Bavarian Soviet Republic

TheBavarian Soviet Republic(orBavarian Council Republic), also known as theMunich Soviet Republic(German:Räterepublik Baiern, Münchner Räterepublik), was a short-lived unrecognisedsocialist stateinBavariaduring theGerman revolution of 1918–1919.
A group of communists and anarchists declared the Bavarian Soviet Republic on 6 April 1919, forcing the government of the existingPeople's State of Bavariato flee toBamberg.The members of the new government, led by playwrightErnst Toller, had no political or administrative experience,and after just six days in power they were ousted in a putsch organized by theCommunist Party of Germany(KPD). The new head of state, the Russian-GermanBolshevikEugen Leviné, quickly instituted communist measures such as worker control of factories. Food shortages led to popular unrest, and on 3 May the People's State was violently put down by soldiers of theGerman Army, supported by paramilitaryFreikorpstroops. Some 600 people died in the fighting,and up to 1,200 communists and anarchists were later executed.
On 14 August 1919, the democraticFree State of Bavariawas established within theWeimar Republic. The Bavarian Soviet Republic contributed to the nationwide split between the moderate and radical Left represented by theSocial Democratsand theCommunists, which seriously weakened opposition to theNazi rise to power.
The roots of the republic lay in theGerman Empire's defeat in theFirst World Warand the ensuingGerman Revolution of 1918–1919. In September 1917, the BavarianSocial Democratic Party of Germany(SPD), which rejected revolutionary efforts in Bavaria, had submitted a corresponding motion (Auer-Süssheim-Antrag) to the Bavarian Landtag, which contained the main demands of the Bavarian SPD, including the abolition of the privileged first chamber of the Landtag (Kammer der Reichsrätein which only the nobility was represented); the abolition of the nobility as a whole; general, equal, direct and secret suffrage; more rights for the state parliament; and separation of church and state.However, this motion failed. At the end of October 1918,German sailors mutiniedoff the North Sea coast.After setting up a revolutionaryworkers' and soldiers' councilatKielIn early November, they quickly spread the councils across Germany and with little bloodshed took power from the existing military, royal and civil authorities.
On 7 November 1918, the first anniversary of theOctober Revolutionin Russia,King Ludwig IIIof Bavaria fled from theResidenz Palacein Munich with his family, andKurt Eisner, a politicianof theIndependent Social Democratic Party of Germany(USPD),becameminister-presidentof a newly-proclaimedPeople's State of Bavaria.The government of the People's State was made up of the SPD, the USPD and theBavarian Peasants' League(BB).
Though he advocated asocialist republic, Eisner distanced himself from theRussianBolsheviksand declared that his government would protectproperty rights. As the new government was unable to provide basic services, Eisner's USPD was defeated in theJanuary 1919 electionand came in sixth place. On 21 February 1919, as he was on his way to the Landtag to announce his resignation, he was shot dead by the right-wingnationalistAnton Graf von Arco auf Valley, also known as Arco-Valley.
After Eisner's assassination, theLandtagconvened, andErhard Auer, the leader of the Social Democrats and the Minister of the Interior in Eisner's government, began to eulogize Eisner, but rumours had already begun to spread that Auer was behind the assassination. Acting on the false allegations, Alois Linder, a saloon waiter who was a fervent supporter of Eisner, shot Auer twice with a rifle and wounded him. That prompted other armed supporters of Eisner to open fire, which caused a melee that killed the conservative parliamentarianHeinrich Osel[de]and provoked nervous breakdowns in at least two ministers.There was effectively no government in Bavaria thereafter.
Unrest and lawlessness followed. The assassination of Eisner created a martyr for the leftist cause and prompted demonstrations, the closing of theUniversity of Munich, the kidnapping of aristocrats and the forced pealing of church bells. The support for the Left was greater than Eisner himself had been able to command.
On 1 March, the Congress of Councils proclaimed a new government underMartin Segitz, but it was neither recognised by the majority of the state parliament and nor politically active.On 17 March 1919, the Socialists' new leader,Johannes Hoffmann, an anti-militarist and former schoolteacher, patched together a parliamentary coalition government
However, a month later, on the night of 6–7 April, communists andanarchists, energized by the news of acommunist revolution in Hungary, declared aSoviet republic, withErnst Tolleras chief of state.Toller called on the non-existent "Bavarian Red Army" to support the newdictatorship of the proletariatand ruthlessly deal with anycounter-revolutionarybehaviour.The KPD reluctantly took part in the newly-formed soviet republic though the party's chairman,Paul Levi, denounced the republic as "revolutionary adventurism".
The Hoffmann government fled toBamberg, in northern Bavaria,which it declared the new seat of government.
Initially, the Bavarian Soviet Republic was ruled by USPD members such asErnst Toller, andanarchistslike writerGustav Landauer, economistSilvio Gesell, and playwrightErich Mühsam.Toller, who was also a playwright, described the revolution as the "Bavarian Revolution of Love".Among the café society of Schwabing, the new government became known as "the regime of the coffeehouse anarchists."
Toller's cabinet picks were controversial. For instance, a burglar with a conviction for moral turpitude was chosen as police president of Munich.Most infamous was the Commissar of Foreign AffairsDr. Franz Lipp– who had been admitted several times topsychiatric hospitals– declared war onWürttembergandSwitzerlandover the Swiss refusal to lend 60 locomotives to the Republic.He claimed to be well acquainted withPope Benedict XVand informedVladimir Leninand the Pope by cable that the ousted former Minister-President Hoffmann had fled toBambergand taken the key to the ministry toilet with him.
Toller's brief government was characterized by bold declarations without real enforcement. The minister for public housing published a decree saying that no house could thereafter contain more than three rooms and that the living room must always be above the kitchen and bedroom. It was also declared that Finance Minister Silvio Gesell's concept ofFreigeldwould be implemented, although it never was.
Members of the Toller cabinet included:
On Saturday 12 April 1919, only six days into Toller's regime, the KPD seized power, led by three Russian-GermanBolsheviks, withEugen Levinéas head of state andMax Levienas the chairman of the Bavarian KPD.The communists managed to secure power after the so calledPalm Sunday Putsch, where the counter-revolutionary government forces were suppressed by the Bavarian Red Army commanderRudolf Egelhofer.Erich Mühsam, a member of the Toller Government, had himself "suggested to Leviné that we [the Toller government] be forcibly ousted so that the hopeless situation would end and the revolutionary work could be secured."
Having received the blessings ofLenin– who at the annual May Day celebration inRed Squaresaid: "The liberated working class is celebrating its anniversary not only in Soviet Russia but in ... Soviet Bavaria"– Leviné began to enact more communist reforms, which included forming a "Red Army" from factory workers, seizing cash, food supplies, and privately owned guns,expropriatingluxurious apartments and giving them to thehomelessand placing factories under the ownership and control of their workers. One of Munich's main churches was taken over and made into a revolutionary temple which would be presided over by "Goddess Reason." Bavaria was to be in the vanguard of the Bolshevization of central Europe, with all workers to receive military training.
Leviné also had plans to abolishpaper moneyand reform the education system but never had time to implement them. There was time, however, for Max Levien, following Lenin's orders, to arrestaristocratsand members of the middle-class as hostages.
During Leviné's short reign, food shortages quickly became a problem, especially the absence of milk. Public criticism over the milk shortage turned political, precipitating the communist government to publicly declare: "What does it matter? ... Most of it goes to the children of the bourgeoisie anyway. We are not interested in keeping them alive. No harm if they die – they'd only grow into enemies of the proletariat."
An attempt by troops loyal to the Hoffmann government and theparamilitaryKampfbund(combat league) of the Neopagan andvolkischeThule Societyto overthrow the BSR on 13 Aprilwas put down by the new Red Army, which consisted of factory workers and members of thesoldiers' and workers' councils. Twenty men died in the fighting.
On 27 April, due to disputes over whether negotiations should be held with Hoffmann's People's State of Bavaria, Leviné's committee resigned and re-elected Toller to lead the Bavarian Soviet Republic.
The rival governments – Hoffmann's People's State of Bavaria seated in Bamberg, and the Bavarian Soviet Republic located in Munich – clashed militarily atDachauon 18 April when Hoffmann's 8,000 soldiers met the Soviet Republic's 30,000. The BSR forces – led by Ernst Toller – were victorious in the first battle at Dachau, but Hoffmann made a deal that gave him the services of 20,000 men of theFreikorpsunder Lt. GeneralBurghard von Oven[de]. Oven and theFreikorps, along with Hoffmann's loyalist elements of theGerman Army– called the "White Guards of Capitalism" by the communists – then took Dachau and surrounded Munich.Supporters of the BSR had, in the meantime, on 26 April, occupied the rooms of the Thule Society in theHotel Vier Jahreszeiten, and arrested Countess Hella von Westarp, the society's secretary, and six others, to be held as hostages.Rudolf Egelhofer, panicked by Munich being surrounded by Hoffmann's forces, had these seven and three other hostages executed on 30 April.They included the well-connectedPrince Gustav of Thurn and Taxis.The executions were carried out despite Toller's efforts to prevent them.
TheFreikorpsbroke through the Munich defences on 1 May,leading to bitter street fighting that involved "flame-throwers, heavy artillery, armoured vehicles, even aircraft".At least 606 people were killed, of whom 335 were civilians.Leviné was later condemned to death for treason, and shot by a firing squad inStadelheim Prison. Gustav Landauer was killed by theFreikorps,and Egelhofer was murdered without trial after being arrested as well. Numerous others were given prison sentences, such as Toller (5 years) and the anarchist writerErich Mühsam(15 years); others received longer sentences, 6,000 years' worth in all, some of it to hard labour.
After the execution of 1,000–1,200 suspected communists,Oven declared the city to have been secured on 6 May, ending the reign of the Bavarian Soviet Republic.Although the Hoffmann government was nominally restored, the actual power in Munich had shifted to the right.
TheBamberg Constitution[de]was enacted on 14 August 1919, creating theFree State of Bavariawithin the newWeimar Republic.
After the Bavarian Soviet Republic was crushed, the SPD returned to power, but was subsequently ousted in theKapp Putschin March 1920.The tumultuous period of thePeople's State of Bavariaand the Bavarian Soviet Republic was used by conservative and far-right circles to stoke fear and hatred of "bolshevism" among Bavarian society.The period was popularly remembered as a period in which both states existed as one of shortages, censorship, restrictions on freedom, violence, and general disorder.The many separate strands of Bavarian conservatism found a common enemy in the far-left, and the former Kingdom became profoundly "reactionary, anti-Republican, [and] counter-revolutionary."
The Communists and Social Democrats both blamed each other following the episode, paralyzing the left through theNazi era.
The fact that some of the prominent figures of the People's State and the Soviet Republic were Jewish was used by conservative and far-right circles to push the conspiracy theory of "Jewish Bolshevism" in Bavaria.
One notable supporter of the Soviet Republic was the artistGeorg Schrimpf, then aged 30, who was arrested when the movement was crushed.His friend, the writerOskar Maria Graf, who was also arrested, wrote about the events in his autobiographical novel,Wir sind Gefangene(1927). The famed anarchist novelist Ret Marut (later known asB.Traven) was an active participant in the establishment of Soviet power and worked as head of the Press Department of the Soviet Republic.During the early days of the Soviet Republic, representatives of cultural life also played an important role in the revolution. Some intellectuals such as the economistLujo Brentano, the conductorBruno Walterand the writersHeinrich MannandRainer Maria Rilkeformed theRat der geistigen Arbeit(Council of Intellectual Work) with Mann as its chairman.
Adolf Hitler's longstanding chauffeur and first leader of theSchutzstaffel(SS)Julius Schrecksigned up and served as a member of the Red Army in late April 1919. Balthasar Brandmayer, one of Hitler's closest wartime friends, remarked "how he at first welcomed the end of the monarchies" and the establishment of the republic in Bavaria.
Hitler himself acted as a liaison between his army battalion – he had been elected "deputy battalion representative" – and the Soviet Republic's Department of Propaganda by soldiers who mostly supported the mainstream SPD as opposed to the more radical USPD.Both newsreel film footage and a still photograph show Hitler marching in Eisner's funeral procession. He wears both a black mourning band and a red band showing support for the Government. It is uncertain whether this indicated that Hitler was a true supporter of the Soviet Republic, or that he was simply taking an available opportunity not to return to his impoverished pre-war civilian life. Befitting what is now known about his character, Hitler's so-called left-wing politics may have been purely opportunistic, rather than reflecting a deeper political belief. It is also known that once the Soviet Republic had fallen to the White Guard and theFreikorps, Hitler immediately changed his loyalties, aligning himself with theWeimar Republicand – as part of a three-man committee assigned to investigate the behavior of his regiment's soldiers – informed on other soldiers who had shown sympathy for the Soviet Government.
Active participants in theFreikorpsunits – those of Oven,Franz Ritter von Epp, andHermann Erhardt– that suppressed the Bavarian Soviet Republic included future powerful members of theNazi Party, includingRudolf Hess, a member of theFreikorps Epp.
In his 1952 memoirWitness,Whittaker Chambersnamed Eugene Leviné as one of three people whom he most admired as he joined theCommunist Party USA, along withFelix DzerzhinskyandIgor Sazonov:
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