Rudolf Lebius

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Rudolf Lebius (born January 4, 1868 in Tilsit , † April 4, 1946 in Berlin ) was a German journalist , trade unionist and politician .

Live and act

Lebius was the son of a grain wholesaler. After graduating from high school, he studied dentistry, philology and law in Berlin . After the death of his father in 1892 he had to give up his studies. He initially worked as a traveling editor for several civil papers.

Known with the sons of Wilhelm Liebknecht , he joined the SPD and wrote a. for the party newspaper Vorwärts . As an editor of the Rheinisch-Westfälische Arbeiter-Zeitung , he was sentenced to two terms of imprisonment for defamatory articles, which he spent between February 22 and March 15, 1900 in the Dortmund District Court prison and between October 13, 1900 and January 12, 1901 in the Königliche Served the Münster penal institution. At the end of 1903 Lebius resigned from the SPD.

In 1904 he worked for the liberal Dresden Sunday newspaper Sachsenstimme and bought the paper. He was the sole publisher of the Sachsenstimme , which suffered from a chronic lack of money.

In 1905 Lebius had to discontinue his paper. As a member of right-wing associations, he now fought the SPD and left-wing unions. In 1907 the Vorwärts published an article entitled Is Lebius a man of honor? .

Due to the new popularity of his name, Lebius became chairman of the Yellow Labor Union in 1906 . In the meantime in possession of his inheritance, he lived in Berlin and published several short-lived magazines with a nationalist right-wing tendency.

In 1918 he founded a National Democratic Party, which stood up against the supremacy of big business, against the admission of Jews into the civil service and everything “un-German” and dissolved again in 1923.

The argument with Karl May

In early May 1904 he went to the well-known adventure writer Karl May and offered to advertise him if he would grant him a loan, but May refused. In September 1904 he threatened him with revelations on an anonymous postcard, but May did not react.

Between November 11 and December 25, 1904, several articles directed against May with an allusion to his previous convictions appeared in the Sachsenstimme . In a libel lawsuit initiated by May, which May won, Lebius was able to inspect the files on May's criminal record. In 1908 he published the brochure Karl May - a spoiler for German youth . In the magazine Bund and four leaflets, he defamed May with questionable information, including citing May's first wife Emma Pollmer , whom he had visited. In a private letter to the opera singer Selma vom Scheidt , he called May a "born criminal". Karl May subsequently filed more than two dozen lawsuits for insult and the like. a. that lasted until his death.

Lebius launched press articles that circulated that May was the leader of a band of robbers and that were reprinted by many newspapers. An insult by May because of the term "born criminal" was dismissed on April 12, 1910 before a jury in Berlin-Charlottenburg. The term “born criminal”, which Lebius had used in a private letter, is a scientific term , so the expression does not constitute an offense. May appealed the judgment.

Lebius has now published his most extensive work directed against May: The witnesses Karl May and Klara May - a contribution to the criminal history of our time . Lebius made extensive accusations against May and published incriminating court files. He focused on a conversation with May, in which he asked why May gave the impression that he had experienced his stories himself, whereupon the latter had developed a theory of two elements. The distribution of the writing was prohibited by a court order on December 13, 1910.

The decisive hearing took place on December 18, 1911 before the court in Berlin-Moabit. In the dramatic main hearing this time the court found that the designation “born criminal” was intended to insult, and Lebius was sentenced to a fine of 100 marks or, alternatively, twenty days' imprisonment for insulting.

Others

literature

  • Jürgen Seul: The Rudolf Lebius files. On the trail of a scandal journalist between the imperial era and the Third Reich. With a foreword by Prof. Dr. Albrecht Götz von Olenhusen. A biography. Bamberg / Radebeul 2019, ISBN 978-3-7802-0565-0 .
  • Jürgen Seul (ed.): Rudolf Lebius: Letters to Konrad Haenisch. From the life of a social democratic journalist. Contributions to Rudolf Lebius research. Volume 1. Verlag ePubli, Berlin 2018, ISBN 978-3-7467-2825-4 .
  • Jürgen Seul: Karl May and Rudolf Lebius: The Dresden Trials . Hansa-Verlag, Husum 2004, ISBN 3-920421-91-4 .
  • Rudolf Lebius: The witnesses Karl May and Klara May. A contribution to the criminal history of our time . Reprint of the Berlin-Charlottenburg 1910 edition, ISBN 3-87998-630-4 .
  • Frederik Hetmann: "Old Shatterhand, that's me" The life story of Karl May . Beltz Verlag, Weinheim and Basel 2000, ISBN 3-407-80872-0 .

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Lebius, Rudolf
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German journalist
DATE OF BIRTH January 4, 1868
PLACE OF BIRTH Tilsit
DATE OF DEATH April 4, 1946
Place of death Berlin