Permanent citizen representation

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The Permanent Citizens' Representation was a constitutional organ of the Free City of Frankfurt .

With Art. 45 of the constitution amendment act, the constitution of the Free City of Frankfurt of 1817, the previous citizens' college (also called 51er committee) was renamed into permanent citizens' representation or citizens' committee. As the name suggests, it consisted of 51 members. In 1821 it was expanded to 61 members.

All male citizens of Christian denomination had the right to vote. Jews were excluded from the right to vote, although many of them were also among the wealthy citizens. It was a matter of course at the time that there was no right to vote for women . Employees of the city and the Senate of the Free City of Frankfurt were not allowed to be elected . In order to limit the influence of large families, it was regulated that father, son, brother, father-in-law and sons-in-law were not allowed to be elected by members. The members were elected for life. Volunteering could only be refused in the event of illness or comparable reasons. From the age of 60 or after 5 years of membership, the members were allowed to resign from their mandate.

The election of new members was carried out by an electoral body consisting of 12 men. Six of them were elected by the Permanent Citizens' Representation, another six by those members of the Legislative Body who were not members of the Senate. During the election it was important to ensure that at least six legal scholars were members of the permanent citizen representation and that several members were elected from each of the three Christian denominations of the city.

At the head of the permanent citizens' representation stood the senior or director elected from among their number . At her side stood a civil consultant and a legal registrar . The permanent representation of the citizens was responsible for the control of income and expenditure as well as the municipal accounting. The auditing of the accounts was the responsibility of the Stadtrechnungs-Revisionscolleg , also called Neunerkolleg , consisting of nine representatives .

Seniors of the permanent citizen representation

Term of office Surname
1817-1819 Johann Georg Meyer
1819-1825 Samuel Gottlieb Finger
1825-1840 Ludwig Freiherr von Günderrode
1840-1852 Friedrich Alexander Bernus
1852-1858 Johann Martin Scharff
1858-1866 Carl August Meyer

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