Johann Viktor Bredt (2 March 1879 – 1 December 1940) was a German jurist and politician. He served as Minister of Justice of the

Weimar Republic The Weimar Republic (german: link=no, Weimarer Republik ), officially named the German Reich, was the government of Germany from 1918 to 1933, during which it was a constitutional federal republic for the first time in history; hence it is al ...

in 1930/1.

Biography

Bredt was born in

Barmen Barmen is a former industrial metropolis of the region of Bergisches Land, Germany, which merged with four other towns in 1929 to form the city of Wuppertal. Barmen, together with the neighbouring town of Elberfeld founded the first electric ...

on 2 March 1879 as the only son of Viktor Richard Bredt (1849–81), an industrialist, and his wife, Henriette née Koll. He worked at the ''Barmer Bankverein'' in 1897/8 before studying jurisprudence and economics at Tübingen, Göttingen and Bonn. In 1901 he was awarded a doctorate (Dr. jur.) and in 1904 a Dr. phil.. In 1909 he became a professor at Marburg. Bredt worked in the civil service in 1903-09 and in 1910 was appointed to a professorship for jurisprudence at Marburg university. Johann married twice: in 1902 Ada Bredt (divorced in 1912) at Barmen and in 1931 Olga Bredt (at Marburg).

Political career

In 1911–8, and again from 1921-4 Bredt was a member of the lower chamber of the

Landtag of Prussia The Landtag of Prussia (german: Preußischer Landtag) was the representative assembly of the Kingdom of Prussia implemented in 1849, a bicameral legislature consisting of the upper House of Lords (''Herrenhaus'') and the lower House of Representat ...

, first for the

Free Conservative Party The Free Conservative Party (german: Freikonservative Partei, FKP) was a liberal-conservative political party in Prussia and the German Empire which emerged from the Prussian Conservative Party in the Prussian Landtag in 1866. In the federal ele ...

in the

Kingdom of Prussia The Kingdom of Prussia (german: Königreich Preußen, ) was a German kingdom that constituted the state of Prussia between 1701 and 1918.Marriott, J. A. R., and Charles Grant Robertson. ''The Evolution of Prussia, the Making of an Empire''. Re ...

, then in the

Free State of Prussia The Free State of Prussia (german: Freistaat Preußen, ) was one of the constituent states of Germany from 1918 to 1947. The successor to the Kingdom of Prussia after the defeat of the German Empire in World War I, it continued to be the domin ...

. From 1924 to 1932, he was the parliamentary leader of the

Reich Party of the German Middle Class The Reich Party of the German Middle Class (german: Reichspartei des deutschen Mittelstandes), known from 1920 to 1925 as the Economic Party of the German Middle Classes (german: Wirtschaftspartei des deutschen Mittelstandes), was a conservative G ...

(which he had co-founded) in the Reichstag. He also held various honorary and political positions on a local (Marburg) and regional (Hesse-Nassau) level. In 1926, Bredt was an expert witness for the parliamentary committee on the causes of the German collapse in 1918. In 1930/1, he served as Minister of Justice in the first cabinet of

Heinrich Brüning Heinrich Aloysius Maria Elisabeth Brüning (; 26 November 1885 – 30 March 1970) was a German Centre Party politician and academic, who served as the chancellor of Germany during the Weimar Republic from 1930 to 1932. A political scienti ...

. Bredt also played a key role in the German

reformed church Calvinism (also called the Reformed Tradition, Reformed Protestantism, Reformed Christianity, or simply Reformed) is a major branch of Protestantism that follows the theological tradition and forms of Christian practice set down by John Cal ...

. In 1925, he was awarded an honorary doctorate in theology ''Dr. theol. h. c.'' by the

University of Bonn The Rhenish Friedrich Wilhelm University of Bonn (german: Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn) is a public research university located in Bonn, North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It was founded in its present form as the ( en, Rhine U ...

. Bredt died 1 December 1940 in

Marburg Marburg ( or ) is a university town in the German federal state (''Bundesland'') of Hesse, capital of the Marburg-Biedenkopf district (''Landkreis''). The town area spreads along the valley of the river Lahn and has a population of approximate ...

Works

* ''Die Trennung von Kirche und Staat'', 1919 * ''Die Rechte des Summus Episcopus'', 1919 * ''Neues evangelisches Kirchenrecht für Preußen'', 3 volumes, 1921–27 * ''Der Geist der deutschen Reichsverfassung'', 1924 * ''Der deutsche Reichstag im Weltkrieg'', 1926 * ''Die belgische Neutralität und der Schlieffensche Feldzugsplan'', 1929 * ''Geschichte der Familie Bredt'', 1937 * ''Haus Bredt-Rübel'', 1937 * ''Die Verfassung der reformierten Kirche in Cleve-Jülich-Berg-Mark'', 1938.

References

External links

* 1879 births 1940 deaths Politicians from Wuppertal People from the Rhine Province Free Conservative Party politicians Reich Party of the German Middle Class politicians Government ministers of Germany Members of the Reichstag of the Weimar Republic {{Germany-politician-stub