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The New Government in Germany1

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 September 2013

Walter James Shepard
Affiliation:
University of Missouri

Extract

The revolution in Germany strikes the observer as different in essential respects from revolutions which have taken place in other countries. One looks, in such events, for a few short days of blood and battle; for power wrested by force from the grip of those who have held it; for popular turmoil, the citizenry waging conflict behind street barricades against the disciplined but gradually disintegrating and increasingly disaffected troops of the established government—in short, for a journée in which the overturn is speedily accomplished and the new régime quickly set up. But the German revolution affords no such spectacle. There has been, to be sure, street-fighting and bloodshed, but they have been incident to the attempt of the extremists to overthrow the revolutionary government or to compel it to undertake a more radical program. The revolution itself was bloodless, and the establishment of the provisional government under Ebert was only the last step in a crumbling process which had been evident during the latter part of the administration of Count von Hertling and the whole of that of Prince Max.

Type
Research Article
Copyright
Copyright © American Political Science Association 1919

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References

2 Since writing this article the Scheidemann ministry resigned on June 20, as was anticipated, over the question of signing the treaty of peace. The premier and several other members were so fully committed to rejection that their fall was certain in the face of the national assembly's strong majority for signing. A new ministry has been appointed under the premiership of Herr Bauer, a Majority Socialist, who had been minister of labor in Prince Max's ministry, and had continued under the provisional Ebert government. This cabinet contains seven members of the Scheideman cabinet. It accepted the mandate of the national assembly to sign the treaty, but otherwise cannot be said to represent any new or different principles. Herr Noske remains minister of national defense and continues to be the strong man of the goverument.

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