USPD

Decision to join the government

A few hours later, Chancellor Max von Baden appointed Ebert to succeed him as chancellor. Ebert was aware that he could not form a functional government without the USPD. That evening, the MSPD negotiators presented the USPD representatives with the choice of either having the MSPD take over the government by itself or the USPD cooperating with it on an equal footing. The USPD responded with several conditions for its participation, including that Germany become a socialist republic and that all power be in the hands of the workers' and soldiers' councils. The MSPD executive committee rejected the conditions out of hand. Under Hugo Haase's guidance, an agreement with the MSPD was reached in the early afternoon of 10 November. The USPD's new conditions simply demanded a role for the workers' and soldiers' councils in the new government and no longer ruled out a constituent national assembly to determine Germany's future form of government.