Heinrich Albertz (22 January 1915 – 18 May 1993) was a German Protestant

theologian Theology is the systematic study of the nature of the divine and, more broadly, of religious belief. It is taught as an academic discipline, typically in universities and seminaries. It occupies itself with the unique content of analyzing the ...

, priest and

politician A politician is a person active in party politics, or a person holding or seeking an elected office in government. Politicians propose, support, reject and create laws that govern the land and by an extension of its people. Broadly speaking ...

of the Social Democratic Party (SPD). He served as Governing Mayor of Berlin (

West Berlin West Berlin (german: Berlin (West) or , ) was a political enclave which comprised the western part of Berlin during the years of the Cold War. Although West Berlin was de jure not part of West Germany, lacked any sovereignty, and was under mi ...

) from 1966 to 1967.

Life

Heinrich Albertz was born in Breslau (present-day Wrocław, Poland), in the

Prussian Prussia, , Old Prussian: ''Prūsa'' or ''Prūsija'' was a German state on the southeast coast of the Baltic Sea. It formed the German Empire under Prussian rule when it united the German states in 1871. It was ''de facto'' dissolved by an e ...

province of Silesia The Province of Silesia (german: Provinz Schlesien; pl, Prowincja Śląska; szl, Prowincyjŏ Ślōnskŏ) was a province of Prussia from 1815 to 1919. The Silesia region was part of the Prussian realm since 1740 and established as an official p ...

, to the court preacher and consistorial councilor Hugo Albertz and his second wife Elisabeth, née Meinhof. His elder half brother was the Resistance fighter Martin Albertz. Having obtained his baccalaureate ('' Abitur'') in 1933, he went on to study theology at the universities of Breslau, Halle and

Berlin Berlin ( , ) is the capital and List of cities in Germany by population, largest city of Germany by both area and population. Its 3.7 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European Union by population within ci ...

. Under the

Nazi Nazism ( ; german: Nazismus), the common name in English for National Socialism (german: Nationalsozialismus, ), is the far-right totalitarian political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in ...

regime, he maintained contact to circles of the banned Social Democratic Party. As a member of the

Confessing Church The Confessing Church (german: link=no, Bekennende Kirche, ) was a movement within German Protestantism during Nazi Germany that arose in opposition to government-sponsored efforts to unify all Protestant churches into a single pro-Nazi German ...

opposing the Nazis, he showed solidarity with the imprisoned pastor

Martin Niemöller Friedrich Gustav Emil Martin Niemöller (; 14 January 18926 March 1984) was a German theologian and Lutheran pastor. He is best known for his opposition to the Nazi regime during the late 1930s and for his widely quoted 1946 poem " First they ca ...

, was arrested several times and finally conscripted into the

Wehrmacht The ''Wehrmacht'' (, ) were the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the ''Heer'' (army), the '' Kriegsmarine'' (navy) and the ''Luftwaffe'' (air force). The designation "''Wehrmacht''" replaced the previo ...

in 1941. After

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposing ...

Albertz moved to Celle, where the

British British may refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * British people, nationals or natives of the United Kingdom, British Overseas Territories, and Crown Dependencies. ** Britishness, the British identity and common culture * British English, ...

occupation authorities entrusted him with the reception of expellees and displaced persons. He joined the SPD and in 1946 became a member of the

Landtag of Lower Saxony The Lower Saxon Landtag () or the Parliament of Lower Saxony is the state diet of the German state of Lower Saxony. It convenes in Hanover and currently consists of 146 members, consisting of four parties. Since 2022 the majority is a coalitio ...

. In 1948 he was appointed minister for expellee affairs in the Lower Saxon state cabinet under Minister-President Hinrich Wilhelm Kopf; in 1951 he became state minister of social affairs. Since 1950 he was also a member of the SPD federal board. He was a Christian pacifist and opposed the production and placement of nuclear weapons on German soil. When the Kopf cabinet was succeeded by the right-wing government of Minister-President Heinrich Hellwege upon the 1955 state elections, Albertz continued his career as a state secretary under the West Berlin mayor Otto Suhr. In 1961 he became Senator (minister) of the Interior under Mayor

Willy Brandt Willy Brandt (; born Herbert Ernst Karl Frahm; 18 December 1913 – 8 October 1992) was a German politician and statesman who was leader of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD) from 1964 to 1987 and served as the chancellor of West Ge ...

and deputy mayor in 1963. When Brandt joined the German grand coalition government of Chancellor Kurt Georg Kiesinger, Albertz succeeded him and was elected governing mayor of West Berlin by the Abgeordnetenhaus parliament on 14 December 1966. Albertz, standing in the shadow of his popular predecessor, led the Social Democrats into the following state election held on 12 March 1967. Nevertheless, the SPD was able to maintain its absolute majority. Albertz' term in office was characterized by the rising student revolts culminating during the state visit by Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi and his wife

Farah Pahlavi Farah Pahlavi ( fa, فرح پهلوی, née Farah Diba ( fa, فرح دیبا, label=none); born 14 October 1938) is the widow of the last Shah of Iran, Mohammad Reza Pahlavi, and was successively Queen and Empress ('' Shahbanu'') of Iran fro ...

. On 2 June 1967, Pahlavi was received in West Berlin, accompanied by violent clashes of protesters with Iranian

secret police Secret police (or political police) are intelligence, security or police agencies that engage in covert operations against a government's political, religious, or social opponents and dissidents. Secret police organizations are characteristic of ...

collaborators and massive police forces, whereby the student

Benno Ohnesorg Benno Ohnesorg (; 15 October 1940 – 2 June 1967)Böttcher, Dirk (2002). "Ohnesorg, Benno" (in German), in: Hannoversches biographisches Lexikon: von den Anfängen bis in die Gegenwart'. Hannover: Schlütersche. p. 275. was a West German ...

was shot by police officer

Karl-Heinz Kurras Karl-Heinz Kurras (1 December 1927 – 16 December 2014)

, an incident that became a turning point in the devolution of the German student movement. On 28 September Mayor Albertz was forced to resign after an investigation into the police's role in the killing. The Abgeordnetenhaus elected Klaus Schütz his successor. From 1970 he worked as a

pastor A pastor (abbreviated as "Pr" or "Ptr" , or "Ps" ) is the leader of a Christian congregation who also gives advice and counsel to people from the community or congregation. In Lutheranism, Catholicism, Eastern Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodoxy and ...

, from 1974 to 1979 in Berlin- Zehlendorf. When on 27 February 1975 the Movement 2 June militant group (named after the obit of Benno Ohnesorg) abducted the

Christian Democrat Christian democracy (sometimes named Centrist democracy) is a political ideology that emerged in 19th-century Europe under the influence of Catholic social teaching and neo-Calvinism. It was conceived as a combination of modern democratic ...

candidate for Mayor of West Berlin

Peter Lorenz Peter Lorenz (22 December 1922 – 6 December 1987) was a German politician of the Christian Democratic Union (CDU). In 1975 Lorenz was a candidate for mayor of West Berlin. He was kidnapped by the 2 June Movement group three days befor ...

, Albertz agreed to accompany the exchanged prisoners, among them

Verena Becker Verena Becker (born 31 July 1952) is a former West German member of the Movement 2 June and later the Red Army Faction. Terrorist career While a student, Becker initially joined Movement 2 June (J2M) and was involved in bank robberies and the bomb ...

and Gabriele Kröcher-Tiedemann, on their flight to South Yemen. Retired in 1979, he joined the German

peace movement A peace movement is a social movement which seeks to achieve ideals, such as the ending of a particular war (or wars) or minimizing inter-human violence in a particular place or situation. They are often linked to the goal of achieving world peac ...

of the 1980s and several protests against the

NATO Double-Track Decision The NATO Double-Track Decision was the decision by NATO from December 12, 1979 to offer the Warsaw Pact a mutual limitation of medium-range ballistic missiles and intermediate-range ballistic missiles. It was combined with a threat by NATO to d ...

. Albertz died in a Bremen nursing home on 18 May 1993.

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Albertz, Heinrich 1915 births 1993 deaths Lutheran pacifists Clergy from Wrocław 20th-century German Protestant theologians Social Democratic Party of Germany politicians Mayors of West Berlin Senators of Berlin Members of the Abgeordnetenhaus of Berlin People from the Province of Silesia Grand Crosses with Star and Sash of the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany German male non-fiction writers 20th-century Lutherans German Army personnel of World War II