Robert Grimm

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Robert Grimm (ca.1930)

Robert Grimm (born April 16, 1881 in Wald ZH ; † March 8, 1958 in Bern ) was a social democratic Swiss politician and publicist. He was the driving force behind the national strike of 1918 and is considered one of the key figures in the Swiss labor movement.

biography

Listening record of a telephone conversation between Robert Grimm and Ernst Nobs on November 8, 1918

The working-class son and trained printer and typographer joined the Social Democratic Party of Switzerland (SPS) in 1899 . After completing his vocational qualification, he went on a craft tour of Europe and stayed in Berlin from 1905 to 1906. After returning to Switzerland, he was dismissed after a short time in two factories in Pruntrut and Bern because of his agitation. In 1909, Grimm became editor-in-chief of the Berner Tagwacht , which he made into the working class' fighting paper. Grimm represented the SP at congresses of the Second International . After its collapse as a result of the truce policy at the beginning of the First World War , he organized the international socialist congresses of Zimmerwald (1915) and Kiental (1916) in order to re-bundle the socialist forces of Europe. Grimm came up against the truce policy and advocated the continuation of the class struggle and anti-militarism by the workers in order to force the warring states to peace. During the First World War, Grimm's political position and international contacts made him one of the leading figures in the labor movement in Switzerland and Europe. He did not get along very well with Lenin , who lived in exile in Switzerland - he rejected his conviction that change in society was only possible through violence. Even so, he helped organize Lenin's trip to Petrograd in the sealed car . A week after Lenin he himself traveled to Russia and found that he could not exert any influence there. His failed attempt to bring about a peace solution in line with Zimmerwald's pacifism became known and had internal political consequences (the so-called Grimm-Hoffmann affair ).

In 1918, the last year of the war, the Olten Action Committee was founded on Grimm's initiative , and he became its president. In this role, Grimm was the driving force behind the organization of the state general strike from November 12th to 14th, 1918. On November 8th, 1918, in the run-up to the state general strike, telephone conversations between Robert Grimm and Ernst Nobs and other parties involved were bugged. The mass strike was excellence proletarian ordnance par for Grimm. Although the Olten Action Committee could not be proven to have had any Bolshevik influence or to plan an overthrow, Grimm and two of his colleagues were sentenced to six months in prison on charges of inciting mutiny. During this time, which he was serving at Blankenburg Castle , the official seat of the Obersimmental district in the municipality of Zweisimmen, he wrote his book “Switzerland in its class struggles”. What the state punished him for was rewarded by the workers: from 1911 to 1919 and from 1920 to 1955 the “class fighter” sat as a representative of the workers in the Swiss National Council . After the annexation of Austria , Grimm supported the proclamation of the Federal Council and the parliamentary groups regarding the neutrality of Switzerland.

The Military Court of Cassation rehabilitated him in 1943. Robert Grimm was head of the War Economics Office for Power and Heat during the Second World War .

Robert Grimm belonged to the Marxist center between the radical and the reformist wing within the SP . Under his influence, the SP also refused to join the Third International in 1920 , which resulted in the split-off of the revolutionary wing and the establishment of the Swiss Communist Party . As the author of the party program of 1935, he finally made social democracy fit for government by rejecting the proletarian dictatorship and affirming national defense.

Robert Grimm (1949)

With his politics, which always advocated a socialist alternative , Grimm played a key role in shaping the Swiss welfare state. "As a great speaker," says the historian Karl Lang, "he embodied the tribune in a positive sense." Perhaps that is precisely why he was never elected to the Federal Council.

Political offices

  • 1907–1909 Grand Councilor of Basel-Stadt (Cantonal Parliament)
  • 1909–1918 Bern City Council (city parliament)
  • 1910–1938 Bernese Grand Council (Cantonal Parliament)
  • 1918–1938 Bern municipal council (city government)
  • 1938–1946 first social democratic Bernese government councilor (cantonal government)
  • 1911–1919 National Council (for the Canton of Zurich)
  • 1920–1955 National Council (for the canton of Bern)
  • 1926 Vice President of the National Council
  • 1946 President of the National Council
  • 1911–1943 President of the SP of the Canton of Bern (member of the executive board until 1958)
  • 1915–1917 and 1919–1936 member of the management of SP Switzerland
  • 1936–1945 President of the Social Democratic Group

(Source: Historical Lexicon of Switzerland , see web link)

perception

From a right-wing perspective, Grimm was a red rag for a long time, and through his role in the national strike he was also incorporated into all kinds of conspiracy theories. It was alleged, for example, that Grimm had personally received instructions from Lenin (with whom he actually had a very tense relationship) for the national strike as the beginning of a communist revolution in Switzerland, which in turn was part of a world Jewish-Bolshevik conspiracy . Such legends appeared before the state strike and some of them persisted into the 1960s. They relied mainly on forged documents by the exiled Russian writer, translator and agent of the French government Serge Persky . When Grimm ran for the first time as President of the National Council in 1926, a massive boom began from right-wing circles. From the mid-30s, however, the view of Grimm improved in parts of the right. In the canton of Bern it was the farmers ', trade and citizens' party that spoke out in favor of an end to the purely bourgeois cantonal government, for fear of an oppositional alliance made up of the strengthened social democracy and breakaway agricultural circles. This enabled Grimm to be elected as the first social democratic councilor in the canton of Bern in 1938. In 1946, Grimm became President of the National Council after all, also with the votes of many right-wingers. It was not until 2018 that Christoph Blocher, in the run-up to the 100th anniversary of the national strike, revisited the old legends about the “communist” revolutionary Grimm and attributed to him a leading role in the Russian revolution and the intention to reshape Switzerland according to the Soviet model.

Fonts (selection)

  • Revolution and mass action . Published by the management of the Social Democratic Party of Switzerland, Bern 1919 [1] , accessed on November 16, 2018, pdf 4.65 MB
  • The state strike trial against the members of the Olten Action Committee before Military Court III from March 12 to April 9, 1919. With a foreword by Robert Grimm. 2 vols. Union Printing House, Bern 1919.
  • History of Switzerland in its class struggles. Union printing house, Bern 1920; Reprint: Limmat-Verlag , Zurich 1976, ISBN 3-85791-003-8 .
  • Education and class struggle. Publishing house of the Swiss Workers' Education Committee, Bern 1921.
  • History of socialist ideas in Switzerland. Oprecht & Helbling, Zurich 1931; Reprint: Limmat-Verlag, Zurich 1978, ISBN 3-85791-012-7 .
  • Our struggle against reaction and fronts: Party congress speech given by Comrade Robert Grimm on October 22, 1933 . Bern: Social Democratic Party of the Canton of Bern 1933.

literature

Web links

Commons : Robert Grimm  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Movie

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Lenin's train. The Russian Revolution and Switzerland. Theme day 2017 on the portal of the University of Bern .
  2. ↑ Failed world revolutionary - how Robert Grimm stumbled upon secret diplomacy. In: Aargauer Zeitung . April 9, 2017.
  3. ^ State strike / general strike, 1918 (dossier). PTT archive, accessed August 25, 2018 .
  4. ^ Federal Council (Switzerland) : Proclamation of the Federal Council and the parliamentary groups regarding neutrality. Swiss National Sound Archives , March 21, 1938, accessed on October 26, 2019 .
  5. ^ Proclamation of the Federal Council and the parliamentary groups regarding neutrality. In: Stenographic Bulletin of the Federal Assembly. National Council (Switzerland), March 21, 1938, accessed October 26, 2019 .
  6. ^ Project of general instructions after the revolution in Switzerland. Swiss National Library .
  7. ↑ Brother Grimm. In: Tages-Anzeiger . December 15, 2017 (archived on the website for the 100th anniversary of the state strike in 1918; PDF; 923 kB).
  8. ↑ Christoph Blocher : Robert Grimm. Civil fright and civil warrior. In: Weltwoche . 22nd January 2018.
  9. ^ Christoph Blocher: 100 years of the general strike. Thanks to the population, authorities and soldiers. Christoph Blocher's website (PDF; 9.1 MB).
  10. ↑ Helene Arnet: How Christoph Blocher writes history. In: Tages-Anzeiger. January 3, 2018.
  11. ^ Website of the Robert Grimm Society
  12. ↑ Linus Schöpfer: «He sloppy». In: Tages-Anzeiger. 5th January 2018.
  13. ↑ Pirmin Meier : Politician of the century Robert Grimm: Who was the important social democrat? In: Switzerland at the weekend . January 7, 2018.
  14. ^ Georg Kreis : Campaign against the left. In: TagesWoche . January 13, 2018.
  15. ↑ Blocher annoys Robert Grimm experts. In: züriost. January 11, 2018.
personal data
SURNAME Grimm, Robert
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Swiss politician and publicist
DATE OF BIRTH April 16, 1881
PLACE OF BIRTH Forest ZH
DATE OF DEATH March 8, 1958
Place of death Bern