GERMAN CATHOLIC CENTRE. – In German parliamentary and political history, the name G. C. C. appeared for the first time in 1859, when Catholic deputies of the Prussian Diet formed their own faction, to which they gave, in view of the position of the seats they occupied in the chamber, precisely the name G. C. C. Politically, this group was identified, including in its personnel, with the Catholic faction of the Diet that had existed since 1852 and had opposed the decrees of Minister Raumer, which infringed upon the personal and religious freedoms guaranteed by the constitution. The programme of the Prussian C. was summed up in 1861 in the following points: a Greater German vision of national unity, with condemnation of the Prussian particularism of a “Little Germany”; freedom of all confessions, and not only of the Catholic one, from state interference; the broadest possible autonomy in every sphere of social life. The G. C. C., therefore, from its origins, was not a confessional party in the strict sense of the word, and, if it later became one for some time, this was due less to the rigid formulation of a political programme than to the Kulturkampf unleashed by Bismarck after 1870.
Indeed, during the so-called “constitutional conflict” (1862–66), the deputies of the faction did not form a homogeneous bloc: some voted against the government, while others granted Bismarck their confidence. Moreover, this C. did not yet constitute a party in the true sense of the word. Lacking any organisational apparatus or a press that could serve as its spokesman and intermediary with the electorate, it disappeared temporarily after the subsequent elections. The publication of the Syllabus (1864), the hegemony of Prussia and Protestantism in Germany after the defeat of Austria at Sadowa (1866), and the definition of papal infallibility (1870) had profound repercussions on Prussian domestic politics. The condemnation of liberalism pronounced in the Syllabus meant that Catholics were viewed with suspicion and accused of obscurantism and ultramontanism. On the other hand, once the North German Confederation had been established under Prussian leadership, Catholics found themselves in a minority vis-à-vis Protestants. They were therefore compelled by circumstances to strengthen their bonds in order to safeguard their rights. Nor did the tension show any sign of diminishing. The dogma of papal infallibility, presented by anticatholic circles as a return to the Dictatus papae of Gregory VII and to the Unam sanctam of Boniface VIII, overheated an atmosphere that was already extremely inflamed. This complex of circumstances determined the formation of the G. C. C. proper, of that party which for more than half a century was to be one of the protagonists of German domestic politics. Its date of birth may be fixed at 11 June 1870, with a letter from Peter Reichensperger, one of the most influential members of the Prussian C. from 1852 onward, which appeared in the Kähnische Volkszeitung. Drawn up in the form of a manifesto, this letter was an appeal to Catholics to choose, in the forthcoming elections, representatives suited to defend the freedom to live as Christians, which was being undermined and threatened by state authority. On 28 Oct. 1870, the first political programme of the G. C. C. appeared, known as the Soest programme, after the western German city in which it was drafted. It consisted of nine points: 1) absolute freedom of the Church; 2) effective equality of the recognised religions; 3) opposition to any attempt to profane marriage; 4) confessional schools; 5) a federal state, with broad recognition of the autonomy of the individual Länder; 6) administrative decentralisation; 7) rigorous control of expenditure, taxes, and levies, and their equitable distribution among taxpayers; 8) overcoming the existing divide between capital and labour by grounding social questions on a strictly legal basis. The elections to the Prussian Chamber of Deputies, held in 1870, secured 48 seats for the G. C. C. The subsequent elections for the first German Reichstag, after the proclamation of the Empire in Jan. 1871, returned 63 representatives of the C. It was precisely at a meeting of the group, in Dec. 1870, that August Reichensperger and Savigny proposed the name G. C. C. for the new party, and it was adopted. Its first leaders were Windthorst and Mallinckrodt. In the Reichstag, the C. immediately took a position in favour of the freedom of the Holy See and of German Catholics. During the debate on the reply to the speech from the throne, the C. proposed that the address should include a request for diplomatic intervention in favour of the Holy See (the occupation of Rome by the Kingdom of Italy had taken place a few months earlier), but the request was rejected by 243 votes to 63. More consequential was the negative attitude assumed by the non-Catholic parties during the discussion of the new constitution of the German Empire. The representatives of the C. perceived, in fact, that the draft constitution lacked any guarantee of the freedom of the Catholic Church. They consequently fought for recognition of their rights. The coalition of the opposing parties again secured the majority. From that time onward, anticatholic measures followed one another. Thus began the so-called Kulturkampf, which for several years profoundly disturbed the patriotism and religious faith of German Catholics. After 1880, Chancellor Bismarck, who had been chiefly responsible for the anticatholic campaign, had to acknowledge the futility of the struggle he had begun, and the anticatholic laws came to an end. The Kulturkampf, moreover, had strengthened the C., and many Catholics who had previously not voted for this party, having perceived the threat, gave it their votes. In this way the conservative and liberal majority disintegrated, and in parliament the C. became the arbiter of the situation, acting as the pivot capable of tipping the scales in one direction or the other. This situation enabled the G. C. C. to oppose an anticatholic policy on the part of the government and parliament, but gave it no possibility of securing positive advantages: on the whole, its policy was static, granting it considerable freedom of manoeuvre while preventing it from carrying out a legislative function with regard to its own programme points. From the exhaustion of the Kulturkampf until the First World War, the political action of the C. retained these characteristics. When war broke out in 1914, the C. also voted the credits requested and renounced every form of opposition for the duration of the conflict. Only in 1917, with the peace motion presented by the centrist deputy Erzberger—a motion that also received the votes of the Social Democrats and liberals—did the C. return to the foreground. After the Revolution of Nov. 1918, the C., while remaining faithful to the Catholic platform of its programme, undertook an internal reorganisation that brought the left wing and representatives of the trade unions to the leadership of the party. Tactically, it aligned itself with the other right-wing parties in order to prevent a Socialist majority. In the elections of Jan. 1919, the C., including the seats of the Bavarian People’s Party, the movement of Bavaria’s Catholics, had a representation of 91 deputies in the Constituent Assembly, and was thus able to oppose the form of social republic envisaged by the extremist parties. During the years of the Weimar Republic, the C. continued to play a major role in German political and parliamentary life, and its representatives several times held the important office of chancellor (Fehrenbach, June 1920–May 1921; Wirth, May 1921–Nov. 1922; Marx, Nov. 1923–Dec. 1924 and May 1926–May 1928; Brüning, March 1930–May 1932).
After Hitler’s rise to power (Jan. 1933), the C. C. T., under the leadership of Msgr. Kaas and Brüning, granted the National Socialists plenary powers, deceived by the promise that the fundamental rights of citizens would not be infringed. A few months later, on 5 July, the C. C. T. dissolved itself, until the German catastrophe in 1945 made its reconstitution possible once again. The initiators were Dr. Hamacher and Johannes Brockmann. The reborn C. C. T., however, lacked a solid electoral base, because this had been absorbed by the new Christian Democratic Union. At the end of 1948, one of the C. C. T.’s most prominent figures, Karl Spiecker, a former collaborator of Chancellor Wirth, therefore proposed the party’s merger with the Christian Democratic Union, but his advice was not followed.