Reichstag election May 1924
The Reichstag election of May 4, 1924 was the election for the 2nd German Reichstag of the Weimar Republic . It ended with a weakening of the moderate bourgeois forces and the SPD and a strengthening of the anti-republic right and the KPD .
Background and election campaign
The parties on the right and left, which opposed the parliamentary-representative republic with opposing motives for different reasons and were temporarily banned during the crisis of 1923, entered the election campaign with radical slogans. Within the KPD, after the failure of the German October after heavy fighting, the left-wing revolutionary wing, oriented towards the guidelines of the Comintern , prevailed.
The NSDAP remained banned, and as a result of the imprisonment of Adolf Hitler after the failed Hitler putsch, it was also leaderless. Parts of their supporters allied themselves with the Deutschvölkische Freedom Party - originally a split from the DNVP.
The DNVP itself took on the bourgeois losers of the inflationary period in the election campaign . At the same time, the party could also hope to benefit from the internal party conflicts in the German People's Party . In this a national liberal association had formed, behind which the industrialist Hugo Stinnes was largely responsible , but who died soon afterwards. The members of this group, including Albert Vögler , were excluded from the DVP and in turn called for the election of the DNVP. The DVP itself claimed the leadership of the state for the bourgeoisie, but also kept the possibility of a grand coalition with the SPD open.
The latter found itself in a deep internal party crisis. The Saxon conflict played an important role in this. In Saxony, Max Heldt had headed a coalition with the DDP and the DVP since January 4, 1924 . This met with considerable resistance from parts of the SPD in Saxony. The dispute in the Free State of Saxony ultimately corresponded to the line of conflict at the Reich level. Part of the SPD around Otto Wels advocated a coalition with bourgeois parties. The left wing around Paul Levi, on the other hand, saw the role of the SPD in a consistent opposition policy .
The background to the election includes the peak of inflation and the stabilization through the Rentenmark, which is also associated with social hardship . However, the associated political excitement was already subsiding. If the election had taken place in the summer or autumn of 1923, the success of the extreme parties would probably have been a lot clearer. Another important aspect for the election was the publication of the Dawes Plan to regulate German reparations as a result of the First World War . The Reich government under Wilhelm Marx of the Center Party formulated in its election call that, despite the great sacrifice, military force - meaning the occupation of the Ruhr - would be replaced by economic reason. The opposition Social Democrats agreed to this in principle. The attitude of the extreme right and the KPD is completely different. The Pan-German Association as argued in this context for a nationalist dictatorship. The DNVP called the plan the "second Versailles ". The KPD struck the same tenor, which also spoke of the "enslavement of the German proletariat ".
This Reichstag election was, after the Reichstag election in 1920, the second in which the Bavarian People's Party independently ran the German Center Party and, with the state election in Bavaria in 1924, this was the only election in which the Center Party put up a rival candidate in Bavaria against its sister party.
Result
The Reichstag election of May 4, 1924, ended with a significant gain in votes for the extreme right and a severe defeat for the moderate left. The DNVP was able to increase its number of votes by 1.4 million compared to the Reichstag election of 1920. Their share of the vote rose from 15.1% to 19.5%. The party thus rose to become the strongest force among the bourgeois parties and was the second strongest party overall after the SPD. The German Volkische Freiheitspartei received 1.9 million votes, which corresponded to a share of 6.5%. A considerable part of the electorate had voted for the DNVP in 1920. Overall, a quarter of voters voted for explicitly anti-republican rights.
The gains of the extreme right were combined with substantial losses for the moderate bourgeois parties. The German People's Party lost 4.7% and the German Democratic Party fell 2.8%.
The Catholic parties Zentrum (−0.2%) and Bavarian People's Party (−1.3%) proved to be comparatively stable .
The fact that bourgeois interest and splinter parties together received 8.5% of the vote and 2.5 million voters suggests that the established bourgeois parties are becoming less binding. Compared to 1920, 1.56 million more voted for these parties. The most important of these parties was the Economic Party .
The DDP and DVP have lost voters in favor of the DNVP, the Völkische and the interest parties.
Retailers , artisans and farmers in particular criticized the fact that after 1918 the republic had primarily advocated consumer interests and pursued a policy that was hostile to SMEs . The middle class, savers and mortgage holders blamed the state for the devaluation of their wealth. The turn to the DNVP and the interest parties of significant sections of the bourgeoisie meant a permanent departure from the bourgeois parties that supported the republic.
Two tendencies can be observed on the political left. First, the divided Marxist parties - that is, above all the SPD, USPD and KPD together - lost approval compared to 1920. A total of 2 million voters turned their backs on the left compared to 1920. Second, within the remaining left-wing electorate, the SPD was weakening in favor of the KPD. At first glance, the SPD's losses appear small. It lost only 1.7% of the votes compared to 1920 and was now 20.5%. At second glance, however, this meant that the SPD, which a large part of the USPD had joined in 1922, could hardly retain its voters. The remaining USPD itself, which had received over 17% in the last election for the first Reichstag of the Weimar Republic, lost all remaining Reichstag mandates in this election with a result of only 0.8%. Even the Socialist Bund founded by its former chairman Georg Ledebour as a split-off from the USPD a few months earlier after an intra-party conflict over the stance on the occupation of the Ruhr was unsuccessful with 0.09%. Against this background, the number of SPD seats in the Reichstag fell from 171 (including those elected from the USPD to the SPD in 1922) to 100. The result was a catastrophe for the SPD. For the remaining USPD, which was still relatively influential until 1920/21, it meant final insignificance.
The majority of the USPD voters migrated to the KPD, which in 1920 was still a splinter party. The KPD increased by almost 11% and now came to 12.6%. This was the first time that the KPD was a large mass party. In the Reichstag, the communist faction grew from 17 to 62 seats.
In addition to the change within the left from the moderate SPD to the KPD, there has probably also been a not inconsiderable migration of voters from the left-wing parties to the right. This applies, for example, to farm workers in East Elbe , who increasingly voted for DNVP. In areas in Franconia characterized by the textile industry , there was even a change from the USPD to the Völkische. The left lost in favor of the right, especially where it had barely gained a foothold before 1914 and there was no firmly established left milieu .
Results
Political party | Votes (absolute) | Votes (in percent) | Change in percentage points | Sit in the Reichstag | modification |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) | 6,008,905 | 20.5% | −1.2% | 100 | −13 |
German National People's Party (DNVP) | 5,696,475 | 19.5% | + 5.1% | 95 | +29 |
German Center Party (Center) | 3,914,379 | 13.4% | −0.2% | 65 | −2 |
Communist Party of Germany - List of Communists (KPD) | 3,693,280 | 12.6% | + 10.9% | 62 | +60 |
German People's Party (DVP) | 2,694,381 | 9.2% | −4.7% | 45 | −17 |
National Socialist Freedom Party (NSFP) (United Lists of the German National Freedom Party (DVFP) and the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP)) |
1,918,329 | 6.6% | - | 32 | +32 |
German Democratic Party (DDP) | 1,655,129 | 5.7% | −2.8% | 28 | −17 |
Bavarian People's Party (BVP) | 946,648 | 3.2% | −1.3% | 16 | −4 |
Country List¹ | 574,939 | 2.0% | - | 10 | +10 |
Economic party of the German middle class | 500,820 | 1.7% | - | 7th | +7 |
German Social Party (DSP) | 333.427 | 1.1% | - | 4th | +4 |
German-Hanoverian Party (DHP) | 319,792 | 1.1% | −0.1% | 5 | ± 0 |
USPD | 236.142 | 0.8% | −16.8% | 0 | −84 |
Bavarian farmers' union | 192.786 | 0.7% | −0.1% | 3 | −1 |
National minorities of Germany , of which the Polish People's Party 0.4% | 132.916 | 0.5% | + 0.2% | 0 | ± 0 |
Others | 1.5% | 0 | ± 0 | ||
Total | 29,281,798 | 100.0% | 472 | +21 |
Note 1: The country list essentially consisted of the Württemberg farmers 'and winegrowers' association (0.8%), the Thuringian country association (0.5%), the Badischer Landbund , the Hessian farmers 'association and the Rhenish Hessian farmers' union , regional organizations of the Reichslandbund .
Parties with the highest number of votes by constituency (the percentage of the strongest party is given)
Government formation
The DNVP entered the negotiations for a new government with excessive demands. Reich President Friedrich Ebert then confirmed the government of Wilhelm Marx with unchanged personnel despite the departure of the BVP.
See also
- List of members of the Reichstag of the Weimar Republic (2nd electoral term)
- List of constituencies and constituency associations of the Weimar Republic
- Marx II cabinet
literature
- Gerhard A. Ritter (Hrsg.): History of the workers and the workers' movement in Germany since the end of the 18th century. Volume 9: Heinrich August Winkler: From Revolution to Stabilization. Workers and the labor movement in the Weimar Republic 1918 to 1924. Dietz, Berlin 1984, ISBN 3-8012-0093-0 .
- Heinrich August Winkler : Weimar 1918–1933. The history of the first German democracy. Revised edition. Beck, Munich 1998, ISBN 3-406-44037-1 .
- Ludger Grevelhörster: A short history of the Weimar Republic. 1918-1933. An overview of the problem history. 4th edition, special edition. Aschendorff, Münster 2003, ISBN 3-402-05363-2 ( Aschendorff Paperbacks ).
Web links
Individual evidence
- ↑ The German Empire. Reichstag election May 1924 Andreas Gonschior
- ↑ The German Empire. Reichstag election 1920/22 Andreas Gonschior