Weimar Constitution

The constitution adopted in 1919 that established Germany as a democratic federal republic. It remained in force until the Nazi regime dismantled its constitutional order.

Reichstag: Germany’s national parliament, elected by voters and responsible for legislation and government oversight. The constitution made the Reichstag the republic’s central elected legislative chamber.
German Revolution of 1918–1919: The political upheaval that ended the German Empire and led to the creation of a republic in 1918–1919. The revolution displaced the monarchy and made a republican constitution necessary.
Nazi seizure of power: The process by which Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party dismantled Germany’s democracy and established dictatorship in 1933. The republic’s constitutional institutions were neutralized during this seizure of power.
Bismarckian constitution: The constitutional framework of the German Empire, combining a federal monarchy with a parliament of limited executive control. Weimar replaced imperial monarchy with a republic and broader parliamentary democracy.
Reich President: Germany’s head of state under the Weimar Constitution, elected directly and endowed with substantial executive powers. The president appointed the chancellor and could invoke Article 48.
German Empire: The federal monarchy that unified Germany in 1871 and lasted until the revolution of 1918. Its monarchical constitution was replaced by the republic’s democratic framework.
Enabling Act of 1933: A law that allowed Hitler’s cabinet to legislate without the Reichstag, effectively ending parliamentary democracy in Germany. It bypassed the constitution’s ordinary legislative process and consolidated Nazi rule.
Parliamentary system: A system of government in which the executive depends on the confidence of an elected legislature. Weimar included parliamentary government alongside a directly elected, powerful president.
Article 48: A provision of the Weimar Constitution allowing the president to take emergency measures and suspend certain civil rights. Repeated emergency decrees under Article 48 weakened parliamentary government.
National Assembly (Weimar): The elected German constituent assembly that met in Weimar in 1919 to draft a new constitution. The assembly debated and adopted the constitution.

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