Friedrich Ebert

:This is not the same Friedrich Ebert who was briefly the GDR's head of state, but rather his father. For the son, see Friedrich Ebert (GDR)

Legacy

Ebert remains a highly controversial figure to this day. While the SPD recognizes him as one of the founders and keepers of German democracy whose death in office in February 1925 was a great loss, socialists and communists argue that he paved the way for fascism by supporting the ultra-right Freikorps and their violent suppression of workers' urprisings.

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Those were the same people who spread the Dolchstoßlegende, the idea that the socialists were responsible for Germany's defeat in World War I. This was a particularly perfidious claim, as the socialists had entered the ceasefire negotiations on request of the military leadership, after the generals had decided that the war could no longer be won. To the generals, the Weimar Republic was a temporary, necessary evil to divert blame from themselves and prepare for the next war, and Ebert is viewed by his critics as playing exactly the role that the military wanted him to play.

Related Topics:
Dolchstoßlegende - World War I

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Some historians have defended Ebert's actions as unfortunate but inevitable to prevent the creation of a communist state (which they view as unacceptable). Leftist historians like Bernt Engelmann have argued that many of the workers were in fact centrist SPD supporters, and that the communist party was not yet politically relevant (in part because of the assassination of Liebknecht and Luxemburg). However, the actions of Ebert and his Minister of Defense, Gustav Noske, against the workers contributed to their radicalization and to increasing support for communist ideas.

Related Topics:
Communist state - Bernt Engelmann - Gustav Noske

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The creation of elected workers' councils, which Ebert had tolerated in the early days of the republic, was viewed by moderate workers as a legitimate centrist instrument to oversee the democratic government, when many government officials were reactionaries who yearned for a return of the monarchy, and when workers still enjoyed little protection from exploitation, so that strikes were frequently ended with machine guns.

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Ebert's critics view him as a knowing or unknowing agent of the reaction who made the wrong decisions in shaping post-war Germany by giving power and influence to those who had already sought German world domination in World War I and preventing the creation of a united, progressive political party. Anti-SPD slogans such as "Wer hat uns verraten? Sozialdemokraten!" ("Who betrayed us? Social democrats!") were born out of the experiences of Ebert's era. Even his defenders acknowledge that with his death, the end of the Weimar Republic became inevitable. His successor, Paul von Hindenburg, had been one of the military leaders of World War I.

Related Topics:
World War I - Paul von Hindenburg

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