1913 Hamburg state election

1913 Hamburg state election

←  1910 1913 1919  →
36 out of 160 in the Bürgerschaft
Turnout	94.60% 0.99pp
First party Second party Third party   Basedow Leader Otto Stolten Hermann Basedow Dietrich Heinrich Daniel Blinckmann Party SPD VL L Seats won 10 8 7 Seat change 1 2 1   Fourth party Fifth party   Leader Binder Dr. H. von Reiche Party LZ R Seats won 5 6 Seat change 1 1

The 1913 Hamburg state election was held sometime during the year 1913. The electorate was split into two regions, the inner city with one electoral district, and the rural regions with four electoral districts. ^[1]

Background and electoral system

Enfranchised citizen, as defined for the Hamburg state elections, were males who paid a certain amount of income tax. Every voter had a total 12 votes.

After the voter disenfranchisement law of 1906, sparked by the electoral victory of the SPD, the subsequent state elections of 1907, 1910, and 1913 would use a system of heavily weighted class suffrage that divided the enfranchised male population into two groups. Group I was made up of citizen who had paid an average annual income tax of above 2,500 ℛ︁ℳ︁ for the last three years, whereas Group II was made up of citizen who paid between 1,200 and 2,500 ℛ︁ℳ︁ in taxes annually. Furthermore, landowners and the notables (primarily current and former MPs) were also enfranchised with 40 representatives per group. A weighted voting system as used to disenfranchise Group II as much as possible. It has been calculated by Margarete Wolters that a notable's vote counted 59 times, a landowner's vote 17 times, and the vote of any other Group I elector counted four times as much as a vote from any one Group II elector. ^[2]

In the years 1910 and 1913, in the last elections according to the electoral law of 1906, the gradation of Hamburg's population was as follows: ^{[2] [3]}

Population group	Population	Allocated Seats [a]
In the urban areas	77,241	72 (36)
└ Group I	28,479	48 (24)
└ Group II	48,762	24 (12)
In the rural areas	5,946	8
Land owners	8,731	40
Notables	954	40
Wealthy voters total	38,164	128
Total voters	83,187	160
Total population	1,037,275	0

Results

Party		Group I			Group II			Seats
		Votes	%	Seats	Votes	%	Seats	Won	Not up	Total	+/–
	Social Democratic Party	13,845	8.75	2	197,196	62.16	8	10	10	20	+1
	United Liberals	39,499	24.97	6	58,133	18.33	2	8	17	28	-2
	Faction of the Left	38,765	24.50	6	24,667	7.78	1	7	28	36	-1
	Faction of the Left Centre	29,047	18.36	5	12,278	3.87	0	5	31	36	+1
	Faction of the Right	29,838	18.86	5	18,629	5.87	1	6	36	40	+1
	Hamburger Conservative Alliance	6,144	3.88	0	4,959	1.56	0	0	0	0	±0
	Fruit- and Vegetable-traders	451	0.29	0	1,318	0.42	0	0	0	0	±0
	Independents	619	0.39	0	52	0.02	0	0	0	0	±0
Total		158,208	100.00	24	317,232	100.00	12	36	122	160	±0
Registered voters/turnout			94.60 [b]
Source: Die Ergebnisse der Wahlen zur hamburgischen Bürgerschaft im Jahre 1913. p. 6

Notes

1. The numbers in brackets indicate the number of seats up for actual election, the rest of representatives were the so-called elders (Erbgesessene) that were to keep a life-long seat.
2. For both groups combined.

References

1. Sköllin, Statistische Mittteilung, p. 59.
2. Eckardt, Von der privilegierten Herrschaft zur parlamentarischen Demokratie, pp. 53/54
3. Niehuss, Strategien zur Machterhaltung, pp. 87

Literature

• Prof. Dr. Sköllin (1919). Statistische Mittteilung über den hamburgischen Staat, Nr. 8 - Die Neuwahl der hamburgischen Bürgerschaft am 16. März 1919. Direktor des Statistischen Landesamtes
• Eckardt, Hans Wilhelm (2002). Von der privilegierten Herrschaft zur parlamentarischen Demokratie. Landeszentrale für politische Bildung. ISBN   3-929728-66-4
• Niehuss, Merith (1989). Strategien zur Machterhaltung bürgerlicher Eliten am Beispiel kommunaler Wahlrechtsänderungen im ausgehenden Kaiserreich, Scripta Mercaturae Verlag.