Raphael Pacher

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Raphael Pacher around 1905

Raphael Pacher (* 21st July 1857 [Czech in Iserthal Řeky , today district of Semily / Bohemia ]; † 23. March 1936 in Vienna ) was a German nationalist politicians in Bohemia and Austria. He was elected Governor of German Bohemia , was a member of the Provisional National Assembly for German Austria from October 21, 1918 and, as State Secretary for Education, was practically the first Education and Education Minister of the Republic of Austria in the Renner I state government appointed on October 30, 1918 .

Life

Origin and studies

Raphael Pacher in the color of his fraternity in 1878

Raphael Pacher grew as the son of Kreishauptmann of Saaz on. After primary school he attended the Lesser Town German grammar school in Prague , where he became a member of the Pennal fraternity Quercus . He studied German and history from 1876 to 1881 at the Karl Ferdinand University in Prague. There he founded the Teutonia academic and technical fraternity with school friends (including Ludwig Ausserwinkler ) in 1876 , to which he remained connected until his death.

Professional activities

From 1880 Pacher worked as a journalist and was active as an editor and writer for various German national newspapers in Brno , Warnsdorf , Reichenberg and Vienna . From 1895 he was editor of the " Deutsche Zeitung " and then the " Ostdeutsche Rundschau " in Vienna.

Political activity

Pacher founded the "German Club" in Prague and the "German National Association" in Brno. From 1899 to 1913 he was a supporter of Georg von Schönerer's German national member of the Bohemian Landtag for constituency 86 ( Komotau - Preßnitz - Weipert ) for the "Free Germans". Pacher had a large German attitude and always saw himself as a “German irredentist ”.

Because of internal party conflicts (especially about the Los-von-Rom movement ), Pacher, Karl Hermann Wolf , Josef Herold and Anton Schalk separated from the Schönerer group in 1902 and founded the Freialldeutsche Vereinigung (actually Free Association of All-German Members of Parliament). In 1903 the name was changed to German Radical Party . By 1905, most of the members of the Schönerer group joined the German Radical Party.

From 1901 to 1918 Pacher was first a member of the Reichsrat for the Pan-German Party , then for the German Radical Party (electoral district Karlsbad -Komotau). His political activity is primarily determined by his commitment to the creation and self-government of a province of German Bohemia and thus for the administrative separation from the Czech ethnic group in Bohemia. From 1908 to 1918 Pacher was chairman of the "Bund der Deutschen in Böhmen", an economic protection association, and became a board member of the "German National Association" for Austria.

   Province of German Bohemia as part of German Austria

When it became clear in 1918 that the First World War would not end victoriously for Austria-Hungary , the politicians of old Austria , who were aiming for independence of their nationalities, intensified their efforts, which were largely announced in the Reichsrat in 1917. The Imperial and Royal Government in Vienna lost its remaining authority when it was unable to propose a fair model for the modern organization of the kingdoms and countries represented in the Imperial Council, mainly because of the conflicting interests between Slavs and Germans . On September 26, 1918, Kk Prime Minister Max Hussarek von Heinlein failed with his offer to grant the Czechs extensive autonomy, as the Czech National Council in Paris had prepared the separation of the Bohemian countries from Austria and agreed with Austria's opponents.

When the Czech preparations for founding their own state took on more concrete forms, Pacher and the Social Democrat Josef Seliger - where Josef Titta had previously failed with the German People's Council for Bohemia - succeeded in securing the members of the state parliament of all German parties in Bohemia on October 14, 1918 to unite in a coalition. This coalition decided on October 23 to set up a twelve-member committee to prepare for the constitution of the Republic of German Bohemia. Together with Seliger and Rudolf Lodgman von Auen, Pacher was a pioneering member of the committee. Events accelerated when the Czechoslovak Republic was proclaimed on October 28, 1918 and it was to be expected that the new Prague government would also lay claim to the German-populated peripheral areas with 3.2 million Germans.

The coalition of October 14th therefore proclaimed the Republic of German Bohemia based in Reichenberg on October 29, 1918 on the basis of the statements of the twelve-member committee . Raphael Pacher was appointed the first governor . It was planned to join German Bohemia to German Austria , whose members of the Reichsrat were constituted as the Provisional National Assembly on October 22, 1918 and appointed the Renner I state government with the Social Democrat Karl Renner from South Moravia as the first government of the new state on October 30, 1918 . Pacher was a member of this National Assembly and the government it established.

In German Bohemia, Pacher was faced with the task of swearing in officials in the new state, creating new offices, clarifying the catastrophic supply situation for the population as a result of the First World War and integrating those returning from the war. In addition, German troops should be raised, since the invasion of the Czechoslovak army into German Bohemia was to be expected; this took place on November 13th.

When Pacher took up his post as State Secretary for Education in Vienna on October 30, 1918, on November 5, 1918, he handed over the office of Governor of German Bohemia to Rudolf Lodgman von Auen, who was 20 years his junior and independent . The state concept of German Austria (with a federal state of German Bohemia) soon turned out to be unrealistic, as Czechoslovakia, supported by the war victor, saw no reason to agree to a division of the historical countries of the Bohemian Crown . The election of the Constituent National Assembly scheduled for February 16, 1919 could therefore not be held in the German areas of Bohemia, Moravia and Austrian Silesia . When this parliament met for the first time in Vienna, the Sudeten Germans demonstrated on March 4, 1919 on the same day , which was ignored by the war winners.

On March 15, 1919, the National Assembly in Vienna elected the Renner II state government , a red-black coalition government to which Pacher was no longer a member. Pacher kept his residence in Vienna and supported the German-Bohemian areas in a leading position in the Vienna “Aid Association for German Bohemia and the Sudetenland”. He also became president of the state-owned Austrian school book publisher .

Raphael Pacher died in 1936 and was buried in a grave of honor in Vienna's central cemetery.

In addition to Georg von Schönerer , Karl Hermann Wolf , Otto Steinwender and Arthur Stölzl, Pacher was counted among the leading figures of the German national movement in Austria.

Honors

Publications

  • German Bohemia, as it already exists by law, Reich election regulations and district division. 1918.

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Harald Bachmann: Adolf Bachmann. An Austrian historian and politician. Verlag Lerche, Munich 1962, p. 102.

literature

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Pacher, Raphael
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Bohemian-Austrian politician
DATE OF BIRTH July 21, 1857
PLACE OF BIRTH Iserthal , Bohemia
DATE OF DEATH March 23, 1936
Place of death Vienna