Julius Motteler (18 June 1838 – 29 September 1907) was a pioneering

German German(s) may refer to: * Germany, the country of the Germans and German things **Germania (Roman era) * Germans, citizens of Germany, people of German ancestry, or native speakers of the German language ** For citizenship in Germany, see also Ge ...

Socialist Socialism is an economic ideology, economic and political philosophy encompassing diverse Economic system, economic and social systems characterised by social ownership of the means of production, as opposed to private ownership. It describes ...

and

businessman A businessperson, also referred to as a businessman or businesswoman, is an individual who has founded, owns, or holds shares in (including as an angel investor) a private-sector company. A businessperson undertakes activities (commercial ...

. Julius Motteler was a leading member of the early German

Labour movement The labour movement is the collective organisation of working people to further their shared political and economic interests. It consists of the trade union or labour union movement, as well as political parties of labour. It can be considere ...

and was repeatedly elected a member of the (German national parliament). During the period 1878 - 1890, defined politically in Germany by the

Anti-Socialist Laws The Anti-Socialist Laws or Socialist Laws (; officially , approximately "Law against the public danger of Social Democratic endeavours") were a series of acts of the parliament of the German Empire, the first of which was passed on 19 October 187 ...

, he organised the party's underground press activities. He was also instrumental in the establishment of

trades unions A trade union (British English) or labor union (American English), often simply referred to as a union, is an organization of workers whose purpose is to maintain or improve the conditions of their employment, such as attaining better wages ...

in Germany, and an early champion of the Proletarian Women's Movement (). He was a member of the inner circle of left wing leaders that also included

August Bebel Ferdinand August Bebel (; 22 February 1840 – 13 August 1913) was a German socialist activist and politician. He was one of the principal founders of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD). Bebel, a woodworker by trade, co-founded the Sa ...

and

Wilhelm Liebknecht Wilhelm Martin Philipp Christian Ludwig Liebknecht (; 29 March 1826 – 7 August 1900) was a German socialist activist and politician. He was one of the principal founders of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD).Social Democratic Party The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology. Active parties Form ...

, having already been a co-founder of several predecessor political parties, the Saxon People's Party, the Social Democratic Workers' Party and the German Socialist Worker's Party ( / SAP).

Life

Early years

Julius Motteler was born the ninth of twelve children in Esslingen, some southeast of

Stuttgart Stuttgart (; ; Swabian German, Swabian: ; Alemannic German, Alemannic: ; Italian language, Italian: ; ) is the capital city, capital and List of cities in Baden-Württemberg by population, largest city of the States of Germany, German state of ...

. His father was a prosperous hotelier. The boy attended the Pädagogium (school) in Esslingen and prepared for a career as a teacher. However, his father died in July 1848 and four years later, in 1852, Julius Motteler quit the local teacher training college and embarked on an apprenticeship in the weaving trade. After he had completed his military service Motteler, who was by now a qualified

weaver Weaver or Weavers may refer to: Activities * A person who engages in weaving fabric Animals * Various birds of the family Ploceidae * Crevice weaver spider family * Orb-weaver spider family * Weever (or weever-fish) Arts and entertainmen ...

and textile (buckskin) worker, and also had some commercial training, moved to

Augsburg Augsburg ( , ; ; ) is a city in the Bavaria, Bavarian part of Swabia, Germany, around west of the Bavarian capital Munich. It is a College town, university town and the regional seat of the Swabia (administrative region), Swabia with a well ...

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where he gained experience as a book keeper and factory manager. He relocated again in 1859, this time to

Saxony Saxony, officially the Free State of Saxony, is a landlocked state of Germany, bordering the states of Brandenburg, Saxony-Anhalt, Thuringia, and Bavaria, as well as the countries of Poland and the Czech Republic. Its capital is Dresden, and ...

, taking a job in September of that year as a dispatcher and book keeper with a textiles company called "Vigonespinnerei Wolf & Kirsten" in

Crimmitschau Crimmitschau () is a town in the district of Zwickau (district), Zwickau in Saxony, Germany. Geography Crimmitschau lies on the river Pleiße in the northern foothills of the Ore Mountains. Neighboring municipalities Adjacent communities includ ...

near

Zwickau Zwickau (; ) is the fourth-largest city of Saxony, Germany, after Leipzig, Dresden and Chemnitz, with around 88,000 inhabitants,. The West Saxon city is situated in the valley of the Zwickau Mulde (German: ''Zwickauer Mulde''; progression: ), ...

Socialist beginnings

In Saxony Motteler increasingly focused on trades union and political activities. In 1860 he joined the politically liberal German National Association, itself a precursor to a political party. This was where he first met

. In 1863 he was one of the founders of the (Workers' Educational Association) in Crimmitschau, which quickly became part of a nationwide movement. In the same year, with the creation of the (''"Association of German Workers' Associations"''), he gave expression to a separation of the workers' movement from what socialist innovators of the time would have identified as "Bourgeois liberalism". He adopted the programme drawn up by

Karl Marx Karl Marx (; 5 May 1818 – 14 March 1883) was a German philosopher, political theorist, economist, journalist, and revolutionary socialist. He is best-known for the 1848 pamphlet '' The Communist Manifesto'' (written with Friedrich Engels) ...

for the

First International The International Workingmen's Association (IWA; 1864–1876), often called the First International, was a political international which aimed at uniting a variety of different left-wing socialist, social democratic, communist, and anarchist ...

as a political road map. In 1866 he was a founding member with

and

Wilhelm Liebknecht Wilhelm Martin Philipp Christian Ludwig Liebknecht (; 29 March 1826 – 7 August 1900) was a German socialist activist and politician. He was one of the principal founders of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD).Saxon People's Party. The next year he lost his job with "Wolf & Kirsten" who objected to his election campaigning, and joined "Spinn- und Webgenossenschaft Ernst Stehfest & Co", still in Crimmitschau, working as a buyer. He was not alone in losing his job for political reasons, and his new employer was a co-operative enterprise, founded on 8 July 1867 by a number of textile workers who had lost their previous jobs for political campaigning. he sector and the region were booming, and the new enterprise was initially successful, but it closed through insolvency in 1876. Motteler had stood as a guarantor for the cooperative. In 1867 Julius Motteler and Karl Wilhelm Stolle jointly established the "Crimmitschau Republican People's Union" (), as the local branch of the Saxon People's Party. He played a part in sending workers' delegates to the Reichstag of the short-lived

North German Confederation The North German Confederation () was initially a German military alliance established in August 1866 under the leadership of the Kingdom of Prussia, which was transformed in the subsequent year into a confederated state (a ''de facto'' feder ...

. In 1869 he participated, with

, in the founding in

Eisenach Eisenach () is a Town#Germany, town in Thuringia, Germany with 42,000 inhabitants, west of Erfurt, southeast of Kassel and northeast of Frankfurt. It is the main urban centre of western Thuringia, and bordering northeastern Hesse, Hessian re ...

of the Social Democratic Workers' Party ( / SDAP), which turned out to be a precursor of the

SPD The Social Democratic Party of Germany ( , SPD ) is a social democratic political party in Germany. It is one of the major parties of contemporary Germany. Saskia Esken has been the party's leader since the 2019 leadership election together wi ...

. Shortly afterwards he established a local party branch in Crimmitschau, in 1868 dissolving the local (Workers' Educational Association) to make way for the new SDAP. In May 1869 Motteler was a founder, in

Leipzig Leipzig (, ; ; Upper Saxon: ; ) is the most populous city in the States of Germany, German state of Saxony. The city has a population of 628,718 inhabitants as of 2023. It is the List of cities in Germany by population, eighth-largest city in Ge ...

, of the "Trades Union of Manufacturing, Industrial and Craft workers of both sexes" (''"Gewerksgenossenschaft der Manufactur-, Fabrik- und Handarbeiter beiderlei Geschlechts"'') which quickly became one of the country's largest trades unions, although it proved short-lived, being closed down by the police on 10 December 1878, after the legislators outlawed trades unions in

1878 Events January * January 5 – Russo-Turkish War: Battle of Shipka Pass IV – Russian and Bulgarian forces defeat the Ottoman Empire. * January 9 – Umberto I becomes King of Italy. * January 17 – Russo-Turkish War: ...

. Nevertheless, in the longer term this union can be seen as a forerunner of the German Textile Workers' Union () founded in 1891 following the lifting of the

(although later closed down by the

Nazis Nazism (), formally named National Socialism (NS; , ), is the far-right politics, far-right Totalitarianism, totalitarian socio-political ideology and practices associated with Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party (NSDAP) in Germany. During H ...

1933 Events January * January 11 – Australian aviator Sir Charles Kingsford Smith makes the first commercial flight between Australia and New Zealand. * January 17 – The United States Congress votes in favour of Philippines independen ...

). In addition to campaigning actively for women's rights long before most of the issues involved found their way into mainstream socialist politics, Motteler also argued vehemently against the use of child labour in factories. He actively backed the creation of various consumer cooperatives, workers' associations and labour unions. With Stolle, in 1870 he founded a co-operative printing press to produce the "Crimmitschau Citizens' and Farmers' Friend" (), identified by some as Germany's first regional Social Democratic newspaper. During the 1870s he was involved with the establishment of a printing co-operative in Leipzig between 1874 and 1876, and in

Barmen Barmen is a former industrial metropolis of the region of Bergisches Land, Germany, which merged with four other towns in 1929 to form the city of Wuppertal. Barmen, together with the neighbouring town of Elberfeld founded the first electric ...

in 1877. He resigned from chairmanship of the Leipzig 1876 for personal reasons in 1876.

National politics

Following

unification Unification or unification theory may refer to: Computer science * Unification (computer science), the act of identifying two terms with a suitable substitution * Unification (graph theory), the computation of the most general graph that subs ...

, in

1874 Events January * January 1 – New York City annexes The Bronx. * January 2 – Ignacio María González becomes head of state of the Dominican Republic for the first time. * January 3 – Third Carlist War: Battle of Caspe &n ...

Julius Motteler was elected to the Reichstag for the Social Democratic Workers' Party ( / SDAP), one of several parties which underwent successive mergers to become, in 1890, the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD). He was elected to represent the "Zwickau Werdau Glauchau Crimmitschau" electoral district. On 22 May 1875 was one of the founders of the German Socialist Worker's Party ( / SAP) which resulted from the merger of the SDAP with the

General German Workers' Association The General German Workers' Association (, ADAV) was a German political party founded on 23 May 1863 in Leipzig, Kingdom of Saxony by Ferdinand Lassalle. It was the first organized mass working-class party in history. The organization existed ...

( / ADAV). He sat as a Reichstag member for the combined party till he lost his seat in

. By 1878 the

chancellor Chancellor () is a title of various official positions in the governments of many countries. The original chancellors were the of Roman courts of justice—ushers, who sat at the (lattice work screens) of a basilica (court hall), which separa ...

, whose tolerance of liberalism and socialism had always may always have been largely tactical, felt able to revert to the comfortable conservatism of the Junker class into which he had been born. The known in English language sources as the

was/were one particularly far-reaching manifestation. A more personal manifestation of the new political climate followed a speech Motteler gave on 4 and 5 June 1878 in which he protested against state sponsored defamation of the SDAP. The speech, which came in the wake of two serious (albeit failed) assassination attempts against the

Kaiser Kaiser ( ; ) is the title historically used by German and Austrian emperors. In German, the title in principle applies to rulers anywhere in the world above the rank of king (). In English, the word ''kaiser'' is mainly applied to the emperors ...

was very widely reported. As the political heat increased Motteler found himself arrested in

on 29 September 1878 and charged with "Kaiserbeleidigung" (disrespecting the Kaiser): however, he was acquitted. Later in 1878 he relocated - as matters turned out briefly - to the

Nymphenburg The Nymphenburg Palace (, Palace of the Nymphs) is a Baroque palace situated in Munich's western district Neuhausen-Nymphenburg, in Bavaria, southern Germany. The Nymphenburg served as the main summer residence for the former rulers of Bavaria ...

district of

Munich Munich is the capital and most populous city of Bavaria, Germany. As of 30 November 2024, its population was 1,604,384, making it the third-largest city in Germany after Berlin and Hamburg. Munich is the largest city in Germany that is no ...

Zürich exile, London exile

The

that came into force in October 1878 were a watered down version of the original proposal that Bismarck had tried, and failed, to get through the Reichstag in May 1878. They nevertheless included or were accompanied by a range of repressive measures including the outlawing of trades unions and the closing down of 45 leftwing journals and newspapers. Social Democrats responded by standing for election not as

SAP Sap is a fluid transported in the xylem cells (vessel elements or tracheids) or phloem sieve tube elements of a plant. These cells transport water and nutrients throughout the plant. Sap is distinct from latex, resin, or cell sap; it is a s ...

members but as independent candidates, while a number of prominent party members relocated to

Switzerland Switzerland, officially the Swiss Confederation, is a landlocked country located in west-central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the south, France to the west, Germany to the north, and Austria and Liechtenstein to the east. Switzerland ...

where there was no ban on producing Social Democratic newspapers for distribution in Germany. Motteler moved, with his wife Emilie, to

Zürich Zurich (; ) is the list of cities in Switzerland, largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is in north-central Switzerland, at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich. , the municipality had 448,664 inhabitants. The ...

in November 1879 from where he organised the production of

Der Sozialdemokrat ''Der Sozialdemokrat'' was a German socialist publication. It was founded by Jean Baptista von Schweitzer. The first issue was published in Zurich on 28 September 1867. Due to the Anti-Socialist Laws, the publication had to be distributed illegal ...

(a weekly newspaper), and its distribution into

Württemberg Württemberg ( ; ) is a historical German territory roughly corresponding to the cultural and linguistic region of Swabia. The main town of the region is Stuttgart. Together with Baden and Province of Hohenzollern, Hohenzollern, two other histo ...

and from there, using an increasingly sophisticated network of trusted "Red postmen", right across

Germany Germany, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It lies between the Baltic Sea and the North Sea to the north and the Alps to the south. Its sixteen States of Germany, constituent states have a total popu ...

, earning himself the soubriquet (''"The red army postmaster"''). From

he also headed up (''"Black Masks"''), a counter-espionage outfit intended to counteract German spying activities against the group of exiled social democrats in Switzerland. Motteler's management experience, his meticulous attention to detail and his sheer talent for conspiratorial organisation were important to the success of the newspaper venture, and also enabled him to unmask several German government spies operating within the group. Although, or possibly because, distribution in Germany of the newspaper printed in Switzerland took place outside the law, the 1880s saw a maintained, and in the view of some commentators an intensified national Social Democratic identity in which the activities of the

exiles played an important part. Someone who undoubtedly appreciated the effectiveness of the Social Democratic caucus in exile was the

German Chancellor The chancellor of Germany, officially the federal chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany, is the head of the federal government of Germany. The chancellor is the chief executive of the Federal Cabinet and heads the executive branch. Th ...

who eventually managed to persuade the Swiss national government to expel the team producing "

". The team arrived in London in June 1888, accompanied by 16 large crates of scrupulously archived and indexed documentation. "

" was printed in London from October 1888 till September 1890. By this time relations within the team producing the newspaper had become acutely frayed, while back in Germany Bismarck had finally retired, in March 1890. The retirement came about after the Reichstag had refused, in January 1890, to renew the

, which had come to be seen increasingly as wrong, ineffective or counter-productive. Early in 1891 Julius Motteler organised the crating up and transfer to Berlin of a portion of the by now prodigious "archive" accumulated during the years of exile. He nevertheless retained many of the party records, since for Motteler himself the London exile was not over. His listing, in German police files, as an outlaw was not at this point rescinded, and he therefore continued, with fellow exile

Eduard Bernstein Eduard Bernstein (; 6 January 1850 – 18 December 1932) was a German Marxist theorist and politician. A prominent member of the Social Democratic Party of Germany (SPD), he has been both condemned and praised as a "Revisionism (Marxism), revisi ...

to operate from London a highly effective branch in exile of the

Social Democratic Party The name Social Democratic Party or Social Democrats has been used by many political parties in various countries around the world. Such parties are most commonly aligned to social democracy as their political ideology. Active parties Form ...

which was now relegitimised in Germany.

Return from exile

Motteler and Germany were finally able to return to Germany in 1901. Thanks to their enforced absence they had been unable to play a leading role in the SPD's formative decade. Motteler was accompanied by more Social Democratic documentation, and he also organised the repatriation of all the archived documents from the Marx-Engels of which he had been given charge following the death, in exile in London in August 1895, of

Friedrich Engels Friedrich Engels ( ;"Engels"
''Random House Webster's Unabridged Dictionary''.1903 General Election he won a Leipzig seats for the Social Democrats, and he sat in the Reichstag till 1907. He died a few months after the 1907 election, having remained active as a social democratic activist and newspaper manager almost to the end.

Personal

Between 1870 and 1878 Julius Motteler was married to Emilie Henriette Kyber from Crimmitschau. Later he was married to Emilie Schwarze from Esslingen. With his first wife he had one recorded son, who died of

Typhus Typhus, also known as typhus fever, is a group of infectious diseases that include epidemic typhus, scrub typhus, and murine typhus. Common symptoms include fever, headache, and a rash. Typically these begin one to two weeks after exposu ...

in 1879.

References

External links

* Archive o
Julius Motteler Papers
at the

International Institute of Social History International is an adjective (also used as a noun) meaning "between nations". International may also refer to: Music Albums * ''International'' (Kevin Michael album), 2011 * ''International'' (New Order album), 2002 * ''International'' (The T ...

{{DEFAULTSORT:Motteler, Julius 1838 births 1907 deaths People from Esslingen am Neckar People from the Kingdom of Württemberg Social Democratic Party of Germany politicians Members of the 2nd Reichstag of the German Empire Members of the 3rd Reichstag of the German Empire Members of the 11th Reichstag of the German Empire German trade unionists German socialist feminists German cooperative organizers