Hostname: page-component-cd9895bd7-mkpzs Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-12-26T04:09:57.839Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Political Role of the Peasantry in the Weimar Republic

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  05 August 2009

Werner T. Angress
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The English word “peasantry” today evokes visions of humble tillers of the soil who dwell in hovels which they share with their families, pigs, goats, and sheep. But translated into German, “peasantry” becomes Bauernschaft, a term which for at least a century and a half has carried an emotional connotation of professional pride. All agrarian producers, whether they cultivate a five-acre plot or a thousand acre estate, belong to the Bauernschaft which sets them off from the rest of the nation. Yet until the end of World War II very distinct class lines existed within the Bauernschaft and divided German farmers into roughly two groups, Gutsbesitzern—(proprietors of estates) and Bauern (peasants). To avoid confusion, “peasantry” will refer hereafter only to the latter, while “farmers” will apply to all German landowners.

Type
Research Article
Information
The Review of Politics , Volume 21 , Issue 3 , July 1959 , pp. 530 - 549
Copyright
Copyright © University of Notre Dame 1959

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

1 For the sake of simplification this division leaves out the 200,000 Grossbauern who owned more land than most of the peasants, but less than the owners of estates. The omission may be justified by the relatively small number of German Grossbauern.

2 Statistisches Jahrbuch für das Deutsche Reich, XLIX (Berlin, 1930),7, 23, 57Google Scholar.

3 Sering, Max, ed. Die deutsche Landwirtschaft, Berichte über Landwirtschaft, Neue Folge, Sonderheft 50 (Berlin, 1932), 237, 697Google Scholar.

4 Ibid., p. 238.

5 Skalweit, August, Agrarpolitik (Berlin and Leipzig, 1923), pp. 199–205Google Scholar.

6 Gerschenkron, Alexander, Bread and Democracy in Germany (Berkeley and Los Angeles, 1943), pp. 26–27Google Scholar; Sering, , Landwirtschaft, pp. 239, 929–931Google Scholar.

7 For the role of the Junkers in pre-war Germany see Gerschenkron, , op. cit., pp. 19–88, especially pp. 25–27, 73–75, 83Google Scholar. Reinhofer, Hugo, Geschichte des deutschen Bauernstandes (Graz-Leipzig, 1925), pp. 407–410Google Scholar, quotes the appeal of the Junker Rupprecht-Ransern which precipitated the founding of the Farmers' League and which contains the famous passage: “Wir mussen aufhoren zu klagen, wir mussen schreien!”

8 Gerschenkron, , op. cit., pp. 75–76Google Scholar.

9 Mattes, Wilhelm, Die bayerischen Bauernrdte (Stuttgart and Berlin, 1921), pp. 36–45Google Scholar.

10 Gerschenkron, , op. cit., pp. 75–76Google Scholar.

11 Sering, , Landwirtschaft, pp. 14–16Google Scholar.

12 Die Ursachen des deutschen Zusammenbruches im Jahre 1918. (Das Werk des Untersuchungsausschusses der deutschen Verjassungsgebenden Nationalversammlung und des deutschen Reichstages), 4. Reihe, Vol. V, 40, 102, 108–9; Vol. VI, 217, 220–1. (Hereafter cited as Ursachen,…).

13 Ibid., V, 145, 210. Rosenberg, Arthur, Die Entstehung und Geschichte der Weimarer Republik (Frankfurt/Main, 1955), p. 91Google Scholar.

14 Ursachen, V, 145. Sering, , Landwirtschaft, p. 16Google Scholar; Rosenberg, , op. cit., p. 91Google Scholar.

15 Ursachen, IV, 115, 125–6, 263–4.

16 Rosenberg, , op. cit., pp. 277–8Google Scholar.

17 For a brief account of Bavarian events see Zimmermann, Werner G., Bayern und das Reich (Munich, 1953), pp. 13–47Google Scholar.

18 Ursachen, IV, 125–9, 205, 307, and 262–4; VI, 133–4, 141–2, 238–241, 361; Eyck, Erich, Geschichte der Weimarer Republik, Vol. I. (Zürich and Stuttgart, 1956), 83Google Scholar. Mattes, , op. cit., pp. 52–3Google Scholar.

19 For a detailed study of the peasant councils see Mattes, op. cit. See also Zimmerman, , op. cit., pp. 15, 16 (n. 17), 22–30Google Scholar; Rosenberg, , op. cit., pp. 242–4Google Scholar; Ströbel, Heinrich, The German Revolution and After (New York, n. d.), pp. 154–5Google Scholar; Volkmann, E. O., Revolution ilber Deutschland (Oldenburg, 1930), pp. 41–3Google Scholar.

20 Mattes, , op. cit., pp. 209–10Google Scholar; Rosenberg, , op. cit., pp. 336, 341Google Scholar.

21 Maynard, John, The Russian Peasant and other Studies (London, 1947), p. 75Google Scholar.

22 Chamberlin, William H., The Russian Revolution 1917–1921, rev. ed. (New York, 1952), pp. 242–53Google Scholar.

23 Gerschenkron, , op. cit., pp. 93–4Google Scholar. Stolper, Gustav, Deutsche Wirtschaft 1870–1940 (Stuttgart, 1950), pp. 115–6Google Scholar. For a divergent view on the question of land hunger see Braun, Otto, Von Weimar zu Hitler (New York, 1940), pp. 65–66Google Scholar.

24 Gerschenkron, , op. cit., pp. 92–5Google Scholar; Conze, Werner, “Die Weimarer Republik,” Deutsche Geschichte in. Überblick, ein Handbuch, ed. by Rassow, Peter (Stuttgart, 1953), p. 630Google Scholar; Holt, John Bradshaw, German Agricultural Policy 1918–1934 (Chapel Hill, 1936), pp. 36–47, 81–8Google Scholar. Cf. Braun, , op. cit., pp. 51–66Google Scholar.

25 Maynard, , op. cit., p. 66Google Scholar.

26 Rosenberg, , op. cit., pp. 361, 381Google Scholar.

27 Conze, , op. cit., p. 634Google Scholar; Gerschenkron, , op. cit., pp. 95–6, 107–9Google Scholar; Skalweit, , op. cit., pp. 360–5Google Scholar; Sering, , Landwirtschaft, pp. 40–1, 49Google Scholar; Holt, , op. cit., pp. 72–9Google Scholar; Schlange-Schöningen, Hans, Am Tage danach (Hamburg, 1946), p. 45Google Scholar; Winnig, August, Das Reich als Republik 1918–1928 (Stuttgart-Berlin, 1928), p. 281Google Scholar.

28 Sering, , Landwirtschaft, pp. 60, 74–5, 88–96Google Scholar; Getzeny, Heinrich, “Was geht in unserem Bauemtum vor?” Hochland, XXVII (10, 1929), 14Google Scholar; Oppenheimer, Franz, “Grundprobleme der deutschen Landwirtschaft,” Krisis, ein politisches Manifest, ed. by Müller, Edgar (Weimar, 1932), pp. 162–3Google Scholar.

29 Sering, , Landwirtschaft, pp. 42–60Google Scholar; Sering, Max, Germany under the Dawes Plan (London, 1929), pp. 184–92Google Scholar; Bauer-Mengelberg, Käthe, Agrarpolitik in Theorie, Geschichte und aktueller Problematik (Leipzig-Berlin, 1931), pp. 181–2, 206–18Google Scholar; Getzeny, , op. cit., p. 19Google Scholar.

30 Getzeny, , op. cit., pp. 30–1Google Scholar; Sering, , Landwirtschaft, p. 55Google Scholar; Bargenhusen, Jan, “Grüner Tisch und Grünes Feld,” Die Weltbühne, XXVII/I (05 12, 1931), 689–92Google Scholar.

31 Schulthess' Europäischer Geschichtskalender, 1920, Part 1 (Munich 1924), pp. 23–4, 308Google Scholar.

32 Bargenhusen, Jan, “Die Grime Front,” Die Weltbühne, XXVT/I (12 31, 1929), 8–11Google Scholar. Gerschenkron, , op. cit., p. 105Google Scholar.

33 Bargenhusen, , “Die Grime Front,” Die Weltbuhne, XXVI/I (03 18, 1930), 420Google Scholar.

34 Herberle, Rudolph, From Democracy to Nazism (Baton Rouge, 1945), pp. 42–3, and 43–70Google Scholar, passim.

35 Bargenhusen, , “Die Grüne Front,” Die Weltbuhne, XXVI/I (03, 18, 1930), 421–3Google Scholar.

35 Ibid., pp. 422–3: cf. Holt, , op. cit., p. 98Google Scholar; Gerschenkron, , op. cit., p. 127Google Scholar.

37 Gerschenkron, , op. cit., pp. 113–24Google Scholar; Holt, , op. cit., pp. 107–10Google Scholar. Support of the peasants vis-a-vis the grain interests came from a parliamentary majority that ranged from the Social Democrats to the People's Party: see Holt, , op. cit., p. 108Google Scholar.

38 Gerschenkron, , op. cit., p. 117Google Scholar.

39 Holt, , op. cit., pp. 137–9Google Scholar. For a more detailed survey of agricultural indebtedness and forced sales see Sering, , Landwirtschaft, pp. 46–60Google Scholar. It should be noted that this indebtedness was the result of financial obligations which had been largely incurred after stabilization of the mark in 1923–1924; ibid., p. 49.

40 Luetgebrune, Walter, Neu-Preussens Bauernkrieg (Hamburg-Berlin-Leipzig, 1931), p. 13Google Scholar.

41 Literature on this subject is as plentiful as it is polemical, because a number of young German nationalist writers embraced the cause of the Landvolk movement. Apart from Luetgebrune's book (he was a well-known nationalist lawyer), the following accounts are informative: Günther, Albrecht Erich, “Die Schwarze Fahne,” Deutsches Volkstum, XII (05, 1930), 335–42Google Scholar; Hielscher, Friedrich, “Der Bauer steht auf,” Deutscher Aufstand, die Revolution des Nachkriegs, ed. by Hotzel, Curt (Stuttgart, 1934), pp. 211–17Google Scholar; Oertzen, Friedrich Wilhelm von, “Bomben in Holstein, der Grosse Landvolk Prozess,” Im Namen der Geschichte! Politische Prozesse der Nachkriegszeit (Hamburg, 1934), pp. 79–101Google Scholar; Schapke, Richard, Aufstand der Bauern (Leipzig, 1933)Google Scholar; Schimmelreiter, Jürgen, Unter der schwarzen Landvolkfahne; die Landvolkbewegung im Kampf für Deutschlands Befreiung (Munich, 1929)Google Scholar; Volck, Herbert, Rebellen um Ehre. Mein Kampf für die nationale Erhebung 1918–1933 (Gütersloh, 1932), pp. 301–466Google Scholar. In addition, Salomon's, Ernst vonDie Stadt (Berlin, 1932)Google Scholar and Der Fragebogen (Hamburg, 1951), pp. 220–259, passimGoogle Scholar; Bauern, Hans Fallada's, Bonzen und Bomben (Berlin, 1931)Google Scholar; and Uhse's, BodoSoldner und Soldat (Paris, 1935)Google Scholar, passim, although all written as novels, capture the atmosphere of the Landvolk movement admirably.

42 Hielscher, , op. cit., pp. 212–213Google Scholar; Luetgebrune, , op. cit., pp. 14–19, 27, 44–5Google Scholar; Schimmelreiter, , op. cit., pp. 4–12, 17–18Google Scholar.

43 Schapke, , op. cit., pp. 33–5Google Scholar; Luetgebrune, , op. cit., pp. 32–40Google Scholar.

44 Luetgebrune, , op. cit., p. 60Google Scholar; Kenstler, A. Georg, “Bauernnotwehr und Landvolkkampf,” Blut und Boden, I (01, 1931), 28Google Scholar.

45 Schapke, , op. cit., pp. £40–1, 81–8, 93–4, 100–103Google Scholar; Anon., “Unter der schwarzen Fahne Florian Geyers,” Blut und Boden, II (02, 1931), 66–8Google Scholar.

46 Oertzen, , op. cit., pp. 82–5Google Scholar; Salomon, Bruno von, “Bomben und Republik Schutzgesetz,” Blut und Boden, VIII (08, 1930), 358–61Google Scholar; Luetgebrune, , op. cit., pp. 192–3Google Scholar.

47 Sentiments such as these are expressed in most accounts that were written during this period. See especially the following: Günther, , op. cit., pp. 336–42Google Scholar; Hamkens, Wilhelm, “Das bündische Reich auf bäuerischem Grund,” Blut und Boden, II (02, 1931), 56–9Google Scholar; Kenstler, , op. cit., pp. 27–8Google Scholar; see also Salomon, Ernest von, Die Stadt, pp. 10–13, 46–7Google Scholar.

48 Heberle, , op. cit., pp. 48–53Google Scholar, and passim; Luetgebrune, , op. cit., p. 22Google Scholar, and passim; Schapke, , op. cit., pp. 108–15Google Scholar; Winnig, August, “Der Acker spricht!” Blut und Boden, VIII (08, 1930), 357–8Google Scholar.

49 Heberle, , op. cit., pp. 24–31, 40–1Google Scholar.

50 Luetgebrune, , op. cit., p. 20Google Scholar; Gerschenkron, , op. cit., p. 17Google Scholar; Schimmelreiter, , op. cit., pp. 24, 28Google Scholar; Abel, Theodore, Why Hitler came into Power (New York, 1938), pp. 291–4Google Scholar.

51 Schapke, , op. cit., pp. 64–6Google Scholar.

52 See for example Anon., “Landvolk in Not,” Das Tagebuch, X, Heft 5 (02 2, 1929), p. 192Google Scholar, which carries the motto “Wir mttssen schreien, schreien, schreien!” and which ends with this verse:

Das ist die ewige Not der Zeit,

Das ist die Zeit der ewigen Not,

Das ist die Not der ewigen Zeit

Das ist die ewige Zeit der Not!

53 Bracher, Karl Dietrich, Die Auflösung der Weimarer Republik, 2nd enl. ed. (Stuttgart, 1957), p. 207Google Scholar; Gerschenkron, , op. cit., pp. 134–5Google Scholar; Eyck, , op. cit., II, p. 323Google Scholar; Bargenhusen, , “Die Griine Front,” op. cit., XXVI/I, Nr. 7 (02 11, 1930), 232Google Scholar; ibid., March 18, 1930, 420–3; Bargenhusen, , “Grüner Tisch und griines Feld,” op. cit., XXVI/II, Nr. 52 (12 23, 1930), 957–9Google Scholar.

54 Schulthess', 1928, p. 71; Bargenhusen, , “Die Grüne Front,” op. cit., XXVI/I, Nr. 7 (02 11, 1930), 233–4Google Scholar. For additional indications of agrarian discontent see Schulthess', 1929, pp. 8, 13, 152, 162, 167.

55 Friedrich, Carl Joachim, “The Agricultural Basis of Emotional Nationalism,” Public Opinion Quarterly, I (04, 1937). 50–61CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Schulthess', 1929, p. 152. Minister for Food and Agriculture, Dietrich, stated in a broadcast on October 18, 1929, that the peasant organizations were opposed to the referendum (see ibid., p. 192). The outcome showed that even if Dietrich's information was correct, the rank and file of the peasantry seemed unaffected by the official attitude adopted by the farm organizations.

56 Gerschenkron, , op. cit., pp. 133–45Google Scholar; Bargenhusen, , “Die Griine Front,” op. cit., XXVI/I (04 1, 1930), 513–7Google Scholar.

57 Horkenbach, Cuno, Das Deutsche Reich von 1918 bis heute, Jahrgang 1931 (Berlin, n.d.), pp. 140, 143, 156, 277Google Scholar.

58 Sering, , Landwirtschaft, pp. 46–54Google Scholar; Oppenheimer, , op. cit., p. 162Google Scholar; Diez, Otto, “Bauernnot ist Volkes Not,” Zeitwende, VII (2nd part, 1931), 300–01Google Scholar; Gerschenkron, , op. cit., p. 149Google Scholar; Bauer-Mengelberg, , op. cit., pp. 210–11Google Scholar.

59 For more extensive information on Osthilfe legislation see Horkenbach, 1931, pp. 59, 113, 345–6, 354–5, 375; ibid., 1932, pp. 47, 102. Also Schlange-Schöningen, , op. cit., pp. 45–61Google Scholar; Bauer-Mengelberg, , op. cit., pp. 237–9Google Scholar; Holt, , op. cit., pp. 157–8, 161–2Google Scholar; Gerschenkron, , op. cit., pp. 150–1Google Scholar. Cf.von Braun, Magnus Freiherr, Von Ostpreussen bis Texas (Stollhamm, Oldbg., 1955), pp. 213–6Google Scholar.

60 Holt, , op. cit., pp. 157–9Google Scholar; Schlange-Schöningen, , op. cit., pp. 67–8, 69–73Google Scholar; Bracher, , op. cit., pp. 505, 511–22Google Scholar, passim; Stolper, , op. cit., p. 116Google Scholar; Braun, Magnus v., op. cit., pp. 219–224Google Scholar.

61 Schapke, , op. cit., pp. 90–1Google Scholar.

62 Ibid., p. 91 Bargenhusen, , “Grüner Tisch und grümes Feld,” op. cit., XXVI/II (12 23, 1930), 958Google Scholar.

63 A very comprehensive and recent account of these developments is in Bracher, , op. cit., pp. 309–22, esp. 310–11, 320–22; 324 (incl. notes 154, 155); 327–9, 331, 336, 348–53Google Scholar.

64 Ibid., pp. 353, 365, n.4; Bargenhusen, , “Die Grüne Front,” op. cit., XXVII/I (01 13, 1931), 46–9Google Scholar; Gerschenkron, , op. cit., p. 145Google Scholar.

65 Heiden, Konrad, Geschichte des Nationalsozialismus (Berlin, 1933), pp. 252–5Google Scholar; Oehme, Walter and Caro, Kurt, Kommt “Das Dritte Reich”? (Berlin, 1930), pp. 77–82Google Scholar; Schneider, Hermann, “Unser täglich Brot; Lebensfragen der deutschen Landwirtschaft,” Nationalsozialistische Bibliothek, XIX (Munich, 1930), 26–32Google Scholar; Holt, , op. cit., pp. 181–3, 185–8Google Scholar.

66 Loomis, Charles P. and Beegle, J. Allen, “The Spread of German Nazism in Rural Areas,” American Sociological Review, XI (12, 1946), 724–34CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Holt, , op. cit., pp. 179–81Google Scholar; Heberle, , op. cit., pp. 21–2Google Scholar, and passim; Gerschenkron, , op. cit., p. 146Google Scholar.

67 Growing support of the NSDAP by German farm groups in general manifested itself also in the Reichstag where delegates representing agricultural interests joined the “National Opposition” during the Brüning era. The Landbund also participated in the Harzburg Front demonstration in October 1931, and in the 1932 presidential election openly endorsed Hitler's candidacy. See Bracher, , op. cit., pp. 384–5, 387, 390, 394, 409, 413, 421, 469, 477Google Scholar; Horkenbach, 1931, p. 301; ibid., 1932, pp. 44, 61, 86.

68 Political behavior of the East Elbian estate owners during the last two years of the republic varied widely and thus defies exact analysis. Some joined the Nazis, others remained in the Nationalist Party (Bracher, , op. cit., p. 514)Google Scholar. It can be assumed, however, that unlike the peasantry most Junkers who went over to National Socialism did so in the expectation that power would fall eventually to them rather than to Hitler.

69 For the most recent comprehensive account see Bracher, , op. cit., pp. 511–26Google Scholar. Cf.Conze, , op. cit., p. 660Google Scholar, and Braun, Magnus von, op. cit., pp. 217–19Google Scholar, for a dissenting viewpoint

70 Holt, , op. cit., p. 180Google Scholar; Loomis, and Beegle, , op. cit., p. 732Google Scholar.

71 Bracher, , op. cit., pp. 645–56, esp. pp. 647–8Google Scholar.

72 Ibid., pp. 696–8, 703; Schulthess', 1933, pp. 11–14; Schlange-Schöningen, , op. cit., p. 81Google Scholar.

73 Bracher, , op. cit., pp. 706, 712, 718Google Scholar; Eyck, , op. cit., II, pp. 565–7, 576–8Google Scholar. Cf.Meissner, Otto, Staatssekretär unter Ebert-Hindenburg-Hitler (Hamburg, 1950), pp. 264–6Google Scholar; and von Braun, Magnus, op. cit., pp. 261–2Google Scholar.