1.
President of Germany
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The President of Germany, officially the President of the Federal Republic of Germany, is the head of state of Germany. Germany has a system of government in which the Chancellor is the nations leading political figure. However, the President has a role which, while not an executive post, is more than ceremonial, Presidents have extensive discretion regarding the way they exercise their official duties. The President gives direction to general political and societal debates and has some important reserve powers in case of political instability. Furthermore, all laws must be signed by the President before they can come into effect. The President, by his or her actions and public appearances, represents the state itself, its existence, its legitimacy, the Presidents office involves an integrative role and the control function of upholding the law and the constitution. In order to exercise power, he/she traditionally acts above party politics. The 12th and current officeholder is Frank-Walter Steinmeier who was elected on 12 February 2017, the convention consists of all Bundestag members as well as an equal number of electors elected by the state legislatures in proportion to their respective population. However it is not required that state electors themselves be members of a legislature, the body is convened and chaired by the President of the German Bundestag. From 1979 to 2009, all these conventions were held on 23 May, in the first two rounds of the election, the Federal Convention attempts to elect a president by an absolute majority of votes cast. If, after two votes, no candidate has received this level of support, in the third. The result of the election is determined by party politics. Usually, the candidate of the majority party or coalition in the Bundestag is considered to be the likely winner, however, if the opposition has turned in a strong showing in state elections, it can potentially have enough support to defeat the governments candidate. For this reason, presidential elections can indicate the result of a general election. According to a long-standing adage in German politics, if you can create a president, you can form a government. The office of president is open to all Germans who are entitled to vote in Bundestag elections and have reached the age of 40, but no one may serve more than two consecutive five-year terms. As yet, only four Presidents have been elected for a second term, the president must not be a member of the federal government or of a legislature at either the federal or state level. On taking office the President must take the oath, stipulated by Article 56 of the Basic Law, in a joint session of the Bundestag
2.
West Germany
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West Germany is the common English name for the Federal Republic of Germany or FRG in the period between its creation on 23 May 1949 to German reunification on 3 October 1990. During this Cold War era, NATO-aligned West Germany and Warsaw Pact-aligned East Germany were divided by the Inner German border, after 1961 West Berlin was physically separated from East Berlin as well as from East Germany by the Berlin Wall. This situation ended when East Germany was dissolved and its five states joined the ten states of the Federal Republic of Germany along with the reunified city-state of Berlin. With the reunification of West and East Germany, the Federal Republic of Germany, enlarged now to sixteen states and this period is referred to as the Bonn Republic by historians, alluding to the interwar Weimar Republic and the post-reunification Berlin Republic. The Federal Republic of Germany was established from eleven states formed in the three Allied Zones of occupation held by the United States, the United Kingdom and France, US and British forces remained in the country throughout the Cold War. Its population grew from roughly 51 million in 1950 to more than 63 million in 1990, the city of Bonn was its de facto capital city. The fourth Allied occupation zone was held by the Soviet Union, as a result, West Germany had a territory about half the size of the interbellum democratic Weimar Republic. At the onset of the Cold War, Europe was divided among the Western and Eastern blocs, Germany was de facto divided into two countries and two special territories, the Saarland and divided Berlin. The Federal Republic of Germany claimed a mandate for all of Germany. It took the line that the GDR was an illegally constituted puppet state, though the GDR did hold regular elections, these were not free and fair. For all practical purposes the GDR was a Soviet puppet state, from the West German perspective the GDR was therefore illegitimate. Three southwestern states of West Germany merged to form Baden-Württemberg in 1952, in addition to the resulting ten states, West Berlin was considered an unofficial de facto 11th state. It recognised the GDR as a de facto government within a single German nation that in turn was represented de jure by the West German state alone. From 1973 onward, East Germany recognised the existence of two German countries de jure, and the West as both de facto and de jure foreign country, the Federal Republic and the GDR agreed that neither of them could speak in the name of the other. The first chancellor Konrad Adenauer, who remained in office until 1963, had worked for an alignment with NATO rather than neutrality. He not only secured a membership in NATO but was also a proponent of agreements that developed into the present-day European Union, when the G6 was established in 1975, there was no question whether the Federal Republic of Germany would be a member as well. With the collapse of communism in Central and Eastern Europe in 1989, symbolised by the opening of the Berlin Wall, East Germany voted to dissolve itself and accede to the Federal Republic in 1990. Its five post-war states were reconstituted along with the reunited Berlin and they formally joined the Federal Republic on 3 October 1990, raising the number of states from 10 to 16, ending the division of Germany
3.
Konrad Adenauer
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Konrad Hermann Joseph Adenauer was a German statesman who served as the first post-war Chancellor of Germany from 1949 to 1963. He led his country from the ruins of World War II to a productive and prosperous nation that forged close relations with France, the United Kingdom, during his years in power West Germany achieved democracy, stability, international respect and economic prosperity. He was the first leader of the Christian Democratic Union, a Christian Democratic party that under his leadership became one of the most influential parties in the country, Adenauer, the Chancellor till age 87 was dubbed Der Alte. British historian Roy Jenkins says he was the oldest statesman ever to function in elected office and he belied his age by his intense work habits and his uncanny political instinct. He displayed a strong dedication to a vision of market-based liberal democracy. A shrewd politician, Adenauer was deeply committed to a Western-oriented foreign policy and he worked to restore the West German economy from the destruction of World War II to a central position in Europe, presiding over the German Economic Miracle. He reestablished the German military in 1955 and he came to terms with France, which made possible the economic unification of Western Europe. Adenauer opposed rival East Germany and made his nation a member of NATO, a devout Roman Catholic, he had been a leading Centre Party politician in the Weimar Republic, serving as Mayor of Cologne and as president of the Prussian State Council. Konrad Adenauer was born as the third of five children of Johann Konrad Adenauer and his wife Helene in Cologne, Rhenish Prussia and his siblings were August, Johannes, Lilli and Elisabeth, who died shortly after birth in c. In 1894, he completed his Abitur and began studying law and politics at the universities of Freiburg, Munich and Bonn. In 1896, at the age of 20, he was conscripted into the German army and he was a member of several Roman Catholic students associations under the K. St. V. He graduated in 1900 and afterwards worked as a lawyer at the court in Cologne and he was strongly interested in the use of medicinal herbs, according to famous French herbalist Maurice Messugue, whom he met and befriended. These were his favorite medicinal plants according to Messugue, though he had knowledge of a wide range of plants. He agreed with Messugue that plants had to be free of sprays and he told Messugue that he owed his good health to the plants, to nature. Adenauer found relaxation and great enjoyment in the Italian game of bocce, as a devout Catholic, he joined the Centre Party in 1906 and was elected to Colognes city council in the same year. In 1909, he became Vice-Mayor of Cologne, a metropolis with a population of 635,000 in 1914. From 1917 to 1933, he served as Mayor of Cologne, Adenauer headed Cologne during World War I, working closely with the army to maximize the citys role as a rear base of supply and transportation for the Western Front. He paid special attention to the food supply, enabling the residents to avoid the worst of the severe shortages that beset most German cities during 1918–19
4.
Ludwig Erhard
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Ludwig Wilhelm Erhard was a German politician affiliated with the CDU and the second Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany from 1963 until 1966. He is often famed for leading German postwar economic reforms and economic recovery in his role as Minister of Economics under Chancellor Konrad Adenauer from 1949 to 1963. During that period he promoted the concept of the market economy. In his tenure as chancellor, however, Erhard failed to win confidence in his handling of a deficit and his direction of foreign policy. He resigned his chancellorship on 1 December 1966, born in Fürth, Kingdom of Bavaria, Erhard was a commercial apprentice from 1913 to 1916. After his apprenticeship he worked as retail salesman in his fathers drapers shop, in 1916, during World War I, he joined the German forces as an artilleryman. He fought in Romania and was injured near Ypres in 1918. Because of his injury he could no longer work as a draper and he received his Ph. D. from the University of Frankfurt in 1925, for a dissertation written under Franz Oppenheimer. During his time in Frankfurt he married Luise Lotter, widow Schuster, after his graduation they moved to Fürth and he became executive in his parents company in 1925. After three years he became assistant at the Institut für Wirtschaftsbeobachtung der deutschen Fertigware, a research institute. Later, he became deputy director of the institute, during World War II, he worked on concepts for a postwar peace, however, officially such studies were forbidden by the Nazis, who had declared total war. As a result, Erhard lost his job in 1942 but continued to work on the subject by order of the Reichsgruppe Industrie, in 1944 he wrote War Finances and Debt Consolidation. In this study he assumed that Germany had already lost the war and he sent his thoughts to Carl Friedrich Goerdeler, a central figure in the German resistance to Nazism, who recommended Erhard to his comrades. Erhard also discussed his concept with Otto Ohlendorf, deputy secretary of state in the Reichsministerium für Wirtschaft, Ohlendorf himself spoke out for active and courageous entrepreneurship, which was intended to replace bureaucratic state planning of the economy after the war. After the war Erhard became an economic consultant, in April 1948 Erhard was elected director of economics by the Bizonal Economic Council. On 20 June 1948, the Deutsche Mark was introduced, Erhard abolished the price-fixing and production controls that had been enacted by the military administration. This exceeded his authority, but he succeeded with this step, in the first free elections following the Nazi era, Erhard stood for election in a Baden-Württemberg district and was elected. He was appointed Minister for Economics, a position he would hold for the next 14 years, some of the societys members were members of the Allied High Commission and Erhard was able to make his case directly to them
5.
Kurt Georg Kiesinger
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Kurt Georg Kiesinger was a German politician who served as Chancellor of Germany from 1 December 1966 to 21 October 1969. Before he became Chancellor he served as Minister President of Baden-Württemberg from 1958 to 1966 and he was Chairman of the Christian Democratic Union from 1967 to 1971. Kiesinger studied law and worked as a lawyer in Berlin from 1935 to 1940, to avoid conscription, he found work at the Foreign Office in 1940, and became deputy head of the Foreign Offices broadcasting department. During his service at the Foreign Office, he was denounced by two colleagues for his anti-Nazi stance and he had nevertheless joined the Nazi Party in 1933, but remained a largely inactive member. In 1946 he became a member of the Christian Democratic Union and he was elected to the Bundestag in 1949, and was a member of the Bundestag until 1958 and again from 1969 to 1980. Kiesinger was considered an outstanding orator and mediator, and was dubbed Silver Tongue and he was an author of poetry and various books, and founded the universities of Konstanz and Ulm as Minister President of Baden-Württemberg. Born in Ebingen, Kingdom of Württemberg, Kiesinger studied law in Berlin, as a student, he joined the Roman Catholic corporations K. St. V. He became a member of the Nazi Party in February 1933, after the war, he was interned and spent 18 months in the Ludwigsburg camp before being released as a case of mistaken identity. They accused Kiesinger specifically of hampering anti-Jewish actions within his department, Kiesinger joined the Christian Democratic Union in 1946. From 1946 he gave lessons to law students, and in 1948 he resumed his practice as a lawyer. In 1947 he also became unpaid secretary-general of CDU in Württemberg-Hohenzollern, in the federal election in 1949 he was elected to the Bundestag. In 1951 he became a member of the CDU executive board, during that time, he became known for his rhetorical brilliance, as well as his in-depth knowledge of foreign affairs. However, despite the recognition he enjoyed within the Christian Democrat parliamentary faction, consequently, he decided to switch from federal to state politics. Kiesinger became Minister President of the state of Baden-Württemberg on 17 December 1958, as Minister President he founded two universities, the University of Konstanz and the University of Ulm. In 1966 following the collapse of the existing CDU/CSU-FDP coalition, Kiesinger was elected to replace Ludwig Erhard as Chancellor, the government formed by Kiesinger remained in power for nearly three years with the SPD leader Willy Brandt as Deputy Federal Chancellor and Foreign Minister. Kiesinger reduced tensions with the Soviet bloc nations establishing diplomatic relations with Czechoslovakia, Romania and Yugoslavia, a number of progressive reforms were also realised during Kiesingers time as Chancellor. Pension coverage was extended in 1967 via the abolition of the income-ceiling for compulsory membership, vocational training legislation was also introduced, while a reorganisation of unemployment insurance promoted retraining schemes, counselling and advice services and job creation places. In addition, under the “Lohnfortzahlunggesetz” of 1969, employers had to pay all employees’ wages for the first 6 weeks of sickness, in August 1969, the Landabgaberente was introduced
6.
Theodor Heuss
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Theodor Heuss was a liberal German politician who served as the first President of the Federal Republic of Germany from 1949 to 1959. Beside the stern chancellor Konrad Adenauer, Heusss cordial manners largely contributed to the stabilization of democracy in West Germany during the Wirtschaftswunder years, Heuss was born in Brackenheim, a small town in Württemberg near Heilbronn. This “wine community” lies close to the border of Swabian to the Franconian area and he studied economics, art history and political science at the universities of Munich and Berlin, receiving his doctorate in 1905 in Munich with Lujo Brentano as his thesis adviser. On 11 April 1908, he married Elly Heuss-Knapp, with whom he had a son, the minister at the Lutheran wedding ceremony held in Straßburg was Albert Schweitzer, a close friend of Ellys. After his studies Heuss worked as a political journalist in Berlin, from 1912 to 1918, he was editor in chief of the Neckarzeitung in Heilbronn. In Berlin, he worked as editor for the weekly newsletter Deutsche Politik, with Naumann, Heuss in 1903 he joined the liberal Free-minded Union, which in 1910 merged in the Progressive Peoples Party, in which he was engaged until its dissolution in 1918. After World War I, Heuss between 1923 and 1926 published the magazine Die Deutsche Nation, on 23 March 1933, along with his four fellow DStP parliamentarians, Heuss voted in favour of the Enabling Act, granting Chancellor Adolf Hitler quasi-dictatorial powers. He had set out to abstain, but after Heinrich Brüning indicated that with regard to the Reichskonkordat the Centre Party MPs would assent, alternative views of Hermann Dietrich, Weimar Republic finance minister claim that he was part of the majority in favor of voting for the enabling law. Following the end of his term he returned to private life, during the Third Reich he stayed in contact with a network of liberals, leading to contacts with the German resistance towards the end of the war, though he was not an active resister. In 1936 Heuss faced a ban, nevertheless in 1941 he became an employee of the Frankfurter Zeitung. Heuss wrote under pseudonyms until publishing of the paper was prohibited in 1943. He spent the following years writing a biography of Robert Bosch, Heuss also taught history at the Stuttgart Institute of Technology in 1946 and 1947, receiving the title of an honorary professor in 1948. He advocated uniting all parties in the Western occupation zones. In 1948, he was a member of the Parlamentarischer Rat at Bonn with considerable influence in the drafting of West Germanys constitution, Heuss was a member of the Evangelical Church in Germany. He took the oath required by article 56 of the Basic Law before a joint session of the Bundestag and the Bundesrat on the same date. Heusss plans for a new national anthem were aborted by Adenauer, a widower since 1952, Heuss was re-elected in 1954 with practically no opposition, after the Social Democrats had renounced the nomination of a rival candidate. Not until May 1956, could he make his first state visit and he held office until the end of his term on 12 September 1959, succeeded by Heinrich Lübke. He had declined a third term in office, as this would have necessitated changing the constitution, Heuss shaped the office of president by his non-partisan governing
7.
Gustav Heinemann
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Gustav Walter Heinemann was a German politician. He was named after his mothers father, a roof tiler in the city of Barmen, with radical-democratic, left-liberal. His maternal grandfather, Heinemanns great-grandfather, had part in the Revolution of 1848. Had s father, Otto Heinemann, a manager at the Krupp steelworks in Essen, in his youth, Gustav already felt called upon to preserve and promote the liberal and democratic traditions of 1848. Throughout his life, he fought against all kinds of subservience and this attitude helped him to maintain his intellectual independence even in the face of majorities in political parties and in the Church. Having finished his secondary education in 1917, Heinemann briefly became a soldier in the First World War. From 1918, he studied law, economics, and history at the universities of Münster, Marburg, Munich, Göttingen and he received a Ph. D in 1922 and a doctorate of law in 1929. The friendships that Heinemann formed during his student years often lasted for a lifetime, at the beginning of his career, Heinemann joined a renowned firm of solicitors in Essen. In 1929, he published a book about legal questions in the medical profession, from 1929 to 1949, he worked as a legal adviser to the Rheinische Stahlwerke in Essen, and from 1936 to 1949, he was also one of its directors. The steelworks were considered to be essential for the war so Heinemann was not drafted into the army and he was a lecturer at the law school of the University of Cologne between 1933 and 1939. It was probably his refusal to become a member of the Nazi Party that finished his academic career. He was also invited to join the board of directors of the Rheinisch-Westfaelisches Kohlesyndikat in 1936, in 1926, Heinemann married Hilda Ordemann, who had been a student of Rudolf Bultmann, the famous Protestant theologian. His wife and the minister of his wifes parish, Wilhelm Graeber, through his sister-in-law, he became acquainted with Swiss theologian Karl Barth, who strongly influenced him such as in his condemnation of nationalism and antisemitism. Gustav and Hilda Heinemann had three daughters, Uta, Christa and Barbara, they also had a son, Peter, Heinemann was an elder in Wilhelm Graebers parish in Essen, when Graeber was sacked in 1933 by the new church authorities who co-operated with the Nazis. Opposition against those German Christians came from the Confessing Church, and Heinemann became a member of its synod, information sheets of the Confessing Church were printed in the cellar of Heinemanns house at Schinkelstrasse 34 in Essen, Moltkeviertel, and distributed all over Germany. From 1936 to 1950, Heinemann was head of the YMCA in Essen, in August 1945, he was elected as a member of the Council of the Evangelical Church in Germany. The Council issued the Stuttgart Declaration of Guilt in October 1945 in which it confessed guilt for the failure of the Protestant church not to oppose the Nazis, Heinemann regarded the declaration as a linchpin in his work for the church. From 1949 to 1955, Heinemann was president of the all-German Synod of the Protestant Churches of Germany and he was among the founders of the German Protestant Church Congress, a congress of the Protestant laity
8.
Federal Ministry of Food and Agriculture (Germany)
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The Federal Ministry for Food and Agriculture, abbreviated BMEL, is a cabinet-level ministry of the Federal Republic of Germany. Its primary headquarters are located in Bonn with an office in Berlin. From 1949 to 2001 it was known as the Ministry for Food, Agriculture, the name Federal Ministry for Food, Agriculture and Consumer Protection was adopted on 22 November 2005 simply to alphabetize its functional parts in the German language. The current Minister for Food and Agriculture is Christian Schmidt, the Parliamentary State Secretaries are Maria Flachsbarth and Peter Bleser. Robert Kloos is the Permanent State Secretary
9.
Bundestag
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The Bundestag is a constitutional and legislative body at the federal level in Germany. For its similar function, it is described as a lower house of parliament along the lines of the US House of Representatives. The German constitution, however, does not define the Bundestag, since 1999 it has met in the Reichstag Building in Berlin. Norbert Lammert is the current President of the Bundestag, Members of the Bundestag are usually elected every four years by all adult German citizens in a mixed system of constituency voting and list voting. There are currently 631 seats, however, one – belonging to the CDU – remains vacant. The Election Day, however, can be if the Federal Chancellor loses a vote of no confidence. In the 19th century the name Bundestag was the designation for the assembly of the sovereigns and mayors of the Monarchies. Its seat was in the Free City of Frankfurt on the Main, two decades later, the current parliament building was erected. The Reichstag delegates were elected by direct and equal male suffrage, the Reichstag did not participate in the appointment of the Chancellor until the parliamentary reforms of October 1918. After this the Reichstag met only rarely, usually at the Krolloper following the Reichstag fire starting in 1933 to unanimously rubber-stamp the decisions of the government and it last convened on 26 April 1942. With the new constitution of 1949, the Bundestag was established as the new German parliament, the Bundeshaus in Bonn is the former Parliament Building of Germany. The sessions of the German Bundestag were held there from 1949 until its move to Berlin in 1999, today it houses the International Congress Centre Bundeshaus Bonn and in the north areas the branch office of the Bundesrat. The southern areas became part of German offices for the United Nations in 2008, the former Reichstag building housed a history exhibition and served occasionally as a conference center. The Reichstag building was occasionally used as a venue for sittings of the Bundestag and its committees and the Bundesversammlung. In 2005, an aircraft crashed close to the German parliament. It was then decided to ban private air traffic over Central Berlin, together with the Bundesrat, the Bundestag is the legislative branch of the German political system. The committees play a prominent role in this process, Plenary sessions provide a forum for members to engage in public debate on legislative issues before them, but they tend to be well attended only when significant legislation is being considered. This check on executive power can be employed through binding legislation, public debates on government policy, investigations, for example, the Bundestag can conduct a question hour, in which a government representative responds to a previously submitted written question from a member
German Empire
Weimar Republic
Nazi Germany
Wehrmacht Heer
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West Germany: Former Grand Master of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of West Germany, Special Class[4][5][6]
Cameroon: Grand Cross of the Order of Valour[7]
Ethiopia: Knight Grand Collar of the Order of Solomon[8][9]
France: Grand Cross of the Order of the Legion of Honour[10]
Iran: Knight Grand Cordon with Collar of the Order of Pahlavi[11][12]
Philippines: Rajah Grand Cross with Collar of the Order of Sikatuna[13][14]
Thailand: Honorary Knight Grand Cordon with Collar of the Order of the Rajamitrabhorn[15]
United Kingdom: Honorary Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Bath[6][16]
