People's State

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Postage stamp of the People's State of Bavaria 1918

People's state is a Germanized name for democracy . It was mainly used in the first half of the 20th century.

designation

The word people's state was initially used in the 19th century for any form of government in which “governmental power essentially comes from the people ”, i.e. synonymous with democracy. At the same time the expression Freistaat emerged as a German synonym for republic . Later the term “people's state” was used by the left and sometimes by the right spectrum of the democracy movement for their own goals. In 1915 Hugo Preuss contrasted the traditional governmental state with the people's state as a unity of state and people . In 1917 Friedrich Naumann saw the "German People's State " as the counterpart to the "Bureaucratic State " and as an expression of the "Parliamentary Regiment".

use

The organ of the Social Democratic Workers' Party published by Wilhelm Liebknecht between 1869 and 1876 was entitled Der Volksstaat .

The official names for some member states of the German Reich after the First World War contain the component Volksstaat , including the Volksstaat Hessen (1918–1945), the Volksstaat Württemberg (1918–1933) and the Volksstaat Reuss (1919–1920). Under Kurt Eisner's government in 1918/19, the official name of the state in Bavaria was "Free People's State of Bavaria".

Wilhelm Hoegner (1887–1980, SPD) suggested the use of the term when formulating the Constitution of the Free State of Bavaria in 1946. Since then it has been found in Article 2, Paragraph 1 with the following wording: “Bavaria is a people's state. The people are the bearers of state authority. "

Individual evidence

  1. ^ Jacob and Wilhelm Grimm: German Dictionary , Volume 26, Leipzig 1854–1960, Sp. 498 ( online ).
  2. ^ A b Franz J. Bauer: People's State of Bavaria. In: Historical Lexicon of Bavaria . March 1, 2011, accessed March 8, 2012 .
  3. ^ Steffen Bruendel: Volksgemeinschaft or Volksstaat. The "Ideas of 1914" and the reorganization of Germany in the First World War . Berlin 2003, ISBN 3-05-003745-8 , p. 106.
  4. ^ Friedrich Naumann: On the way to the people's state. Reichstag speech of May 15, 1917. In: Ders .: Werke , Vol. 5: Daily political writings. Cologne / Opladen 1967, p. 576.
  5. ↑ Peter Claus Hartmann: Bavaria's way into the present. From tribal duchy to free state today . Regensburg 1989, ISBN 3-7917-1183-0 , p. 468.
  6. ↑ current Bavarian constitution