. ^ Herbert Müller: Kempten during the Weimar Republic. P. 411f.
  12. ^ Herbert Müller: Kempten during the Weimar Republic. Pp. 413, 423, 428.
  13. ^ Herbert Müller: Party or administrative supremacy? P. 33f.
  14. ↑ Martina Steber: Ethnic certainties. P. 228.
  15. ^ Albert Thurner: Der Bezirkstag Schwaben , p. 25f.
  16. ↑ Martina Steber: Ethnic certainties. P. 228.
  17. ^ Herbert Müller: Party or administrative supremacy? P. 250.
  18. ^ Herbert Müller: Party or administrative supremacy? P. 249f.
  19. ↑ Martina Steber: Politics for a “different modernity ”, p. 99f.
  20. ↑ Georg Hölzle: History of the South German Butter and Cheese Exchange e. V. (online) (PDF file; 107 kB).
  21. ^ Herbert Müller: Kempten during the Weimar Republic. P. 432.
  22. ^ Herbert Müller: Party or administrative supremacy? P. 251.
  23. ^ Herbert Müller: Kempten during the Weimar Republic. P. 429f.
  24. ↑ Martina Steber: Politics for a “different modernity” , p. 94, 100-105.
  25. ↑ Martina Steber: Ethnische Gewissheiten , pp. 227ff., 235ff., 257ff.
  26. ^ Thurner: Der Bezirkstag Schwaben , p. 30.
  27. ↑ Steber: Ethnische Gewissheiten , pp. 204ff., 219, 261ff.
  28. ↑ Martina Steber: Politics for a “different modernity” , p. 98ff.
  29. ^ Ortwin Domröse: The Nazi state in Bavaria from the seizure of power to the Röhm putsch. Diss. Munich 1974, pp. 190f.
  30. ↑ a b c Gernot Römer: "If resistance, then through noticing" In: Gernot Römer: There are always two possibilities. Fellow fighters, followers and opponents of Hitler using the example of Swabia. Wißner, Augsburg 2000, ISBN 3-89639-217-4 , pp. 93ff.
  31. ^ Müller: Party or administrative supremacy? Pp. 39f., 59, 326.
  32. ^ Herbert Müller: Party or administrative supremacy? Pp. 40f., 326.
  33. ^ Müller: Party or administrative supremacy? Pp. 41, 326 (footnote 27).
  34. ↑ EK Zelenka [= Erwin Kreuzer]: Men as we need them , p. 44. (Online) .
  35. ^ Müller: Party or administrative supremacy? Pp. 41f., 326f.
  36. ^ Albert Thurner: Der Bezirkstag Schwaben , S. 34ff.
  37. ^ Müller: Party or administrative supremacy? Pp. 42, 327.
  38. ^ Müller: Party or administrative supremacy? Pp. 42f., 327. The quote is reproduced by Müller from a copy of Brändle's letter in the Merkt estate.
  39. ^ Ortwin Domröse: The Nazi state in Bavaria from the seizure of power to the Röhm putsch. Diss., Munich 1974, p. 194.
  40. ^ Ortwin Domröse: The Nazi state in Bavaria from the seizure of power to the Röhm putsch. Diss., Munich 1974, p. 194.
  41. ^ Müller: Party or administrative supremacy? Pp. 42-45.
  42. ^ Müller: Party or administrative supremacy? P. 45.
  43. ^ Müller: Party or administrative rule? P. 268f.
  44. ↑ Steber: Ethnische Gewissheiten , pp. 322–328.
  45. ↑ Steber: Ethnische Gewissheiten , p. 347.
  46. ^ Müller: Party or administrative supremacy? P. 250; Steber: Politics for a “different modernity” , p. 99f.
  47. ↑ See Steber: Politics for a “different modernity” , p. 92; there also the quote from Merkt's speech.
  48. ↑ Quoted from Steber: Ethnische Gewissheiten , p. 326.
  49. ^ Herbert Müller: Party or administrative supremacy? P. 267.
  50. ^ Herbert Müller: Kempten in the Third Reich , p. 439ff.
  51. ↑ Klaus Schönhoven: Political Catholicism in Bavaria under the Nazi rule 1933–1945. In: Martin Broszat , Hartmut Mehringer (Hrsg.): Bavaria in the Nazi era. The parties KPD, SPD, BVP in persecution and resistance. Oldenbourg, Munich 1983, ISBN 3-486-42401-7 , p. 564.
  52. ^ Herbert Müller: The time after 1945. P. 459.
  53. ^ Albert Thurner: The district day of Swabia. P. 51.
  54. ^ Herbert Müller: The time after 1945. P. 449.
  55. ^ Herbert Müller: Party or administrative supremacy? P. 109f.
  56. ↑ Doris Pfister: Documentation on the history and culture of the Jews in Swabia, I.2: Archive guide . Augsburg: District of Swabia, p. 903. Online .
  57. ^ Herbert Müller: Party or administrative supremacy? Pp. 205, 231f.
  58. ^ Albert Thurner: The district day of Swabia. P. 122.
  59. ↑ Birgit Kata: Curtain up! 400 years of theater in Kempten. 1st edition. LIKIAS, Friedberg 2007, ISBN 3-9807628-8-2 , p. 34-38 .
  60. ↑ a b c d e f Gernot Römer: "If resistance, then through noticing" In: There are always two possibilities. Fellow fighters, followers and opponents of Hitler using the example of Swabia. Wißner, Augsburg 2000, ISBN 3-89639-217-4 , p. 96f.
  61. ↑ Gernot Römer: "If resistance, then through remark" In: There are always two possibilities. Fellow fighters, followers and opponents of Hitler using the example of Swabia. Wißner, Augsburg 2000, ISBN 3-89639-217-4 , p. 97.
  62. ↑ War diary of the town hall 1939 to 1943. In: Nachlass Merkt (Box IV / 17) , accessible in the Kempten town archive.
  63. ^ Albert Thurner: The district day. Schwaben, p. 70ff.
  64. ↑ Albert Thurner: Der Bezirkstag Schwaben , P. 70f. Thurner quotes the minutes of the 16th session of the Second District Assembly, December 2, 1930, p. 13.
  65. ↑ Albert Thurner: Der Bezirkstag Schwaben , p. 74. Thurner quoted from a contribution by Faltlhauser in the magazine for psychic hygiene , vol. 4 (1931), p. 135-146: To what extent can we psychiatrists based on our current knowledge recommend sterilization of mental abnormalities for eugenic reasons?
  66. ^ Albert Thurner: The district day of Swabia. P. 72f.
  67. ↑ Martina Steber: Ethnic certainties. P. 241.
  68. ^ Albert Thurner: The district day of Swabia. P. 34.
  69. ^ Albert Thurner: The district day of Swabia. Pp. 74-80.
  70. ^ Albert Thurner: The district day of Swabia. P. 94.
  71. ^ Albert Thurner: Der Bezirkstag Schwaben , S. 93ff.
  72. ^ Alfred Weitnauer: Mayor Merkt. P. 5f.
  73. ^ A b c Franz Rasso Böck: book review. In: Allgäu history friend. Kempten 2011, No. 111, pp. 241–244.
  74. ↑ Oded Heilbronner: The Catholic-Liberal Anti-Milieu in Southern Germany - Achilles Heel of German Catholicism (Southern Baden, Southern Württemberg, Bavarian Swabia). In: Joachim Kuropka (ed.): Limits of the Catholic milieu. Stability and endangerment of Catholic milieus in the final phase of the Weimar Republic and in the Nazi era. Aschendorff, Münster 2013, ISBN 978-3-402-13005-6 , pp. 65–128, here p. 85.
  75. ^ Franz-Rasso Böck : 125 years of Heimatverein Kempten. In: Allgäu history friend. Kempten 2009, No. 109, p. 14f.
personal data
SURNAME Notice, Otto
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Ekkehard
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German local politician and local researcher
DATE OF BIRTH July 26, 1877
PLACE OF BIRTH Kempten (Allgäu)
DATE OF DEATH March 23, 1951
Place of death Kempten (Allgäu)