2. Weimar Constitution

Question 1

What is the role of the President ? (5)

Answer 1

• The people elected the president every seven years.
• The right to dissolve the Reichstag
• the appointment of the chancellor
• the role of the Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces
• ability to rule by Article 48

Question 2

What could the German people do in the Weimar ?

Answer 2

• everyone over 20 could vote for party lists for the Reichstag every four years

Question 3

When was the Weimar Constitution adopted by the National Constituent Assembly?

Answer 3

July 31st 1919

Question 4

when was the Weimar Constitution signed by President Ebert ?

Answer 4

August 11th 1919

Question 5

What were the proposals for the constitution influenced by?

Answer 5

They were influenced by the long-established democratic ideas of Britain and the USA

Question 6

What was introduced that was traditional in Germany?

Answer 6

Proportional representation and the creation of a federal structure

Question 7

What is proportional representation

Answer 7

A system that allocates parliamentary seats in proportion to the total number of votes. This elects one seat per 60,000 votes

Question 8

Describe the role of the Reichstag in Parliament

Answer 8

• Main representative assembly and law making body of parliament that consisted of deputies elected every four years on the basis of PR

Question 9

Describe the role of the Reichstrat (3)

Answer 9

• less important house in parliament
• made up of representatives from all of the 17 state regional governments
• reichstag could overrule it

Question 10

Role of the Bill of Rights in the Weimar Constitution

Answer 10

The constitution drew up a range of individual rights. It outlined broad freedoms e.g speech, religion and also social rights e.f welfare provision

Question 11

What are Länder

Answer 11

Regional states

Question 12

What did Länder mean in Germany

Answer 12

It meant that Germany was a federal system

Question 13

What was the Supreme Court for

Answer 13

Created in order to settle different interpretations of law

Question 14

What three key points of the Weimar Republic are suggested to have led to the success of Hitler and the Nazis (3)

Answer 14

• the introduction of proportional representation
• the relationship between the president and the Reichstag & article 48
• traditional institutions of Imperial Germany were allowed to continue

Question 15

Why was the introduction of proportional representation criticised? (4)

Answer 15

• It was argued it had encouraged the formation of new, small splinter parties e.g the Nazis.
  This made it more difficult to form and maintain governments
• it was virtually impossible for one party to form a majority government, so coalitions were required
• it was argued that the negotiations involved in forming governments contributed to the political instability of Weimar
• PR encouraged the emergence of political extremism

Question 16

What other political system was argued to be better than PR?

Answer 16

• a voting system based on two major parties (USA, Britain) which favoured the ‘first past the post’ model, would have created more political stability

Question 17

What is a ‘first past the post’ model?

Answer 17

An electoral system that simply requires the winner to gain one vote more than the second placed candidate.

Question 18

Name an argument for PR

Answer 18

Since the parties established in the nineteenth century were meant to reflect different political, religious and geographical views and therefore a system of PR was the only fair way

Question 19

What did Article 48 allow the President to do?

Answer 19

The Article provided the head of state with the authority to suspend civil rights in an emergency and restore law and order

Question 20

Give two examples of traditional institutions of Imperial Germany (2)

Answer 20

• the civil service was well educated and professional, but tended to conform to the old fashioned conservative values of Imperial Germany
• the army enjoyed great status and many of the generals were socially linked with the Prussian landowners. If sought to maintain its influence after 1918 and was generally not sympathetic to democratic Germany

Question 21

What was the role of the Chancellor (3)

Answer 21

• appointed by the president but must have the support of the Reichstag in order to elect the chancellor
• President tended to choose the chancellor as the leader of the largest party in the Reichstag
• the presidents power of Article 48 created a complicated relationship between the powers of the president and the Chancellor