Stresemann (1878-1929), Gustav

Born in Berlin, he studied political economy. Stresemann began his career in the beer industry. In 1903, he married Käte Kleefeld, the daughter of a rich Jewish businessman. He affiliated to the Liberal Party and won elections to the Reichstag in 1907, being so the youngest member ever elected. In 1917, he followed Ernst Bassermann as leader of the National Liberal Party. A month after the armistice of November 11, 1918, Stresemann formed the German People's Party. He was elected to the national assembly, which gathered in Weimar in 1919 to frame a new constitution. He then was elected to the new Reichstag in 1920, where he spent the next three years in opposition. From August 13 to November 23, 1923, Stresemann was Chancellor of a coalition government. He was very active: he restored peace in Bavaria after the Hitler putsch, ended the passive resistance of Germans in the Ruhr to the French occupying forces, and began the work of stabilizing Germany's currency. Stresemann also helped Germany getting out of its isolationism. He negotiated with great skill a reduction of war reparations. In October 1925, he signed the Locarno Pact that reshaped without violence the borders of Germany, France and Belgium. In 1926, he received the Nobel Peace Prize together with Aristide Briand. On September 8, 1926, he contributed to the unanimous acceptance of Germany's admission into the League of Nations. The same year, he signed the non-aggression Briand-Kellogg Pact. He died in Berlin in October of 1929.

Turner, H. A., 1963, Stresemann and the politics of the Weimar Republic, Princeton, N. J.: Princeton University Press.

Stresemann, G., 1972, Reichstagsreden. Bonn: Verlag AZ-Studio.