German Revolution (1918–19)
What triggered the German Revolution of 1918–19?
What was Friedrich Ebert’s initial goal during the revolution?
Who were the leaders of the radical Spartacus League?
What was the outcome of the elections on January 19, 1919?
How did historians view the German Revolution in the long term?
German Revolution (1918–19), uprising that was triggered by the military defeat of the German Empire during World War I. This mass movement succeeded in toppling imperial Germany’s semi-autocratic constitutional monarchy and setting up a democratic republic.
Beginnings
The republic proclaimed on November 9, 1918, is often called the “accidental republic.” When Friedrich Ebert—the leader of the so-called Majority Socialists, a faction of the Social Democratic Party (SPD)—accepted the imperial chancellorship of Germany from Maximilian, prince of Baden, it was with the understanding that Ebert would do his utmost to save the imperial system from revolution. Ebert believed that the only way to accomplish this would be by transforming Germany into a modern constitutional monarchy. Elections would have to be held for a constituent assembly, whose task would be to draw up a new constitution.
Ebert, however, faced a precarious situation. Four years of seemingly futile combat and sacrifice had resulted in popular disaffection with the war and had discredited Germany’s imperial system as well as its emperor, Wilhelm II. Shortages of food and fuel had rendered the population vulnerable to the influenza epidemic sweeping Europe. Independent Socialists in Munich had forced the abdication on November 8 of Bavaria’s king, Louis III, and had proclaimed a Bavarian socialist republic. The next day, the abdication of the emperor was announced, even before he had consented to relinquish the throne; he gave in under pressure from army commanders. The port cities along the North Sea and the Baltic Sea were falling into the hands of sailors’ and workers’ and soldiers’ councils (Räte) in the wake of the naval mutiny at Kiel in early November. Karl Liebknecht and Rosa Luxemburg, leaders of the radical Spartacus League, were eager to transform Germany into a republic of workers’ and soldiers’ councils (a Räterepublik) in imitation of the soviet republic being established by the Bolshevik leaders in Russia. On November 9 in Berlin, as Ebert was accepting the reins of government in the Reichstag building, the seat of the imperial legislature, Liebknecht was proclaiming a socialist republic at a rally of his own followers in front of the deserted Royal Palace, about a mile away. Many Marxist revolutionaries believed that the Bolshevik Revolution was merely the spark that would set off the worldwide proletarian revolution that Karl Marx had predicted. Given this ideologically charged scenario, Liebknecht confidently anticipated his destiny to become the German Lenin.
While the Liebknecht rally was proceeding in front of the Royal Palace, an angry crowd was gathering before the Reichstag building. Because Ebert had just left the premises, his friend and fellow Majority Socialist Philipp Scheidemann felt called upon to address the crowd. To meet its inevitable demands for change and to forestall whatever Liebknecht might be telling his followers, Scheidemann in his speech used the slogan “Long live the German republic!” Once made, the proclamation of a republic could not be withdrawn. Ebert was furious when he learned of Scheidemann’s “accidental” proclamation, but he realized that there was no turning back. He spent the afternoon seeking partners to form a provisional government to run the newly proclaimed republic. By nightfall he had managed to persuade the Independent Socialists, a faction that in 1917 had split from the Majority Socialists over the continuation of the war, to provide three members of the government. To gain their cooperation, Ebert had to agree to name the government the Council of Peoples’ Commissars and to transform Germany into a vaguely defined social republic. Despite this promise, Ebert still hoped that elections to a constituent assembly would lead to the creation of a moderate democratic republic. The Independent Socialists, however, though not as radical as Liebknecht, held to their vision of a socialist Räterepublik. They hoped that workers and soldiers would elect a multitude of councils across the country during the following weeks, and they assumed that these would establish the foundation for a genuinely socialist republic.
For the time being, however, Majority and Independent socialists jointly formed a provisional government for the defeated country, which everywhere seemed on the verge of collapse. Although the armistice of November 11 ended the fighting, it did not end the Allied blockade of Germany. The winter of 1918–19 brought no relief of the shortages of food and fuel, and the flu epidemic showed no signs of abatement. Soldiers returning from the fronts by the hundreds of thousands were left stranded, jobless, hungry, and bitter—grist for the mill of revolution.
The revolution’s spread
The push for revolution, led by an enthusiastic Liebknecht and a less enthusiastic Luxemburg, came on January 6, 1919, encouraged by Soviet Russia and further prompted by fear that Ebert’s plans for the election of a constituent assembly, scheduled for January 19, might stabilize the German situation. The Spartacists, now officially the Communist Party of Germany, initiated massive demonstrations in Berlin and quickly seized key government and communications centers.
The events of “Spartacist Week,” as the radical attempt at revolution came to be known, demonstrated that Germany was not nearly as ripe for revolution as leading radicals had believed. As Luxemburg had feared, most German workers remained loyal to the Independent Socialists or to Ebert’s more moderate and democratic vision of socialism. The German army, moreover, was determined to prevent a further move to the left. In December it had begun secretly to train volunteer units drawn from soldiers returning from the fronts. These so-called Freikorps (“Free Corps”) units formed dozens of small right-wing armies that during the next years roamed the country, looking for revolutionary activity to suppress. The Spartacist revolt, which was confined largely to Berlin, was put down within a week by some 3,000 Freikorps members. After Liebknecht and Luxemburg were captured on January 15, they were both shot at the initiative of Freikorps officers. Although sporadic revolutionary activity continued elsewhere in Germany during the following months, its failure in Berlin clearly marked its doom. The proclamation on April 4, 1919, of a Räterepublik in Bavaria revived radical fortunes only briefly; Freikorps units had put down the radical socialist takeover by the end of the month.
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The collapse of the Spartacist revolt greatly enhanced the chances for Ebert’s vision of Germany’s future to prevail. Moreover, the meeting of a national congress of workers’ and soldiers’ councils in mid-December 1918, upon which the Independent Socialists had pinned their own hopes for creating a socialist republic, proved to be far less radical than expected. It did nothing to interfere with Ebert’s plans to hold elections for an assembly to draw up a democratic constitution. The elections on January 19, 1919—the first German elections in which women had voting rights—produced a resounding victory for Ebert’s conception of democracy. Three of every four voters gave their support to political parties that favored turning Germany into a democracy. After months of turmoil the country was to become a democratic republic. The assembly began its deliberations on February 6, 1919, having chosen to meet in Weimar, a small city that was considered less vulnerable to radical political interference than Berlin.
On January 18, 1919, representatives of the Allied and Associated Powers, including the United States, which had been victorious over Germany had begun the deliberations in Paris that would establish a European peace settlement. U.S. Pres. Woodrow Wilson’s peace proposal, the Fourteen Points, seemed to promise Germans national self-determination as well as to encourage the efforts to transform Germany into a democracy.
But after the peace negotiations got underway in Paris, Germans learned that their country continued to be viewed as the pariah of Europe. Wilson’s idealism was forced to yield to still-fresh wartime resentments being articulated by the leaders of the French, British, and Italian delegations. Instead of offering to negotiate with the Germans, the major Allies and the U.S. forced them to sign the treaty with virtually no alterations.
Historical impact
The short-term effects of the November Revolution appeared to be epochal. Germany had managed to abolish its monarchy with a minimum of violence while establishing a democratic parliamentary system that boasted some notable progressive features, such as women’s suffrage and the abolition of censorship and the nobility. However, many historians came to view the revolution as a failure in the long term, given that it left Germany unable to resist extremist forces and thereby paved the way for the Nazi takeover of 1933. Attitudes varied on the basis of political stances. Thus, leftists tended to view the events as a missed opportunity to stage a genuine socialist revolution, whereas nationalist and right-wing forces, such as the German National People’s Party (DNVP), rejected the resulting democratic system as a whole.