1919–1922: Years of Crisis and Uncertainty

Abstract

On 21 August 1919 Ebert, who had been acting as provisional President since the previous February, took the oath to the Constitution as Germany’s first Republican head of state. The fact that he did not present himself for popular election as envisaged in the constitution illustrated the weakness of the new régime. Public opinion had been so outraged by the Versailles Treaty that an anti-Republican candidate might have defeated Ebert. Similarly, the Constituent National Assembly did not dissolve itself, but continued to function as Germany’s legislature. The Weimar Coalition parties did not wish to face a parliamentary election.¹