The Weimar Republic

War and Revolution in Germany

• German Generals knew they were losing– Asked Kaiser for peace

• Was all done in secret

• Soldiers stationed in Kiel mutinied– Suicidal attack

War and Revolution in Germany

• Formed a democracy– Thought Allies more

sympathetic– Asked Social

Democrats to form a republic

– Friedrich Ebert was the party leader

– All done in secret

War and Revolution in Germany

• Kaiser fled to Netherlands- Nov. 9th

• Paul Von Hindenburg, commander of German forces, and others who signed treaty called the “November Criminals”– Generals didn’t set record

straight• New government called

Weimar Republic• Imposition of the enemy

Spartacus Uprising

• 1919- Spartacus Uprising– By communists– General strike and occupy public buildings– Led by Karl Libeknecht and Rosa

Luxemburg – Ebert uses the Free Corps to put it down

• Ex-army soldiers who hated communists and loved violence

Setting Up Weimar GovernmentAugust 1914

• Reichstag- German parliament• President- chose among candidates• Members of Reichstag- choose a party

and party chooses members– Called proportional voting

• Majority Party in Reichstag chooses Chancellor, or Prime Minister

Setting Up Weimar Government

• Whenever there was controversy, could call for new election– 14 years- 20 different elections

Germany’s ConstitutionKaiser Wilhelm II

(hereditary monarch)

appoints

Government

Chancellor

Ministers

Calls/dismisses

Reichstag

(elected)

which can stop laws proposed by the government, but can’t make laws

controls

The Army

Electors

Men over 25 can vote

The Weimar Constitution of 1919Bill of Rights

promises all Germans equality before the law and political and

religious freedom

safeguards

Electors

All men and women over the age of 20 can vote

elect

Reichstag

(elected)

from which is selected

Freidrich Ebert

(elected President)

The ArmyGovernment

Chancellors and Ministers

must have a majority in the Reichstag and do as the Reichstag says

Weimar Constitution

• 56 articles that spelled out rights– Freedom press, speech, religion– Gave women right to vote and hold office– Many laws discriminated against gays and

Gypsies (Roma and Sinti)– Article 48- allowed the President to

suspend the Reichstag in times of national emergency

Weimar Constitution

• 109- All Germans equal in front of the law

• 111- All Germans enjoy the freedom to move and settle anywhere

• 118- Every German can express opinion freely in word, writing, print or image

The Weimar Government

• Jan. 1919- almost every eligible voter voted for parties that supported the republic.– They won less than half in every other

election

1920 Berlin Kapp Putsch

• First major attempt to overthrow Weimar Republic– Putsch- uprising

• Led by Wolfgang Kapp and General Walther Luttwitz

• President Ebert- fled the town and called on supporters to strike and bring transportation and commerce to a standstill.– Military refuses to fight

1920 Berlin Kapp Putsch

• Kapp and Luttwitz flee realizing they can’t overthrow government

• Ebert returns• Judges did not impose harsh punishments

on plotters• Lack of military support• Showed that the new government was weak

1920: Founding of the Nazi Party

• National Socialist German Workers Party

1920: Jazz in Germany

• Jazz is symbol of American culture– Paul Whiteman “The King of Jazz”– Rhapsody in Blue

• Nazi’s viewed it as a symbol of moral degeneration which embodied the Negro who created it and the Jew who promoted it.

Jungenbund der NSDAPMarch 1922

• Was the first Nazi Youth organization– Disbanded when Hitler

was in jail in 1923

• 1926 younger members were officially named the Hitler Youth (Jugend)

1922: Walter Rathenau Assassinated

• Allocated resources in WWI– Negotiated armistice– Was the foreign

minister– Was also a Jew

Reich Foreign Minister Walther Rathenau in his car, in which he was fatally wounded by a

gunman on June 24, 1922.

1923 France Invades the Ruhr• Germany is not paying reparations so

France and Belgium invades the Ruhr– Workers told workers to carry out passive

resistance and refuse to work– In 8 months shot 132 Germans, including a

7 yr. old boy– Expelled 150,000 from region

1923 France Invades the Ruhr• To meet economic crisis, Germany

prints unbacked currency

• World leaders lose confidence and pull money out of Germany

• Leads to massive hyperinflation

• Streseman, the new Chancellor, orders Rohr workers back to work and calls off strike

German Inflation• Huge inflation after the war• Hyperinflation

– Runaway prices– Brought an urgency to shopping– Workers demanded paid twice a day and

given one hour off– Germans blamed Jews for hyperinflation

• Believed they controlled the economy

• Really hurt people on fixed incomes

Berlin Riots on HyperinflationNov. 5 & 6 1923

• Mob of 30,000 people rioted in Berlin to protest misery brought on by hyperinflation

• Blamed their plight on Jews who mistakenly controlled the German economy and involved in international conspiracy to dominate the world economy

American Reaction

• American leaders played down the seriousness of the situation.– Did not want to call attention to themselves

by making it appeals on behalf of their German Jewish brethren

Munich Beer Hall PutschNov. 8, 1923

• Hitler leads a group of soldiers in a beer hall and tries to overthrow government

• Sentenced to 5 years, serves 9 months in Landsberg prison

• Could have been tried for treason– Austrian citizen, not deported

• Trial gives him a forum to speak

Hitler’s Trial• “In the case of a man whose thoughts and feelings

are as German as Hitler’s,

the court is of the opinion that the intent and purpose of the law have no application.”3– What if the judges had followed the law and deported Hitler? – Would people have protested the decision?– was Hitler so unknown and unimportant at the time that his

case was likely to be overlooked?

Mein Kampf

• Writes Mein Kampf (My Struggle)

• Goals of Mein Kampf– Loyalty to Germany– Racism, all other races inferior to Aryans– Lebensraum- living space in Poland and

Russia– Obedience to the Fuhrer

Quotes from Mein Kampf

• “The Jew has always been a people with definite racialcharacteristics and never a religion.”

• “[T]he personification of the devil as the symbol of all evil assumes the living shape of the Jew.”

Quotes from Mein Kampf

• “What we must fight for is to safeguard the existenceand reproduction of our race and our people, the sustenance of our children and the purity of our blood, the freedom and independence of the fatherland, so that our people may mature for the fulfillment of the mission allotted it by the creator of the universe.”

1924: Dawes Plan

• Allies negotiated loans to Germany and brought an end to hyperinflation– Introduced a period of stability

1924-1929 The Golden Age

• Gustav Stresemann becomes the foreign minister– Had been the

Chancellor in 1923

• Currency became stable

Politics in Weimar Germany

• 1925 Stresemann restores relations with France– Sign Locarno Pact- agree to never change the

border between them

• 1925- Ebert dies • Paul Von Hindenburg becomes 2nd President

– Could set record straight, but doesn’t

1926 - "Black Reichswehr" Investigation

• Critics of the military accuse them of funding and arming paramilitary groups, the so called “Black Reichswehr”

• This trial made it clear that funds and arms had gone to Anti-Republican groups– Even some generals were involved

Weimar Republic

• 1926- Germany joins League of Nations

• 1927- Kaiser Wilhelm Institute for Anthropology, Human Genetics, and Eugenics opens– Paved way for Eugenics movement

Politics in Weimar Germany

• 1928- Kellogg-Briand-Stresemann Pact– All nations signing it agree to settle

disagreements peacefully• 1928 Young Plan

– Lowered reparations and U.S. would continue loans

Election 1928

Politics in Weimar Germany

• 1929- Opening of All Quiet on the Western Front

• Why do Communists help Hitler destroy the Weimar Republic?

Politics in Weimar Germany

• 1929- Nazi’s Protest Opening of All Quiet on the Western Front

1929 US Stock Market Crash

• World Depression hits

• U.S. has to call back loans

• Unemployment increases – 978,000 in 1924– 5,109,000 in Oct. 31, 1932

• Many Germans feel a renewed sense of despair.

Election 1930

Politics in Weimar Germany

• 1930- Max Schmelling defeats Joe Lewis

• 1932- Unemployment reaches 5 million

1932 Elections

• Nazi Party receives 38% of the votes– Over 30 parties represented

1933 • Jan. 30, 1933- Hitler named last

Weimar Chancellor• 1933 elections- Nazi’s receive 44% of

the vote, the highest percentage ever won by their Party– Even though they have destroyed much of

the opposition– Social Democrats only ones to resist

.

1933

• Hitler passes the Enabling Act

– Permits government to decree laws without parliament.

Culture in Weimar

Metropolis by Otto Dix 1928