German history: Steinmeier recalls the ambivalence of November 9th

German history
Steinmeier recalls the ambivalence of November 9th

Germany’s November 9th – a day of greatest national happiness and at the same time the greatest national abyss: Federal President Frank-Walter Steinmeier has called for us to deal more closely than before with this contradicting day and to celebrate it “as a day to reflect on our country”.

November 9, 1918 and 1989 remind the Germans that freedom and democracy did not fall from the sky and were not secured forever, he said on Tuesday at a memorial event at Bellevue Palace. November 9, 1938 commemorates the crime of the Shoah against humanity and urges vigilance and moral courage.

The day stands for three decisive dates in German history: On November 9, 1918, Philipp Scheidemann proclaimed the republic from a window in the Reichstag building, the monarchy was sealed. November 9, 1938 went down in history as the day of the National Socialist pogroms and stands for the persecution and extermination of the Jews. And on November 9, 1989, the fall of the Berlin Wall ushered in German reunification.

Today’s Germany could not be understood without the shadows of National Socialism, the war of annihilation and the Shoah, emphasized Steinmeier. But also the love for freedom and the courage for democracy are deeply rooted in German history. The Federal Republic was able to grow from these roots after 1945.

“Patriotism of soft tones”

“To endure this ambivalence, to carry light and shadow, joy and sadness in your heart, that is part of being German,” emphasized Steinmeier. To accept both, shame and sadness about the victims and respect and appreciation for the pioneers of our democracy, that is what it should be about. “That is the core of enlightened patriotism. Instead of trumpets and trumpets, a patriotism of soft tones. Instead of triumph and self-assurance, a patriotism with mixed feelings. “

The heads of the four other constitutional organs also came to the Great Hall of Bellevue Palace for the commemoration: the Executive Chancellor Angela Merkel (CDU), Bundestag President Bärbel Bas (SPD), Federal Council President Bodo Ramelow (left) and the President of the Federal Constitutional Court, Stephan Harbarth .

During the memorial hour, the youngest member of the new Bundestag, Emilia Fester (Greens), looked at the events of 1918. «The German people have triumphed across the board. The old rot has collapsed. Militarism is over. The Hohenzollern abdicated. Long live the German Republic, ”she quoted from Scheidemann’s speech.

Then Margot Friedländer’s description of the morning after the pogrom night in Berlin in 1938 was oppressive. The just 100-year-old Holocaust survivor was brought onto the stage by the Federal President, who later called her a “blessing for our country”.

She told how she had noticed the unusual emptiness of the street, where actually only “men in the hated brown uniforms” stood around in small groups in front of destroyed Jewish shops. ‘Whatever the store offered was out on the street now, and anyone could help themselves while the browns looked on happily. (…) I heard crunching under my shoes. I stepped on glass, the glass of the Jewish shops that no longer existed. ” Friedländer reported fear, helplessness and powerlessness and said in a halting voice: “We knew that this was the beginning of much worse, what was to come.”

The former GDR civil rights activist Roland Jahn also experienced the feeling of powerlessness when he was forcibly expatriated by the SED regime in 1983. The later federal commissioner for the Stasi files, however, experienced a “very personal lucky day” on November 9th, when he immediately rushed to his family in Jena after the fall of the wall in West Berlin. The fall of the Berlin Wall on November 9, 1989 was a “signal to the world” that could give people courage, Jahn said: “Dictatorship can be overcome – this is the sign of hope from Germany to Belarus, China or Cuba.”

dpa