Parlamentarischer Rat
The Parliamentary Council was directed by the three Western powers, France, Britain and the United States set up by the eleven Prime Ministers of the German states of the three Western occupation zones of America political body and consisted of representatives elected by provincial assemblies.
The panel should be on the basis of the Frankfurt documents to which the Prime Minister in the resolutions adopted at the Rittersturz Conference Koblenz decisions commented, and the Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany elaborate on which were already present preliminary work by the Convention of Herrenchiemsee. The Basic Law should only be considered provisional constitution. The decision to place the seat of this body to Bonn was, (as well as the pre-tuning of Bonn as the future federal capital ) taken in Dusseldorf, where the ministers of internal affairs met for a preliminary Constitutional Convention on 11 October 1948.
History
The opening ceremony of the Parliamentary Council took place in a ceremony on 1 September 1948 for the Museum Alexander Koenig in Bonn. The first inaugural meeting on September 1, 1948, all other plenary and committee sessions were in the Pedagogical Academy, which later became the House of Parliament, held. Convened the first meeting by the chairman of the Prime Ministers' Conference, the Hessian Minister President Christian Stock. He and the state leader, the North Rhine -Westphalian Minister Karl Arnold, held the opening speeches. To the President of the Parliamentary Konrad Adenauer was elected. The CDU / CSU faction came under Council in King Winter, the SPD Parliamentary Group in the district of Bad Honnef Rhöndorf and the remaining fractions in Bonn. The Allied occupation forces talked connecting rods at the Parliamentary Council: France and the United States in a semi-detached villa in Joachimstraße and the United Kingdom in the villa alcohol.
The Parliamentary Council consisted of 65 voting delegates of the Western occupation zones, and five non-voting members from Berlin ( West), who had been elected by the respective parliaments. A deputy represented in each case about 750,000 inhabitants; North Rhine- Westphalia sent with 16 parliamentarians, most representative, Württemberg-Hohenzollern and Baden 2 and Bremen with 1 the least. Since there was no minimum number of Members to form a political group consisted of six factions in the Parliamentary Council. Here, the deputies of the CDU and CSU merged to form a political group, as well as the deputies of the three liberal parties FDP, LDP and DVP. Strongest fractions, each with 27 MPs were CDU / CSU and SPD, followed by the FDP by five members and the KPD, the German Party and the center with two deputies. The chairmen of the three largest groups were Anton Pfeiffer (CDU / CSU), Carlo Schmid ( SPD) and Theodor Heuss (Liberal ). The stalemate between the major parties forced to agreement on the key issues and prevented one party alone could put their stamp on the Basic Law.
Even if was contemporary spoken of the " fathers of the Basic Law ," were among the deputies and four women (6% ), namely Friederike Nadig (SPD ), Elisabeth Selbert (SPD ), Helene Weber (CDU ) and Helene Wessel ( center ), now referred to as mothers of the Basic Law.
The Parliamentary Council was dominated by lawyers and officials. Including Alternates were twelve deputy state ministers, including five Ministers of Justice. 47 MPs were previously tenured or at the time of the Parliamentary Council. A university degree had 51 MPs, including 32 a law degree and an economics eleven. Many Members have already clothed important positions in the Weimar Republic. Eleven MPs were previously members of the Reichstag, and three had already collaborated in the drafting of the Constitution of the Weimar Republic in 1919. Höpker Aschoff (FDP) was 1925-1931 Prussian Finance Minister, Paul Lobe (SPD), long-time president of the Reichstag. Furthermore, there were numerous professors, including designated constitutional experts such as Carlo Schmid. Secretary of the Parliamentary Council was senior executive officer Hans Troßmann (CSU ).
Many MPs had suffered in the era of National Socialism under persecution, prohibition or detention. Some deputies had to flee abroad, five deputies had been interned in a concentration camp.
Others, like the CDU deputy Hermann von Mangoldt (Professor of Public Law ), the FDP deputy Hermann Höpker - Aschoff ( chief legal officer of the Main Trusteeship Office East), the DP deputy Hans -Christoph Seebohm ( co-founder of Egerlander Mining AG, as " collecting society has been " specifically to take over " founded aryanised " property) and the linearization expert Dresdner Bank Paul Binder, CDU, looked at more or less influential careers during the Nazi period back or were as low-ranking SA leaders such as the CDU deputy Adolf Blomeyer caught up in the terror of the Nazi regime after the "seizure of power ". During the deliberations of the Parliamentary Council, presented six deputies down its mandate, Felix Walter ( CDU) died on 17 February 1949. Therefore there were seven substitutes and a total of 77 members.
Of the allied Western powers given main goal of the creators of the Constitution was to learn from the mistakes of the Weimar Republic and the dictatorship of the Nazis. Content in the Basic Law should establish a democratic order at the state basis with constitutional guarantees and thus a counter-proposal to the totalitarianism of the Nazi regime of injustice. In conscious distinction on this issue and the people's democracies Soviet-style, most MPs known to parliamentary democracy, the idea of substantive law and the separation of powers principle.
The drawn by the Parliamentary Council lessons from the failure of the Weimar Republic were about the definition of material barriers for constitutional amendments in Article 79 paragraph 3 of the Basic Law. There was a consensus on the priority and the normativity of the Constitution, should bind the legislation, jurisdiction and administration. In particular, the fundamental rights have been strengthened and enhanced the role of the Registrar. For example, the constructive vote of no confidence so called was introduced instead of a simple. The position of the German President has been redesigned. The mothers and fathers of the Basic Law were advocates of a militant democracy and wanted to ensure that, unlike in the Weimar Constitution arrangements have been made, it should make enemies of democracy impossible to subvert again in a legal way. As " guardian of the Constitution ," one equipped with comprehensive powers Constitutional Court was provided. It should ensure that the right is recognized as the basis of human society and not political expediency is elevated to the highest principle. Law should go with power. The rule of law and the rule of all state expression of power as well as their procedural security has been locked in 4 of the Constitution in Article 20, paragraph 3 and Article 19 para.
The primary objective of the Basic Law was the establishment of the unity of all Germans, as it was expressed in the Preamble and in Article 23. However, it was also to the interests of the (Western) Allies to take into consideration that demanded improvements in detail issues; this concerned the role of Berlin, which should be an equal state after the request of the Parliamentary Council, while the victors insisted on the special status of the city, which was expressed about the fact that the Berlin Parliament were not given the right to vote in the German Bundestag in particular.
On May 8, 1949 at 23:55 clock ( to the political significance of the day -willed ) of the Parliamentary Council adopted by 36 -time improvements of 53 to 12 votes, the Basic Law. Against the basic law thereby agreed in each case the two members of the Communist Party, the center, the DP and six of the eight CSU Members.
The three Western Military Governors announced on May 12 its agreement and the provinces agreed to the draft - only the Bavarian state parliament agreed by a majority of the Basic Law, which seemed too little federalist, but with the proviso recognizing the fundamental law if two-thirds of states would ratify what was the case (Art. 144 para 1 of the Basic Law ). The Basic Law was promulgated on 23 May 1949 and was in West Germany (except initially in the Saarland, which is part of the Federal Republic was only in January 1957). The Basic Law contained some special arrangements for Berlin (West).
The Parliamentary Council dissolved after the preparation of the first elections to the German Bundestag.