HITZE, FRANZ. - German Catholic politician and sociologist. Born 16 March 1851 at Hänemicke (Westphalia), he was ordained a priest in 1878. In 1880 he was elected secretary general of the «Arbeiterwohl»; from 1893 until 1920 he was professor of Christian sociology at Münster, Westphalia; from 1884 he was also a member of the Reichstag, active in the Centre Party. He died at Bad Nauheim on 20 July 1921.
For forty years he devoted all his work, through writings and speeches, to a social reform to be carried out through cooperation among the Catholic Church, the State, and society, while leaving it to private initiative and charity, before advocating State intervention, to implement a sound social programme. He succeeded in convincing German Catholics, sensitive to the social problems arising from the transformations which, in his time, both the economy and society were undergoing, and obtained in Germany recognition of the trade-union self-administration of leagues safeguarding the economic interests of professionals and workers.
Among other works, he wrote: Die soziale Frage und die Bestrebungen zu ihrer Lösung (München-Gladbach 1877); Kapital und Arbeit und die Reorganisation der Gesellschaft (ibid. 1880); Die Arbeiterfrage und die Bestrebungen zu ihrer Lösung (ibid. 1892); Zur Würdigung der deutschen Arbeiter-Sozialpolitik (ibid. 1913).