"'The Lokal Anzeiger' has several times failed to appear, as the result of repeated efforts of the Spartacus gang to seize it. Careful burghers chain up the house doors, and it would be well if the steadier elements of our workmen and soldiers would chain up the door of their hearts against the murderous and suicidal ideas of the Spartacus gang." The Spartacides made a practice of terrorizing German newspapers into supporting them. In the early part of 1919, they tried to prevent the Constituent Assembly from coming together, and later on engineered many a revolt in the various cities of Germany. Since their leaders, the fiery Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg, were assassinated, the orderly elements of the German people have succeeded more and more in weakening the power and influence of the Spartacans. Kurt Eisner, of Bavaria, after the overthrow of the German Imperial Government, sought to establish a federation of German republics under the head of Bavaria. It was not very long before the first step was taken, Bavaria declaring itself a republic independent of the Berlin Government. After the assassination of Eisner, Bavaria, and especially its capital, Munich, came more and more under the control of the extreme radical group of Socialists known as the Communists. About the end of March, 1919, Bela Kun, the Foreign Minister of the newly established Communist Government of Hungary and one of the most active propagandists of Russian Bolshevism, arrived at Munich to confer with the leaders of the Bavarian Government. Shortly afterwards, in the early part of April, a Soviet Republic was proclaimed at Munich. The socialization of industry began. That part of the press that favored the new regime was upheld by the Government, which suppressed unfriendly organs. Members of the Christian Textile Workers' Association were forced, on pain of being deprived of work, to join the Social-Democratic Union. Various other measures of "freedom, equality, and justice" were also bestowed upon the people, and the hope was expressed by the Red Socialists of Munich that the proclamation of a Bavarian Soviet would have its effect throughout Germany and result in a world revolution. Towards the middle of April, 1919, press dispatches stated that the Munich Communists had elected a council, consisting of five workmen and five soldiers, with Herr Klatz, a bricklayer, as president; that the police was disarmed; that eleven hostages were taken from the ranks of the trade-union leaders; that revolutionary tribunals were established at Munich, where twenty-eight judges continued, in relays of seven, to pass sentences day and night, and, finally, that a decree was issued by the Communist government confiscating all dwellings.