And the Kaiser abdicates: The German Revolution November 1918-August 1919Bouton, S. Miles (Stephen Miles)
History
And the Kaiser abdicates: The German Revolution November 1918-August 1919
Bouton, S. Miles (Stephen Miles)
Germany -- History -- Revolution, 1918; Germany -- Politics and government
In their rejoicing at the revolution and the end of the war, the great
mass of the people forgot for the moment that they were living in a
conquered land. Those that did remember it were lulled into a feeling of
over-optimistic security by the recollection of President Wilson's
repeated declarations that the war was being waged against the German
governmental system and not against the German people, and by the
declaration in Secretary Lansing's note of the previous week that the
Allies had accepted the President's peace points with the exception of
the second.
The Soldiers' and Workmen's Councils held plenary sessions on Monday and
ratified the proceedings of Sunday. The spirit of the proceedings,
especially in the Soldiers' Council, was markedly moderate. Ledebour,
one of the most radical of the Independent Socialists, was all but
howled down when he tried to address the soldiers' meeting in the
Reichstag. Colin Ross, appealing for harmonious action by all factions
of Social-Democracy, was received with applause. The _Vollzugsrat_,
which was now in theory the supreme governing body of Germany, also took
charge of the affairs of Prussia and Berlin. Two Majority and two
Independent Socialists were appointed "people's commissioners" in
Berlin. It is worthy of note that all four of these men were Jews.
Almost exactly one per cent of the total population of Germany was made
up of Jews, but here, as in Russia, they played a part out of all
proportion to their numbers. In all the revolutionary governmental
bodies formed under the German Socialistic Republic it would be
difficult to find a single one in which they did not occupy from a
quarter to a half of all the seats, and they preponderated in many
places.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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