JÖRG, JOSEPH EDMUND. - Historian, publicist, and politician, b. at Immenstadt on 23 Dec. 1819 and d. at Landshut on 18 Nov. 1901. He studied theology, philosophy, and history at Munich, as a pupil and collaborator of Döllinger on his Geschichte der Reformation.
In 1852 he entered the Bavarian administration (archives department) and in the same year assumed the editorship of the Historisch-politische Blätter, which he retained (from 1857 together with Franz Binder) until shortly before his death. Because of his opposition to the government, he was transferred to Neuburg on the Danube, but in 1863 he was elected substitute member of the Bavarian Parliament; from 1868 to 1869 he was a member of the Zollparlament, and from 1874 to 1879 of the Reichstag.
He wrote: Deutschland in der Revolutionsperiode 1522-1526, that is, a history of the Peasants’ War (1851); Geschichte des Protestantismus in seiner neuesten Entwicklung (1858); Die neue Ära in Preussen (1860). He was among the first to understand the significance of the development of socialism in Europe, as is shown by his Geschichte der sozialpolitischen Parteien in Deutschland (1867). J. was a convinced Catholic, conservative, monarchist, and a tenacious opponent of the Bavarian Liberal Party and of Bavaria’s subordination to Prussia. Through his efforts, the Bavarian Volkspartei, within a few years, grew from a small group of deputies to gain a majority in the Chamber. In his final years he withdrew from politics, but not from his activity as a publicist.