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Volkskammer
__NOTOC__ The Volkskammer (, ''People's Chamber'') was the unicameral legislature of the German Democratic Republic (colloquially known as East Germany). The Volkskammer was initially the lower house of a bicameral legislature. The upper house was the Chamber of States, or ''Länderkammer'', but in 1952 the states of East Germany were dissolved, and the Chamber was abolished in 1958. Constitutionally, the Volkskammer was the highest organ of state power in the GDR, and both constitutions vested it with great lawmaking powers. All other branches of government, including the judiciary, were responsible to it. By 1960, the chamber appointed the Council of the State, the Council of Ministers, and the National Defence Council. In practice, however, it was a pseudo-parliament that did little more than rubber-stamp decisions already made by the SED — always by unanimous consent — and listen to the General Secretary's speeches. Membership In October 1949 the ''Volksrat'' charged ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Käte Niederkirchner
Käte Niederkirchner (born Käte Appel or Käte Dienstbach: 30 January 1944 - 19 November 2019) was a German politician (Socialist Unity Party of Germany, SED / Party of Democratic Socialism (Germany), PDS) and Pediatrics, pediatrician. In 1967 she became the youngest member of the Volkskammer, East German parliament (''"Volkskammer"''). Her life was impacted by having been born with a famous aunt, the Communist Party of Germany, Communist German resistance to Nazism, resistance activist Käthe Niederkirchner who was killed by Schutzstaffel, Nazi paramilitaries at Ravensbrück concentration camp in 1944, and who was posthumously much celebrated by East Germany, East Germany's Socialist Unity Party of Germany#Central Committee, political leadership. Early life Käte Appel was born at Chelyabinsk, an industrial city east of Ural Mountains, the Urals. "Appel", the family name by which she was known to comrades, was her father's party pseudonym. Her father's name had been : ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gerald Götting
Gerald Götting (9 June 1923 – 19 May 2015) was a German politician and chairman of the East German Christian Democratic Union (CDU) from 1966 until 1989. He served as President of the (''Volkskammer'') from 1969 to 1976 and deputy chairman of the from 1960 to 1989. Life Götting was born in Nietleben, in the Prussian[...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Heinrich Homann
Heinrich Homann (6 March 1911 – 4 May 1994) was a communist politician and former Wehrmacht officer who held a number of offices in the German Democratic Republic. Biography Heinrich Homann was born the son of a shipping company director in Bremerhaven in 1905. He studied law at the universities of Tübingen, Jena, Göttingen, and Hamburg. In 1933 he joined the Nazi Party and the following year entered the military. He eventually rose to the rank of Major in the Heer and fought on the Eastern Front in World War II. In 1943 he was taken prisoner by the Soviets at the Battle of Stalingrad. During his time as a prisoner of war, Homann became a member of the anti-Nazi National Committee for a Free Germany. After the war, Homann returned to Soviet-occupied Germany and began his work in politics. He joined the National Democratic Party (NDPD), which largely represented former members of the Nazi Party and helped bind them to the state ideology of the German Democratic Republic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Johannes Dieckmann
Johannes Dieckmann (19 January 1893 – 22 February 1969) was a German journalist and politician who served as the 1st acting president of the parliament of East Germany from 1949 to 1969. Early life Dieckmann was born in Fischerhude in the Prussian Province of Hanover, the son of a Protestant pastor. He studied economics and philosophy at the universities of Berlin, where he joined the Verein Deutscher Studenten (VDSt), a German Studentenverbindung, Giessen, Göttingen and Freiburg. In 1916 he was recruited to the German Army and was severely injured in World War I, declared permanently ineligible. Nevertheless, he was later still mobilised to Italian campaign 1917. During the German Revolution in November 1918, he became chairman of a Soldiers' council. After the war, he joined the liberal German People's Party (DVP) and became a close associate of Gustav Stresemann in his election campaign.Article by Marc Zirlewagen in ''Biographisch-Bibliographisches Kirchenlexikon'' In ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Sabine Bergmann-Pohl
Sabine Bergmann-Pohl (née Schulz; ; born 20 April 1946) is a German doctor and politician. A member of the Christian Democratic Union of Germany (CDU), she was president of the People's Chamber of East Germany from April to October 1990. During this time, she was also the interim head of state of East Germany, holding both posts until the state's merger into West Germany in October. She was the youngest, first female and last head of state of East Germany. After the reunification of Germany, she served in the government of Chancellor Helmut Kohl, first as one of many Minister for Special Affairs appointed to provide representation for the last East German government in cabinet, then as Parliamentary State Secretary in the Ministry of Health for the remainder of Chancellor Kohl’s time in office. Early life and education She was born as Sabine Schulz in Eisenach, Thuringia. After leaving school in 1964, Bergmann-Pohl was initially not admitted to university and entered a two ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Ernst Goldenbaum
Ernst Goldenbaum (15 December 1898, Parchim, Mecklenburg-Schwerin – 13 March 1990) was an East German politician. Biography Goldenbaum was born in Parchim. During World War I he served in the military and he participated in the German November Revolution. In 1919 he joined the left-wing USPD and a few years later the Communist Party of Germany. From 1923 to 1925 he was a member of the city council of Parchim and from 1924 to 1932 he was a member of the Landtag of Mecklenburg-Schwerin. From 1932 to 1933 he was the editor of '' Volkswacht'', a communist newspaper. After the Nazis seized power he became a farmer and a member of the German resistance. In 1944 he was arrested and he spent the last year of the war in concentration camp Neuengamme. In 1945, he was one of very few who survived the sinking of the SS ''Cap Arcona'' which claimed over 4000 lives. After the war he joined the Socialist Unity Party (SED), but in 1948 he co-founded the communist-sponsored Democratic ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vincenz Müller
Vincenz Müller (5 November 1894 – 12 May 1961) was a military officer and general who served in the Imperial German army, the Wehrmacht of Nazi Germany, and after the war in the National People's Army of the (East) German Democratic Republic, where he was also a politician. Müller eventually became a member of the East German parliament, the ''Volkskammer'', and served as chief of staff of the National People's Army. Early career Müller was born in the Kingdom of Bavaria into a non-military family, being the son of a tanner. He completed high school at the Metten Abbey gymnasium and joined the Württemberg Army's pioneer force. As a lieutenant he spent much of World War I with the German military mission to the Ottoman Empire. He was wounded by a grenade fragment at Gallipoli, and was then transferred to Baghdad and the Persian Front, returning to Germany after contracting malaria and typhus. In 1917 he returned to Turkey as a tactics instructor for Turkish officers. Af ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
German Reunification
German reunification (german: link=no, Deutsche Wiedervereinigung) was the process of re-establishing Germany as a united and fully sovereign state, which took place between 2 May 1989 and 15 March 1991. The day of 3 October 1990 when the German Reunification Treaty entered into force dissolving the German Democratic Republic (GDR; german: link=no, Deutsche Demokratische Republik, DDR, or East Germany) and integrating its recently re-established constituent federated states into the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: link=no, Bundesrepublik Deutschland, BRD, or West Germany) to form present-day Germany, has been chosen as the customary ''German Unity Day'' () and has thereafter been celebrated each year from 1991 as a national holiday. East and West Berlin were united into a single city and eventually became the capital of reunited Germany. The East Germany's government led by the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) (a communist party) started to falter on 2 May 1 ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Reinhard Höppner
Reinhard Höppner (2 December 1948 – 9 June 2014) was a German politician (SPD) and writer. Höppner held a Dr. rer. nat. in mathematics. In 1990, in the first (and last) free election in the assembly's history, he was elected a member of the East German People's Chamber (''Volkskammer''), becoming the assembly's vice president. He became the 4th Minister President of Saxony-Anhalt in July 1994 when, his SPD (party) having failed to secure an outright majority, entered into a minority governing coalition with the Green party. This was controversial at the time because most had expected that the SPD, if denied an overall majority, would govern in coalition with the PDS, successor to the old East German ruling party: together the SPD and PDS would have had an overall majority. The so-called Magdeburg model for a minority SPD/Green coalition that excluded the PDS but nevertheless was tolerated (not voted down) by them was subsequently followed in other regional assemblies ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Christian Democratic Union (East Germany)
The Christian Democratic Union of Germany (german: Christlich-Demokratische Union Deutschlands, CDU) was an East German political party founded in 1945. It was part of the National Front with the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED) and a bloc party until 1989. It contested the free elections in 1990 as an arm of the West German Christian Democratic Union, into which it merged after German reunification later that same year. Party politics The CDU was originally very similar to its West German counterpart. Like the West German CDU, its support came mostly from devout middle class Christians. However, it was a little more left-leaning than the West German CDU. Its first chairman was Andreas Hermes, who had been a prominent member of the Centre Party during the Weimar Republic and a three-time minister. He fled to the West in 1946 and was replaced by Jakob Kaiser, another former Centre Party member and a leading member of the resistance movement during World War II. Ka ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Social Democratic Party In The GDR
The Social Democratic Party in the GDR (german: Sozialdemokratische Partei in der DDR) was a reconstituted Social Democratic Party existing during the final phase of East Germany. Slightly less than a year after its creation it merged with its West German counterpart to form the Social Democratic Party of Germany. History Foundation What became East Germany was traditionally the heartland for the SPD in united Germany. In 1946, the Soviet occupation authorities forced the eastern branch of the SPD to merge with the eastern branch of the Communist Party of Germany to form the Socialist Unity Party of Germany (SED). Within a short time, however, the few independent-minded members from the SPD side of the merger had been pushed out, and the SED became a full-fledged Communist party–essentially the KPD under a new name. A Eastern Bureau of the SPD continued to exist and was allowed to participate in the 1950 ''Volkskammer'' election, winning 6 seats. However, it was prevented ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Democratic Beginning
Democratic Beginning (german: Demokratischer Aufbruch) was an East German political movement and political party that was active during the Revolutions of 1989 and in the period leading up to the German reunification. While it was a relatively minor party, it took part in the first democratically elected government in East Germany in 1990, and is especially known because future Chancellor of Germany, Angela Merkel started her political career within the party. It was founded on 29 October 1989, based on existing politically active church groups. Founding members included Wolfgang Schnur, Friedrich Schorlemmer, Rainer Eppelmann, Günter Nooke and Thomas Welz. The organisation became a political party on December 16/17, 1989 in Leipzig. The party convention adopted a more conservative program than some of the founding members, like Schorlemmer, were willing to bear, so they left the party. Others, like Nooke, who left some time later, resented the growing cooperation with the Ch ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
