Victor Aimé Huber

Victor Aimé Huber ( born March 10, 1800, Stuttgart, † July 19, 1869 in Wernigerode ) was a German social reformer, political thinker, travel writer and literary historian. Huber has been next to Eduard Pfeiffer, Karl Korthaus, Hermann Schulze- Delitzsch, Wilhelm Haas and Friedrich Wilhelm Raiffeisen, one of the leading founders of the cooperative system in Germany.

Life

Huber was the son of writer couple Ludwig Ferdinand Huber and Therese Huber, born Heyne and related products. Forster. After the early death of his father, he was sent as a 6- year-old as a foster son Philipp Emanuel of Fellberg after Hofwil near Bern. Fellberg, a former friend of Pestalozzi, was in the process of establishing an educational institution for the sons of the upper classes, received his education in the Victor Aimé Huber was the first pupil. In 1816, he resigned in a dispute with Fellberg prematurely from the hospital and moved to Göttingen to the relatives of his mother. Here he studied medicine and operating alongside language and literature studies.

Med with the goal to settle as a practicing physician in the Bavarian and the widowed mother to allow his doctorate in 1820 in Würzburg Dr. Huber a carefree retirement. But first he went in 1821 to France, Spain, Portugal, Scotland and England and published travelogues, in the morning paper for the educated classes, a much-read leaflet of Cotta's Allgemeine Zeitung published.

It was not until 1824 Huber returned back to Germany and tried at the University of Munich to the graduation from medical school. He failed at the resentment of the examiners and fell in 1825 by the exam. Huber pointed as the twist of fate, hung the unloved medicine at the nail and devoted himself entirely to publishing political articles - only at Cotta, then as a freelance journalist - what he made ​​further trips to France and England.

Since Huber did not deserve to write enough money to feed the mother, he took a job as a teacher in 1828 for history and modern languages ​​at the trade school in Bremen, later at the Old School in Bremen. In 1830 he married Auguste Klugkist, the daughter of the Bremen Senator Jerome Klugkist. In 1832 he became professor of new and occidental languages ​​in Rostock, 1836 in Marburg, and in 1843 professor of literary history, as well as editor of the conservative magazine Janus in Berlin. In 1852 he retired from the civil service and settled in Wernigerode in the Harz down from where he worked as a private and cooperative expert.

Confession and conversion

Huber was the confession of his father following baptized Catholic without the Roman Catholic Church ever feel inwardly belong. Executive action orientation arose not from his religion, but rather from the political liberalism.

That changed, as Huber had seen on his travels that the ideal of liberalism could be realized only very imperfectly; matters further, he was not able by his socially unsecured position to provide for his mother. Therese Huber died shortly before he could get to his Bremen, which Huber life not relatives. From this life crisis out Huber converted to the Reformed Church. The turning point had been prepared by contacts with key representatives of the revival movement, but also by the connection with the Reformed family Klugkist Senator. Since his conversion, Victor Aimé Huber understood as a pious, faithful church, Protestant Christian, which was based on the Bible and the Confessions. Center of his faith was the doctrine of justification, which is why he grew into more and more in the Lutheran Church in the course of time.

As an evangelical Christian Huber was also active in church matters. As one of the first outside of Hamburg he campaigned publicly for the Rough House Johann Hinrich Wichern, which he had visited shortly after the foundation itself. Even before the Wittenberg Church Huber sat in Janus for the Inner Mission one; began to flourish when this company after 1848, he was excluded from the refinement, which was due not least to his controversial political reputation. Huber remained an ardent supporter of the Inner Mission and held on some days church lectures on co-operation; his friendship with Wichern remained until 1862 exist.

In Janus Huber 1847 reported in detail on the negotiations of the first General Synod of the Evangelical Lutheran Church in Prussia, whose decisions, however, took place in the upheavals of the March Revolution in the sand.

Together with Friedrich Julius Stahl, Ernst Wilhelm Hengstenberg and Ernst Ludwig von Gerlach had Huber Evangelical Association, a branch association of the Gustav -Adolf -Verein, with. The club gave out Christian writings at affordable prices, as well as an illustrated Gospel book and a frequently issued picture Bible, whose motives were selected by Huber. His goal was to reach especially the working-class families with Christian educational content.

Political commitment

As a student Huber broke the ideals of liberalism, he saw, especially in the realization of a made ​​by the people, free constitution. Looking for that ideal, he traveled through France, Spain, Portugal and the UK, who were all constitutional states during this period.

From 1830 Huber tended increasingly to the monarchical conservatism embossing and leaned constitutions of German States finally categorically. In 1842 he wrote the first Conservative Party program of Germany, when the Conservatives were still far away, to see themselves as a party. This commitment earned him the reputation of the University of Berlin, where he was requested mainly as an initiator of a newly formed conservative magazine. As the editor and lead author of the journal Janus. Yearbooks German education, attitude and deed which first appeared in 1845, Huber became politically between the fronts: the liberals and socialists he was a monarchist and Pietist enemy par excellence; be strictly antikonstitutionalistischer, monarchist conservatism also proved to be incompatible with the political convictions of the leading Prussian layers, so that the actual co-thinkers presented against him. The moral and financial success of the Janus turned out correspondingly modest and was both the Prussian government as well as for Huber to loss business.

As Prussia in the wake of the March Revolution of 1848 became a constitutional state, Huber presented the Janus, drew largely from political journalism and devoted himself entirely to the social question. In 1852 he took his leave from Berlin.

Social question and cooperative movement

From childhood, Huber had been practiced by the mother and the nursing father Fellberg Social Responsibility upper for the lower layers. This responsibility could only meet Huber when he found himself in secure material circumstances as a professor. In Rostock, and Marburg, he founded toddler care institutions and sewing schools. His efforts were initially entirely within the framework of the then common Charity.

On a research trip Huber 1844 walked through ( the same year as Engels) the residential area of ​​the factory workers in Manchester. He was clear that poverty was not a single fate, but threatened that the working class to become destitute a whole segment of the population. To address this problem, Huber 1846 promoted under the title of "internal colonization " is a concept for housing cooperatives. After his plan cottage settlements should arise, the ample living space available to set the working families that allowed next to the material livelihood as well as an orderly, Christian family life. About the rental payments, the workers should be in time to be owners, so secure their financial situation. Furthermore, Huber saw before to connect tenants by various ( Christian ) education to an organic community. He wanted to generate from sales of shares the necessary capital. Huber's call for the creation, funding and management of housing cooperatives went solely to the financial and moral betters. An active participation of the workers even he could imagine only if they had been molded by the life in the cooperatives by the elites to help themselves.

Huber's social and political ideas were to some extent realized in practice. From 1849 to 1852 he was a board member of the liberal dominated Berlin -profit construction company that built 58/58a six small houses for 15 families on the land Beautifully Allee. The Bremen -called settlement amount should be a prime example of " internal colonization ", but had (in its early form ) does not last long. 1888/89, the last now derelict cottages were demolished and made ​​way for a new, denser development.

With its cooperative thoughts Huber is one of the intellectual pioneers of the cooperative movement in Germany. Its importance lies not so much in its practical work or theory, but rather in his work as a multiplier. He tirelessly collected on trips to Belgium, England and France information, making him the leading authority of European co-operatives, who enjoyed good reputation, particularly abroad. He published The information gained in countless articles and brochures, as well as at conferences.

During his lifetime, came Huber in Germany no significant resonance. He failed to systematize his theories in a closed main work, what a reception difficult. In addition, Huber stood with his Christian- conservative stained cooperative plans literally between the chairs of all relevant socio-political currents of his time: the Conservatives was the co-operative idea too liberal, the liberals were Huber's views on conservative- monarchist, the Socialists to paternalistic and reactionary political Catholicism Protestant.

Works (selection)

• Peep pictures and otherwise Allerley from Paris, in: Morning Journal for the educated classes No. 205 (1819), No. 208 (1821), No. 212, No. 259
• De lingua et size Hyoi deo pici viridis, Diss Stuttgart 1821
• Sketches of Spain, Volume 1, Göttingen 1828
• About neglect and rescue the children, first in relation to the rescue facility in Hamm near Hamburg, in: Mecklenburg leaves. Edited to the best of the poor 1834/35, No. 24, 368-376, No. 25, 385-390, No. 26, 393-407
• The English universities. A preliminary work on the English literary history, 2 vols, Kassel 1839/1840
• About the elements, the possibility or necessity of a conservative party in Germany, Marburg 1841
• Where does the right people take? in: Janus 1845 Vol I, 69-108
• Impressions and observations of a traveler. ( From letters to a friend. ) Manchester. The proletariat, in: Janus 1845 Vol II, 641-678, 705-727
• The self-help of the working class by industry associations and internal settlement, 1848 (anonymous)
• The inner mission as a cause of the Church, in: Evangelical Church Zeitung No. 95 (1848 ), 937-944
• Concordia. Leaves of the Berlin -profit construction company, Berlin 1849
• Inner Mission and Association. A memorandum to the Church in 1853, Berlin in 1853
• Travel Letters from Belgium, France and England in the summer of 1854, 1855
• The essence of the cooperative and its importance for the Inner Mission, in: Flying leaves from the napping house (1862 ), 353-365