Steffen Heitmann

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Steffen Heitmann (born September 8, 1944 in Dresden ) is a German Protestant theologian, church lawyer and former politician. From 1990 to 2000 he was the Saxon Minister of Justice , he was a member of the Saxon State Parliament from 1994 to 2009. From 1991 until he left in 2015 he was a member of the CDU .

Life

Childhood and youth

Steffen Heitmann's father died in 1945 in Soviet captivity , his mother died in 1957. Heitmann grew up with his grandparents and graduated from high school in Dresden in 1963. He began training with the Protestant church administration.

Study and job

Heitmann studied theology and classical philology at the University of Leipzig from 1964 to 1969 , passed the state examination in theology and passed the second theological examination in 1972. 1971/73 he was parish vicar and pastor in the Protestant student community in Dresden.

This was followed by an apprenticeship in church law , which he completed in 1980 with the first and in 1981 with the second legal exam. From 1982 he headed the Dresden District Church Office as senior church councilor . When he was supposed to be called up for a reserve exercise of the NVA , he refused to use the weapon . He did not have to do alternative service as a construction soldier .

politics

Heitmann was during the revolution and peaceful revolution in the GDR legal adviser of Dresdner opposition group the Group of 20 . From April 1990 he headed a working group that drafted a constitution for the Free State of Saxony . This draft, presented in August 1990, the basis of the later constitution, is named Gohrischer draft after its place of origin .

In November 1990, Heitmann became Saxon State Minister of Justice in the Biedenkopf I cabinet and joined the CDU in December 1991. Since 1994 he was a member of the Saxon state parliament and represented the constituency of Dresden 2 .

In 1993, Heitmann was the preferred candidate for Helmut Kohl and the CDU for the office of Federal President for the upcoming election in May 1994 . After controversial statements - on the role of women, the Holocaust and foreigners - that were viewed by critics as ultra conservative or even reactionary , he decided not to run on November 25, 1993. The support required by the FDP in the Federal Assembly in 1994 was already uncertain.

The case also points to the potentially powerful impact of media. Surveys showed that only a minority in the population, Heitmann, expressed external views that many share. His concrete statements as such, without reference to Heitmann as a person, were approved by clear majorities (of 78%, 71% or 64% on the three topics, Allensbacher Archive, IfD survey 5086, 1993).

An interview with Heitmann in the Süddeutsche Zeitung on September 18, 1993 gave rise to discussions about Heitmann's political positions. In the interview, Heitmann said about the multicultural society : “I consider this term as a program to be wrong. A multicultural society cannot be prescribed, it can at best grow. "Regarding the nation, Heitmann said:" I am not afraid of the term, I am only afraid of its abuse. " Heitmann positioned himself on how to deal with the Nazi past :" The German post-war special role was yes, in a way, a continuation of the presumed special role of the Nazi era. That’s over. [...] I believe that the organized death of millions of Jews in gas chambers is actually unique - just as there are many historically unique occurrences. There are no repetitions in the story anyway. But I do not believe that a special role for Germany can be derived from this until the end of history. The time has come - the post-war period has finally come to an end with German unity - to classify this event. "In this context, Heitmann referred to taboos that he saw in the political culture of Germany:" The strange thing in the Federal Republic of Germany is that there are a few areas that are taboo. There is an intellectual state of debate which does not necessarily correspond to the feelings of the majority of the citizens, but which one cannot leave with impunity. And that includes the topic of foreigners. This includes the subject of Germany's past - the Nazi past. This includes the issue of women. I believe that these debates have to be broken up, even at the risk of being placed in certain corners in which one does not feel comfortable. "

From 1995 to 2010 Heitmann was co-editor of the weekly newspaper Rheinischer Merkur . From 2003 to 2010 he was President of the Cultural Foundation of the Free State of Saxony .

In 2000 there were allegations that Heitmann, as Minister of Justice, had intervened in ongoing proceedings for the benefit of party friends; After a complaint by the Saxon data protection officer and after letters of protest from a large number of judges, he resigned from the ministerial office, but rejected any guilt.

In the Saxon state election in 2009 , he did not run.

During the refugee crisis in Europe in 2015 , Heitmann wrote an open letter to Chancellor Angela Merkel at the end of November and resigned from the CDU in protest against her refugee policy. In the letter he blamed the Chancellor for an "uncontrolled flow of refugees" and declared: "I have never felt so strange in my country - not even in the GDR."

Private

Steffen Heitmann has been married to the sculptor Christine Heitmann (* 1937) since 1965 , the couple has two grown children. Since the mid-1970s, the couple held "cellar talks" with lectures and discussions in their own cellar. Christine Heitmann was a co-founder of the Dresden Sezession 89 female artists' association .

Publications

  • The revolution in the right track; Merit and weakness of the upheaval in the former GDR. Reuter + Klöckner, Dresden 1996.

Awards

literature

Web links

Commons : Steffen Heitmann  - Collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Manfred Agethen: Steffen Heitmann . In: History of the CDU. Konrad Adenauer Foundation .
  2. ↑ Good man from Dresden . In: Der Spiegel . No. 37 , 1993, pp. 21 ( online ).
  3. ↑ Constitution. In: slpb.de. Saxon State Center for Political Education , accessed December 20, 2019 .
  4. ↑ Right man, right time . In: Der Spiegel . No.  36 , 1993 ( online ).
  5. ^ National misfortune . In: Der Spiegel . No. 41 , 1993 ( online ).
  6. ↑ Professional - Steffen Heitmann . In: Der Spiegel . No. 22 , 1995, p. 236 ( online - May 29, 1995 ).
  7. ^ Heitmann is the new President of the Saxony Cultural Foundation
  8. ↑ Ulf Großmann is the new President of the Cultural Foundation
  9. ↑ Thilo Alexe: Heitmann and Iltgen end their political careers . In: Sächsische Zeitung , July 10, 2008 ( online for a fee , copy from Karl Nolle ).
  10. ↑ Sharp criticism of Merkel's refugee policy - Heitmann resigns from the CDU , report in the FAZ from December 2, 2015.
  11. ^ House group Christine and Steffen Heitmann, Dresden , exhibition Boheme and dictatorship in the GDR - groups, conflicts, quarters. 1970 to 1989 , German Historical Museum , 1997.
personal data
SURNAME Heitmann, Steffen
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Saxon politician (CDU); Member of the Bundestag and church lawyer
DATE OF BIRTH September 8, 1944
PLACE OF BIRTH Dresden