State Committee

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Friedrich Ebert with representatives of the German states in the Reich Chancellery, exact date unknown

The State Committee was a body in the German Reich in 1919. It served as a representation of the member states in the transition period after the November Revolution of 1918/19. The actual body for this was the Federal Council . Since the fall of the monarchy, however , the Federal Council has been essentially inactive at the behest of the Council of People's Representatives . Since then, the forum of the state governments has been a state commission (26-30 January 1919) and a conference of states (1st February, 5-8 February).

The Weimar National Assembly addressed on 10 February 1919 a provisional constitutional order one: the law on the provisional imperial power . The State Committee appears in Paragraphs 2-4 and 6. The State Committee was involved in the legislative process.

The provisional constitutional order excluded the State Committee from deciding on the new Reich constitution. Still, he had great influence on the federalist elements in it. After August 11, 1919 there was, on the basis of the new Weimar Constitution , the Imperial Council .

Historical precursors and comparison to 1949

Plenipotentiaries of the Allied Governments in 1867

In the time of the revolutionary German Empire of 1848/49 there were plenipotentiaries for the state governments . They did not form an official body and did not appear in the Central Power Act , but were consulted by the Reich government from around the beginning of 1849. In the case of the Erfurt Union , both the Administrative Council and the provisional Princely College represented the member states.

When the North German Confederation was founded in 1866/67, the government representatives formed an informal body. Often referred to as "the allied governments". The draft constitution, which was submitted to the constituent Reichstag , came from this body . After the deliberations of the constituent Reichstag, the body adopted the amended draft constitution. Then the approval of the state parliaments was requested.

When the Basic Law of the Federal Republic of Germany was drafted in 1949, there was no comparable body of the federal states. However, the decision for a Parliamentary Council came from the Prime Minister's Conference. The state parliaments elected the members of the Parliamentary Council. The Basic Law later required ratification by the state parliaments.

composition

Paragraph 2 of the law mentions the sending of representatives of the member states to the State Committee. The law assumes that this only applies to those states in which there is already a government that has been set up by a freely elected parliament. However, for the other member states (the council republics ) there is a deadline of March 31, 1919.

Each member state had the right to one representative. One state sent further representatives for every million inhabitants. However, no state was allowed to provide more than a third of all representatives. There was also a regulation for German Austria .

The chairman of the State Committee was a member of the Reich government. Members of the State Committee had the right to speak in the National Assembly.

Duties and rights

The State Committee participated in the legislation of the Reich. In theory, a law could only become valid if both the National Assembly and the State Committee agreed. However, there were a few exceptions that severely restricted the power of the State Committee:

  • The future constitution was only adopted by the National Assembly (§ 4).
  • If the National Assembly and the State Committee did not agree on a law, the Reich President could bring about a referendum.
  • A bill by the Reich Government needed the approval of the State Committee. If they could not come to an agreement, they were allowed to submit their drafts to the National Assembly. That meant: The State Committee had its own right of initiative (it could introduce bills). Ultimately, however, he had no right of veto over government drafts.

In addition to imperial laws, the approval of the National Assembly and State Committee also required:

  • international treaties if they related to subjects of Reich legislation
  • Treaties with the League of Nations, should Germany already join a League of Nations

In the legal text (§ 4) it says:

The future imperial constitution is passed by the National Assembly. However, the territories of the Free States can only be changed with their consent.

The second sentence seems to refer to the National Assembly. According to Michael Kotulla, the territorial status could only be changed if the member states agreed. However, Huber does not mention this.

In the transitional period, the National Assembly passed several enabling laws. The State Committee was involved in two of these: the Emergency Act for Alsace-Lorraine Affairs and the Act on a Simplified Form of Legislation for the Purposes of the Transitional Economy (March and April 1919). According to these enabling laws, the Reich Government could issue statutory ordinances. However, the State Committee and a committee of the National Assembly had to agree.

Weimar Constitution

Reich Interior Minister Hugo Preuss from the DDP initially presented a very unified draft of the Reich constitution. Above all, the destruction of Prussia was close to his heart. He accepted the amendments proposed by the State Committee in the hope that the National Assembly would largely reverse them.

Although the approval of the State Committee was not necessary, the member states had a major influence on the Weimar Constitution. Their committees fought for a more federalist character of the Reich in the drafts of the Reich Minister of the Interior. They succeeded in enforcing a Reichsrat (with government representatives, but free mandate ) instead of a state house (with elected, free members of parliament) . In addition, the states were allowed to conclude their own international treaties, provided that they were approved by the authorities. Instead of the Reich, the states were responsible for the restructuring of the Reich territory.

The Reich Minister of the Interior, Hugo Preuss , had accepted the change requests, but expressed himself critically in the National Assembly. The required two-thirds majority (in the Reichstag and Reichsrat) would make future constitutional changes more difficult. He also wanted the empire to play a greater role in restructuring.

The majority socialists also demanded that a reorganization could take place without the consent of the state governments or constitutional amendments. A compromise was then reached, according to which a simple Reich law was sufficient if the state government was against it. In addition, the Constitutional Committee of the National Assembly ensured that the members of the Imperial Council were subject to the instructions of their governments. The only exception was for those Prussian members appointed by the provinces.

Comparison to the Federal Council and Reichsrat

The State Committee is an intermediate member in the development from the Empire to the Weimar Republic . In the most important points, however, it already resembles the later Reichsrat and, in some cases, today's Bundesrat.

The constitutions of the North German Confederation and the German Empire expressly stipulated the number of votes of the states in the Bundesrat. For the State Committee, on the other hand, a new form of distribution was introduced: It was based on the number of inhabitants in millions, so that the number of representatives rose automatically when the population grew. This was continued in the Reichsrat and also in today's Bundesrat.

Like the Reichsrat, the State Committee knew a clausula antiborussica . This was a new method of limiting Prussia's superior power: in the State Committee to a third of all members, in the Reichsrat to two fifths.

The chairman of the old Federal Council was the Federal Chancellor or Reich Chancellor . In the State Committee and the Reichsrat the chairman only had to be a member of the Reich government. The right of state committee members to speak in the National Assembly corresponded to the regulations before 1918.

Overall, the power of the State Committee was less than that of the old Federal Council and the later Reichsrat. The old Federal Council was able to prevent all laws. The Reichsrat was also weaker than that, but a two-thirds majority in the Reichsrat was necessary for constitutional changes.

supporting documents

  1. ^ Ernst Rudolf Huber: German constitutional history since 1789. Volume V: World War, Revolution and Reich renewal: 1914-1919 . W. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart [u. a.] 1978, p. 1182.
  2. ^ So with Ernst Rudolf Huber: German Constitutional History since 1789. Volume V: World War, Revolution and Reich renewal: 1914-1919 . W. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart [u. a.] 1978, p. 1079.
  3. ^ Ernst Rudolf Huber: German constitutional history since 1789. Volume V: World War, Revolution and Reich renewal: 1914-1919 . W. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart [u. a.] 1978, p. 1079.
  4. ^ Michael Kotulla: German constitutional history. From the Old Reich to Weimar (1495–1934) . Springer, Berlin 2008, p. 583.
  5. ^ Ernst Rudolf Huber: German constitutional history since 1789. Volume V: World War, Revolution and Reich renewal: 1914-1919 . W. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart [u. a.] 1978, pp. 1182-1184.
  6. ^ Ernst Rudolf Huber: German constitutional history since 1789. Volume V: World War, Revolution and Reich renewal: 1914-1919 . W. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart [u. a.] 1978, pp. 1184/1185.
  7. ^ Ernst Rudolf Huber: German constitutional history since 1789. Volume V: World War, Revolution and Reich renewal: 1914-1919 . W. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart [u. a.] 1978, pp. 1196/1197.
  8. ^ Ernst Rudolf Huber: German constitutional history since 1789. Volume V: World War, Revolution and Reich renewal: 1914-1919 . W. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart [u. a.] 1978, p. 1194.
  9. ↑ See Ernst Rudolf Huber: German Constitutional History since 1789. Volume V: World War, Revolution and Renewal of the Reich: 1914–1919 . W. Kohlhammer, Stuttgart [u. a.] 1978, p. 1194.